The Christological Season of Epiphany

Happy Feast of Epiphany! The following is an excerpt from Fleming Rutledge’s new book, Epiphany: The Season of Glory, the latest installation in the IVP “Fullness of Time series“. This work won the Credo Magazine Imagination, Beauty, Liturgy book award in 2024. May we behold afresh “his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father” (John 1:14) in this season.

---

Many scholars have attempted to reconstruct the earliest years of the liturgical calendar. It is pleasing to imagine the leaders of the emerging Christian communities discussing the various portions of the Bible and attaching them to the various liturgical feasts and seasons, selecting which ones to use and how to place them in a sequence. Exactly how all of this was accomplished in the first four centuries is largely unrecoverable to historical method. The wonder is that still today, the liturgical calendar retains its power. The list of historical calamities over the centuries has been amplified by the extreme, indeed unprecedented, global threats of our own time in the third millennium, and yet the Word of God read in the sequence of the church seasons remains ever “living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword” (Hebrews 4:12). Whatever charges can be brought against the lectionary, it remains an extraordinary sword in the hands of the Church Militant.

We know for certain that the liturgical calendar began to take shape in the first four centuries AD, but it did not become embedded in all formal Christian worship until the sixteenth century. When the Protestant Reformation declared its independence from the Church of Rome, a large part of the Western church abandoned the calendar, along with a great many other accumulated traditions. Observation of the church seasons remained largely intact, however, in the Anglican Communion (including American Episcopalians), the Lutheran church, the Moravian church, and a few other smaller branches. In recent decades, there has been a phenomenal resurgence of interest in the other American “mainlines”—Methodists, Presbyterians, Congregationalists, the Reformed churches—and also in a surprising number of looser forms of Protestantism.

This somewhat unexpected development has shown that the calendar can be a powerful aid to growth in faith and service. The rhythm of the seasons, the repetition of the sequence year after year despite outward circumstances, the variety and richness of the Scripture readings, and, most of all, the story that the seasons tell in narrative progression throughout the year—all of this can be powerful for the nourishment of growth in grace. Thus we may say that the calendar is edifying—providing instruction, guidance, and inspiration for the upbuilding of the church.

But above all, the church year leads us to Jesus Christ. This will be the central focus of the pages that follow. The progression of seasons, when all is said and done, is designed so that the members of Christ’s body may participate even now in his eternal life by rejoicing in his living presence, following him in our various vocations, enacting his teachings in our ministries, knowing him as our Savior, and above all glorifying him as Lord. In our time, however, many of the very same mainline churches who show a new interest in the church seasons have grown weak in proclaiming Christ. It does not give me any pleasure to note this. Jesus of Nazareth is revered as a teacher and moral exemplar, not infrequently side by side with various other religious figures, but the apostolic message about the unique identity and destiny of the Messiah (Christos) has become attenuated. As for the so-called evangelical, conservative, or right-wing churches, they have often allowed Jesus to become a repository of various grievances, so that the invocation of his name at political rallies has become commonplace. When something or someone less than God in Jesus Christ is evoked in worship, the central focus of the apostolic message is obscured, if not negated outright.

The good news that the Scriptures proclaim will not thrive in this theological crisis. Serious attention paid to the themes of the season following the Feast of the Epiphany, in particular, can be a strong antidote to a weak Christology. To be sure, all of the church calendar is formed around Jesus, but there is a sense in which Epiphany is the most specifically christological season. The lectionary readings for Epiphany are chosen and arranged in an order designed to glorify him. When the season is preached and taught with this in mind, there can be no doubt—for those who have ears to hear—as to who Jesus is and what he has been born to accomplish. As we shall see, there are particular events from Christ’s life that have been part of Epiphany for two millennia—events that specifically elevate him as Savior and Lord.

