Today we celebrate the Feast of the Epiphany, one of the most ancient Christian holidays. These days, we mostly associate it with the arrival of the Magi, the wise ones from the east who see the star shining and follow it where it leads, bringing royal gifts to the newborn Jesus: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. But in its more ancient form, it actually wrapped together several different stories into a kind of mega-feast: beginning with Jesus’ birth, including the arrival of the Magi, but stretching forward to his baptism in the River Jordan and his first miracle at the wedding in Cana. It celebrated all the manifestations of Christ, all the ways in which Christ appeared or was revealed to all the nations of the world, which is what the word “Epiphany” means.

It’s a holiday of glory and splendor, of light and power, and yet it’s a holiday of paradoxes. Because while that star shone so brightly in the sky for everyone to see, there were only a few who understood and followed. While we celebrate and remember Jesus’ earliest miracles, we live in a world in which miracles often seem like far-off memories. And while our church calendar lists Epiphany as one of the six principal feasts of the church year, it often passes by unnoticed, less than culmination of the Twelve Days of Christmas than an afterthought, an echo, a day in which the City of Boston has already collected Christmas trees from the streets.

In a way, though, this paradox of revelation and obscurity is fitting, because this is exactly how Christ appears in our world and in our lives today. We do not see light shining in the sky pointing out to us where to find Jesus, but we’re told in whom we can find Jesus and how. We don’t receive miracles of water turned into wine, we receive stories and are called to walk by faith, and not by sight. We don’t always set aside time for another party or celebration—sometimes we don’t even have a service in church—but always, everywhere, all around us, Christ is being made manifest in the world.

So I pray, in this new year of 2022, that you may find the ways in which Jesus is being revealed in your life; that you may see the star shining in the lives of the people around you, and see the miracle of each everyday act of human love.

And as the Collect for the Epiphany prays:

O God, by the leading of a star you manifested your only Son to the peoples of the earth: Lead us, who know you now by faith, to your presence, where we may see your glory face to face; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.