Happy Epiphany!

Hello all -

We celebrated the new church year back on Nov. 28th, the first Sunday of Advent. That day officially begins the new year in the church calendar with a season of hope and expectation and longing. Christmas celebrates the initial fulfillment of that hope. And now we are in the season of Epiphany. It's today, actually.

Epiphany is about proclaiming that Jesus is the Christ. On this day we commemorate the wise men from the east to came to worship, seeing in this little peasant boy the true king. The image of a light shining forth truth in the darkness prevails.

And then we move into ordinary time. The time that makes up most of the calendar, and indeed most of our lives. The time between the big events. Seth and I have finally managed to hang some pictures in our living room (we've only been in our house since June!). Most of the pictures are of the trip we were fortunate to take to Israel and Egypt in 2008. Seth commented that our life consists of more than just this trip.

And that is true. Our lives consist of much more than the big events. They consist mostly in the ordinary, the every day, the mundane, the boring, even. Dishes must be washed, laundry must be done, meals must be cooked. This is our life. And it is the life that Jesus came to share. Most of Jesus' life, the ordinary time, isn't recorded in Scripture. There is much time "in between" the big events. How we live in the every day moments matters, perhaps even more than the big events. Do we allow Jesus to shape our everyday lives? Our mundane moments? Our dishwashing? Or do we only remember Jesus in the big events, the crises and celebrations? Where is Jesus in your ordinary time?

Pastor Stacia