“Fearfully and wonderfully made” 

            From our psalm this morning, we hear our psalmist praising God, saying:  “I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” (Psalm 139.14). I love this poetic image so much because it not only describes our origins and whose image we’re all ultimately made in, but the content of it -fearfully and wonderfully made:  there’s something about that which points towards the sublime in our human beings -there’s something ‘otherwordly’ about us that like God is a little terrifying and incredibly wondrous, giving us room to pause when we contemplate what this might mean for us as human beings and especially when we encounter one another and how we treat one another.

            Now we’re in the season of Epiphany.  This word epiphany, as you can probably imagine from plenty of my previous sermons, is of greek origins.  Epiphany means manifestation, revealing, or a striking appearance  where the experience often involves a sudden or striking realization into something deeper about say, a place, or a person, or something about reality itself. 

            When I was studying German for one year at York University when I was a much younger man, something that struck me as quite wondrous, was the formal way that Austrians to this day, still greet one another, where instead of saying something like “guten tag,” meaning good day or hello, instead they say, “gruss Gott,” which literally means “to greet God,” and ore specifically to greet the image of God in one another.

            Now I found that striking and I continue to find this expression striking to this day, because how often in our lives, have we come across the right person or the right book or the right moment where seemingly out of the blue perfect strangers will come to have some way a profound affect on us, perhaps only coming into our lives for a short season, perhaps being a person who helps us out of a jam like when a stranger helps someone who’s got a flat tire along the side of the road, or helps us when we are lost.  But there are some strangers who will come into a lives for a lifetime, becoming say either lifetime friends or mentors existing with us in a lifetime relationship. 

            Because you know the more I think deeply about this strange truth about everyone that comes across our paths, it seems to me that in fact everyone of us can become an epiphany for others; where if it is true as our psalmist claims that we are all ultimately made in the image of God, then every single one of us is actually a piece of the knowledge of God and that every single human being that comes across our path has the potential to share with us a piece of God in some way.

            Now I know if that sounds either a little “trippy” or maybe even a little “hokey” for some of you, I’d like to humbly suggest that this little piece of revelation comes to us in all our lectionary readings for today.  From not only our first reading, where we hear how the young boy Samuel receives a message from God to share with the old man Eli, and Eli helps Samuel to make sense of that message; but it’s also in our epistle lesson for today from 1 Corinthians, where St. Paul presents the body image to the Corinthian community explaining to them that they are all interconnected as one body sharing the same one spirit with each of their bodies being a temple of the Holy Spirit.

            But also this understanding of how each of us can become an epiphany for others is made explicit in our gospel reading for today where its author John reveals a striking pattern for us to contemplate.

            Because did you notice how our gospel story begins.  There’s Jesus, and Jesus goes to Galilee and he “finds” Philip and he says “follow me”, which echoes exactly what Jesus says only a few verses earlier to Andrew, Peter’s brother.  Where similarly, Jesus finds Andrew, and tells him to follow me, and “come and see.”  Come and see who I am…  And then what does Philip do after Jesus finds him?  Philip copies this exact pattern by going in turn, to go and “find” Nathaniel and says to him, “We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth, [the messiah].” (John 1.45-46). So do you see how Philip is continuing this move that is initiated by Jesus or by God by coming to someone and telling them to “come and see” what I have found.  What I have discovered.  Something that is so incredible, so wondrous, for we have received an epiphany from God and now I am becoming in turn, this epiphany for you.

            But of course, what is Nathaniel’s response to the epiphany that Philip is sharing with him?  “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”  Notice that Nathaniel’s response represents the great temptation that can limit the horizon of our “seeing” -in Nathanael’s case in the epiphany that is being offered to him through someone else because of pre-conceived notions of how things are supposed to work.  Because in Nathaniel’s case like in a lot of people’s cases, everyone knew that the messiah was supposed to come from some place called Bethlehem.  Their scriptures clearly told them that.  The messiah wasn’t supposed to come from Nazareth, and his response oddly enough, is very revealing of how human beings can often say to one another, “can anything good come from that place, or from that person, or from that situation?”

            You know when I think about a lot of the world’s troubles today, I often hear Nathaniel’s retort to Philip, as very revealing when as human beings, we believe there is nothing good or nothing true that can come from what someone else is telling us or sharing with us.  In a way, it’s where we insist on keeping on our blinders and shutting up our eyes and ears to any possible revelations of meaning or truth to us because of our own agendas or pre-conceived notions about how things are.  It’s like when we see Russians and Ukrainians fighting each other, when both people share so much in common, common language, common cultural traditions, common history, as well as the common image both people are ultimately made in.  Or in the Holy Land, where we see jews and Palestinians hurting each other, even though they have shared the same space and history and land for so very long.

            Or it’s just every time when we see someone we don’t really like, and the moment they come into eye’s view, it’s like there’s this big sheet or cover that comes over us and we can not see anything good about them.  Can anything good come from this person?  And if we take up this position, this is when I believe we falter every time as human beings by cutting the other person off as a revelation, or an epiphany or a piece of God coming to us with something no matter how small to offer us.  For we all are one body, St. Paul says in our epistle lesson sharing in the one same common spirit coming from the same one common God in whose image all of us are fearfully and wondrously made.

            But then notice that Jesus does not condemn Nathaniel.  He does not chastise Nathaniel.  But just like the God whom our psalmist praises this morning by praising how this God knows me inside and out, “my body was not hidden from you while I was being made in secret…” (v.14) Jesus calls Nathanael by name, even though he’s a stranger to him, but Jesus knows him, he sees the good in him, “Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit,” (John 1.47)and when Nathanael is dumbfounded and asks Jesus, when did you get to know me, Jesus says to him, “I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you.” (John 1.48). Here is Nathanael’s eureka moment, here is where the stranger becomes the epiphany for him, here is where Nathanael confesses to Jesus, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God, you are the King of Israel.”

            Now traditionally, the season of Epiphany offers to us the revelation of who Jesus is and God’s presence in Jesus, but it’s also simultaneously true, that this epiphany is the revelation of who we are too in terms of our true and ultimate identities and who we are in each other.  Jesus tells Nathanael, “Very truly, I telly you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”  This is not an image of angels like little insects crawling all over Jesus, but in a nutshell is revealing to us where Jesus ultimately comes from, and descends from and through his death and resurrection will ultimately ascend to, and where each of us in term also come from and descend from, and will ultimately return to.

            This is the relationship of abiding that Jesus invites in us and invites each of us to see in each other.  You know one of the most beautiful things we do every Sunday as we gather here in worship is the way we end our worship.  And notice it’s not me, the priest giving the final benediction, but it’s all of us, singing “May the road rise up to meet you,” and in that time, what do we do, we turn and acknowledge one another.”  It’s something beautiful where what we’re doing is we’re acknowledging one another, we’re greeting the God or Spirit of God that we know dwells in each one of us, and it’s fitting that as one body, we bless one another. 

            The challenge for us, or the homework, if I could give you any, is to do what we do in here at that moment, out there, becoming for every one we meet an epiphany and like in the model and pattern that we see in our gospel story, to share with others what we have found or discovered, “follow me and come and see…”. This is how each one of us literally brings the revelation of who God is to others.  So Gruss Gott everyone.  In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.