A NINE MILE DETOUR
A Meditation by the Rev. Dr. James G. Kirk
Harundale Presbyterian Church
Text: “a ruler who is to shepherd my people Israel.” (Matthew 2:6)
First Reading: Isaiah 60:1-6
Second Reading: Ephesians 3:1-12
Link what we’ve just heard read to the current situation in Afghanistan and it’s very easy to hear what the Israelites heard back in 580 B.C.E. They had just returned to Jerusalem from a long exile in Iraq. A poet in their midst wrote how they would rebuild their cities, chief among them would be Jerusalem. “Arise, shine; for your light has come.” Their light had come. It would be similar to when the Taliban left Kabul. Throughout the Taliban rule the people had not been allowed to listen to radio. They could not play their music. The men were not allowed to shave their beards and the women had to be covered from head to toe.
Suddenly, the Taliban were gone. The first sound the people heard was music wafting through the air. You remember when I went to India, my suitcase didn’t make the connecting flight to Bombay and I never saw it until I was ready to board the plane in New Delhi for the flight home. For two weeks I lived in the clothes on my back. How pleasant it was to open my suitcase, take out clean underwear and a change of clothes! Just to feel the clean clothes on my body. We don’t realize how we take so much for granted until it is taken away from us. How sweet the sound of music must have been to the Kabul people; how freeing it was for the men to shave their beards and the women to dare to think about life outside the veil. It would be similar to what we hear in Isaiah, “Lift up your eyes and look around.”
As the poet continues we begin to get the connection to our story in Matthew. We hear how the trade routes will be opened with Arabia and there shall come to Jerusalem great wealth as the nation rebuilds, “They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall proclaim the praise of the Lord.” Walter Brueggemann, a professor of Old Testament at Columbia Theological Seminary, writes how the wise men surely would have known about Isaiah 60. “They know they are to go to Jerusalem and to take rare spices, gold and frankincense and myrrh. Most important, they know that they will find the new king of all peace and prosperity. But when Herod (the current king in Jerusalem) hears of these plans, he is frightened. A new king is a threat to the old king and the old order.” (“Off by nine miles,” The Christian Century, December 19-26, 2001. Page 15)
So, the frightened King Herod summons his court analysts and advisors and asks them about this new Messiah and what course of action he should follow. They, being quite shrewd and wise about such matters, especially when it comes to pleasing the King, set him on a divergent course of action. They tell him to forget about the predictions in Isaiah 60 and think instead of the forecast in Micah 5:2. “But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah, who are one of the little clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to rule in Israel, whose origin is from of old, from ancient days.” What that does is take the pressure off both the King and Jerusalem and detours the Wise Men nine miles down the road to Bethlehem, which is, of course, exactly what they do. That nine-mile detour sets the stage for a series of historical events that will have implications to this day.
That nine-mile detour also sets in motion a series of contrasts that may assist us as we enter this New Year. As Brueggemann writes, “The narrative of Epiphany is the story of these two human communities: Jerusalem with its great pretensions, and Bethlehem, with its modest promises. We can choose a ‘return to normalcy’ in a triumphalist mode, a life of self-sufficiency that contains within it its own seeds of destruction. Or we can choose an alternative that comes in innocence and a hope that confounds our usual pretensions. We can receive life given in vulnerability. It is amazing—the true accent of Epiphany—that the wise men do not resist this alternative but go on to the village. Rather than hesitate or resist, they reorganize themselves and their lives around a baby with no credentials.
“Our task is to let the vulnerability of Micah 2 disrupt the self-congratulation of Isaiah 60. Most of us are looking in the wrong place. We are off by nine miles. We are now invited to travel those hard, demanding miles away from self-sufficiency. Epiphany is a good time to take the journey, for September 11 reminds us of the shambles that can come through our excessive pretension. The way beyond is not about security and prosperity but about vulnerability, neighborliness, generosity, a modest future with spears turned into pruning hooks and swords into plowshares.” (Ibid. Page 15)
September took away our security and a good bit of our prosperity. What we do have left is our vulnerability, our neighborliness and our generosity. In some sense we share more than we probably realize with Afghanistan. Both of us have had our lives altered radically by the Taliban. We both face a New Year vulnerable to the ravages of war. But, the events of the past year give the United States an opportunity to show Afghanistan neighborliness that ten years ago was unthinkable. Many of us didn’t even know where Kabul or Khandahar were, let alone care. Now we have family members stationed there. As the Wise Men teach us we can learn a great deal from Afghanistan just as they learned a great deal from Bethlehem. Also, our generosity will go a long way towards helping them as a people to rebuild their country with dignity.
Brueggemann concludes, “The wise men, and the eager nations ready for an alternative, made the trip. It would be ironic if the ‘outsiders’ among us made that move and we who are God’s own people resisted. Imagine a nine-mile trip…and a very different way home!” Perhaps a nine-mile detour would be a good thing!