Because of this, the season needs to be brought into the foreground along with Christmas. If the season of Epiphany were to be strongly presented as a central, cohesive narrative during the winter months by clergy, teachers, and other leaders, it would make a powerful impression. Lent gets more attention, and for good reason, but Epiphany can excel in theological and narrative power if it is forcefully shaped, preached, and taught. If those who shape worship in local congregations took seriously the opportunity to manifest the identity, mission, and, yes, the glory of Christ as Epiphany unfolds, it could be a transformative season of growth in faith. It is not for nothing that the season has been associated with mission and growth—with the spread of the gospel (much more of that later).

The season of Epiphany always begins on January 6 (the Feast of the Epiphany) and extends until Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. Ash Wednesday’s date is determined by the date of Easter, so Epiphany is much shorter in some years than in others. This may have something to do with its comparative neglect in the church. Despite its beauty and depth, it is arguably the least understood and least appreciated of all the seasons. We know Advent, or think we do, because it comes just before Christmas—a fact which, for better and worse, has shaped the season. We know that Lent means the cross, and Easter means the empty tomb. Pentecost means the descent of the Spirit. Epiphany means . . . what, exactly?

Epiphaneia in New Testament Greek means manifestation. An effective method of teaching the content of the faith, not often enough used, is to instruct congregations in the texts of the seasonal hymns. This can be easily done by calling attention to the words being sung in the service of worship. One of the Epiphany hymns, “Songs of Thankfulness and Praise,” which briefly summarizes the trajectory of the season, repeats the word “manifest” a number of times, so as to make clear its significance. This hymn text displays the major biblical passages associated with Epiphany in narrative order. It remarkably sets out the Epiphany sequence in order of its special themes:

Manifest at Jordan’s stream,
Prophet, Priest, and King supreme;
And at Cana, wedding guest,
In thy Godhead manifest;
Manifest in pow’r divine,
Changing water into wine;
Praises be to thee addressed,
God in flesh made manifest.
Manifest in making whole
Palsied limbs and fainting soul;
Manifest in valiant fight,
Quelling all the devil’s might;
Manifest in gracious will,
Ever bringing good from ill;
Praises be to thee addressed,
God in flesh made manifest.

Following this striking summary, the Episcopal hymnal inserts a verse by the noted clergyman F. Bland Tucker, in order to complete the sequence with the climactic scene of the transfiguration:

Manifest on mountain height
Shining in resplendent light,
Where disciples filled with awe
Thy transfigured glory saw.
When from there thou leddest them
Steadfast to Jerusalem;
Cross and Easter Day attest,
God in man made manifest.

Each of these references in the hymn refers to passages in Scripture that “manifest” the identity of Jesus as God in human form. They are “epiphanies”—events of revelation not available to human beings without an act of God. This is important, because in biblical faith, knowledge of the true God is not attainable by human effort. We cannot summon up the presence of the living Jesus by efforts of our own, however “spiritual”; his presence is his to give. Any manifestation that reveals Jesus’ true identity occurs because the power of God is at work upon the eyes, ears, and hearts of the recipients. The unfolding of the Epiphany season is therefore a record of God’s definitive and unique actions in the One who has been born in Bethlehem.

We may therefore note that the familiar Christmas hymn of Charles Wesley, “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing,” sets out in one verse a capsule of Nicene doctrine:

Christ, by highest heaven adored,
Christ, the everlasting Lord . . .
veiled in flesh the Godhead see;
hail th’incarnate Deity,
pleased with us in flesh to dwell,
Jesus, our Emmanuel.

The fulness of the incarnation that has taken place will be manifested in various ways during the Epiphany season—and climactically in Lent and Easter soon to follow. The themes of Epiphany can be powerfully preached and taught for the health and growth of the church. They are revelatory themes, suitable to the overall motif of manifestation or showing forth—the basic definition of epiphaneiain New Testament Greek. What exactly is it that is shown forth? We shall see as the biblical witness unfolds.

*Taken from Epiphany by Fleming Rutledge. ©2023 by Fleming Rutledge. Used by permission of InterVarsity Press. www.ivpress.com.

Image Credit: H. Siddons Mowbray, The Magi, ca. 1915