There was always a recurring moment in that famous television series Yes, Prime Minister when Humphrey, the ultimate civil servant, would say to Prime Minister Jim Hacker “Oh, how very courageous of you Prime Minister.” And when Hacker heard these words a look of wild panic would cross his face. I suppose that that moment could be described as an epiphany for the Prime Minister–a moment when everything suddenly comes into focus more sharply, he sees things in a new way and a whole new course of action would open up for him. But for Hacker, doing something courageous was not a good thing and usually meant he would lose his popularity with the public and a lot of votes. That is what he wants to avoid at all costs.
Epiphanies tend to be moments of revelation, clarity and also moments that demand a choice be made. Having seen things in a new way, one must choose to change or to try and ignore what has happened. Major life changes and unexpected developments can be epiphany moments. As I prepare now to move on to another diocese and another post this whole process is an epiphany for me. Reflections on the past, on my time here, on what has been done–or not done–make me face the changes that are about to occur. And they demand I make a choice as to how I will respond to these changes.
Something that underlies all epiphanies is a sense of God’s presence and of hope. Tonight’s reading from Jeremiah is just such an epiphany for the people he is prophesying to. Jeremiah was either born or began his ministry in 627 BCE. He probably wrote the passage we heard this evening about 600 BCE. These words are spoken at a time when there was little evidence that anything remotely resembling what Jeremiah had hoped for would come true. Thousands of his people were already in captivity in Babylon, taken there by the Babylonian attack in 597BCE. He himself was in a precarious position in Jerusalem. His warnings against foolish political decisions by the rulers of his nation had made it possible for them to label Jeremiah an enemy of his own people. Yet Jeremiah never gives way to a bitterness and cynicism that could so easily have been justified. He allows himself to show anger, weariness, frustration–and these are all quite understandable in the circumstances. He faces great changes, many choices calling for a response, strident voices pointing to various solutions, deep divisions of thought and attitude concerning the future. Yet through it all Jeremiah never lost what one commentator has called his “sweetness of soul.”
Jeremiah never lost hope. That he never lost hope is all the more remarkable because he was a very sensitive and emotional person. Many times he is devastated by the rejection and contempt that he receives, yet in spite of everything, he can summon up the inner strength to speak of a future joy as if it were already being experienced.
The reason for this inner strength lies in his understanding of the nature of God. He believed God would be utterly faithful. God was not merely the God of the nice and cozy but of the hardships as well. God’s people, in the moral freedom and responsibility that they’ve been given, had by their choices and actions made exile inevitable. Yet even here, God does not leave them destitute. Listen to God’s words: “I am going to bring them from the land of the north They shall come and sing aloud on the height of Zion.” And the people who will return home are a changed people. They are a people who have found grace in the wilderness.
The start of a new year is always a time that has the potential to be an epiphany moment. Here, at the beginning of 2006 with a whole new year ahead we realize that we see ahead of us not only 12 months, but 52 weeks, 365 days, 8,760 hours, 525,600 minutes, 31,536,000 seconds. And one thing that most of us probably do not think of very much is that all of it is a gift from God. We have done nothing to deserve it or earn it and we haven’t purchased it. Like the air we breathe, time comes to us as a part of life.
The gift of time is not ours alone. It is given equally to every person. Rich and poor, educated and ignorant, strong and weak every man, woman and child has the same twenty- four hours every day. Time cannot be stopped. There is no way to slow it down, turn it off, or adjust it–no remote control to “fix” it. And we cannot bring back time. Once it is gone, it is gone. Yesterday is lost forever. Now all of this seems very obvious and probably rather boring to say. But if one actually meditates on time–and not just at the start of a new year either–one finds that the meditation itself becomes an epiphany moment.
Thomas Carlyle was fond of telling the story of how, when he was a boy, a beggar came to the door. His parents were out and he was alone in the house. On a boyish impulse, he broke into his own savings bank and gave the beggar all that was in it, and he said that never before or since did he know such sheer happiness as came to him in that moment. On this Epiphany as we again remember and give thanks for the gift of God–of himself–to all people let us too give thanks for the gifts God gives to each one of us.
Terrance Bell
TEXTS: Jeremiah 31:7-14 & John 1:29-34