Sermon St E          9.45 14 February 2021         Year B         Transfiguration
2 Kings 2v1-12         Psalm50v1-6         2 Cor 4v3-6                  Mark 9v2-9

Let us pray:

Perhaps one of the foundational beliefs of our Christion faith are the words spoken by God the Father at the Transfiguration of our Lord Jesus, “This is my Son, the Beloved, listen to Him”. A lesson for all of us as believers that we must always be ‘listening to Jesus’ if we are truly to become His disciples. So let us take a look at this important, and theologically significant, story of Jesus’ transfiguration recorded in all three synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke, and referred to by St Peter in his second epistle (2Pt1v16), saying “we were eyewitnesses of his majesty”.

The first question we may have is why did Jesus only take three of his disciples with him up that high mountain to witness his glory? We read in our gospel that this event took place six days after Jesus had been with his disciples at Caesarea Philippi in the north of the Galilee. There Jesus had asked the disciples a searching question “Who do you say that I am?” A question that Jesus still askes of all people today, and a question that each one of us has had to make an answer to, so can we, have we, said like Peter, “You are the Messiah”, you are the anointed one from God. Perhaps it was in recognition of this great confession from Peter that Jesus took him, together with James and John, his closest three disciples, up the high mountain to witness His glory.

So where was that high mountain? If you visit Israel the tour guides will take you to mount Tabor in the Galilee, where there is an easily accessible commemorative church, but in Jesus time there was a Roman garrison at the top. The more probable true location is on the slopes of the towering mount Hermon, in the north, and not so accessible for the average tourist.

Then it was there on Hermon’s holy slopes that Jesus was transfigured, changed in appearance, in the presence of Moses and Elijah, and clothed in ‘dazzling white raiment’, in Luke’s words, or as Matthew says, ‘white as light’, and this reclothing of Jesus was a clear indication of His divinity.

You will remember that throughout the scriptures we see descriptions of God surrounded by light, and as the Hebrew people made their exodus from the bondage of Egypt, what accompanied them? Yes, the shekinah glory, the pilar of dazzling light that hovered over the Tabernacle, the tent of meeting between God and Moses, and signified that God was travelling with them on their journey to freedom in the promised land. And we as Christians have that same light of God, the presence of Jesus and the Holy Spirit, travelling with us along the path of our present earthly pilgrimage.

But why Moses and Elijah? And of course you know the answer to that. Because they signified how both the Jewish law, the Torah, and all the Prophets, pointed to the coming of Jesus as Messiah. The Torah and the Prophets had maintained throughout Jewish history, a testimony to the coming of Messiah, the anointed One from God the Father. Do you remember the words Jesus spoke to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, that the words of the prophets spoke of him, and of his suffering. Jesus takes up that same theme, in Luke’s account of the transfiguration, speaking to those three disciples of, ‘his departure which was soon to be accomplished at Jerusalem’, through his death on Calvary’s tree.

We then read of what I take as some often misunderstood words from Peter, “Master, it is well that we are here; let us make three booths, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah”, and Mark adds, ‘for he did not know what to say, for they were exceedingly afraid’. Clearly the three disciples had recognised who was with Jesus, Moses and Elijah, but were they afraid, or were they in exceeding awe at the majesty and person of their Lord being transfigured before their eyes in this spectacular way?

I think Peter’s words held in them a pointer for us to indicate the time of year when this event actually took place. Can you make that link?

In speaking of booths the thought that may have flashed into Peter’s mind may have been the upcoming Jewish festival of booths, or Tabernacles. A time when the people still dwelt in temporary shelters for a week, a time to remember their ancestors who had dwelt in tents, or booths, as they moved across the wilderness from Egypt to Canaan during the 40 years.

If that was the case then the transfiguration may have been in late summer of AD 29 just before the celebration of Tabernacles in the September.

