Birthing God: Advent 2005
Buddy Summers, Christ Church Uniting,
A few weeks ago some of you challenged me to take the Virgin Mary seriously in a series of pre-Christmas sermons under the heading “birthing God as spiritual practice.” Who are you people? Where do you get these ideas?
I had pretty much exhausted my Virgin Mary material when I wrote the “Extra Virgin” sermon a few years back. I said that God could make virgins out of any of us. That was pre-Google. This year I will try to go a step further.
Protestants wouldn’t necessarily know this (I didn’t), but the mother of Jesus has had an enormous impact across the earth over the past two millennia. Did you know, for example, that Mary is the only woman mentioned by name in the Quran?
Mary figures globally in the prayer life of many Christians---
“Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou
amongst women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of
God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.”
Mary’s impact is felt from
An internet casino paid $28,000 for a ten year old toasted cheese sandwich said to bear an image of the Virgin Mary. Why? “Because,” they said, “it was part of pop culture".
The Third Ecumenical
Council, a fifth century meeting in
Mary, the mother of
Jesus, (as theotokos) bore God’s love and grace into her world. This Advent, with God’s help, I want to move
beyond my Protestant ignorance and prejudice by asking
“How
can the Virgin Mary, as we encounter her in Luke’s Gospel, help us understand
the practical steps we would be taking if called to bear God’s love and grace
in our world, the 21st century?”
Consent as
Spiritual Birthing
Today, my focus will
be upon consenting to God’s call to us as individuals as a way of giving birth to
God, allowing God’s love and grace to be born into the circumstances of the
world around us.
One thing I’ve learned
from thinking about the angel Gabriel’s visit to Mary is that everything
(Jesus’ birth, the new thing God intended to do, everything) depended upon
Mary’s response to God. Her “yes” and
ours (should we give it), can make all the difference.
The Call of Mary
The
angel Gabriel from heaven came,
his wings as drifted snow, his eyes as flame;
"All hail," said he, "thou lowly maiden Mary,most highly favored
lady,"
Basque carol, translated by
Sabine Baring-Gould (1834-1924)
Greetings favored one! Be cheerful highly favored lady, rejoice---the Lord is with you.
This
is the way it always begins. There is
something unnervingly familiar about these words. In Exodus, from the burning bush God assured
Moses that he would never be bereft of divine companionship ("I will be
with you.") Then God calls Moses to an utterly unimaginable mission (i.e.
Tell old Pharaoh: Let my people go.) But,
but… “the Lord is with thee.”
In
the Book of Judges in the time before
“The
Lord is with you,” Gabriel says.
Understandably, Mary wonders about this greeting, what it might mean for
her, she who is an equally unlikely young nobody, a soon to be child bride in a
backwater nowhere village that few call home.
Do
not be afraid Mary, you have found favor with God. “OK,” she’s thinking, “here it comes,
brace yourself Mary.” And now, you will
conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus.
“That’s it? Just have a baby. What: No tramping out the vineyards where the
grapes of wrath are stored? No journey
to
God’s presence in our lives always changes things. Mary who was a nobody is now a player, about to be a decision maker, somebody with a heart and voice, a mind, and a calling. Mary, as someone called by God, suddenly has possibilities and questions, and she wants to think them through. “So, how would that work actually since…you know?”
The angel said, “The Holy Spirit, the power of the Most High
will overshadow you. The child to be
born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. And (for a sign) your relative
Mary’s cousin
For his altogether reasonable doubt, Zechariah got laryngitis and no sign. Mary asks for no sign but is given one anyway (go see your cousin---she’s pregnant). Further, Mary’s question is answered (with God nothing is impossible), and, in due course, empowered and proud Mary gives God an answer to his call.
Mary’s Response
Here am I, the servant of the Lord.
Let it be with me according to your word.
She doesn’t wilt, choke, or abdicate the power that has been given her. She asks good questions and evaluates the answers. Everything hangs on her response. Heaven holds its collective breath. The most highly favored lady could have said, “You know, that doesn’t work for me just now.”
United Methodist Bishop and former dean of Duke University Chapel William Willimon wrote,
Mary could have said No. We could say no. We can say “No thank you God, I am quite happy with my life the way it is. My life may be proceeding in some rather unimaginative ruts, but at least they are my ruts. I may be living only for myself and my projects, but at least they are mine. I’m not so sure that I want to have my life caught up in anything much larger than my life.
What went through Mary’s mind? What goes through our minds when it begins to dawn upon us that God is calling? Nelson Mandela could have had Mary in mind when he quoted and applied these words to apartheid survivors:
Our greatest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our greatest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, “Who am I to be brilliant, talented, fabulous?”
Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world.
Mary made a choice. She chose not to play it small. Her consent allowed God’s love and grace to be born afresh and in the flesh.
The Practice of Saying Yes to God’s Call
Mary’s acceptance, her consent, I think, informs our own discipleship and spiritual practice. God’s call, when it comes, when the angel brings greetings, gives us enormous power. It gives us the power to give birth to God’s love and grace into some part of the world around us---or, I might add, not to do so.
God comes to us in our weakness, in our relative insignificance. Biblically speaking, the insignificant, vulnerable and weak ones are the ones whom God chooses.
Is that Gold Star mother Cindy
Sheehan in
I know this: God does not intend us to stay as we are, to consent to status quo, to say “oh well.” We like to say that God loves us just as we are. That’s true. God loves us and even in our hiding comes to us and invites us to come out into the sunlight, to expose ourselves as we engage in work that was utterly unimaginable to us before the angel came with God’s greetings.
The angel comes to someone and
says, “Blessings friend of God, the Lord is with you, the peace of Christ is
with you. It’s time for something new in
the
The angel is coming to someone to
say, “Aloha, beloved of God. The Lord is
with you. It’s time for something
totally new in affordable housing on
I see Gabriel sitting in someone’s
kitchen somewhere, perhaps in
Conclusion
Not everyone is called. Only the most unlikely are called. Only the poorest equipped are called. That might mean us. We might be called. And then there is that verse that says, “Many are called but few are chosen.” What’s that all about?
When do your angels show up? Early in the morning, or late at night, a few sips into the first glass of wine, nearly through the news cast, or sometime during the silence of worship?
When the angel of the Lord show up to greet you, there will be prayers in heaven and hope on earth.
Aloha nui loa.
Blessings beloved. The Lord is
with you.
