Sermon by The Very Rev. Chris Yaw†; based on Matthew 2:1-12
Trial lawyer Shawn Askanosie reached the pinnacle of his career early on, when the first case he tried was featured on a TV show called Dateline.
While he subsequently worked on several other high-profile cases, he eventually discovered that the law profession just wasn't right for him and didn't allow him to pursue what he was discovering as the north star of his soul, the values and ethics of his heart.
So, Shawn went on a trip to find himself.
He quit law and checked out a Trappist monastery, then a couple of odd jobs, before his heart led him to the world of... chocolate.
Shawn had always had a passion for chocolate, but now he studied how chocolate was made, from the trees, to the harvest, and on through production. What he saw was injustice, unfairness, and an opportunity to bring his heart convictions to an industry and to a product that he had fallen in love with.
Today, Askanosie Chocolates is considered the finest chocolate in the world, just Google it and read the reviews. And it's not just the chocolate that's appealing, it's the way Shawn has gone about structuring his company so that workers are fairly paid, land is respectfully cultivated, and chocolate is carefully produced. Shawn says he followed his North Star, put his values at the center, and what he finally discovered was fulfillment, purpose, love, and a life that more closely matched his gifts and convictions.
His star led him to put:
people over profit,
sharing over hoarding,
forgiveness over vengeance,
charity over selfishness.
This reminds you and me that there are many stars in the sky.
There's the Anxiety Star, anybody here ever follow that one?
There's the entertainment star
There's the fitness star
The travel star
The food star
The sleep star
The book star
The home improvement star
The Apathy Star...
Too many stars to name - all shining brightly and bidding us to follow them.
And the question is, which one are you following today?
What is your star?
And where is it guiding you?
The invitation of Epiphany is to follow the star that leads to Jesus - to hope, to courage, to gratitude, to faith that all will be well.
To follow that star is not easy.
The three kings remind us that following that star can be dangerous, inconvenient, uncomfortable, even lonely, as we trek across an unknown desert in faith, looking to find God.
When we follow that star, we more deeply connect with that inner voice, the goodness of our souls, the better angels around us. And because faith is not just about belief, but about action, we must not just believe, but do. We must follow and go where that voice of faith, hope, and love takes us.
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In the shadow of January 6th, and the one year anniversary of the scariest and most serious threat to democracy in a very long time, America needs to ask those questions of ourselves, our fellow citizens, and our government.
What are we following?
And where is it guiding us?
If you've been reading the papers like I have, and you have considered what experts are saying; that we are divided, we are split, perhaps hopelessly so, some people predict a civil war, others see the country splitting up into five smaller countries. There are dire predictions out there, from very smart people, about where we are going as a country.
Some of those eventualities may come to pass, we are best to consult political science experts - not clergy.
My job is to be your pastor and in this sermon not to offer up perfect solutions for saving our democracy or shiny bromides to assure you America will always overcome its challenges. My job to preach Jesus Christ and his values, to remind us that we all have responsibilities and commitments to our shared life as Christians and as Americans, and to point out, remind, and assure each one of us that no matter what happens, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Like most of you I believe that there can be no soft-pedaling of what happened on January 6th of last year and no absolution for those who planned, encouraged and aided the attempt to overthrow our democracy, and I agree with a Republican strategist named Karl Rove who wrote. “Love of country demands nothing less than calling to account those responsible for these despicable acts in accordance with our shared values as a nation - of justice, accountability, and the rule of law. That’s true patriotism.”
And I would hope that each one of us, as Americans, as those who put our faith into action, has observed and prayed diligently about our shared citizenship in this great country and the ways in which we are called to make things better. The call of Jesus is not one of isolation and individualism, but one of participation, and forming community around our shared values with those in our communities.
Standing up for our shared values of justice, fairness, equity, partnership amiddy differing opinions, these are values and hallmarks of our faith and our democracy.
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What Epiphany invites us to do is to shine a light on those shared values, and the deepest values of our hearts, looking to be motivated, encouraged, and propelled into the world by that which is deepest within us, pushing aside worldly temptations driven by fear, control, and a sense that God is not with us — and lifting up those values of love for ourselves, our neighbor - and even our enemies.
