1 The Reverend Julie D Bryant, December 21, 2008 Once upon a time there was a young woman, minding her own business folding the laundry or spinning flax into linen or fleece into wool or starting dinner for the family or making plans for her wedding to the older man to whom she was engaged. Okay, so I don t know what she was doing. I do know that she was beautiful With long dark hair the color of night, Or maybe it was bright as sunshine That fell straight down her back Or maybe it was curly, and a bit unruly, never quite staying in its braids. All right, I admit I don t know what she looked like, either. What I do know for absolute certain, is that she was visited by an angel whose sudden appearance and message frightened her. This young girl was not the first one to be visited by this particular angel, nor to be frightened by his presence and message.
2 Today s Gospel passage is from the first chapter of Luke, but the story of the angel appearing to Mary begins 26 verses into the chapter. The first twenty-five verses of Luke describe the angel s visit to Mary s cousin-in-law, Zechariah. It goes something like this: Zechariah, an old man, was a priest who went with his wife Elizabeth to Jerusalem twice a year. They went so that Zechariah could perform his duties as a priest at the temple. Elizabeth would have been used to the trips to Jerusalem because the men in her family were priests, too. When they had married, there was an expectation that they would be doubly-blessed because they both carried the priestly tradition in their families. But things had not turned out quite that way. Zechariah and Elizabeth wanted children, and everybody in those days considered the gift of children to be a sure sign of God s blessing. No children came into their lives, and now they were so old that it just wasn t going to happen. When they got to Jerusalem, and Zechariah joined his fellow priests at the Temple, they always cast lots, so that by a random drawing, one of them would be chosen to go into the holiest part of the temple with a burning, fragrant pot of incense, with which to pray, asking God to come among them and to bless them. This year, when the lots were cast, Zechariah was chosen. So, he went in with the bowl of smoking coals, whose tendrils reached heavenward. And he put the bowl in its
3 place, and then lay down in complete obedience to God, and began to pray. For God s blessing. For God s presence. And suddenly, there was an angel with him! And the angel had a message just for him news that his wife Elizabeth was going to have a child after all. And the child was going to be great in the sight of the Lord. That he would be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from birth. He would follow God s law to the letter, and would turn the attention and hearts of many people toward God. He would make a way for the coming Messiah. Now, Zechariah was frightened by the appearance of the angel or at least he was startled. After all, the very thing he d been praying for at that moment was kind of coming true. God was showing up in that very moment, in that very place, to him. Very few of us really expect or really prepare ourselves for God to answer us in quite that direct and immediate a manner. But Zechariah manages to recover himself enough to ask a question. How CAN this be?
4 The angel replies that he is Gabriel, who spends his time standing in the presence of God, and that he s been sent specifically to Zechariah at this time to bring this news. And, because Zechariah has doubted, that the angel is going to silence him until the birth of his son, whom he is to name John. When Zechariah emerges from the temple, the other priests have been wondering what took him so long, and they take his inability to speak as a sure sign that he has had a vision. Elizabeth did realize that she was expecting a child, and she proclaimed that The Lord has done this for me. And Zechariah was silent until John was born. Now six months after the angel Gabriel appeared to Zechariah the priest in the temple, he found Mary, a young girl who was planning to be married to Joseph. Gabriel tells Mary, just as he told Zechariah, not to be afraid. And he calls her favored one. To quote a good friend of mine and yours, that s some serious favor! God not only has a good opinion of the young girl, but is willing for her to bear the Savior of the world. For the child that Gabriel tells Mary she is going to carry and mother into adulthood is going to be the Son of the Most High, and sit upon the throne of
5 David to reign over a Kingdom that would never end. And she is to name him Jesus. Mary, like Zechariah, recovers herself enough to ask a question of the angel. How WILL this be? For she knew a few things about how babies get born, and she knew that all of that was supposed to happen after she d married Joseph. Gabriel tells her that this miracle will happen because of the Holy Spirit, and that she can know all of this is true because of another strange and wonderful thing happening something she can go to see for herself. Her cousin Elizabeth is carrying a baby after waiting all these years. Mary says to Gabriel finally, Here am I. Let it be with me according to your word. I was listening to a news report last week about college entrance applications and essays. Some schools are trying to find out more about how the teenagers applying for admission think and feel about the world, so the schools are asking different questions than they used to. The one that stuck with me was the direction to write about the most important words ever spoken by a human being.
