On the Christian Church Calendar in the Western half of the church, following the Christmas Season, is the Epiphany season. In the Western Christian churches, Epiphany begins with the Magi coming to see Jesus. The Eastern churches begin Epiphany with Jesus’ Baptism. The beginning of the Epiphany season is either celebrated on January 6 (Western and some Eastern churches) or January 19 (many Eastern churches).
The Epiphany season is considered connected to Christmas and Jesus’ birth. In fact, you might call it “seeing the Christmas miracle revealed.” Since Christmas celebrated God becoming man, or God taking on human flesh (fully God and fully man), Epiphany celebrates the revelation of this mystery. All the biblical texts that are assigned to be read in Epiphany show Jesus to be God’s only begotten son. Showing His miracles and even how they are greater than previous ones, the Bible readings testify and point to Jesus as the unique Son of God.
The two high points of the Epiphany season are Jesus’ Baptism and His Transfiguration. These events clearly show Jesus to be God’s Son for God the Father speaks in these texts. He tells those who hear that Jesus is His beloved Son and that they should listen to Him. The accent of Epiphany is on Jesus’ divinity. He is shown as true God, begotten of the Father, unlike the rest of humanity who have been created by God, not being of the same substance as God.
And yet the joy of Epiphany is that God actually comes down to us and dwells with us. We rejoiced in the Christmas miracle and we continue to rejoice and celebrate that God continues to reveal Himself to us. The revelation of who Jesus is and what He has come to do continues in Epiphany.
He attested as the Savior and Messiah at Christmas (Luke 2:11; Matthew 2:21) and is more fully revealed as God’s Son during Epiphany (Matthew 3:17; 17:5; Mark 1:11; 9:7; Luke 3:22; 9:35), which means He does indeed have the authority and power to do what He said He was sent to do: to earn for you a place in heaven with the Father.
In Epiphany, Christians rejoice that Jesus identified with us in our world because through His identifying with us, we are able to identify with Jesus. That is to say, that we are called what we were not previously called. We are called God’s Sons. Because Jesus took on our flesh, we are adopted into God’s family. We once were outside of His family but now we rejoice in being incorporated into His family. Mary rightly testified of God that He “exalted them of low degree” (Luke 1:52 KJV) and thus we celebrate that we are promised as God’s children to dwell with God the Father forever.
So, Epiphany reveals Jesus as truly and fully God hidden in true human flesh while at the same time celebrating our exaltation achieved and given freely to us by God’s Son come in the flesh for us. This year, the season of Epiphany stretches from January 6th to February 21st.
This article was originally published in the Davis County Clipper in Utah; it is printed here with permission of the authors, Rev. Jason Krause and Rev. Kurt Hering. Rev Hering is currently serving at Holy Baptism Lutheran Church in Ogden, UT