The Revd Jenny Mills, United Reformed Church Secretary for Education and Learning, offers this journey-themed prayer to mark Epiphany.
A journey.
From the East.
Strangers,
travelling,
following a star….til it stopped.
Finding the unexpected.
And stopping,
to pay homage.
The rich
encountering the ordinary.
And bowing in praise.
Sensing that this
was something that
would change the world.
Because the people they met and the stories they heard
defied the odds.
They included
outcasts.
The poor.
The excluded.
The unexpected.
They had journeyed so far.
Having high hopes.
Bringing gifts for a King.
Yet they found a baby.
In a stable.
And it felt momentous.
And special.
And they paid their respects.
Then journeyed on.
Changed by what they had seen.
Affected by what they had experienced.
Sensing
something had shifted.
That the world order had been
turned upside down.
A new Way
of being
was heralded.
A new Way
of seeing the world.
A new Way
of encountering the Divine.
A new Way of living
and loving,
giving
and forgiving.
And being.
In reality the journey was just beginning…
Image: Inbal Malca/Unsplash