December 13, 2020: May God’s words be spoken, may God’s words be heard. Amen.
We get some of the most beautiful music and memorable scripture passages in Advent, particularly on this Sunday. We again hear John the baptizer telling us to prepare the way for what is to take place. We hear also from St. Paul imploring us to “Rejoice!” and to “pray without ceasing.” There is the passage from second Isaiah of God’s anointed who will bring good news to the oppressed and the brokenhearted. But the most powerful of them all, are the words of Mary, which itself harkens back to an earlier mother, Hannah. It is what we call the Magnificat, from the Latin word for magnify, taken from the first verse. Today we heard it as “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.” But in the NRSV, KJV, and many other translations, it is “My soul magnifies the Lord.”
But before we get to this magnificent Magnificat (try saying that five times fast), let’s take a step back and remember what is going on here… Previously on the Jesus Channel, we hear about Mary – a young and unmarried woman. She has been told by the angel Gabriel that she will become pregnant with the child of God through the power of the Holy Spirit. She decides to go to visit her cousin Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John – yup, the same locust eating, camel hair wearing prophet we hear about in the gospel – that one. Thankfully for Elizabeth, he wasn’t born wearing camel hair, all that came much later.
Anyway, Mary entered the home of her cousin, and was greeted with the most astounding news – Elizabeth tells her that the child in her womb leaped with joy upon seeing Mary…well, really upon being in close proximity to the child yet to be born in Mary’s womb, and Elizabeth echoes the proclamation of the angel – only this time it is to affirm that Mary is indeed pregnant. Did Mary understand that already?
I suspect so, as many a mother will say that long before they had confirmation from a doctor they knew they were with child – they just instinctively knew it. Still, it must have been as profound a moment for her as when old Gabe stood there telling her to not be afraid, that she, this unmarried young woman engaged to another man was going to have a baby that would not be his. This was a dangerous thing for this young woman – she could be killed by stoning for suspected adulterous behavior in those days. Yet how does she respond to it all?
Well, to the angel she says “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” A response born of courage. Then when it is all confirmed by her cousin, Mary says that her soul magnifies the Lord – proclaims the greatness of God! A response born of faith.
There is a lot to say about the response of Mary, the Theotokos – the God bearer – to this news of her role in the working of God’s dream for the world. Books & hymns have been written about this moment in her life, truly all generations have called her blessed – as well they should. And as I pointed out last year, despite what one modern Christmas song will tell you – Yup – Mary knew – but those songwriters clearly never read the bible, because they obviously didn’t know anything about Mary or her song.
And oh what a powerful song it was: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior; for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant. From this day all generations will call me blessed: the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name. He has mercy on those who fear him in every generation. He has shown the strength of his arm, he has scattered the proud in their conceit. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty. He has come to the help of his servant Israel, for he has remembered his promise of mercy, The promise he made to our fathers, to Abraham and his children for ever.”
Now that is good news! But we have to get past some crazy grammar to really get at the meaning of it. If you think she is saying all this already happened, well – it’s obvious it hadn’t to that point in time, yet the language is “God HAS [insert great thing here]” “God has filled the hungry” “God has cast down the mighty.” Well, we all know that wasn’t true when Mary said that, nor is it true today. So how on earth is it good news? Well, this is why really studying scripture helps (not to mention being a grammar fan). Our current English does not have what is known as the aorist tense, but the Greek in which this was written did. Now, not to get all Geeky with the Greeky here – the essential thing to know is that when we hear “has” in the Mary’s song, it isn’t that it actually has taken place, nor is it solely a thing of the future. It is both – the already and the not yet. In other words, it is the very essence of our faith, and Advent is truly an aorist season. Yet for most folks, it is heard as something that will happen in the future, because we know that the hungry are still hungry, and the powerful are still ruling over others.
So, back to it then, and for simplicity, we will stick with a future tense understanding so we don’t get time whiplash…
The mighty will be cast down, the hungry fed…God is going to do all that! Awesome, right? It’s like some big to-do list for God, or so many seem to think of it that way. You know, sort of like “Just you wait folks, cause God is gonna come down here and right all the wrongs and fix everything…just you wait! Yup…any minute now…”
Not to rain down on anyone’s Christmas parade, but that isn’t what this moment is telling us. First, let’s go back to that first line, okay – My soul magnifies God, or proclaims the greatness of God… See, there is the key – hold that in your heart and ponder it like Mary for a bit. Now, let’s look at the passage from Isaiah we also heard this morning.
It begins in a very similar way, doesn’t it? We hear “The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me.” Who, exactly, is the “me,” the “anointed by God?” Some might argue it is the prophet speaking, but that is not really clear in the text. Let’s set that question aside for the moment, and just note that both the Magnificat and the passage from Isaiah begin with someone’s response to being chosen by God. Both passages then tell us what God will be bringing about by that choice God has made, and it is very much the same message, is it not? Both Mary and that anonymous anointed one in Isaiah proclaim a sea change that will overturn the world order – that will be good news to all who hunger and thirst, who live on the margins, who are imprisoned in all the ways that may mean.
