The Epipheny of His Grace - or The feast of His Appearing
"Alan Mc Savage"
Epiphany. It means "appearing," it means to "shine out of the gloom and death of sin," the shining out of God's grace, love, and kindness.
In Titus 2:11 where we have the word "epiphany," appearance, "for the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men." There the apostle says that when Jesus Christ was born, the wonderful grace of God shone out.
In our Weekly studies, we looked at Titus 3:4, "But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared to us." Again, when Christ was born, the kindness and the love of God toward His church appeared, shone forth in all of its brilliance.
Today I want to look at the third time where the word "epiphany" or "appearing" is used to refer to the birth of Jesus Christ. That passage is II Timothy 1:9, 10. There we read, "Who [that is, God] has saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began, but is now made manifest by the appearing [there is the word epiphany] of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel." Today, then, I speak to you on the appearance of God's grace in the birth of Jesus, which brings immortality.
That is, after all, the heart of our rejoicing, is it not, in the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ? Is not the heart of our rejoicing this, that the child of Bethlehem came to bring to us immortality? It is exactly because He was born and suffered and died sacrificially and rose again the third day that we will not die. That is why we rejoice. The chapter (II Timothy 1) is a chapter that gives holy encouragement to us to preserve or persevere in our calling in Christ Jesus. Paul is telling Timothy that he must be brave and true in the testimony of the Lord Jesus. Timothy, Paul says, was a man who experienced many fears. And Paul says to him in that chapter that the servants of the Lord must be emboldened by the power of the gospel as that power lives in their own heart. By the power of the gospel, Paul says to Timothy, you have been saved and you have been called. And Timothy had need for great endurance, for his task was, indeed, a difficult one. Paul, then, seeks to unpackage the salvation of Jesus Christ. Paul seeks to trace the source of that salvation to the eternal grace of God in Christ. And He does all of this in order that Timothy — understanding the gospel and understanding that through Jesus Christ he has been given immortality, a life that cannot die, a life that must live forever with God — might not be afraid, might not shrink back, might not be overwhelmed with his trials and weariness. But that he might endure. So also is the Word of God to you and to me today. We are being told, then, that the birth of our Savior in Bethlehem's manger was the epiphany, the appearance, of God's eternal grace, a grace that, we read, was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. I am referring now to the ninth verse of II Timothy 1. Let us follow that verse for a few moments. Let us follow the wording very carefully because that verse is a treasure chest, and the contents will cause our hearts to bow down in wonder. And, remember, it is spoken for the purpose of our comfort and encouragement. We read, "God has saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began." There the apostle says that it was God who, by His power, pulled us out of the pit of sin and hell and brought us to the gates of heaven. He delivered us from the cesspool of our sin and brought us to the mansions of glory. And God did this by His power — He called us unto a holy calling. God summoned, God spoke His powerful and living Word. God said, "Come to Me." God called and saved us. Why did He do that? The apostle says, He did this "not according to our works." That simply means that our salvation is not based upon anything we are, did, or can do. It was not according to those things. Not according to anything we are, that is, any intrinsic virtue, goodness, worth, or value, for we had absolutely none. It was not according to anything we did, any good deed, decision, will, or acceptance of Christ. These we did not have and could not do. And it was not according to anything we can do. It was not according to our works as Christians — our prayers, our repentance, our offerings in the collection plate, our raising of our children. Our salvation is not based upon anything we are, did, or can do. The Word of God is saying that if you search yourself down to the very bottom, everything you are, did, or can do, and if you leave nothing unturned, your works, all you did, all you are, there is not one thing of yourself to which you can point as the cause or the reason of your salvation. Rather, when you look within yourself as a child of God, what do you find? If the Holy Spirit, through the Word, is searching you out, you find this: that you, with all mankind, are accursed of God and are a corrupt and guilty sinner. So God has called us to salvation not according to our own works, but, says the apostle, according (I am reading again II Timothy 1:9) to His own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. God is saying that the reason for our being called to salvation is to be found in God alone. It is to be found in His own purpose — that is, His eternal choice or decree, His eternal decision. One's purpose is what one intends to do. God had a purpose, a purpose that He had within Himself from all eternity — a purpose to save His people in Christ. We read in Ephesians 1:10 of this purpose — a purpose that He purposed in Himself, that He would gather together in one all things in Christ — "being predestinated," says the apostle, "according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the council of his own grace." God, for His own reason, found in Himself, freely, without any merit on our part, purposed to call and to save us by His grace alone. The reason for our being called to salvation is to be found in God alone. And the apostle says that this grace, which is the cause of our salvation, was an eternal grace. We read that this grace "was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began." Now, did you hear that? Read the words. Did we read this: "God has called us and saved us according to His purpose and grace, and that grace was given to us in Christ Jesus when we accepted Jesus"? No, that is not what you read! That would be a perversion of the Word of God. Do we read this: "That grace was given to us in Christ Jesus after God saw what kind of a person we would be and that we would be willing to believe in Him"? No! That