The New Epiphany: Jan 6, 2021

 

Today is an ironic day. It's one year since the Capitol Siege. It's also Epiphany on the Christian calendar.

Epiphany is the day that we celebrate that God became human in the person of Jesus Christ to reveal his nature to all people. Many of the Jews expected their Messiah King to lead a violent revolt against the Roman authorities, thereby establishing an everlasting kingdom. Matthew tells us that Jesus is the King of the Jews, but not in the way they expected.

Instead of violent revolt and political domination, Jesus ruled by self-giving love. He taught his followers to do the same, to consider greatness only in terms of humble service to the poor, the weak, and the vulnerable. Jesus gained victory and power not by coercion or violence, but by the laying down of his life.

The irony is that one year ago a mob violently stormed the Capitol in order to bring about what they perceived to be justice / God's will in the name of Jesus, the same Jesus who refused to become an earthly king by violent and political means, the same Jesus whose kingdom is governed by the law of self-giving love and trust in the Father.

So today is marked by a new epiphany, the manifestation and incarnation of the false god of Christian nationalism. It's the revelation that the king of the Christian nationalist religion is not the Jesus who subverted all of our expectations, but rather a false Jesus who vies for political and cultural power by any means necessary. It's a false Jesus who takes all for himself, not the Jesus of the Gospels who gave himself for all.

May we remember our true King today and forsake all of the false images that have been raised up in his name.

---Garrett Struwe