But then we have recorded the ultimate testimony to the divinity and person of our Lord Jesus in the words of God coming from that voice from the bright cloud that had overshadowed them all on the mountain slopes.

Matthew records those words more fully than Mark saying, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to Him”. What do you notice? There are three short, but very significant, phrases. And just where did each of those phrase come from?

Maybe you already know that the Jewish bible, our Old Testament, is divided into three sections, ‘the Torah’, the law of Moses; the Prophets, the Nevi’im; and the Writings, the Ketuvim. These three divisions form the acronym Tanakh, the name describing the Hebrew Bible.

The three phrases spoken by God’s voice from the cloud, each have their origin in one of those three sections of the Tanakh, showing how God was specifically affirming the person of His beloved Son Jesus from the ancient scriptures.

‘You are my Son’, is a quotation from the great psalm two where God says, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you”. This now forms part of our creedal statement, so here reference was being made to the writings.

Then we had, ‘with whom I am well pleased’, a quote from the great prophet Isaiah, where at the start of chapter 42 God says, “Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights”. Clearly God took great delight, and was well pleased, with the obedience shown by Jesus in doing the will of his heavenly Father. A delight God still experiences as we his children today chose to obey His commandments and statutes.

And finally, the little phrase ‘listen to him’, comes from the Torah, the first five books of the bible, it is a quote from Deuteronomy chapter 18 (v15). There Moses makes a prophetic promise to the people saying, “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me, from among you, from your brethren-him you shall heed”, or listen to.

I guess Moses when he also heard the voice from the cloud thought, ‘I told you so, and here he is’, the prophet like me God promised to raise up.

What clearer witness could there be from God the Father in heaven to the person of our Lord than reference to all three sections of the Hebrew scripture, references that would not have been missed by those three disciples. Reference that we, and all humankind, neglect at our peril.

Jesus was indeed shown to be greater than all the law and the prophets.

No wonder Matthew tells us that the disciples hearing that testimony ‘fell on their faces and were filled with awe’. Jesus then went to those three disciples and touched them saying, “Rise and have no fear”, the cloud with Moses and Elijah vanished, and the disciples looked, and saw ‘no one but Jesus only’

What an encouragement for us that at all times and through all our various situations, we only need to look and to see Jesus for us to be able to move along our path with no fear as we exercise our faith and trust in him.

But just why, after such a transformational encounter, as they came down from the mountain to meet up with the other disciples, did Jesus instruct them to tell no one of their experience till after He had been raised from the dead?

Perhaps it was to avoid any possible misunderstanding that such an early revelation of his true and unmistakable identity as the Messiah, could have if too many people shared in that knowledge before his resurrection.

The writer to the Hebrews (1v3) may have seen in the transfiguration a clear indication that Jesus reflects ‘the glory of God, and bears the very stamp of God’s nature, upholding the universe by his word of power’.

That is the Jesus we have been called to love and to serve. The Jesus who  not only fulfilled all that was written of him in the Tanakh to be the Messiah and to be ‘the lamb of God who was to take away our sin’, but also the very word who in the beginning was with God the Father.

That is the Jesus who has promised to you and to me an ‘eternal life’, and the hope of a future together with him in the coming new creation. Now that should bring about a transfiguration of our lives and our ways.

Let us take a moment of quiet as we reflect upon the awesome nature of Jesus our Lord, our Saviour and our coming King. Amen

This is my sermon for last Sunday (31 January) that I should have give at Peter and Mary Tavy, but they have now closed!

Sermon for Candlemas 31 January 2021 Year B Epiphany 4 Presentation
Malachi 3v1-5 Psalm 24v 7-10 Hebrews 2v 14-18 Luke 2v22-40

Let us pray

Even from before the time of King David the Jewish people had been looking forward to the coming of a ‘Messiah’ figure, a prophet like Moses to lead them out of bondage, and to fulfil the promise to be a light to the nations. And then it happened, just as the prophet Malachi had said, but not as most of the people were expecting, one who was to deliver them from the oppression of the Romans. No, Messiah suddenly came into the Lord’s Temple as a babe, the one who was to purify and refine through His suffering upon a Roman cross.

