Jeanette Renouf

Dear friends,

Here we are at the Feast of the Epiphany, 12th Night, final day of Christmas season. All our lessons today are about gifts--from God, from the Magi. Gold, Frankincense, and Myrrh are clearly not the gifts you would bring to a baby. They must have been astounded at what they found, a baby in a stable, not a king in a palace. All that time of following a star, the arduous journey for this? Yet they didn’t seem to doubt and presented their gifts. What were these gifts?

These were wise men from the East. It is believed that they represented the great religions of the East: Zoroastrianism from Persia, Buddhism from Tibet, Hinduism from India, and perhaps there were others, such as Taoism from China. The gifts of the revelation of God in the great faiths of the East. What an amazing thing. The revelation of God had been going on ever since creation. It was only after Christianity became the religion of the empire that we had the hubris to believe we were the only ones to know God. Christianity had a new revelation, but it was not the first or only. There is one God who goes by many names. We can learn from one another. What a gift to offer the Christ child. A gift he clearly embraced in his acceptance of love of everyone, even those considered enemies by his culture.

I have been very intentional about Advent this year and have been amazed at the things I have seen that have been right in front of me for years, yet I didn’t notice. The gifts I have received this year were not wrapped in fancy paper and bows. My eyes and heart have been opened in new ways to see what Advent and Christmas have to offer. God’s love is present everywhere--thanks to the baby in the manger we can now recognize it, embrace it, and give thanks. I hope you, too have received unexpected and blessed gifts this Christmas season; that you can accept God’s amazing and forgiving love for you and all that God has created.

Blessed holidays

Jeanette Renouf