The Rev. Ann R. Lougee
January 27, 2008
Seeking God's Face
1 Corinthians 1:10-18; Matthew 4:12-23

The Epiphany season is the season of light, and the first disciples, those whom Jesus called from the shores of Galilee, seem to be like those "who sat in darkness" but "have seen a great light." So it seemed to the author of Matthew's gospel, who appropriated those words the prophet Isaiah uttered 6 to 8 hundred years earlier.

The light seems to blind these fishermen to their everyday pursuits and commitments. They seemed to see nothing but that they must follow this man in whom they see God's love so clearly.

We might legitimately wonder how to connect this sort of abandonment with the emphasis that many people these days place on using faith or at least religious identification to put their lives in respectable, orderly comfort. But scholar Thomas Long says, "The patterns of our lives are not made secure by the kingdom of heaven; the kingdom of heaven rearranges them into the new design of God's own making."

Long also says that all this disruption is "not to destroy but to renew," so that lives are transformed in the process. How does God call us, in our own settings, to repent, that is, to turn in a new direction, to open our lives to a radical renewal that may upset and re-orient them?

How might this radical renewal contradict the many middle-class, prosperity-driven theologies that seem to under-emphasize the call to work for justice for the poor? How willing are we to have our lives turned upside down in order to experience this kind of repentance?

Jesus provoked and angered many of his listeners with such expectations, but on the other hand, he inspired a number of them to leave everything for exactly such a reorientation and renewal. Their lives were never again the same, and probably not too comfortable, either.

Out of Galilee, that place at the crossroads of international trade routes which frequently knew the heel of foreign armies as they marched through or stopped to occupy the land, out of this land contaminated by Gentiles – one scholar calls it "the land of contempt" – out of that place came light for the world in the person of Jesus. That light was experienced as compassion for the physical and spiritual suffering and hungers of the people.

So our hearts may sing as we hear the glorious prophecy of Isaiah repeated in Matthew's gospel: "The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light." But then when we turn to Paul's epistle to the Corinthians, it reveals that just a generation or two later the members of the fledgling church at Corinth have been busy in attempts to put out that light.

As Paul describes their quarrels, they sound a lot like the brother and sister who were fighting ferociously about who would sit in the front seat when their mother came to drive them home from school. Exasperated, the mother asked, "Is there anything you two won't fight about?"

The squabbling stopped for a few moments as both children looked at her, and then, beaming, they both happily shouted, "No." At least in their desire to fight they are united, and the mother sees that they really love each other and are indivisible.

Paul seems to assume that the Corinthians too will continue to have their differences, but he wants them to see that the only thing that matters is the unity that they find in Christ. Attempting to bring them to their senses, he asks, "Has Christ been divided?"

The only answer can be: Of course not. Light is light. And only light can bring our fragmented darkness into focus and let us see things whole. Paul knows what the contemporary German theologian Jurgen Moltmann knows, too: "The nearer we come to Christ, the nearer we come together."

The message of Epiphany is that we ourselves are those most unlikely of people, the mostly unexpected sources of help and hope, and good news for the world. In us, the light of the world is to continue to shine.

Commentators agree about the importance of the community of followers (that is, those of us who have abandoned our nets and boats, and had our lives changed forever) as, "a countercultural force, untamed and raw, summoning us away from all easy ruts to the new life of righteousness." How many local congregations would be willing to include such words in their mission statements, do you suppose -- to summon us away from all easy ruts?

Still, the story continues: light breaking forth in the most unlikely of places, in the midst of the most unlikely people (and for them, too). And light shining even today in the ministry and faithfulness of communities gathered in Jesus' name, churches like ours.

We are here because God calls us here, to be disciples. We must keep seeking God's face because we know all too well what life becomes when we neglect to do so, when we try to operate by our own light only, and find ourselves cast into inner darkness.

Psalm 27, with which we began the service in our Call to Worship, reminds us that whatever happens, the important thing is to keep seeking God's face. We are not to dwell on the worst that can happen but to remember that the best we can hope for is to remain in God's house, free always to – in a phrase I love – "inquire in God's temple."

May our inquiry in God's temple help us to have our lives and relationships healed, help us to find a new direction when we need it, free our hearts to be compassionate and caring, and teach us to live with meaning and purpose, with joy. "Come," our hearts say, "seek God's face!" Your face, O God, do we seek. Amen.