Off By Nine Miles
Matthew 2:1-12
January 9, 2022
Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley
Image: The Wise Men's Dream by Rev. Lauren Wright Pittman; © a sanctified art | sanctifiedart.org
Note: A recording of the worship service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://youtu.be/xdBFHMt_5VY
This story about the magi comes around every year. Every time it does, I find, in my files, an article written by Walter Brueggemann more than twenty years ago now. The article is entitled Off By Nine Miles, and yes, I stole the sermon title from him.
The magi went to Jerusalem, to Herod’s palace, which is where a person might understandably expect to find a royal baby. But, as Matthew and Luke have told us, Jesus was born in Bethlehem, which is nine miles south of Jerusalem. Not a lot of difference geographically, but worlds apart in most other ways. Brueggemann notes, “The narrative of Epiphany is the story of these two human communities: Jerusalem, with its great pretensions, and Bethlehem, with its modest promises.”[1]
The magi did not undertake this trip on a whim. They were not flippant or unconcerned about the outcome. They planned carefully and gathered provisions. They packed the camel bags and repacked them to balance and lighten the loads. They consulted maps and ancient texts and the stars and even remembered to bring gifts. They did not go straight to Bethlehem, but it wasn’t for lack of good intentions and careful efforts.
They were off by nine miles, on a journey of 500-600 miles without the benefit of GPS or an interstate highway system. That seems within a reasonable margin of error. Perhaps it would be better to say they were off by only nine miles. They just needed a slight course correction.
I’ve read Dr. Brueggemann’s article many times, but this is the year when it really resonated with me. It struck a nerve because you and I have recent and repeated experience in course correction. For the last 21 months – which you know is 5 ½ years in Covid time – we have repeatedly been changing course. We’ve been told it’s safest to stay home, then it’s safe to gather outdoors, then wear a mask. Come to church with your mask and sing. Oh no, change that. Don’t sing. And you know what? – let’s go back to just staying home again now.
As far as we know, the magi only needed one course correction. So good for them. And maybe, all of the pivoting we’ve done is going to also be good for us. Maybe it is getting us in shape for something yet to come, a new and better direction.
It’s that time of year when some people make New Year’s Resolutions. Actually, we are nine days into the New Year -- that time when many have already abandoned any resolutions they made. But it’s only my first Sunday to preach in 2022, and I’m thinking about course corrections. I’m thinking about how it is possible to plan carefully and do your best and still be off by nine miles.
It’s the kind of thing that sometimes happens to me with gift-giving. I feel the pressure of making a decision about what to get and then purchasing and wrapping it festively and getting it there on time. I get caught up in those details, in making sure that I have something for everyone I need to. And then, in that moment when we exchange gifts, I sometimes remember that my goal wasn’t simply checking a list. It wasn’t just having a package to unwrap. My goal was the moment of fun or surprise or delight or laughter that brings joy. Sometimes, despite my best intentions and careful efforts, I miss the joy by nine miles.
It happens in my church life too. Planning worship matters to me. I spend probably too much time word-smithing the call to worship and deciding on art for the PowerPoint and choosing hymns. I do that because I want to enhance our sense of God’s presence, to enable us to draw us close as we can. Some services are more frenetic than others. Christmas Eve was one of those. I had thought about a lot of things ahead of time – coordinating music with Michael and the choir, planning tech stuff with the tech team, figuring out the best way to do the candle-lighting while attending to Covid protocols. All of those things were appropriate and necessary – like the magi’s loading the camel bags before their trip. Worship was almost over when I finally connected. It was at the moment on the third verse of Silent Night when the piano dropped out and we stood together in the darkness, singing a capella. I heard it, I recognized it for what it was, I took a deep breath and it was over. Caught up in my tasks and details, I almost missed it altogether.
I expect you have some experiences like that too. Times when you realize that the worries and responsibilities required in getting through the day have pulled you off course.
Maybe some of the events of the last 2 years, as difficult and unrelenting as they have been, have helped us realize our need for change. Some of us have recognized in a new way the importance of sustaining our primary relationships, and the urgency of tending to what really matters whether that is self-care or spiritual exploration or a change in vocation.
Collectively, we are seeing more clearly the brokenness of our institutions. From health care to policing to schools to our cherished values of freedom and justice for all – almost everywhere, we find evidence that while we might still be pointed in the right direction, we need a course correction. And sometimes, we are pointed in the wrong direction and our only hope is metanoia, repentance.
