Signs We Will Recognize

Signs We Will Recognize--January 5, 2017

"In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, magi 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 we have come to pay him homage'." [Matthew 2:1-2]

Whose bright idea was it, do you suppose?

These peculiar mystics, these pagan astrologers, these curiously driven outsiders... they make a trip of who knows how many miles to go see a baby they have never met, from whom they cannot get any favors, and who will not even remember their efforts.  It's an odd sort of a mission, isn't it?

So... whose bright idea do you suppose it really was?

I ask the question because I am convinced it goes further "back," or further "up" than just the Magi themselves, however many of them there were. (Tradition and church hymnody has made the assumption that there were just three of them, but of course, that's only because there are three gifts named--who knows how big or small a caravan came?  Matthew doesn't seem all that interested in that bit of data.) The story itself points further back... to a star.  To a light in the sky.  The Gospel itself drops the not-very-subtle hint that God stands behind the motion in the story, putting some kind of light in the sky that these sky-watchers would have noticed.

Yes, the magi had to have been watching for a sign... but as modern astronomers listening and looking for signs of life in the stars will confess, watching and listening for messages is only meaningful if there is someone out there sending a message in the first place.  If these ancient SETI researchers that we call "the Magi" had been looking but God had not placed a light in the sky to get their attention, they would not have gone on their daring trek in the first place.

All of that is to say that the movement in this story--as with all the Bible's stories, really--begins with God.  It's not that a bunch of smart spiritual seekers came up with the bright idea to go knocking on random doors looking for Messiahs.  It's that God, who was doing something amazing and new in Jesus, wants to be found.  God does the drawing.  God does the pulling.  God does the leading.  God is trying to be found, and so speaks in terms that will get our attention and get our feet moving.

I'm reminded of that scene in the modern sci-fi classic Contact, where Jodie Foster's character Ellie Arroway finally gets to communicate "in person" with the aliens she has been tracking for the whole movie. And they choose to appear to her in the form of her father and a memory from her childhood imagination, because, they tell her, that is something her brain can make sense of--she wouldn't be able to handle seeing them as they are.  So they present themselves in a form that she can wrap her mind around.  And they have been the one sending a signal to Earth all along--their signal is what sets the whole rest of the story and the journey to meet them in space into motion.

Something like that is happening in the story of the Magi... and something like that is happening in this moment now.  The living God doesn't play hide-and-seek.  The Creator of the universe doesn't wait to be found, playing coy and hard-to-get.  The God of the Testaments sets things into motion that kickstart our venturing out where the Light leads.  God starts the movement--reaching out to us, pulling us like gravity, getting our attention in ways and signs that we can recognize. 

And once our hearts and eyes of faith recognize that Love has been smacking us upside the head to get our attention, we find our feet and we go. The rest of the world will not always understand why it is worth it.  The rest of the world will wonder what makes it worthwhile to set aside our own personal quests and agendas and plans in order to spend time with people whom God sends across our path. The rest of the world will not see the value in our commitment to gather with God's people week by week when we could be watching television or sleeping in or taking our kids to karate class and hockey practice. But God has gotten our attention.  God began the movement.  It always starts with God, who reaches out to us so that we won't miss something wonderful, like a parent pointing out an airplane in the sky to the kids. God comes to meet us in Jesus, and then God taps us on the shoulder to get us moving to be drawn to that same Jesus... and along the way, we are changed.

So today... listen.  Today... keep your eyes open.  If we really believe that the Love that made the universe is speaking and getting our attention still, then there will be signs to watch and listen for.  And when we finally at last perceive them, it will be the most obvious thing in the world to get up and go where the signs lead us--to find the presence of God in unexpected places, among ordinary people. 

But when we find ourselves being drawn to the light that God sends, remember this: it was God who sent the sign in the first place, whose love has been pulling us closer all along.  This whole life of faith... this was God's bright idea.

O Living God, get my attention today in ways that my dim perception and preoccupied heart will recognize, and as you lead me onward, let me see that it has been your Love all along reaching out to me, and to all of us.