Growing in Wisdom and Favor

In 1106 Hildebert and Mechthilde of Bingen gave their eight year-old daughter Hildegard to the church. Hildegard was their tenth child, and her parents gave her as a tithe to the Benedictine community at Disibodenberg, near present day Mainz in Germany. Little is known of Hildegard’s life between then and 1136, although she seems to have been something of a prodigy in the religious life. Unlike most children of her time, she grew and developed within a small closed circle. Indeed, in her first years at Disibodenberg, she was literally “enclosed” with an older nun, Jutta, and interacted with very few people. Later she related that the vivid visions of God that she had throughout her life began during those early years. As she came of age under the Benedictine rule, Hildegard learned how to read and write and studied Scripture and theology. She also learned to play and compose music. In 1136, at the age of thirty-eight, she was named a magistra, a “teacher” of the church, and became prioress of a new Benedictine community.

Hildegard lived until 1179. As an adult, she founded other communities, lobbied princes and senior prelates, including popes, in support of her communities, counseled abbots and abbesses, and travelled widely in Europe. She composed music that is still sung today, invented an alternative alphabet, and wrote three books of her visions, a drama, and a treatise on the physical sciences, all while leading the various communities that she had founded. When she died at the age of eighty-one, Hildegard was one of the best known women in central Europe.

Today’s gospel story suggests that Jesus may also have been something of a religious prodigy, and that Hildegard and he shared similar early experiences. Curiously, Luke is the only one to tell us anything of Jesus’ “hidden years,” the years between his birth, which we celebrated on Christmas Eve, and his baptism at about the age of thirty, which we will celebrate next week. As he relates Jesus’ first spoken words in the gospels, Luke clearly suggests that there is something different about this twelve year-old boy. He can engage in theological debate with religious scholars and impress them. He understands that his true father is not Joseph but God. Most important, he senses, even at this young age, what his true calling is, as he reminds his parents that, “I must be in my Father’s house.”

However, in Luke’s narrative, Jesus is still clearly an adolescent boy. Unlike the other evangelists, Luke emphasizes Jesus’ humanity. Throughout his narrative, Luke wants his readers to understand that Jesus may be the Word made flesh, but he is also fully human. Although he is aware of his calling, Jesus here is also a surly adolescent who causes his parents great anxiety and then arrogantly chides them when they express that anxiety. However, having made his point, Jesus then becomes obedient to his human parents, even if they don’t understand who he is or what his calling might be. To ready himself for his public ministry as an adult, he returns to Nazareth to continue growing. As with Hildegard, none of the evangelists tells us what else happened during these “hidden years,” except that, like Hildegard, Jesus “grew in wisdom and years, and in divine and human favor.”

So what lessons do we take from the life of Hildegard of Bingen and the gospel lesson for today? The first lesson is obvious to all parents and to all who look seriously at their own lives: growth takes time. Hildegard spent thirty years, from eight to thirty-eight, living in the convent at Disibodenberg. Jesus also went through childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood in Nazareth. At least eighteen years elapsed between the time of the story we just heard and the time that Jesus was baptized and began his public ministry, years during which he presumably continued to study Torah, perhaps learned Joseph’s trade of carpentry, and observed his family and friends.

Growth takes time, even if you’re Jesus or Hildegard. Sometimes we want to skip the long phase of growing. Don’t we all know children who are twelve going on twenty? Or we think we have to be fully formed spiritually from the get go. When the priest pours the water on our heads, or the bishop lays on hands, we will understand every sentence of the Nicene Creed! When we learn a new spiritual discipline, we want to do it perfectly right away. When we try a new ministry, we want to get it right immediately. But God is not in a hurry. Instead, God works with us patiently, training us and helping us as we continue to grow. Often God works within us secretly, and we discover that the growth that we long for has actually somehow happened. Indeed, some spiritual writers even suggest that, if we knew God were at work in us, transforming and changing us, we would resist God or try to control the process!

Here’s the second lesson: sometimes in order to grow we have to submit ourselves to our inferiors, or to people who don’t really understand us. Hildegard’s first caretaker Jutta had nowhere near Hildegard’s spiritual abilities, yet she was an able teacher for the little Hildegard. Later, Hildegard was subject to the discipline and teaching of the other nuns, abbots, and prelates. Jesus too was subject to his parents, even though they didn’t understand who their son truly was. Yet, they were able to see that he studied Torah and had the skills necessary for his adult ministry.

