Celebrating Epiphany at Grace

“On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother…And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.” Matthew 2:10-12

While many in our surrounding culture are breathing a sigh of relief this January that all the frantic preparations and celebrations are now past, we in the Church enter this Epiphany season with a renewed sense of baptismal calling: the people who have walked in darkness have seen a great light, a light made manifest in the infant Jesus, and we, too, walking wet in our baptisms shine with Christ’s light.

The magi, whose story we may read or hear proclaimed on the day of Epiphany (January 6), followed a great light, that brilliant star, which pointed the way to the Christ child. As the story is told, after first looking in Herod’s palace, they encounter the Christ not in a palace made for kings but in a simple house, and they return to their homeland by another way.

The season of Epiphany offers an opportunity to give thanks for homes and to bless them. We give thanks to God for the gift of a home, remembering all who live without homes especially this winter, and give thanks for all the ways Christ is encountered in our homes: in family and friends, in visitors and strangers, in faith put into action, in the welcome we receive.

On Wednesday, January 14, after Holden Evening Prayer, the Grace community and ASU students will gather for a house blessing of our own and ALL are invited! Please consider joining the community that evening as we gather for a congregational meal at 5:50 pm, worship at 6:45 p.m. with Holden Evening Prayer, and gather afterwards for a simple blessing of the Norris House, our new home.

We will pray especially that night for all who enter this new home—that they, like the wise men of old, will encounter the living Christ and having received welcome in Christ’s body, will return home by another way, transformed and shining with the light of Christ.

Walking wet in the light of Christ,
Pastor Sarah

The Music Ministry at Grace was recently featured in the December issue of the High Country Magazine.  It is available locally at various business locations, or you can read it online here:  High Country Magazine December.  It starts on page 94!