Simeon and Anna represent those who had down through the centuries held fast to the hope of a Messiah who would suddenly appear in the Temple. And Simeon had been given God’s promise that he was not to die till he should see that promise fulfilled, and in responding to the prompting of the Holy Spirit he entered the Temple at the very moment the Holy family arrived with Jesus.

I wonder, would you have placed in the arms of a complete stranger your precious baby as Mary did when meeting the old Simeon? Clearly this too was a prompting from the Holy Spirit in Mary, and the response was a revelation from God to Simeon enabling him to declare the grace and mercy that God was to provide to all humankind through his gift of baby Jesus. Simeon broke into praise and thanks to God in the beautiful words of the ‘Nunc Dimittis’.

Simeon, after his wait of many years, could at last ‘depart in peace’ for he had now seen the one who was to provide ‘God’s salvation’; a salvation not just for the Jewish nation who had been awaiting the Messiah, but a salvation for the peoples of all nations who would put their faith and trust in this babe.

Jesus was indeed to be a light to the Gentiles, a light that was to make known the mystery that Saint Paul speaks of that had been hidden for generations; a mystery that God’s salvation was to be for all peoples as well as for the glory of God’s people Israel. There we may have a controversial issue, which we shall not touch on here, but to say that not only did Jesus fulfil all the Old Testament prophecies concerning his birth, but there are still many more prophecies still to be fulfilled both those relating to the coming return of Jesus, and prophecies relating to the nation of Israel which we see being fulfilled in our time.

Simeon also declares to Mary a hint of her son’s future death in the words, ‘a sword will pierce your own soul too’.

I guess that Mary did not understand what those words meant at that time as she rejoiced in the joy of having just fulfilled God’s purpose for her declared by the angel Gabriel at the annunciation of Jesus birth. Emmanuel, God was now with us in her baby, but when she looked back after the dark afternoon of Calvary, all must have started to fall into place.

After Simeon handed the precious babe back to Mary we see the faithful Anna coming onto the scene, she was also directed by the same Holy Spirit. Anna was 84, and had probably been married around the age of 13 to 14, as was the custom in her society during the second Temple period. Her life had not been easy, only married for 7 years and then living as a widow for over 60 years. We read that Anna had spent her lifetime in the worship and praise of God in the Temple. The phrase implying that she spent her time ‘night and day’ in the Temple needs some comment for the Temple doors were shut at night apart for the time around ‘Yom Kippur’, the day of atonement. So was Jesus presented in the Temple around the time of that special day? Jesus was the true high priest who was going to atone for our sin once and for all?

Anna is a lesson for all of us as disciples of our Lord and Master. Our lives like hers should be filled with praise and worship to God, and our lips should be speaking of the redemption that Jesus still brings to this world, a world still held in its bondage to sin and death, until freedom comes through the liberating massage of the gospel.

After their time in the Temple the Holy family returned to their home in Bethlehem, and remained there until after the visit of the Magi, the wise men, some 15 months later, that time which we remember during the Epiphany. The holy family then had to flee to Egypt to escape King Herod, and the tradition of the Egyptian Coptic Church is that they remained in Egypt for some two to four years before making their move back to Joseph’s home in Nazareth. I don’t know about you but I would love to have some of the details of Jesus early home and family life. There are many stories dating from the second century relating to this time, but most of them are far to fanciful.

However, we are told in the gospels that Jesus became strong and was filled with wisdom, and we have evidence for this in the later gospel story when Jesus was twelve years old and we read of him debating with the scribes in the Temple.

Jesus also found favour in his Father’s sight, a favour that was to remain with him throughout his life as he sought to do the ‘will of him who sent me.’