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In his January 6 sermon in Washington, D.C., Presiding Bishop Michael Curry said the Capitol Riot offered both peril and promise - and suggested we do three things in response:
First, that January 6th invites us to we renew our relationship with God.
This is about finding our star.
This is about following the star that leads us to God and God's values.
‘We must each find our path to connect with God' - our God of ‘love’ - whose call is the pursuit of peace and reconciliation.
We must look to Jesus Christ as our example and guide along the path of love.
Second, Bishop Curry reminds us that we need to revive our relationships with each other.
This is not about reaching out to friends with whom we agree, but with those with whom we disagree.
The late South African archbishop Desmond Tutu, a man whom both Fr. Steve and I knew personally - incidentally, he once showed his legendary humor to me when he autographed a book for my father’s birthday with the inscription— ‘Dear Jim, you have good genes.’
But Archbishop Tutu said this: “If you want peace, you don’t talk to your friend, you talk to your enemies.'
Jesus was very clear in instructing us that we are to love all people, pray for all people, especially those with whom we seriously disagree, never forgetting that the way we treat other people is the way we treat God.
There was a theologian in the last century named Martin Buber. He famously spoke about the ways you and I tend to relate to one another. Buber said we tend to treat people as either I-It or I-Thou, making the differentiation between the ways we can treat people as things, as impersonal, as simply means to an end - versus seeing people as sacred co-equal, partners in our shared job of living into our calling and making the world a better place.
We cannot stress enough the human element and it's important in making our lives and democracy work.
The truth is that there is no legislative solution, no military solution, no political solution to the deepest problem threatening American democracy, which is our profound lack of trust in the legitimacy of the opposition.
And while we may not be able to change our broken system, we need to safeguard, and to take care that are broken system does not change us.
Following our star means following Jesus, deciding not to follow all those other stars out there, especially those that lead to apathy, hopelessness, worry, and this sense that we are abandoned and that there is no hope.
Third, Bishop Curry encourages us to resurrect our commitment to the ideals we share.
"Flawed as he was, Thomas Jefferson gave voice to one of those ideals when he wrote in the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are all endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”"
Abraham Lincoln would go on to echo these words in his famous Gettysburg address, as we do every time we recite our pledge of allegiance.
I pledge allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America
And to the republic for which it stands
One nation, under God, indivisible
With liberty and justice for all
"We may and will disagree on many things.
We may and will strive and fail and wound one another and beg forgiveness along the way.
But we do have some ideals and values that we share.
One of those ideals, is our experiment in democracy itself, our representative form of government, based on the promise of liberty and justice for all, which itself is based on the hope that we may be one nation, even with our many differences."
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Speaking of Abraham Lincoln, when he took office at the start of the Civil War, he gathered his top generals, staff members, and military experts in his office in the White House to plan strategy.
Lincoln, a small town Illinois lawyer, was not trained in military strategy, though he had pored over numerous books he had checked out of the library, autodidact that he was.
And after calmly considering the advice and opinions of those gathered, he said to them, “Vicksburg is the key” - referring to the small but mighty Mississippi river town, which housed numerous rebels and was geographically located in an important place. “If we can just take Vicksburg, we can crack open the Confederacy, split up the enemy’s forces, and send them into a full retreat."
It was that Vicksburg conviction that served as Lincoln’s guiding principle, his North star, for the entire war - that’s how resources were allocated, Generals assigned, and goals set. Despite pushback from numerous sides, Lincoln held firm to his resolve. And whether it was the only strategy, or one of many that would have led to the final result, the Vicksburg conviction proved effective - the war was won for the North - and a milestone for the end of slavery was set.
The Vicksburg conviction was the guiding star that led the president away from war and closer to peace, truth, justice, and to a pinnacle moment in the freedom of slaves in our country.
So let me end with these questions, which we can contemplate as we listen to our musical meditation in just a moment.
What star are you following?
How single-minded are we following it?
Are we spending too much time following other stars?
How does our star invite us to think about ourselves, our community, in our country?
Amen.