All of us, of course, were subject to our own parents, even though they often didn’t understand us, and even though some of us did not become the people they expected us to become. Often we find that we must obey employers, spouses, coaches, military commanders, spiritual directors, and others. Read sometime Mark Twain’s Life on the Mississippi, for a delightful account of Twain’s training as a river boat pilot, and all he had to endure under the various pilots under whom he served. We may feel that those to whom we are subject are not our spiritual, moral, or intellectual equals. Yet unless we experience physical or psychological abuse, we may have much to learn from those who have authority over us.

The third lesson: we need God’s grace. Throughout her life, Hildegard knew herself to be deeply dependent on God’s grace. Although the gospels do not always say so explicitly, Jesus too knew himself to be dependent on God’s grace. We are not alone. We can prepare the way for God’s leading and God’s deepening influence in our lives, but we cannot manufacture growth – any more than a child or a tree can cause itself to grow. Without God we can do virtually nothing; with God we can grow and develop beyond what we might expect or even imagine.

And finally: our growth is always for a purpose. Ultimately, any growth and development for good that we experience, any growth that is led by God, fits us to be stronger partners in God’s mission, in bringing God’s reign closer. Hildegard grew during her “hidden years” and became a great foundress, counselor, theologian, musician, and artist. The church is still benefiting from her legacy. Jesus grew into his public ministry and all that that ministry entailed. He could not stay in the Temple but was eventually sent by God into the world to announce the nearness of God’s reign and to demonstrate in the flesh what God’s reign looks like.

We too are meant to grow into our own ministries. That’s really what Christian formation is all about. Just as almost all of us have continued to mature since we left our parents’ houses, so too are we called to continue to grow in our Christian lives. We are called both to deepen our relationship with God and, through our relationship with God, to be better equipped to minister to others, both inside the church and outside the church, both individually and corporately. How are we doing? Are we growing and maturing as individuals? As a parish? What has God been fitting us to do?

It is a new secular year, and a relatively new church year. Instead of your usual new year’s resolutions, I invite you to take some time to sit with these questions. How do you envision God helping you to grow this year? What do you ask of God to help you as you grow in a new year? What would you like God to teach you?

“I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ … may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him, so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance among the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power for those who believe.” Living and growing in Disibodenberg, Hildegard would have studied these words from Paul’s letter to the Ephesian Christians. As she took these words to heart and grew as God’s servant, may we too be ready to grow in our ability and desire to follow where God leads us.

Seekers

I’ll never forget that day as long as I live. It was a long time ago, but I can still remember it all: the journey, Herod, the house, the child. There are days when I still can’t believe we really did it, really actually saw the child, especially since we had such a hard time finding him. But it was all worth it. My life has never been the same since. I’d do it all again in a heartbeat.

We were astrologers. Well, I was really an apprentice, but I was far enough along that my master slipped me into the travelling party. We lived in Persepolis, in the eastern part of the Persian Empire. We were Zoroastrians at that time. As astrologers, we diligently studied the skies. We read all the old treatises and knew exactly where all the stars, comets, and galaxies were. We knew how the Sumerians, the Greeks, and the Buddhists had mapped out the constellations. About that time, we’d had some inkling that some kind of shift or transformation was about to take place in the cosmos, but no one was sure what it was, or how we would know that it had happened.

One night my master came running in from the observation room. “The House of the Jews,” he shouted, “It’s in the house of the Jews!” “What is, master?” I asked. “It’s a star I’ve never seen before in that constellation,” he shouted. “Call the others!” After the others had studied the House of the Jews, they tentatively agreed that there seemed to be a new star there. None of them could say for sure the meaning of such a sign. My master, though, was sure that this star was the sign of the transformation we had been expecting. He said, “I feel a stirring, deep down. Some of us most go to Jerusalem, to the center of the land of the Jews and find out what this star means.” Most of the others looked at my master doubtfully. Jerusalem? Travel a thousand miles just because you think you see a new star?

My master was determined. He doggedly pursued his friends, and finally a few other astrologers agreed to go with him. They had to raise funds for the trip. They had to buy the provisions and equipment. They had to arrange for the camels and the camel drivers. My master had to get a letter of introduction to the government in Jerusalem. Finally, we were able to leave Persepolis. It should have taken us about two months to get to Jerusalem. Even though my master had maps, we got lost several times. Some of the roads were washed out. The camels got sick, and one even died. And the camel drivers demanded that we spend longer than just one night whenever we stopped at a caravanserai. And, of course, none of us knew exactly where we were going. My master had figured out that we were looking for “the king of the Jews,” but he had no idea where this king might actually be.