It will be fascinating to see the history of this time when it is written in the future. Churches, like everyone else, have coped in different ways. Some have succumbed to internal pathologies and stressors present before the pandemic. Many will close permanently before it is over.
Some have been caught up in Christian nationalism, the perversion of the gospel that merges Christian and American identities, resulting in a profound distortion of both. This is a political-theological worldview that co-opts Christian faith and symbols to support a kind of patriotism which is often a cover for white supremacy and violence of many kinds.
Many of those involved in the insurrection at the Capitol on January 6 2021 were Christian nationalists. On the church calendar, January 6 is the day of Epiphany, the day which remembers the choice the magi had to make between the king in Jerusalem and the one in Bethlehem. That irony is probably lost on the insurrectionists. At least one sign in the angry mob claimed “Jesus saves”. Many prayed in Jesus’ name in what they called the “sacred space” of the Senate chamber, giving thanks for the God-given opportunity to do what they were doing. I hesitate to call that church, because it is so antithetical to what Jesus taught, but some churches are supporting it. It is imperative that we, who seek to follow Jesus, denounce that as demonic, an utter distortion of his good news.
On a local level, inside the history we are living through, it seems that churches like ours are learning how much we value the personal relationships, the sense of community developed over years of shared faith and life. Our definition of success has never been about how many programs we ran or how many people attended an event, but about our mutual celebrations of joy and sharing of support in crisis. Which is a good thing to discover.
But I’m still wondering what we might be missing. What brings us joy? What connects us to the very center of Christ’s reign? How are we so intent on our tasks and to-do lists and good intentions and careful efforts that we miss the goal by nine miles?
One of the messages of this Bible story is that it sometimes takes an outsider’s perspective to nudge us in the right direction. The magi got very close on their own. And they then asked questions of the insiders.
The magi seem to know a little bit of Bible. They know Isaiah 60 which speaks of Jerusalem as a place of productivity and prosperity. They seem to have read what Isaiah says about camels bringing gold and frankincense. But Herod’s scholars, those who are inside the tradition, know more. They know about Isaiah 60, but they also know Micah 5. So, they quote it to the king “But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah, who are one of the little clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to rule in Israel, whose origin is from of old, from ancient days.”
Brueggemann says “This is the voice of a peasant hope for the future, a voice that is not impressed with high towers and great arenas, banks and urban achievements. It anticipates a different future, as yet unaccomplished, that will organize the peasant land in resistance to imperial threat. Micah anticipates a leader who will bring well-being to his people, not by great political ambition, but by attentiveness to the folks on the ground.”[2]
The magi got very close on their own. Many of those outside our church walls know something about Jesus. Many of them know a lot. And sometimes their questions can remind us what really matters, if we can let our defenses down long enough. Sometimes, we already have the answer. We need to shift our focus to the right text for guidance. Sometimes, the course correction requires us to stop and see the bigger picture, to cut through the layers of tradition and history and get back to the heart of our faith.
Epiphany means revelation. It is the season when we focus on God as revealed in Jesus who arrived as a baby in Bethlehem. One way to open ourselves to a course correction may be to listen particularly well to Jesus’ own words. As we worship together for the next two months, we will revisit Jesus’ first sermon and his primary teachings as Luke gathered them together in the Sermon on the Plain.
We don’t know what the year ahead holds exactly, but I am hopeful. I am hopeful because we are resilient and we are staying connected to each other and continuing to care for strangers through this difficult time. I am hopeful about our new governance structure, which is a kind of grand experiment in course correction. As we began to live into this together, I hope that we will seek to be at the center of Christ’s reign, a place of vulnerability and joy.
As the poet adrienne maree brown wrote, “Things are not getting worse. They are getting uncovered. We must hold each other tight and continue to pull back the veil.”[3]
May it be so for you and for me. Amen.
[1] Walter Brueggemann, “Off by Nine Miles: Isaiah 60:1-7, Matthew 2:1-12,” The Christian Century, December 19, 2001 https://www.christiancentury.org/article/2001-12/nine-miles
[2] Walter Brueggemann, “Off by Nine Miles: Isaiah 60:1-7, Matthew 2:1-12,” The Christian Century, December 19, 2001 https://www.christiancentury.org/article/2001-12/nine-miles
[3] http://adriennemareebrown.net/2017/02/03/living-through-the-unveiling/