Tomorrow, January 6th is Epiphany. The day we celebrate the visiting of the wisemen to Jesus. The word epiphany means the revelation of something special… something like a spiritual “light bulb” going off… that “aha moment!”

The wisemen or magi as they are sometimes referred to were scientists and astronomers from the far away country of Persia. They had seen the natal star and were so intrigued that they followed it. Now the wisemen weren’t Jewish. Their religion was most likely Zoroastrianism, an ancient Iranian religion. Yet they came to find the “child who was born the king of the Jews.” When they found Jesus, they knelt down, paid him homage, and brought gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. I’d heard a theory that the gifts have symbolic meanings. The gold symbolizes royalty, the frankincense symbolizes worship, and the myrrh the prediction of Jesus’ death because it is used to prepare a body for burial.

Last Sunday I read the beginning of the gospel of John, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.”

Jesus is the light… the star… the “spiritual lightbulb”… Epiphany!

See you Sunday!