is not what the Word of God teaches at all. That, also, would be a perversion. It says this: The grace, which is the cause, remember, of our salvation, "was given to us in Christ Jesus before the world began." That is, before time, before creation, before any act of man, but freely, when only God was existing eternally as the glorious and sufficient and wonderful God, then God, in His own thoughts, down in the infinite depths and splendor of His own heart, decreed that He would give to us grace in Christ. He said, "I will show My glory. I will do it in My Son. I will freely choose a people to save. And I will call them to salvation in Christ. And I will do this solely out of grace." What is the Word of God, then, saying to us? It is saying this. Before the elect of God were born, they were enrolled in God's registry of salvation. Do you want to know the source of salvation? It is God's eternal grace. Our salvation does not hang in any respect upon our deserts or acts; it does not hang upon anything other than God. God did not look outside of Himself for the reason to save us. On what does our salvation hang? It hangs on the eternal choice and the grace of God, on the unconditional election and grace of God. Salvation is caused by God's everlasting grace. God chose, according to grace, to save and call His church to Christ out of desperately wicked sinners who are guilty of themselves in Adam. Before the elect of God were born, they were enrolled in God's registry of salvation The Feast of the Epiphany (epiphany means "manifestation", "revelation") is the oldest of the Christmas feasts and is still celebrated on January 6th as the major feast of the season by the eastern Christian churches. The feast probably began in those churches in the Middle East strongly influenced by the Gospel of John, who proclaimed of Jesus Christ: 1. And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us, and we saw his glory, the glory of the Father's only Son, full of grace and truth. (John 1, 14 ) As "the true light, which enlightens everyone " come into the world, Jesus came not only that we might see his glory but also that we might share in it. "From his fullness we have all received, grace for grace." (John 1,16) King Herod normally didn't lose sleep over peasant babies, but he was terrified of the one born to be a king. Herod wasn't inclined to notice the nobodies walking the streets and roads of his kingdom, but royal seekers from the East chilled his spine. Herod didn't make plots against the powerless. But he plotted, and acted, against the One whose star in its rising had drawn the Magi to find him. 1. Herod feared this One whose impending kingship threatened his place, his power. We, too, have seen his star in its rising. We, too, must decide if this is good news or bad news for us. Will we, like Herod, draw back in fear because this One comes in our likeness with the promise to remake our world? Is that a message we really want to hear? We regularly decry Herod's failure to see and accept God's plan of redemption and consequent plot against the Word made flesh. Do we do better? Jesus became like us so he might make us like him. The light of his Epiphany, his star in its rising, is intended to shine into the dark places in our lives. His grace is given so we might be changed and made new. Is that good news? A typical dictionary definition of "grace" is "unmerited divine assistance given to man for his regeneration and sanctification" (Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary). Although this definition has about as much romance as the telephone book, it is true enough as far as it goes. It does, moreover, point out two absolute human needs. 1. Every human being needs to be "regenerated," literally "to be born again" as a new kind of immortal creature. Human nature is fallen, so that every human being born into this world in the natural way is born subject to sin and death. Regeneration, on the other hand, is to be reborn supernaturally, "from above" by the power of God's grace. Thus, if we are born, we will die. But if we are reborn, we will never die, because Jesus Christ has done for us what we could not do for ourselves. Jesus Christ gave his life on the cross to conquer sin and death, so that sin and death cannot conquer those who live their lives faithfully in him. When we are baptized, we are baptized into Jesus Christ's death on the cross, so that we may enjoy the benefits of his one sacrifice of himself once offered. And because we share in his death, we share in his resurrection as well. But Baptism isn't a magic trick. We can't just "go through the motions." In order to rise again with Jesus Christ, in order to be fit citizens of the kingdom of heaven, we must live an entire life in him. Living in Christ and becoming more like him, day by day, is our "sanctification" or "being made holy." Our Lord offered his entire life to his Father in heaven, not just on the cross, but in every minute of every day, without exception. The grace of sanctification, therefore, is the way that God in heaven assists us supernaturally to live the right kind of life, a life pleasing to him, in this natural world. When we do the right thing, that is grace. When we resist doing the wrong thing, that is grace. When we admit or realize that we have done wrong, asking God's forgiveness, that is grace too. Thus grace makes us alive before God by regeneration in Jesus Christ, and grace enables us to live that new life by sanctifying our everyday living according to the model of Jesus Christ. So, that's what grace does, but what is it? What does it mean to call it "unmerited divine assistance"? The answer lies in the words from Isaiah with which we began, "But thou, Israel, art my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend." Grace is the gift of God's personal friendship, backed up by all the goodness and omnipotence of an unchanging and eternal God. Think about the Book of Genesis and how it records all of the trouble that Abraham got into during his life. But God had given Abraham his friendship. God loved him, and so God saw him through it all. Think of Abraham's grandson Jacob, who spent most of his life trying to find his way. God loved him, offered him his friendship, and saved him, not simply for his own sake, but because his grandfather was God's friend. God gave Jacob a new name, Israel, "the one who wrestles with God." And God made Israel's descendants a nation, which he loved, because their ancestors had been his friends. Grace is the great connection of love and friendship between God and