Message for an Epiphany Night of Sedition
[Sarah Drummond shared this message at Andover Newton Seminary at Yale Divinity School’s student-led Epiphany worship and prayer service January 6, 2021, hours after the storming of the US Capitol]
John 1:1–5
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
John 18: 33–38
Then Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus answered, “Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?” Pilate replied, “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?” Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” Pilate asked him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” Pilate asked him, “What is truth?”
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Seminary students all know that the story of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus comes to us through four different chronicles known as the Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Epiphany celebrates a story about Jesus’ birth we find in Matthew’s gospel, but it’s John’s gospel where we learn about Jesus and light.
First, we hear John’s abstract birth narrative, where Jesus is the light that shines in the darkness, and the darkness can’t overcome it. Later, not long before Jesus’ crucifixion, we learn that Jesus has come to testify to the truth. Truth, light: they’re one, and we celebrate their marriage on Epiphany.
A United Church of Christ congregation in Cambridge, MA celebrates Epiphany this way: families come to the 300-year-old, maze-like structure, comprised of a tiny meeting house and 20K square feet of additions from over the years, and they turn out all the lights. Members of the congregation light candles and flashlights and walk all around the church, bringing light into each space. The ritual serves as a metaphor: Jesus as light.
Learners do the same as they bring light into different corners of the catacombs of their minds. Graduate students in theology move from unknowing to knowing, sometimes gradually, sometimes all-of-a-sudden. Learning doesn’t always feel good, because the truth can hurt, but we believe that our search for truth pleases God.
Yale University’s motto is this: Lux et Veritas, light and truth. Harvard’s motto: Veritas. When I was a college student here, some wore tee shirts to The Game (Yale v. Harvard in football) that read, “Your veritas sux if it ain’t got that lux.” Sux was spelled with an x at the end, so it wasn’t a dirty word. The tee shirt was funny, the slogan profound: we need light and truth together.
When preparing to condemn Jesus, Pontius Pilate played politics. He knew Jesus was innocent of the claim that he was trying to overthrow the government, but Pilate was more interested in placating an angry mob than he was in the truth. He saw truth as something with a lower-case t that could be whatever a person of ambition wanted it to be. Jesus suggested that there’s an uppercase-t-Truth that he came to share. Pilate just couldn’t get his head around that idea.
We imperfect human beings don’t know the full, capital-T truth, but we were given glimpses of it through the good news Jesus shared. The Truth recognizes the dignity of all creation. The Truth is about awe and beauty. The Truth is love. We want to know it better, know it more fully, and live it. But even with our imperfect understandings, we can feel it when truth is violated, and when it is, we must stand firm. Dignity. Awe. Beauty. Love. That’s the Truth for which we stand.
And that’s why people go to seminary, and why they become ministers who help others find light and truth. Pastor to the Pilgrims John Robinson said to the religious refugees on whose ideas we built our school the following: “There is yet more light and truth to break forth from God’s word.” May the light of love help us to see that truth, and may that truth set us free.
