Thankful Thursday

Songs of thank­ful­ness and praise,
Jesus, Lord, to thee we raise;
Man­i­fested by the star
To the sages from afar
Branch of royal David’s stem
In thy birth at Beth­le­hem;
Anthems be to thee addressed,
God in flesh made manifest.

That Epiphany hymn started play­ing in my head this after­noon and I haven’t been able to get the tune out of my mind. This is not the Epiphany sea­son, of course. Epiphany is cel­e­brated on Jan­u­ary 6, com­mem­o­rat­ing the arrival of the Magi who fol­lowed the star to the sta­ble to wor­ship the new­born King.But the word “epiphany” has a cou­ple of other mean­ings, one of them being:

A sud­den, intu­itive per­cep­tion of or insight into the real­ity or essen­tial mean­ing of some­thing, usu­ally ini­ti­ated by some sim­ple, homely, or com­mon­place occur­rence or experience.

What I am thank­ful for this week is the fact that every day is another oppor­tu­nity to cel­e­brate Epiphany. Dur­ing the Advent and Christ­mas sea­son we spend a lot of time reflect­ing upon the man­i­fes­ta­tion of the Divine Cre­ator in the per­son of a lit­tle baby, born in the most hum­ble sur­round­ings imag­in­able. We reflect upon all the imagery and sym­bol­ism, and before we know it, Ash Wednes­day has arrived. We for­get about that lit­tle baby until the leaves turn brown again, the Christ­mas lights and dec­o­ra­tions are taken back out of stor­age and we are bom­barded with the sights and sounds “of the sea­son” until we can’t stand to hear one more Christ­mas carol or Ephiphany hymn … until next year.

But if we are really faith­ful, we should stop and remem­ber that lit­tle baby every once in awhile through­out the year, includ­ing in the mid­dle of the long, hot sum­mer. We can travel, like the Magi, back to the manger every moment of every day. We can reflect upon the hum­ble man­ner in which the Divine sent its reflec­tion to live among and teach us how to live. We can pause to con­sider the inno­cence and purity of the new­born King.

The poten­tial for Epiphany and epipha­nies exists every day and we can avail our­selves of the oppor­tu­nity to expe­ri­ence those moments ever time that we take stock of the world around us and go back into the Word for guid­ance. Epipha­nies, at least for me, don’t usu­ally come in big “a-ha!” moments. Rather, they most often creep into my con­scious­ness qui­etly, grad­u­ally, as I read and study. Some­times I expe­ri­ence an epiphany when I am writ­ing here.

Those moments are the Divine’s gifts to us and I am thank­ful for them because they keep my hope alive from day to day and moment to moment. It is the promise of Epiphany and epipha­nies that inspire me to strive to live a life exem­pli­fy­ing faith.

Grant us grace to see thee, Lord,
Present in thy holy Word;
Grace to imi­tate thee now
And be pure, as pure art thou;
That we might become like thee
At thy great epiphany,
And may praise thee, ever blest,
God in flesh made man­i­fest. ((Hymn #90, Verses 1 and 4, Lutheran Book of Worship))

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