Some years ago somebody sent me a screen treatment, a scenario, for a movie about Jesus. The scene I read was set in a trashcan-strewn alley in Hell’s Kitchen, New York. Running down the alley towards us was a teenage boy and he was in a hurry, jumping over trash cans, evidently avoiding pursuit.
When I called the producer and told him I’d been asked to give him my comments, I told him that I had worked for the Jesus Seminar. And so he said, “I already know what you are going to say.”
I could have pointed out the inauthenticity of what his Jesus said and did.
Of course what I wanted to say was, “I want to know what happens next.”
That is the way it is with Jesus. You never know what is going to happen next… in fact, at first, for most people, it was hard to recognize him for who he was. He wasn’t a kid tipping over trash cans as he ran down an alley, but he was somebody unlikely to be … what he turned out to be.
Even his closest disciples, the ones like Andrew who spotted him immediately, and those on whom it gradually dawned, as they walked with him on the roads of Galilee, were surprised by joy and sorrow at the end.
It was actually after they had endured not only joy but sorrow that they began to understand. And after the end had come, and the end of hope that they had placed in him, that a new understanding, and a new hope, dawned upon them.
In the times when Jesus was born, hope was already a fragile thing. The country had been under the thumb of the Roman power for years, and their own leaders cooperated in the domination system of that imperial rule.
His mother was apparently quite young, her husband somewhat older. They had traveled through the cold of midwinter to his ancestral home town, and found some shelter there, in time for the child to be born.
Meanwhile in the capital city strangers appeared in the palace of the king, the local ruler who kept things quiet for the emperor. Three strangers appeared. Magi, wise men, astrologers, or kings, from the East, who had nothing to do with Rome or Jerusalem, showed up and asked a question.
“Where is he who is born to be king of the Jews?”
And who did they ask? Herod! Who was king, or said so, though he knew his claim was … inventive. Hence his toothy smile, seek for him diligently and let me know when you find him, that I too may go, and…
Today, in the visit of the Magi to the cradle, we are in suspense about what happens next with Herod. What we see is the first great epiphany, revelation, of who Jesus really is.
In coming weeks, Sunday gospel lessons will recount other epiphanies, other God-sightings, as Jesus is revealed in the Presentation in the Temple (“Now let your servant go in peace”), in his baptism by the Jordan river (“You are my Son, the Beloved”), in the wedding-feast in Cana (“You have kept the good wine until now"), in his reading of Isaiah in Nazareth (“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me”), in the miraculous catch of fish (“Put out into the deep water”)...
For now, though, there was a little child. And the strangest of visitors.
There in a manger, a feeding-trough for farm animals, was a little baby. These wise men from the east, kings of Orient, or simply astrologers, had seen a star at its rising. And so of course they had gone to the capital and introduced themselves. “Where is he that is born King of the Jews?”
Herod knew trouble when he saw it. He hadn’t stayed in power all those years without some wisdom. The wisdom of the world. He knew that for things to stay the same, things would have to change. But he didn’t want them to change like this. So, he questioned the sages, smiled his toothy smile and asked them to report back to him when they had found him.
“So that I too may go and worship him.”
But they were, after all, wise men, and so they departed by another road.
What happens next? What happened to the kid in the alley, I don’t know. I was curious. What happens next to this little baby, and the other kids his age, we do know. Because after the joy began the sorrow.
Herod sent his soldiers. They slew all the children they found in that area, of the right age. This is the massacre we remember in the feast called The Holy Innocents.
Of all those children one survived. And improbably he grew up to become the fulfillment of all Herod’s fears.
For as a later ruler of Judea would know, he was “The King of the Jews.”
When they met him, the wise men knew. For others, it took a little time. Some of his home folk, back in Nazareth, couldn’t believe it. It made them angry. But for others, like Andrew by the lakeside, they knew who he was.
He was the real thing. They just didn’t know what that meant yet.
As we learn throughout the Christian year, the Gospels tell us what following this king would mean.
There was joy, and there was sorrow.
And then, after the sorrow, there was joy beyond imagining. After death, there was life. And after the end of hope, there was hope beyond hope.
We here may not know, or may not have known, what it meant to be nearly hopeless, in a village surrounded by an imperial enemy, with disciplined troops nearby, always vigilant for signs of resistance.
We may know, through our own experience or that of family members or refugees we have encountered, or aid workers we have known, just exactly what that was like.
There is fear. But there is always hope. There is darkness. And - there is light.
And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not - cannot - put it out. For in him was life, and this life is the light of all people. Merry Christmas, once again.
January 5, 2025. the Feast of The Epiphany (observed).
Santa Cruz Lutheran Church, Tucson. 9:30am JRL+
Matthew 2:1-18
The Visit of the Wise Men
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.
The Escape to Egypt
Now after they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, ‘Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.’ Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfil what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, ‘Out of Egypt I have called my son.’
The Massacre of the Infants
When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the wise men. Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah: ‘A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled, because they are no more.’
Footnote: I am looking forward to listening to the 2024 Town and Gown lecture with Nicholas Terpstra (University of Toronto) from the Division of Late Medieval and Reformation Studies at the University of Arizona, "Blood and Betrayal Meanings in the Massacre of the Innocents."
Temporarily available at https://youtu.be/5LbJOGuh42A?feature=shared
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