6 One could argue that Mary s answer to Gabriel s news constitute the most important words ever spoken. Here am I. Let it be with me according to your word. Without her agreement, would God have found a different bearer for the Messiah? Can the will of God be forever stopped by an anxious, frightened young girl saying no? Of course, that presumes that Mary was the first and only one asked to be the first Christ-bearer. We know from the rest of the Gospel story that she is not the only one expected to share the good news of his presence and saving nature with the world. Mary carried Christ in her very body and we are all called to carry God within us spiritually. Whether she was the first to be asked or the first to agree matters little she was asked and she answered yes. And so, she allowed herself to be the means by which God came into the world. A young girl from a small town in the middle of nowhere agrees to be bigger than anyone ever, more spacious than the heavens because in her womb, God found a home. It is almost time for us to mark the birth of Mary s child. In just a few days, we will gather around with our beloveds, and around the images we have of that holy
7 night a little manger with figures of the young girl and her husband and the newborn child, or a single star shining more brightly than all the other lights on the tree, or a whole multitude of angels poised to sing Gloria in excelsis deo. But, before we rush past today straight to that moment, let s linger in the last of Advent, and take from this first chapter of Luke a few things that will help to make that coming celebration more complete. Zechariah was praying for God s blessing and presence during his one and only turn as bearer of the people s prayers inside the temple. Gabriel finds him there and brings astounding news. Zechariah is frightened, and questions the likelihood that this could ever come true. Gabriel silences him for the weeks and months it takes for John to be born. We have come to associate keeping silence in this season before Jesus birth as a gift, especially when the noises of too much everything else seem to overpower the voice of God. What may have been a punishment to Zechariah for his momentary doubt has become a gem in the treasure box of our common spiritual practice. It is in silence that we enter the mystery differently than we do in spoken prayers or in conversation with others. When we cannot protest or interrupt, we have a fuller opportunity to listen. Zechariah heard Elizabeth s assertion that the child she carried was a gift from God, and when Mary visited, may have heard the exchange between the women Elizabeth s greeting and acclamation of Mary as blessed among women, and perhaps the
8 hymn we call Magnificat all without the ability to comment. He had no choice but to hear without offering interpretation or objection. Not being able to engage through speech meant that he was forced to receive, forced to surrender any influence on the happenings around him. This is our season to keep silence in anticipation of God s presence, and to practice not objecting or interpreting, but simply receiving. Mary was not silenced for impertinence when she questioned Gabriel. This different response is explained by some commentators as appropriate because they say she asked how WILL this be rather than how CAN this be? Their position being that she wasn t actually doubting, just asking for clarification of a few details. But Gabriel offers her proof that it will happen because something remarkable is happening with her cousin Elizabeth a something she can (and does) go to see for herself I find it hard to believe that Mary would need to go and see for herself unless she had at least a little doubt of her own. As we approach the Christmas celebration, if we take it seriously, we will have to acknowledge our doubts about God s action and purpose then and now. And to wonder what message Gabriel or another courier would have for each of us. Even the strongest faith has moments of doubt, and in Mary and Zechariah, we have the encouragement to name those doubts forthrightly, expecting God s reassurance.
9 Mary and Zechariah question God. You might even say they challenge God, and come close to arguing with Gabriel. They do so because they are close enough to God to know that the relationship can withstand a little tugging back and forth. I would invite each of us, in these last Advent days, to ponder the trust we have in our relationship with God. Are we close enough, trusting enough, to question without expecting that will mean an end to our relationship with God? If we know that we would be more than momentarily startled by the sudden appearance of an angel, or that we would hesitate to pour out our true concerns about what we hear God asking us to do, how confident can we be of our faith? Perhaps it is time for us to leave the others behind, go into a quiet place to deliver our prayers, and to surrender our lives to the task God sets before us so that we can be preparers of the way and bearers of the Son in our time. For Christ will come again, and while our recounting of the story of his birth is intended to remind us that we are beloved, favored ones it is just as surely intended to prepare us for the moment when he returns. May our prayers rise this day like incense, and may we grow in confidence of God s love for us so that we may without fear welcome being called to witness to Christ s presence here, now, and always. Amen.
10 THE LESSONS 2 Samuel 7:4,8-16 But that same night the word of the LORD came to Nathan: Now therefore thus you shall say to my servant David: Thus says the LORD of hosts: I took you from the pasture, from following the sheep to be prince over my people Israel; and I have been with you wherever you went, and have cut off all your enemies from before you; and I will make for you a great name, like the name of the great ones of the earth. And I will appoint a place for my people Israel and will plant them, so that they may live in their own place, and be disturbed no more; and evildoers shall afflict them no more, as formerly, from the time that I appointed judges over my people Israel; and I will give you rest from all your enemies. Moreover the LORD declares to you that the LORD will make you a house. When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come forth from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me. When he commits iniquity, I will punish him with a rod such as mortals use, with blows inflicted by human beings. But I will not take my steadfast love from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away from before you. Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me; your throne shall be established forever.
11 The Epistle Romans 16:25-27 Now to God who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the proclamation of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages but is now disclosed, and through the prophetic writings is made known to all the Gentiles, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith-- to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever! Amen. The Gospel Luke 1:26-38 In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, "Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you." But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will
12 be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end." Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I am a virgin?" The angel said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God." Then Mary said, "Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word." Then the angel departed from her.