Epiphany of the Lord

We parade into our worship spaces singing “Hosanna,” only to realize we’ve been following Jesus’ hearse.

Maybe we ask too much of ourselves—and too little of God—if we expect to produce light.

To be God’s people is to be caught up in parable, in story and storytelling.

Herod is frightened—or disturbed, or troubled, or all of the above.

When hope is dim, we need the assurance that God is with us.

You rarely see a children’s pageant based on Matthew’s story of escape from a raging despot.

Is Matthew so embarrassed by Bethlehem’s lowly status in Micah that he feels the need to punch it up a little?

Do they later say to their friends, “How could we not have known?”

In welcoming the Magi into her home, Mary opens the door to the whole world.

And six stars they offer for our own

It must have been a strange sight: grown adults, prostrate before a toddler.

The glorious and impressive features are only half of the story.

Theology is not popularly understood to be a landscape where dreams are welcome.

It’s all too much like a fairy tale.

Epiphany is the ultimate bad-guy story.