So, what’s going on and what does it have to do with us?
You know, one of those sappy Christmas movies on Hallmark, or Lifetime, or one of those channels that run them non-stop, had a story about a town that had it’s very own angel. Now, of course this movie had the same playbook as all the others – smart successful woman (or sometimes man) goes to a small town over Christmas for one reason or another, happens to run into a very different sort of smart successful man or women, and just like that – decides to pack up everything and move to write a book, open a store, or save the family farm. Unlike some of those others though, this one didn’t have some strange Santa looking guy wandering around town who gives cryptic answers to questions and grants wishes. No, this was a story about an Angel.
Every year, people put wishes on a town Christmas tree, and this Angel answers them. Many are poignant pleas for help with food, medical bills, or some other thing. A journalist goes to try to find out who this Angel really is – to expose him or her. Over time though, she keeps encountering people who are helping this Angel. Some who run a bakery are loading boxes of goods for neighbors who are in need. Others are finding a way to bring toys to children of parents who lost their jobs. Eventually, we come to find out – spoiler alert – that Angel is a person well known to this journalist, and is real…but the real work is done by everyone. In essence – Angel is real, but the promise of the miracles is that they are fulfilled by many out great love.
Here’s the thing about that silly movie – it was a cinematic presentation of our lives in Christ – of what Mary seemed to know instinctively in her heart in that moment.
See, if we really think about it, that is why Mary rejoiced and sang her song, because she could feel the presence of the Christ within her, and understood the power of that – of being the God bearer. She knew that nothing – for her – or for the world – would ever be the same. She was now a partner with God in the transformation of the world.
And if we think this is something only for Mary, then we need to remember the words of Isaiah. Remember I said we would get back to that, well – here we are. Now, if you thought you had heard these words before, well – you have! In the gospel of Luke, the same one in which we get our beautiful Magnificat, one of the very first acts of Jesus is to go into the temple, open the sacred scroll, and there he read to all in attendance “The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn;
He then says that all of it has been fulfilled in their hearing, rolls up the scroll, and sits down. He doesn’t have to hit the mute button, because all the other folks zooming in that day in the synagogue went mute all on their own – Jesus did a drop mic right there in the temple. Bam! In other words, he just said – hey folks – that God’s anointed one you’ve been waiting for…he’s right here in front of you, and here is what’s going to happen.
And here’s the thing that will rock your world like it did Mary’s – if he is the anointed one to bring good news to the poor, to free the captive, to comfort the mourning – than we – the body of Christ – we are the anointed ones today!
We are the ones that will magnify God, that will rejoice and proclaim the greatness of God because Christ is within us!
We are the ones who will, in partnership with God, bring about the dream of God for us all!
We are the ones to proclaim the good news of God’s great love for everyone – in all time!
The questions we must ask ourselves is: Will we be like Mary and say Yes to God’s call to us? Do we have her courage, her faith, her sense of Jesus within us?
I bet we can all resonate a bit more with Mary’s bravery in that moment when we consider that she was the one chosen by God to bear Christ, and we are chosen to be Christ.
When we think of it that way it might feel a bit daunting, as it must have been for her, as it must have been for those earliest followers, as it must have been for the saints through the centuries. Yet one of those saints, Thomas Merton, whose saint day was this past week (Dec 10th) offers us a glimpse as to how we can be like Mary and accept our call as partners with our creator.
Merton was a renowned spiritual author, poet, and monk, who sadly died of accidental electrocution in 1968 while on a trip attending an international conference on Christian and Buddhist monasticism in Bangkok, Thailand. He once wrote: “You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognize the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope.”
Let me repeat that: “You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognize the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope.”
That is our very life of faith.
That, my friends, is how Mary was able to sing her song.
Mary responded with joy and courage because she was a woman of great faith, not because she had all the answers, or had the strength of an army. She knew that no matter what lay ahead for her and this baby, she was not alone – God was with her. And she would need God, as we all do, for she would face trials that only a mother who has lost her child can understand.
And in that life she bore to us all, we were given our life in him. A life that calls us to rejoice for Christ is within us, to have courage to be the Christ we are, and to have faith to know that as we bring that good news of the Magnificat closer to reality, we do not do that Beloved Community work alone – God is with us – and together, as partners with our Creator, we can bring about the miracles of Angels.
So let us join with Mary in her song and magnify God, whose light born to us at Christmas, shines within us, for the hope of the world.
Amen.
For the audio from the 10:30am service, click below, or subscribe to our iTunes Sermon Podcast by clicking here:
The Rev. Diana L. Wilcox
Christ Church in Bloomfield & Glen Ridge
December 13, 2020
Sixth Sunday of Advent (7 Week Advent)
1st Reading – Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11
Canticle 15
2nd Reading – 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24
Gospel – John 1:6-8,19-28
