2 Epiphany – January 14, 2024
John 1:43-51
Epiphany is a season of light and revelation, a season of searching, discovering, finding, and knowing. What can we learn from the penetrating and grace-filled vision of God in these days? If Jesus were here right now, looking at what we’re looking at, what would he see?
In our reading from John’s Gospel, we encounter a skeptic named Nathanael who thinks he knows exactly who God is and how God operates. Nathaniel seemed to approach life with a critical lens — a master of suspicion. His friend says, “we found the man about whom Moses and the prophets wrote!” And Nathaniel doubts it, rationalizing that nothing good comes out of Nazareth.
Jesus greets him generously as a man in whom there is no deceit.
And Nathaniel is suspicious, “Where did you get to know me?” Nathaniel is no Mr. Congeniality.
So when this guy, who tends to see the negative, effuses this overwhelmingly positive declaration of who Jesus is, after just meeting him, our expectations are toppled. What is going on here? Has Nathaniel really just uttered a statement with two exclamation points? Maybe we should pay attention.
The drama in this story counts on the fact that this character, Nathaniel, doesn’t tend to act in this positive manner. He does not declare false positives, so if Nathaniel, of all people, confesses faith in Jesus, you can trust him because he is not predisposed to bubbliness. No, his faith has overcome suspicion about Jesus.
This text, this story, which falls during our season of Epiphany, is an epiphany. Epiphanies tend to transform people. This is seen in Nathaniel’s change and also, as we celebrate the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy, in an epiphany-induced change that Martin Luther King, Jr. describes in his book, Stride Toward Freedom. He writes:
I was ready to give up. With my cup of coffee sitting untouched before me, I tried to think of a way to move out of the picture without appearing a coward. In this state of exhaustion, when my courage had all but gone, I decided to take my problem to God. With my head in my hands, I bowed over the kitchen table and prayed aloud.
The words I spoke to God that midnight are still vivid in my memory. “I am here taking a stand for what I believe is right. But now I am afraid. The people are looking to me for leadership, and if I stand before them without strength and courage, they too will falter. I am at the end of my powers. I have nothing left. I’ve come to the point where I can’t face it alone.
At that moment, I experienced the presence of the Divine as I had never experienced God before. It seemed as though I could hear the quiet assurance of an inner voice saying: “Stand up for justice, stand up for truth; and God will be at your side forever.” Almost at once my fears began to go. My uncertainty disappeared. I was ready to face anything.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was changed by this epiphany often referred to as his “vision in the kitchen.” Nathaniel’s epiphany, in which he suddenly could see clearly who Jesus was, changed Nathaniel. An epiphany of God allowed something new to snap into focus for Nathaniel. That newness changed his life.
Is it possible for us to see our present moment as Jesus sees it? Instead of deciding that we know everything there is to know about the political “others” in our lives, can we ask God for fresh vision? Instead of assuming that “nothing good” can come of the cultural mess we find ourselves in, can we accept Philip’s invitation to “come and see?” What would happen if we left our comfortable vantage points, and dared to believe that just maybe, we have been limited and hasty in our original certainties about each other, about God, and about the world? To “come and see” is to approach all of life with a grace-filled curiosity, to believe that we are holy mysteries to each other, worthy of further exploration. To come and see is to enter into the joy of being deeply seen and deeply known, and to have the very best that lies hidden within us called out and called forth.
In Just Mercy, his powerful book on the blight of mass incarceration in the United States, lawyer and author Bryan Stevenson insists that “each of us is more than the worst thing we’ve ever done.” Each of us, in other words, benefits from a second look, and a third, and a fourth. To offer that second look, that deeper, kinder, and more penetrating look, is grace. It is the gracious vision of Jesus, and it is the vision we are called to practice in a world that too often judges and condemns too quickly. Is there anything, after all, that feels lonelier than the experience of being unseen, misunderstood, and prematurely dismissed? And is there anything more life-giving than the experience of being seen for who we really are, deep down beneath the fragile defenses we hold up out of fear?
This week, we honor the legacy of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a man who dared to see as Jesus sees. A man who dared to call forth the best in all people — both black and white, both victim and oppressor. A man who looked deeply into the racial hatred of his day, and yet envisioned a world where justice would roll down like mighty waters. This is the call of Epiphany. To see. To call forth. To dream. And to bless.
What would Jesus see? Go and see likewise. Amen.
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