SOMETHING YOU NOTICE

The first few weeks of a new year are called "Epiphany" in the church calendar. Epiphany is an old word that's coming back into fashion. It means...well, this morning I was waffling at some bored children in a school assembly, trying to explain what "Epiphany" means. I don't think they were desperately interested. But then I got a text message from Janet telling me she'd just, on impulse, bought a re-upholstered Victorian armchair. So while I was blathering incompetently about Epiphanies, she was busy having one.

Epiphany means something you notice, that changes you. Epiphanies are usually quite little...even ones that turn out to be big, generally start small. Some enchanted evening, you might see a stranger across a crowded room...

The Christian "Epiphany" season begins on January 6th with the magi and their strange journey. Millions of people would have seen whatever was shining in the east; but the magi noticed. When they got to Bethlehem, all that was there was some baby and its young parents, in a dull stable. Many locals had presumably seen this nondescript family. But the magi noticed, and noticed the wonder of the moment, and were open to the possibility that the kid was an emissary from heaven. 

What has to happen, in order for us to notice this moment we are in now, and to be open to its possibilities? 

The Epiphany season, at the start of a new calendar, supposedly reminds us that wonderful happenings, flaming sunrises, angelic visitations, reconstituted Victorian armchairs, are not all long ago and far away... but might be here, now.

It's worth paying attention to this present moment...which may seem dull, but has never been before, and will never come again, however many zillion universes are out there.  

Wake up! Potential epiphanies are just waiting to happen!

Paul Nelson