Is it just me or have you ever wondered - what happened to the Wise Men when they went back home? Do you think they lived happily ever after? Do you think their lives were forever changed after experiencing the splendor of the star’s light? After they had finally found the new and future king… did it make a difference back home on Monday morning… when they were dragging their garbage to the curb?
After all is said, these Wise Men had followed a star and had been, “… overwhelmed with joy.” I love that phrase, “overwhelmed with joy!” But, was the worship of the child really their journey’s end? Matthew’s text tells us that they were warned in a dream not to return to Herod; they went home by a different road.
It is interesting that having found the child; they continued to remain open to mystery, for it was in a dream that they were told to go home by a different road. Dreams are mysterious… dreams take place when we have yielded our self control to allow sleep to overtake us. Dreams occur in that place between earth and heaven. In the Bible, it is in that space, devoid of human control, that angels give instructions and insights.
Are we descendents of the star gazers who engaged in the unclear, the vague; the formless mystical naiveté of the wise men? I believe that today we tend to insulate and isolate ourselves from wonder… from imagination… from mystery because it is unmanageable, it’s impractical; it can be messy! But I also believe it is precisely that ‘awe’ that we hunger for.
Isaiah tells us that God has written each of our names on the palm of his hand… God adores you and me. God is inviting us into the realm of mystery. We can decide to go home by a different road. We can decide to pay more attention to all of life. We can decide to listen more with our hearts. We can decide not to be so hurried, so closed, so secular that we miss seeing the star. The star is shining in the faces of our children. The star is in the face of the person sitting next to you on the subway or bus.
Did this Christmas change us for forever? Did we discover the star’s true light? Are we taking the mystery of Christmas with us into the New Year? |