Home By Another Way

"And being warned of God in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed into their own country another way." Matthew 2:12, King James Version.

Matthew 2:1-12 tells the story of the visit of the wise men from the East, who bring lavish gifts to the baby Jesus and kneel to worship and adore him. It is a wonderful story, one in which the limited amount of details have fueled and captivated our imaginations, the the church tells each Epiphany. (Or, in my opinion, should tell each Epiphany; our culture's collectively shortened attention span attempts to put the entire Christmas story into the weeks preceeding Christmas...and then be done with it. We collapse the stories of the shepherds, angels and wise men into one night's Children's paegent...but I'm starting to rant!)

The part of the story of the visitors that capture my imagination is the very end of the story. The visitors from the East, because they are warned in a dream to not return to Herod (who had plans of his own regarding the newborn Christ child) return home by "another way." For me, this notion of returning home by a different way is a metaphor for our spiritual journey. When we encounter Jesus and when we give him the best of ourselves, we are transformed and become different. We can't help but return home a different way - because we are different. Like the author of Second Corinthians claims, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! (2 Corinthians 5:17)."

Having encountered Christ once again, through the preparation of Advent and the celebration of the birth narratives at Christmas time, I wonder: how am I different? What different route am I going to return home by? I think there are times in my own life where I neglect and forget about the continuing and ongoing nature of the transformed life in Christ. I act as if the moment in which I have been made new was something that happened in the past. I am reminded that this new thing that God is doing in my life is something to be lived into.

The beginning of a new year is a time for many of us to take stock and review and intentionally reflect on ways we want the next 12 months to be different. Many of us make goals that involve eating less candy, exercising more, or get back to blogging more (okay, that one is for me, since this hasn't exactly been the weekly discipline I imagined it to be.). I have certainly done that in the past, and in fact, most years my list of "New Year's Resolutions" is identical. It's difficult to change habits and create something new.

Which means brings be back to this idea that God leads us home by a different way after an encounter with Jesus Christ. As I think about 2012 and the ways in which I hope (and yearn) to experience God's newness in my life, I find myself thinking about reconnecting with the basic disciplines of prayer, reading the bible, bible study with others, and worship. I do this things with some frequency (some better, more regularly than others I'll admit), but I want to approach them with a new spirit of openness to see what new thing God might be doing in/through/around me. I guess you could say that I am returning "home" trusting that God will lead me there by a new way.

I'll do my best to keep you posted.

Pastor John