Refuge and Retreat - Third Sunday after Epiphany
Author: Pastor Scott Schul
January 25, 2026
Linda and I recently returned from
a tour of Egypt, along with about fifty pastors, spouses, and Lutheran teaching
theologians from across the US. I had
always thought of Egypt as a land of pyramids, pharaohs, and sandy
deserts. And indeed we saw plenty of
those things. But I learned that Egypt
has a central role in the Bible as a place of formation, transformation,
renewal, and preparation for mission and ministry.
Let me give you a few
examples. The first is Joseph, he of the
coat of many colors. His journey into
Egypt began because of his brothers’ jealousy. It was an exile into slavery aimed at eliminating him. But God used Egypt to form, transform, and
renew Joseph, so he could be prepared as a great leader who would save his
people from starvation.
Another example is Moses. When he was a baby, his mother set him adrift
in a papyrus basket so he could escape execution and be found and raised by
Pharaoh’s daughter. Moses was reared as
an Egyptian but eventually embraced his Hebrew heritage, which set in motion a
series of events that included a conversation with God through a burning bush
in the Egyptian desert. That encounter propelled
Moses to leadership of his people and a long trek that would carry them to the
promised land of Israel.
And then there’s Jesus. He too had an Egypt connection. That’s where his family fled in order to
escape the massacre of children in Bethlehem that Herod ordered shortly after
Jesus’s birth. Twenty-five sites in Egypt claim a connection
to the Holy Family. I saw one in Cairo;
it’s a cave where it’s believed Jesus, Mary, and Joseph lived for about three
months of the roughly three and a half years they hid from Herod in Egypt.
Imagine how important Egypt was in
the development of Jesus as a young child. It’s the place where he said his first words, the place where he took
his first steps, and the likely place where his parents first taught him the
prayers and piety of his Jewish tradition. We all know how formative those early years of childhood are. Jesus would of course become the savior of
all humanity. But everything in his life
and death that would unfold in Galilee and Jerusalem had its initial foundation
in Egypt.
Friends, what was true for Joseph,
Moses, and Jesus is true for us. Throughout
our lives we all need places of refuge and retreat. We need a “spiritual Egypt” where we can
catch our breath, recenter our souls, reprioritize our lives, and be emptied
out so God can refill us. These are the
places where God forms, transforms, renews, and prepares us for whatever God’s
call to us might be. Of course you don’t
have to literally travel to Egypt or any other far-flung location to find that
place. It can be in your own community,
even your own home. The challenge isn’t
finding the place; it’s making the commitment to carve out that time.
Jesus sets the example. Throughout his life, he regularly retreated
from the stresses and burdens of the world. The first verse of today’s Gospel highlights one such time. When Jesus heard that his cousin John the
Baptist had been arrested, Jesus withdrew to Galilee. This wasn’t some panic-stricken dash to
safety. It was a calculated step back so
Jesus might have space to mourn John’s circumstances and prepare for all that
was poised to unfold in his own mortal ministry. And it followed an even earlier withdrawal
Jesus had made, one chapter earlier in Matthew’s Gospel, when the Spirit led him
into the wilderness for forty days of testing. We’ll hear more about that in Lent. Both of those withdrawals were crucial times of formation,
transformation, renewal, and preparation for Jesus.
But let’s be clear. These seasons of retreat are not ends in
themselves. They are moments of
transition where physical, mental, and especially spiritual energy build so we can
be formed, fortified, and propelled forward as agents of God’s will and
blessing in the world. Jesus clearly and
unambiguously shows us what this looks like. Right after his time in the wilderness and then his withdrawal into
Galilee, he did not remain in hiding or go to ground, never to emerge again.
On the contrary. His ministry rocketed forward. As we heard in today’s Gospel, he assembled
his inner circle of disciples as he called Peter, Andrew, James, and John. Jesus then traveled throughout the Galilee
region, publicly teaching in the synagogues and curing every disease and
sickness. Suddenly the obscure Nazarene,
the carpenter’s son from a backwater town, was drawing massive crowds
throughout Syria, all throughout Israel, from Galilee in the north to Jerusalem
in the south, and everywhere in between. The Son of God was now center stage.