That is again a lesson for us to who seek to follow our master who said, “If you love me you will keep my commandments”. We are called to do the will of Jesus who has called us, and then sends us as his ambassadors to our world.

Through Jesus obedience to God’s will, and through his death on Calvary, Jesus overcame the old order of sin and death. The writer to the Hebrews tells us that Jesus came that he might ‘destroy the one who has the power of death, that is the devil’.

Remember that, because of our faith, you and I are described as the descendents of Abraham, and we are thereby set free from the fear of death. Our faith and trust in Jesus make us brothers and sisters with our Lord, truly an amazing promise and hope of things to come. It is so important to grasp that it is through Jesus death and resurrection, and through our faith and trust in Him, that we are now God’s adopted children.

And that faith gives to us the promise of hope as we enter another new year, a hope that so many long and need to hear. It is the promise of sharing in the eternal life of Jesus, and in the kingdom that God has prepared for those who love him. It is a promise that with all the saints we shall be partakers of God’s new creation, a creation where ‘sorrow and sighing will have passed away’. Now if that hope does not set our hearts on fire I do not know what will.

So as we gather round the table of our risen Lord once again this morning, we remember the sacrifice that Jesus made of his body and his blood in order to bring us into fellowship with the one true and holy God, to give us that promised share in his eternal life. May we resolve this new year that through God’s grace, and the power of his indwelling Holy Spirit, we may live out our lives in a way that finds favour in God’s sight.

Let us pray: The shorter Collect for the 4^th Sunday of the Epiphany,

God of heaven,
you send the gospel to the ends of the earth and your messengers to every nation:
send your Holy Spirit to transform us by the good news of everlasting life that we now have in Jesus Christ our Lord and Master. Amen

Sermon St Eustachius 9.45 & 10.30am Sunday 17 January 2021  Year B Epiphany 2
1 Samuel 3v1-10            Psalm 139v1-5, 12-18                        Revelation 5v1-10            John 1v43-end
Let us pray:- Lord Jesus give us hearts like those two disciples when on the road to Emmaus felt their hearts burn within them as Jesus interpreted to them the things in all the scriptures concerning himself, so we pray open our hearts and minds to your word this morning. Amen

At this time in our Christian calendar we have been focusing on the advent, birth and Epiphany, the revealing to the nations of our great High Priest, and our soon to be coming again King, our Lord Jesus.

In our gospel reading this morning the apostle John records the second encounter between Jesus and his cousin John the Baptist, only mentioned in his gospel. It took place a couple of months after John had baptised Jesus in the Jordan near Jericho, sometime in the winter of AD 27-28.

Now John the Baptist and Jesus meet up again, but this time much further along the Jordan valley at what is called ‘Bethany beyond the Jordan’. We are not certain of its precise location, but some now believed it to be in the Batanea, in the Decapolis, in a region SE of the Sea of Galilee. It was the place where Elijah the prophet, to whom John was often compared, had been fed by the ravens after he had predicted drought in Israel, and so this region would have been dear to the Baptist. There John describes Jesus in the beautiful words we use in the Eucharist, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world”.

As the cousins again meet up, John points out to all the people gathered there that Jesus was the Son of God, for he had seen the Holy Spirit descend upon Jesus as a dove when John had baptised Jesus earlier in the Jordan. Jesus was their promised and long awaited Messiah; the one who had now burst upon the scene of history not only to deliver all peoples from their bondage to sin, but also to ‘baptise them with the Holy Spirit’.

You and I, in this twenty first century, still have that same message to proclaim. Jesus, the promised Messiah, is still the one who alone can deliver and set us free from our bondage to sin, once we have put our faith and trust in him. But there is more, if we will but look to Jesus, John the Baptist’s promise still holds true that ‘Jesus will also baptise us with the Holy Spirit’. As we embark upon this new year following a very disturbing 2020 dominated by the pandemic, do you, do I, feel the need to have that promised power of the Holy Spirit with us as we seek to further the presence of God’s Kingdom?