At last we reached Jerusalem. We took our letters of introduction to Herod’s palace. We knew that Herod was an evil king – people said he had actually murdered members of his own family – but we asked for an audience with him anyway. My master asked him point blank, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews?” Herod and his courtiers went white. Herod actually trembled. Then he called for his priestly advisors. His voice shook as he asked them what Scripture had foretold about the birth of the Messiah. “Bethlehem,” they said, “the Messiah is to be born in Bethlehem.” With that, Herod sent us on our way, reminding us to come back and let him know where this child was, so that he too could worship him. I was skeptical. Herod had called himself the “king of the Jews.” Would he really let someone else, even a child, usurp his power?

Although Bethlehem was only six miles away from Herod’s palace, again we got lost. We couldn’t find the right gate out of the city. When we got to Bethlehem we wandered around for a while. Then we reached a small house on the street of the carpenters. “This is it!” my master shouted. “Are you sure?” the others said. “This little house? We thought we were looking for another king.” My master gingerly knocked. I held my breath. A man ushered us in. And there he was, the most beautiful child I had ever seen, a toddler, maybe eighteen months old or so, sitting on his mother’s lap. Seeing us, he leapt up and ran to us. He laughed and crowed and opened his arms to welcome us. We were awe-struck. For several minutes we couldn’t do anything but kneel there gazing at him. Then he laughed some more. We unfroze and began to unpack our bags and pull out the gifts we had carefully carried all the way from Persepolis, gold, incense and myrrh. Even now, I wonder how my master actually found the child. I wonder if the child knew who we were. The gifts we had brought were what one would bring to a new king, but I wonder what his mother thought when she saw them.

We found a place to stay for a few days. Then we knew it was time to go back. The night before we were to leave my master had a dream. “We’re not going back to Herod,” he said, “that old fox is up to no good.” My master consulted his maps and figured out how to get back to Persia without going through Jerusalem. Later, I shuddered as I heard that Herod, instead of worshipping the holy child, had ordered his soldiers to kill all the boys in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or younger. “Don’t worry,” said my master. “Herod didn’t find him. His parents had already taken him to safety in Egypt.”

I’m an old man now. I have children, grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren. They are all wonderful people. But something about that child made him more wonderful than any other child I’ve ever known. And my life changed forever the day I saw him. I knew myself as loved and accepted by God in a way I had never known before. I knew that the covenant God had made with the Jews now included all people, even us Zoroastrians. How grateful I am that my master saw that miraculous sign and persuaded us all to join him on that wondrous journey.

Only Matthew tells us this story. And what a wonderful story it is. How can it be that foreigners, people from Iran, a country from which the U.S. is currently estranged, were the first to sense the true identity of the holy child? Could it be that God’s revelations sometimes come to outsiders, not only to faithful Christians or Jews? Is it possible that God’s revelations even come to our enemies or to those we think undeserving of God’s love? How could it be that the Persian astrologers were led not by Scripture, but by a celestial phenomenon? Could it be that God speaks through the non-human world as well as through the human world? Could it be that birds and fish and bears and deer, even our own companion animals, reveal something to us of God? And how could it be that God spoke to the astrologers through dreams? Could God be speaking to us too through our dreams, through our hopes, wishes, fears, and joys?

How could it be that the astrologers trusted God to lead them back home by an alternate route? As 2015 begins, many of us are not where we thought we might be. Perhaps unexpected changes have occurred in our families, in our health, and in our relationships. Perhaps someone has lost a loved one or been forced to change living arrangements. Perhaps good things have happened. Perhaps we’ve changed jobs, joined a new church community, or taken on new roles. Perhaps we have a deeper sense of God’s love for us. At the very least, by virtue of being a year older, we are travelling by a different road than we travelled last year. Even so, like the Persian astrologers we too can trust God to continue to reveal Godself to us and to lead us on the challenging alternate roads of our lives.

Laura Sumner Truax reminds us that, “The Magi are traveling companions for us in our information-rich age and especially good for us to emulate as we put one year to bed and once again hold out hope for the new one.”1 We may think we know where we are headed, but just as 2014 took many of us in new directions, so will 2015. And as we set forth, we may not have any better information than the astrologers. Even though we have diligently read the Bible, faithfully worshipped, and fervently prayed, we still may have only a dim sense of who God is and what God desires for us. We still may not know exactly where God is leading us. We still may get stuck or discouraged and wonder who can give us accurate directions. We still may encounter detours and alternate routes, even to return home. We still may have to endure losing companions along the way.

Here is the good news: God is with us. Wherever we are on our spiritual journey, beginner, wanderer, wonderer, or old soul, God is with us. God will lead us, sustain us, and bring us home. And we can be sure that, “all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.”

1. “Reflections on the Lectionary,” Christian Century, 130, 26, Dec. 25, 2013, p. 19.