Looking ahead in Matthew’s Gospel,
Jesus’s ministry would take yet another huge leap forward as, over chapters
five, six, and seven, he offered a lengthy and substantive body of teaching. It includes one his most beloved lessons, the
Beatitudes, which provides insight into the life of discipleship and glorious
assurances concerning the pervasive presence of God, even in the most
challenging circumstances of life. That
body of teaching in chapters five through seven also includes instruction on
Chrisitan morality and conduct, proclamations from Jesus concerning his divine
nature, and his definitive teaching on how to pray, something we of course know
as our Lord’s Prayer. All these facets
of Jesus’s ministry suddenly and spectacularly erupted like a geyser. It’s no coincidence that they were preceded
by seasons of refuge and retreat.
Now friends, let’s apply this
sacred insight to our own lives. Just
like Joseph, Moses, and even Jesus, God has called each of us to a ministry in
this world. That ministry may look quite
different from theirs, but it’s a ministry nonetheless, a call issued to us at
the time of our baptism. The world needs
the work of our hands and the witness of our hearts. But to fulfill the call to ministry and
service that we all have, we must be formed and prepared. That’s not work we can do for ourselves. In today’s Gospel, Jesus doesn’t simply tell
his new disciples to fish for people. He
says, “I will make you fishers of people.” Only Jesus can form and equip them to fulfill
their call. The same is true for
us. But how does that happen?
There are a range of answers to
that question, but within the limitations of our time this morning, let’s focus
on the most important one of all. Make
Sunday worship your priority. Make a
commitment to yourself and to God to be here every Sunday that you can. After all, it is one of the Ten
Commandments. But it’s not merely an obligation. Sabbath and worship are gifts. More than anything else right now, we all need worship, prayer, and Holy Communion to nourish us, allow us to catch our
breath, recenter our souls, reprioritize our lives, and be emptied out so God
can refill us. Each of us need this hour,
this respite, so God can begin to form, transform, renew, and prepare us for
whatever God’s call to us might be.
Look, our world is a mess right
now, filled with soul-draining conflict. The 24-hour news cycle is grinding us down, and too often we are wearing
ourselves out trying to repair all the brokenness by ourselves, as if we alone
have the power to fix everything. We
can’t. But God can, and God
will. And God will do it by working
in, with, and through us. But for us to
be that force of goodness and mercy, we need to regularly find refuge and
retreat, and Sunday morning worship is the best place for that. But remember: part of the reason for this
respite is to prepare us for the next phase of our ministry. The carpenter’s son from Nazareth is tapping
all of us on the shoulder right now. And
he is saying, “Follow me.” Amen.
© 2026 Rev. Scott E. Schul, all rights reserved
Gospel
Text: Matthew 4:12-25
12 Now when Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to
Galilee. 13 He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by
the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, 14 so that
what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:
15 “Land
of Zebulun, land of Naphtali,
on the
road by the sea, across the Jordan, Galilee of the gentiles—
16 the
people who sat in darkness
have seen
a great light,
and for
those who sat in the region and shadow of death
light has
dawned.”
17 From that time
Jesus began to proclaim, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
18 As
he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called
Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea—for they were
fishers. 19 And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make
you fishers of people.” 20 Immediately they left their nets and
followed him. 21 As he went from there, he saw two other
brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John, in the boat with their
father Zebedee, mending their nets, and he called them. 22 Immediately
they left the boat and their father and followed him.
23 Jesus
went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the
good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the
people. 24 So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they
brought to him all the sick, those who were afflicted with various diseases and
pains, people possessed by demons or having epilepsy or afflicted with
paralysis, and he cured them. 25 And great crowds followed him
from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and from beyond the Jordan.
BACK