We need to see the Holy Spirit sweep through our nation as in previous times of revival.

The evangelist John then goes on to describe how after this second encounter between the two cousins, Jesus started to call his first five disciples; Andrew, Simon Peter, Philip and Nathaniel-otherwise known as Bartholomew, and by implication the fifth was the evangelist John himself.

Jesus encounter with, and His call of Nathaniel, shows how within a matter of moments Nathaniel could turn from being a sceptic, ‘can any good thing come out of Nazareth’, to one of complete belief and trust in Jesus, ‘Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!” Such was the power of Jesus words then, and that power is still true for today, a power that we also see depicted in the beautiful call of the prophet Samuel.

Samuel’s call contains much which is relevant for us as individuals, as well as for our nation at large, so it deserves our attention. Not only were the eyes of God’s priest Eli growing dim, but the word of the Lord had also become rare in those days. Fortunately the lamp of God, the light of God, the revelation of God, had not quite gone out completely. Does that sound to you like the times in which we also live today? It does to me.

Where is the word of God, the statutes and promises of God being clearly and loudly sounded out to our nation, and not just to our nation, but also to this hurting and confused world in which we now live. How many eyes have grown dim, and where is the word of God being declared for all peoples benefit? In parliament, in the media, on the streets, in all the churches? Not that I see, so no wonder the people and our land languishes.

And what about us? The boy Samuel did not yet know the Lord, the word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him. In his duty to the old priest Eli, while serving in the house of the Lord Samuel lay down near the arc of God. What was in the arc? It was not what Indiana Jones anticipated, it contained the word of God. The book of the law, the Torah given by God Himself to Moses upon mount Sinai during the exodus from bondage. It contained all that the people needed to live a peaceful and prosperous life in the promised land, to live lives pleasing unto God. But did they?

We in this twenty first century have an even greater revelation of the word of God than was present in Samuel’s time. We have just celebrated the Epiphany, the revealing of the incarnate God, the word made flesh, in the person of our Lord Jesus the Messiah for all peoples, but have the nations responded? No.

One wonders just how much longer God’s patience and mercy will extend.

God desires is that no one should perish, but that all people should come and believe in Him, but will they? You must look around the world and make up your own mind. So how may they hear?

It took God three calls to young Samuel before God could get through. It took some time before the old priest Eli, who should have known better after all his time in the service of God, to recognise that God was calling the boy. But eventually the light did dawn and we read the final and lovely response from Samuel, ‘Speak Lord for your servant is listening’. Is God still trying to get through to you and to me? Are we taking time out so we can say to God, ‘speak Lord for your servant is listening’. Are we close to the arc, to what God has to say to us through His word in the scriptures?

Saint John in his Revelation tells us that when the time came for a sealed scroll in heaven to be opened, ‘no one was found worthy’ to open the scroll. John was sad and began to weep bitterly until he saw Jesus, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root-the descendent of king David, the one who had overcame sin and death through His cross; Jesus was the one, the only one, who could open the scroll. That brought much joy in heaven, and a new song burst forth, ‘You, speaking of Jesus, are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain and by your blood you ransomed for God saints from every tribe and language and people and nations’.

I wonder how God feels when he looks at our present rebellious world? Does He weep bitterly, thinking, ‘when will this people hear, listen and respond to my ‘still small voice’, respond to my presence clearly visible in the beautiful world I have created for them to enjoy, when will they respond to my love, grace and mercy shown to all humankind through my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased?’ When? What will it take to make people wake up?

So what role do we have to play in making God’s call clear and plain so people will respond and say with Samuel, ‘speak Lord for your servant is listening’? How can we help people to recognise the amazing call God has for each one of us, a call and promise to be built into a kingdom of priests and to serve Him, our creator God, for ever in the coming new creation?

