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WHAT
ARE YOU LOOKING FOR?
As we step across the threshold of a whole new year, what will the coming days and weeks and years hold for you? What will you be looking for, hoping for, reaching for?
Some of us spend our days and years and lives looking forward to the next paycheck or the next weekend, seeking the most convenience or the most comfort, casting our gaze on the next deadline or bottom line.
I suppose that describes all of us at least some of the time. I know it does me.
So how do we make sense of those three seekers, who were supposed to be so wise, traveling hundreds of miles through the desert, seeking a baby born to a peasant couple in a drab, dry country, so they could bend their knees and give him their precious assets? That has to take the prize for one of the most absurd expeditions in history, if you're seeking the least hassle, the most comfort, and the biggest bang for your travel and entertainment dollar.
But we can't dismiss those magi so easily, can we? Those magi saw a star that set their visions higher than the bottom line and their comfort level. They were open to an epiphany, to God showing Godself, to an encounter with the divine. They didn't exactly know what they would find or where they would find it. But they believed they would find something that spoke to them of God. And so they sacrificed, they sought and they found. That speaks to me. Does it you?
Can that happen to us, this epiphany business? Can we ordinary people have encounters with the divine? The answer depends largely on what we're looking for. If we're looking for more stuff or status or control, we'll never see our guiding star. But more and more people are waking up to the reality that there is more to life than that.
And so, we who are increasingly defined by TV and computers and consumption and productivity need to learn what those wise men knew that heaven and earth are not so very far apart. Something as familiar as a star, or as a baby, can hold an epiphany, a revelation of God. It all depends on what you are looking for.
So if you want to experience epiphanies, maybe we shouldn't go looking for God directly. Remember, the wise men set off looking for a prince. The key is to look at everything through the eyes of faith that is to say, through the eyes that humbly acknowledge both our humanness and the reality and closeness of God. Through the eyes of faith, a sunset isn't just the refraction of the visible light rays of the sun by the earth's gravitation. It is a glorious gift that calls us to put down our dishrag or remote control and say, Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to Thee, how great thou art, how great thou art.
Through the mind of faith, the people we encounter every day aren't just means to our ends or competitors to be conquered, but are fellow souls who in their own unique ways can tell us about God, because we are forgetting already.
So as you head into this new year, what will you be looking for, and how will you seek it? My prayer for you, and for me, is that we will keep finding the One who is right here looking for us.
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Lynnewood United Methodist Church
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