The first time I heard the description “window treatment,” I thought of old wood frame windows. Quickly my ignorance was exposed and learned this was a eupemism used by Interior Decorators. Growing up our windows were treated with drapes. Big, heavy, thick drapes.
When we wanted to see who was at the door in those “home alone” moments, it was difficult to do so without those big, heavy, thick drapes being seen moving. The upside to those drapes – you could block out the daylight and avoid being awakened by the sun.
Tuesday was the Day of Epiphany in the Church Year. Beginning this Sunday each week until Lent will be referred to as the 1st (2nd, 3rd …) Sunday after the Epiphany. The reference to the visitation of the Magi to the young Jesus’ family and the subsequent illustrations where Jesus is declared to the “Son of God” comprise the kinds of “revealing moments” intended by Epiphany.
The revealing of Jesus, that is the Incarnation, in at least one sense, if not a major sense, intends to shatter our statements made about God. In other words, Jesus is the medium and the message of God to us. When we hope to talk about God and any way of living that would underscore what it means to follow Jesus, we must pass through Jesus and not make Jesus pass through us.
Carl Raschke writes,
As Christians we are called to reveal who Christ is – the truth of God made flesh in relation to us, the real Emmanuel, “God with us” – just as Christ revealed the Father. In every day and every way, the Christian life amounts to a radical relationality, a readiness to reveal who God is while “being Jesus” to others when the occasion arises. As Christians we are always Christs to one another. (Raschke, GloboChrist,p.118-119)
The ongoing “epiphany” of Jesus to the world comes when we pass through Jesus on the way to the world. Our “wish dreams” (Bonhoeffer, Life Together) become shattered by the life of Jesus. Only then do we find the living way of Jesus that compels others.
You could say, Jesus pulls the drapes back. No longer big, heavy, thick drapes. Exposing us to life in God, life with God and life for God, Jesus shed light on God. Now we can say what we say only as we cause what we say to pass through the life of Jesus. Better yet, we can now live by pressing the way we live through the life of Jesus.