That remains our ongoing challenge as we enter yet another new year of opportunity. It is a challenge God has not left us powerless to fulfil. God has promised that through our Lord Jesus He will give us His life giving Holy Spirit, and give it in abundance, so we may make Jesus known to our needy world.
Let us not fail God in that call.

Let us pray: Eternal God, our beginning and our end; bring us with all peoples and with the whole of creation to your glory, hidden through the past ages and now made known through Jesus Christ our Lord.                  Amen

Sermon St Eustachius 9.45 & 10.30am Sunday 3 January 2021          Year B Epiphany

Isaiah 60v1-6                        Psalm 72v10-15            Ephesians 3v1-12                        Matthew 2v1-12

Let us pray:

As we come together this morning to celebrate the great feast of the Epiphany, I would like us to ask the question, what was it that motivated the Magi to follow the star?

Despite various distortions from the biblical account of Messiah’s birth that we have in our Christmas story, there certainly was a Christmas star and Magi. Perhaps you heard of the coming together, the conjunction, of the planets Jupiter and Saturn on 21 December, described by the media as ‘the Christmas star’, but that was not the true Christmas star that the Magi followed. The power of modern computers and simulation software means we can now map the sky for any place or time in history, and those simulations give us some amazing insights.

It was probably the close conjunction between the king planet Jupiter, and Venus, on 17^thJune 2BC, that caught the eye of the Magi. They would have appeared as one very bright morning star, and also close to the king star Regulus, and all this in the ‘Royal Constellation’ of Leo the lion. You will remember that the term ‘bright morning star’ is used in the Revelation of Saint John to describe our Lord Jesus, who is also described as ‘the lion of the tribe of Judah’.

It was then probably a further conjunction between Jupiter and Venus on August 27^th of that same year, that combined with a grouping of the four planets Jupiter, Mars, Venus and Mercury, and again in Leo, that set the Magi off on their journey to Jerusalem.

The computer simulations shows that the most probable ‘star’ the Magi followed was then the motion of the king planet Jupiter which we read, the Magi had observed ‘at its rising in the east’. Then it was Jupiter’s subsequent movement westward that led them to Bethlehem. Amazingly, because of the form of Jupiter’s motion across the sky, called its retrograde motion, Jupiter did in fact ‘stand still’ over Bethlehem on 25^th December 2 BC, the place where the holy family, with the 15 month old Jesus, no longer a baby, were living.

To me as a Physicist it is quite wonderful how God used the natural events of His universe to make known the time of our Lord’s appearing, an event planned from before the foundation of the earth, a phrase that is used three times in the New Testament (Jn17v24, Eph 1v4, 1Pt 1v20).

So what more do we know about the Magi? Despite the lovely hymn ‘We three kings of orient are’, it was not three kings, but those Magi who came to the Holy family bringing their gifts, and ready to worship the new born king.

Mary Leith in her Biblical Archaeology article relates how the word Magi was technically the title of Zoroastrian priests, but its use here in the gospel describes dream interpreting astrologer-astronomers. The idea of ‘kings’ was understandably introduced much later in the thirteenth century from the reference in our psalm 72 (v10-11) where we read, ‘May the kings of Tarshis and the coastlands render him tribute; may the kings of Sheba and Seba bring gifts! May all kings fall down before him, all nations serve him!’ So how many Magi were there?

We do not know how many followed the star, the number three was proposed by the early Church Father Origen in the third century based on their three gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.

Our celebration of the Epiphany, the appearance or revelation of the incarnate God, the Christ child, to the gentiles, that is to us non Jews, is signified in that the Magi were ‘strangers from the east’. The Epiphany, one of the oldest Christian feasts, was probably first celebrated in Alexandria, in Egypt, by Origen sometime during the third century.

Many of the early Christian depictions of ‘this adoration of the Magi’, show them in Persian dress, and were recorded by paintings on the columns of the Basilica of the Nativity in Bethlehem. It was those images that saved this ancient church from destruction by the muslim armies in the seventh century, as the Magi were recognised as fellow Persians.

