Audio file of 8:00am Holy Communion service, Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany
Click here to listen to an audio recording of the 8:00am service of Holy Communion at Christ Church on the Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany.
Day: February 6, 2022
Sermon for the Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany
“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom”
We don’t hear these readings very often. Epiphany season varies in its length along with the Trinity season. The readings for the Fifth and Sixth Sundays after Epiphany do double duty. They were appointed by John Cosin in the 17th century for both these Sundays after Epiphany and for the Twenty-fifth and Twenty-sixth Sundays after Trinity in those years when the date of Easter is early, resulting in the shortening of the Epiphany season and the lengthening of the Trinity season. Cosin’s choices reveal a profound understanding of the logic of the eucharistic readings throughout the course of the church year and, especially, about the connection between the Epiphany season and Trinity season.
One of the benefits of the suspension of services over the past several weeks – over Christmas in its entirety and most of the Epiphany season – has been the opportunity to consider not just the eucharistic readings (Epistles and Gospels) but the readings for Matins. For the last three Sundays we have been reading from the Book of Amos and from John’s Gospel. Such readings contribute to a deeper appreciation of the doctrinal and devotional aspects of the Epiphany season. Accordingly, I want to make reference this morning to the Matins readings along with the eucharistic propers.
This Sunday marks the end of the Epiphany season this year. It ends, we might say, with the sunset blaze of the light of Candlemas, on the one hand, and with a note of reflective judgment, on the other hand. Candlemas marks the transition from the Christmas cycle to the Easter cycle. It belongs both to Epiphany and to the pre-Lenten and Lenten journey of our souls. Such coincidences are providentially wonderful and soul-enriching..
Epiphany season is about the making known of God and about what God wants for us. It centers on the idea of revelation, that there are things God wants us to know and which are revealed to us. That says much about the truth and the dignity of our humanity and about the truth and the mystery of God. God makes himself known to us so that his life can live and move in us. This is Paul’s point: “let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom”. In a way, it is a kind of summary of the Epiphany teaching.
Week at a Glance, 7 – 13 February
Sunday, February 13th, Septuagesima
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion, followed by Annual Parish Meeting
Upcoming Event:
Tuesday, February 15th
7:00pm Christ Church Book Club: Alistair McGrath’s The Reenchantment of Nature: The Denial of Religion and the Ecological Crisis (2002) & Peter Harrison’s The Territories of Science and Religion (2015).
Services to be held in the Parish Hall, January through March.
The Fifth Sunday After The Epiphany
The collect for today, the Fifth Sunday after The Epiphany, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):
O LORD, we beseech thee to keep thy Church and household continually in thy true religion; that they who do lean only upon the hope of thy heavenly grace may evermore be defended by thy mighty power; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
The Epistle: Colossians 3:12-17
The Gospel: St. Matthew 13:24-30
Artwork: Pedro Orrente, Parable of the Tares, first half of 17th century. Oil on canvas, Prado, Madrid.