Sermon – Epiphany Sunday – April Karli
January 7th, 2020 | Josh Williams
On Epiphany Sunday, April Karli shared about the revelation that Jesus is for everyone. We considered the story of the three wise men through this text from Ephesians.
Ephesians 3:1-12
This is the reason that I Paul am a prisoner for Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles — 2 for surely you have already heard of the commission of God’s grace that was given me for you, 3 and how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I wrote above in a few words, 4 a reading of which will enable you to perceive my understanding of the mystery of Christ. 5 In former generations this mystery[b] was not made known to humankind, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit: 6 that is, the Gentiles have become fellow heirs, members of the same body, and sharers in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.
7 Of this gospel I have become a servant according to the gift of God’s grace that was given me by the working of his power. 8 Although I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given to me to bring to the Gentiles the news of the boundless riches of Christ, 9 and to make everyone see[c] what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in[d] God who created all things; 10 so that through the church the wisdom of God in its rich variety might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. 11 This was in accordance with the eternal purpose that he has carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord, 12 in whom we have access to God in boldness and confidence through faith in him.
Quotes from the sermon:
I don’t think we make enough of the Feast of the Epiphany. That could be because us Gentile Christians pretty much take our access to the faith for granted, as if Christianity was always a non-Jewish religion. We need to recover the extraordinary grace of God that threw open the doors to heaven, that rent the temple curtain in two, that called sheep from other pens and invited us into this one flock under our one shepherd. – Michael Frost
The truth is that mystics are those who really believe what the rest of us say we believe—that God is real, that God is mystery (that is, totally beyond our human comprehension), that God can be encountered in the depths of our being, and that our human lives can be radically oriented and responsive to the One who is always present with us. – Ruth Haley Barton
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