During the fifth century, in a sermon, pope Leo the great wrote, “In the three Magi let all peoples worship the author of the universe; and let God be known not in Judah alone, but in all the world”. And here we are celebrating that ancient feast as it has been for at least sixteen centuries.

So what does that ‘revealing’ mean to us as Christians in this twenty first century? Well, perhaps the same as it did to Saint Paul, and to paraphrase what he wrote to the Ephesians, ‘for the sake of you gentiles, God revealed to me the mystery of Christ, a mystery not understood by humankind in former generations’. So just what was that mystery that the Holy Spirit revealed to the apostles, and has also revealed to us?

It is the greatest mystery of hope that could ever possibly be revealed to humankind. It was a mystery that Paul, who humbly described himself as ‘the very least of the saints’, was to bring to the gentiles, that we are to become ‘fellow heirs with Christ’ when the kingdom is finally realised on earth.

Can you, can I, even begin to get the slightest glimpse of what that means? For those of us who have responded to the Epiphany, to the revealing of the good news made known to us in Christ, those of us who have put our faith and trust in Jesus, then we have an amazing hope set before us.

It is not just a hope of being with Jesus in heaven, that is for the short term while we await His appearing a second time; we are destined to come with Jesus and all the saints, to reign with Him in the new creation. That is the eternal purpose that God is to carry out through our Lord Jesus.

But Paul does not stop there, he goes on to speak of ‘the boundless riches of Christ’ that we participate in now. So what are these ‘riches without bounds’ that we believing Christians share?

They are not the material or physical riches that we may or may not acquire here on earth, but the spiritual riches which come as a gift from God our Father, riches that we cannot earn but give a richness to our souls. Do you, do I feel, and experience a spiritual richness in our souls, especially after the events of this past year? So let us ask, what are those riches that we should now be enjoying?

There are many but perhaps these six give us some insight. A glimpse into the knowledge of the glory of our God, an experience of the grace of God, the truth of God’s holy word revealed to us through the holy scriptures, the wisdom that God gives to us through His indwelling Holy Spirit, the eternal life of God that we have now and not just for our future in eternity, and perhaps above all, the love of God that we see in the face of Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour.

As we make our new year resolutions we should ask, ‘are we availing ourselves of these abundant riches that God has promised us in Christ.

Perhaps these can be summed up in what Paul writes (Eph 2v4-7), ‘But God is so rich in mercy and He loved us so very much, that even while we were dead because of our sins, He gave us life when He raised Jesus from the dead’.

After all we have passed through during the covid pandemic of the past year, do we not all need a sprinkling, no a deluge of riches and hope?

And that hope is firmly set in the Lord Jesus. Our light has come, the glory of the Lord is indeed rising upon us as the time of Jesus return draws ever closer, and when His glory will indeed appear over us.

Words from a beautiful old early nineteenth century hymn that some of you may know, helps us to sum up the hope we have as believers and children of God, our heavenly Father; ‘My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness; no merit of my own I claim, but wholly trust in Jesus’ name’. ‘On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand’.

So as we enter a new year, not knowing what lies ahead for us all with the pandemic still raging and Brexit finally with us, it may seem that the thick darkness Isaiah spoke of does cover the earth. But as the Magi came with their gifts and into the brightness of God’s dawn, we are to be a people of hope, and ready to proclaim Jesus as the light of the world, and to sing our praises to the Lord. We take Paul’s words at the end of our reading from Ephesians to heart, “In Him, in Jesus, and through faith in Him, we may approach God with freedom and confidence”.

Let us pray:         Lord our God, Creator of the heavens, who led the Magi by a star to worship the Christ-child; guide and sustain us, that we may find our journey’s end in Emmanuel, Jesus the Messiah, who is our Saviour, Lord and coming King.