New Year's Resolutions for Magi

New Year's Resolutions for Magi

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, Rector

St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas

January 4, 2015; 2 Christmas, Year B

Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

Matthew 2:1-12 – In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, "Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage." When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, "In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet:

`And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,

are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;

for from you shall come a ruler

who is to shepherd my people Israel.'"

Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, "Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage." When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

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I find this story about the visit of the wise men so compelling. The contrasts are so vivid. Exotic foreigners come to the humble manger where a Jewish peasant is born. These travelers represent different cultures, different races, different languages, different religions, all gathered in harmony at the stable where Jesus is born. What a beautiful symbol of interreligious harmony, pluralism, and the respect and acceptance that nurtures relationships between human beings who appear to be very different from one another.

The scripture says that the visitors "knelt down and paid homage." They offered a liturgical act with meaning. An act of respect and honor. They gave gifts – made a sacrifice, if you will. Then they left and went home, back to their own familiar traditions and culture, to their own religion and practice. Yet both the magi and the holy family seem touched positively by their communion with each other.

Today we live in a wonderful age that is also a terrible age. Ours is an age when some religious extremists will condemn and even kill anyone who is not one of them. But it is also an age where great-hearted people from around the world can meet in interreligious dialogue to share their wisdom and practice and to learn from each other.

One of my mentors Fr. Thomas Keating has helped foster thirty years of Interreligious Dialogue from his monastery in Snowmass, CO, inviting deep practitioners from many traditions to share their wisdom. They have found important points of agreement among the world's religious and spiritual traditions:  They recognize that the various religions all bear witness to the experience of Ultimate Reality, the ground of infinite potentiality and actuality which cannot be limited by name or concept. They agree that faith is opening, accepting, and responding to Ultimate Reality; that faith precedes every belief system. They affirm that the potential for wholeness is present in every human being and may be experienced not only through religious practice, but also through nature, art, human relationships, and service to others. And they note that disciplined practice is essential to the spiritual life, but spiritual attainment is not the result of our efforts, but the result of the experience of oneness with Ultimate Reality. Magi – wise men and women – visiting together in our age.

In the spirit of the magi, as we begin this new year, I would like to invite you to take a journey on your pilgrimage of faith. Consider adopting a disciplined practice, a spiritual practice that will deepen your life and bring you closer to your union with the divine and with creation. Something that will help you become a person of wisdom.

My first suggestion for a new year's spiritual resolution would be for you to commit to participating in the Eucharist weekly. Early Christians were willingly martyred for the sake of joining together as the Body of Christ, hearing the scriptures, praying together, and being fed with the Bread of Life and the Cup of Salvation. I'm moved by the story of a young Christian named Felix. In the year 304 he stood before a torture rack where he watched the deaths of his father and a friend, their bodies torn apart by barbed hooks. The authorities then turned to young Felix and asked if he were one of the assembly. His response: As if a Christian could exist without the Eucharist, or the Eucharist be celebrated without a Christian! Don't you know that a Christian is constituted by the Eucharist, and the Eucharist by a Christian? Neither avails without the other. We celebrated our assembly right gloriously. We always convene at the Eucharist for the reading of the Lord's Scriptures. Those were his final words.

"A Christian is constituted by the Eucharist and the Eucharist by a Christian." If you are not present, our Eucharist is not quite complete. We need you here. Let your weekly Eucharist become as habitual and life-giving as eating is for you. And if you are ill, join us online through our LiveStreaming from our web page.

If you make one spiritual resolution for this new year, resolve to attend weekly Eucharist and the great Holy Week services of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Vigil.

For a bit more spiritual nourishment this year, you might adopt a daily practice if you do not have one. Give yourself the gift of time for daily prayer, daily reading, or some form of regular mindfulness.

The Church's tradition of the Prayer Book office of Morning Prayer or Evening Prayer is a beautiful way to join with millions of others around the world, being formed and informed by a systematic reading of the scripture and by the regular prayers of the church. In your Epistle bulletin insert we always print the Prayer Book's list of the upcoming week's scripture readings for the Daily Office. Some people use the online service from missionstclare.com or the new Episcopal Prayer Book app on their phone or tablet to read Morning or Evening Prayer. Our associate priest Lora Walsh sends an email reflection on the daily readings every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. It's fun to see how her thoughts might complement yours as you share the reading of the same scriptures. Sign up for our "Morning Reflection" emails.

I've written some thorough instructions about how to pray the Daily Office in my little pamphlet on prayer; it's available in the office. That booklet also offers an assortment of traditional ways to practice prayer, including traditions for meditating with scripture, simple forms of conversational prayer, praying in nature, and various contemplative traditions like breath prayer and Centering Prayer. Pick up a copy. Try some prayer practices and choose one that fits your needs. And feel free to visit with one of your priests about these things.

Whenever I think of the visit of the magi to the holy family, my mind also moves toward similar visitations among spiritual seekers in our day.

As the world's religions and spiritual traditions speak with each other, one of the spiritual practices that we find we all share is a discipline with various names. In Catholic spirituality it is sometimes called "recollection;" more commonly in English it called "mindfulness."

To practice mindfulness is to cultivate your awareness of present experience with acceptance. The nineteenth century French Jesuit spiritual director Jean Pierre de Caussade called it the "sacrament of the present moment" and "abandonment to divine providence." In our day there is a great deal of secular research about mindfulness as an antidote to the stresses and pathologies of our age.

So I would offer one more new year's suggestion. Practice mindfulness. Practice living in the present moment with full awareness and acceptance. In our Christian tradition mindfulness can be strengthened when we engage in meditative or contemplative disciplines like Centering Prayer or Breath Prayer.

In mindfulness practice, we take some time apart to use some discipline of focus to help us detach from the thoughts and feelings that tend to capture our moment-by-moment consciousness. In mindfulness practice, we let go of our attachment to the impulses and the mind chatter that tends to push us reactively from one compulsive thought to another. There is space between the compulsive thoughts that would drive you to mindless reaction. In mindfulness practice, you simply choose not to react. You just stay with the impulse to react and watch it come and go like an ocean wave.

The practice that I learned offers a teaching called the Four R's as ways of coping with afflictive emotions and thoughts. Resist no thought. Retain no thought. React emotionally to no thought. Return ever-so-gently to your mindful focus. When you practice living with your present experience with that kind of acceptance, you find that the practice flows into the rest of your life. You can become less reactive; there is space between impulse and reaction; you can live more in the present.

It's my hunch that these magi were people of mindfulness. People who could patiently watch the heavens for signs and were free enough to follow the heavenly guidance of the moment. They diligently traveled great distances guided by their simple focus on the star. They brought their gifts to pay homage to a child of a distant culture and different religion. And they returned blessed and enlightened, continuing along their pilgrimage of openness and awareness.

Our life in the present moment has an infinite, heavenly quality. Let your focus be here and now, in open awareness with relaxed acceptance. And then move securely, enveloped in the divine love that moves the heavens and the stars. God still needs people of wisdom. Why shouldn't that be our purpose and calling in our day.

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The Mission of St. Paul's Episcopal Church is to explore and celebrate

God's infinite grace, acceptance and love.

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