As we begin a new year, we live in a world marked by rapid change, deep division, and widespread exhaustion. Many of us sense that something essential is being revealed—but we are not always sure what to do with what we see. This Epiphany series asks a simple but demanding question: What do we need to see more clearly now?
Take a close look at the image above. What do you see? Why was this image chosen for a series on epiphanies?
A figure stands alone in ruins—crumbling walls, peeling paint, debris scattered across the floor. The space feels abandoned, forgotten, and left to chaos and decay. But look closer. The figure isn’t looking at the destruction around them. They’re looking through it, toward an archway that frames brilliant light streaming in from beyond.
This is a threshold moment. Not the comfortable kind where you stand safely on one side deciding whether to cross. This is the kind where you’ve already stepped through—where the doorway behind you has closed, and the only way forward is toward that light ahead, even if you can’t yet see exactly where it leads.
That’s where we find ourselves as we begin 2026.
Over seven weeks, we will explore epiphanies that matter for this moment—epiphanies about limits, truth, neighbors, suffering, and responsibility. These are not abstract ideas. They are ways of seeing that shape how we live together, how we love, and how we act with integrity in the world God so loves.
In our tradition, the season of Epiphany begins with the Magi—outsiders to Israel’s faith, culture, and story. They were immigrants. Strangers who traveled far to encounter Jesus. While there, a dream warned them about King Herod’s true intentions, and they had to find another way home. They couldn’t return the way they came.
They returned to their country by another road, since God had warned them in a dream not to go back to Herod.
Matthew 2:12
Having seen what they’d seen, the old road was closed. They’d crossed a threshold. There was no going back.
Epiphany reminds us that God’s self-disclosure is rarely confined to familiar places or familiar people. And while thresholds are intended as two-way, for entering and exiting, the reality is that once we cross, we don’t return the same.
That’s the invitation of this series: to name what we’ve seen, to stand honestly in the ruins of what’s broken, and to keep our eyes fixed on the light ahead rather than exhausting ourselves trying to force our way back through doors that have closed behind us.
Epiphany is not about having all the answers. It is about learning to see—and then deciding how we will live in response.
Here is the outline of our series:
| Episode | Sunday | Title | Scripture |
|---|---|---|---|
| One | January 4 | Strangers | Matthew 2:1–12 |
| Two | January 11 | Limits | Mark 6:30-32 |
| Three | January 18 | Truth | John 8:31-32 |
| Four | January 25 | Neighbors | Luke 10:25-37 |
| Five | February 1 | Suffering | Matthew 2:16-18 |
| Six | February 8 | Responsibility | James 2:14-17 |
| Seven | February 15 | Transformation | Matthew 2:12 |
Each week we’ll explore these epiphanies alongside Nadia Bolz-Weber’s book Accidental Saints (see our Book Club article for details). Her raw, honest stories about encountering God in unexpected places will deepen our journey through this season.
Look again at that figure in the ruins, standing at the threshold, facing the light. That’s us. That’s where this series begins.
Join us starting January 4 as we ask together: What do we need to see more clearly now? And having seen it, how will we live?
We can’t go back to 2025. And who would want to given the chaos that unfolded across our nation. Likewise, we can’t unsee what we’ve already witnessed. The only question is: will we keep moving toward the light, or exhaust ourselves trying to force our way back through a door that’s already closed? This Epiphany, we choose the light. We choose to see clearly. And we choose to let that clarity change how we live.
The threshold is behind us. The journey begins January 4.
Please join us each Sunday at 10:30 a.m. We share our weekly episodes on Facebook and our YouTube channel, and go live at 10:30 a.m. You can find these links and more information about us, or join our live broadcast on our website, FlintAsburyChurch.org.
Pastor Tommy
Nadia Bolz-Weber. Accidental Saints: Finding God in All the Wrong People. NY: Convergent Books, 2015. (ISBN 978-1-60142-755-7 ).