man, extended not merely to isolated individuals, but to entire families and nations, for the sake of his abiding friendship. There is no way to earn love or to deserve such friendship, or to earn and deserve any kind of love and friendship at all. We don't sell our love to our families or to our friends, we give it, and we commit ourselves to give it whether they are particularly deserving or not. We love whom we love, and so does the God in whose image we are created. A word related to "grace" is the word "gratuitous," which means "free, unearned, not based on a return benefit." Grace, then, is really just the working-out of God's gratuitous love. And yet another related word spells out the proper sort of response to such a love: gratitude. A true friend of God doesn't try to re-negotiate their friendship or to lay down terms. A true friend is grateful to God for his love and tries to live up to it, and this is grace, too, since it begins and ends with God. How grateful should we be? When we were still dead sinners, God sent his Son Jesus Christ to be born into the family of his friend Abraham, so that every family might be reborn and saved, so that we would be reborn and saved. There is nothing we can pay or do to get such friendship, and there isn't any way that we can live without it. That is grace, and it is as personal as a Father's hand on each of our heads. It is as unmerited as Jesus Christ's decision to die upon the cross for us. It is as uncontrollable as the Holy Ghost's descent upon the Church at Pentecost. It is the greatest power in this world, because it comes from outside this world. It is the freely given love of the God who made this world real grace--truly tough, gritty, divine-style grace--can be difficult to swallow. It's one thing for any one of us to revel in the reality of grace. As this morning, so every week we enjoy getting to that "Assurance of Pardon" portion of the service and its wonderful reminder that we are swaddled in grace and so are forgiven despite our foibles, faults, flaws, and sins. But even so, who among us finds it easy to accept that same grace when we see it getting applied to someone who really hurt us, or someone who never hurt us but whose lifestyle over the years has been a good example of everything we despise? Don't we often find ourselves silently wishing that so-and-so would get his comeuppance before he gets any grace? Don't we chafe just a bit when we get the sense that a certain person is getting off scot-free, getting off the hook, slipping out of the noose, escaping his just deserts? That is what grace is all about, but sometimes it's a little tough to take! 1. As C.S. Lewis once wrote, we all agree that forgiveness is a lovely idea, right up until the moment when we have someone to forgive. Lewis wrote that right after World War II and in connection with the need for British people to forgive the Germans and the Italians. Today we could apply it to terrorists, to rogue and renegade nations, or less dramatically to any number of people whom we personally know and who have wounded us. But if we are to radiate grace, if we are to let our light shine as we talked about last Sunday morning, then this is our challenge Symeon the New Theologian : BECOMING INVISIBLE AND SUDDENLY APPEARING 1. DIDN'T know yet, my Lord, that you exist, you who made me from clay and gave me all these goods. I didn't know yet, that you yourself was my un-proud God and Lord. Because I had not received yet the grace to hear your voice in order to know you; you had not yet come and said mystically to me that ‘I am'. I was unworthy and unclean, still having the ears of my soul obstructed by the clay of sin, and my eyes under the command of disbelief and of the sense and fog of the passions. And I was seeing thus you my God, but without knowing, not having first believed that God, as much as possible being seen, he is being seen by some, I could not discern that God or God's glory is this, which, sometimes thus, sometimes otherwise, is revealed, but the miracle being unusual astonished me and filled the whole of my soul and of my heart with joy, so that I was seeing even my very body partake of that ineffable grace. But I didn't know yet clearly who you are, whom I was seeing. I started to see more often the light, sometimes inside, when my soul enjoyed serenity and peace, sometimes outside somewhere far away appeared to me or it was wholly hiding itself and hidden it was bringing sadness unbearable to me, because I was thinking it will no more in any way be revealed. And while I was mourning and weeping and showing all kinds of strangeness, obedience and humility, it was revealing itself upon me just like the sun, that cuts the fatness of the cloud and little by little appears friendly in the shape of a sphere. This way then you, the ineffable, the invisible, the untouchable, the immovable, the everywhere forever and in everything present and filling everything, at all times, to say so, in day and night being seen and hidden, going away and coming, becoming invisible and suddenly appearing, little by little you drove away the darkness inside me, you drove away the cloud, you made thinner my fatness, the dirt of my spiritual eyes you cleaned perfectly, removed the obstacles from the ears of my mind and you opened them, you surrounded and removed the covering of insensitivity, and besides these, all passion and all carnal pleasure you drove to perfect sleep and perfectly you exiled it away from me. ... These are God's wonders towards us, brothers! And while we are elevated to a greater perfection, no more like before without shape or form the shapeless and formless comes, or the presence and arrival of His light in silence works in us - but how? In some form, yet God's form. God is revealed not in a shape or outline, but in incomprehensible, wonderful and formless light formed is revealed simple - nothing more can we say or express - , He starts to be revealed clearly and to be known in a great familiarity and to be seen much clearly, the invisible, invisibly speaks and hears and, as if a friend to a friend, face to face, who is by his nature the God speaks with them who have been born from Him by grace Gods, and as a father loves and by his sons He is loved in a great warmth and He becomes for them a strange vision and a more terrific sound, without being able either to be spoken by them worthily, or to be neglected, covered in silence. Because by the yearning for Him they always are lit up and mystically by Him resound. Alan
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