Homily: Yr C Advent 4, December
23 2012, St. Albans
Readings: Micah 5.2-5a; 1 Sam
2.1b-10; Heb 10:5-10; Luke 1:39-55
When I was in Grade 8, one of the kids in my class was a girl
named Liz. She lived not too far away
from where I did, and we knew each other, not close friends, but friends
nonetheless. One day she didn’t show up
for school. And she didn’t come
back. I wondered about that. I heard later that Liz had left town because
she was pregnant. For me, 13 years old
at the time, it was a surprise. I expect
that for Liz and her family it was quite a shock, and a source of shame. I guess that’s why she left town. I don’t know for sure, I never saw her again.
Liz, of course, isn’t the first 13 year old girl who had to
run away from town because she got pregnant.
Our gospel reading this morning tells the story of another unmarried, 13
year old girl who had to run away from town because she got pregnant. As Luke tells it, “in those days, Mary set
out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country.” There, she took refuge in the house of a
relative, her cousin Elizabeth. And for
Mary, in her day, it was probably even worse than for Liz. An unmarried girl who got pregnant would be
“put away” in the words of Matthew’s gospel, that is, if she was lucky and she wasn’t
stoned to death for committing adultery.
She would bring great shame on her family, and would be unmarriable,
destined for a life of solitude and poverty.
No wonder Mary had to run out of town.
Now perhaps some of you are thinking, yes, it’s true that
everyone in Mary’s village would be talking in terms of shame and disgrace,
and, yes, that’s why Mary had to get away, but at least Mary knew what was going
on. After all, she’d had a visit from an
angel!
Well, let me address a few misunderstandings about angels in
the Bible. The Greek word angelos, which
we usually translate as “angel”, is actually the word for a messenger. In the Bible, an “angel” is someone sent with
a message from God. No wings, no halo,
no trumpets, no glowing white clothes.
Just someone with a message. A
messenger. And just because a stranger
shows up with a message doesn’t mean that you’re necessarily going to believe
him. In the first chapter of Luke, an
angel tells Zechariah that his old wife is going to have a child. You know what Zechariah’s response was? Yeah, right!
And Zechariah was a priest. You’d
think if anyone could figure out that they were being given a message from God,
it would be the priest, right? Well,
apparently not.
But Mary gets it.
She’s able to see the presence of God in the person of the
messenger. She’s able to hear the voice
of God in the messenger’s strange story.
She’s able to see her own experience as part of a bigger picture. She makes the connection between what she
hears from the messenger and the promises that God made to Abraham thousands of
years ago. She has a vision of God’s
trajectory, a vision of where the story that she’s being invited to become a
part of is going. And when she accepts
that invitation, she joins in by singing. She sings with unadulterated, celebratory joy.
“My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my
saviour”
Now, I want you to notice the choice that Mary makes here, in
response to the angel’s announcement.
Mary could just as easily have uttered the following words:
“My soul curses the Lord and I am in despair because God has
ruined my life and condemned me to suffering.”
Because Mary’s life has been irrevocably changed by God’s
intervention. She will endure insults
and shame in her village. She will raise
a rebellious child. She will see that
child grow into an adult who appears to have severe psychiatric problems, who
will wander around homeless, who will routinely be called demon-possessed. She will see her son clash with the
authorities and be put to death before her eyes, perhaps the worst fate any
mother can imagine. On that day when she
arrives on Elizabeth’s doorstep, Mary could just as easily utter a lament
rather than a song as a consequence of her encounter with the divine.
But she doesn’t. She
sees what’s going on in her experience as part of a bigger picture, and she
sings the song we call the Magnificat, a song of joy, a rebel song.
“my soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my
Saviour.
For he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his
servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me
blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is
his name.
He has brought down the mighty from their thrones and lifted
up the lowly,
he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he
has sent empty away.”
I think that, like Mary, you and I also have experiences of
the divine. I believe that God is
present and active in our midst. But I
also think that much of the time, we just miss it. Or, like Zechariah, we dismiss it. Or, even when we do seem to notice something,
we aren’t able to make the connection between what’s going on in our experience
and the bigger picture, and as a result, we fail to grasp what’s really going
on.
I think we all have a lot to learn from Mary, and from the
song she sings. Here’s what Mary does.
The first thing that she does is she names her experience of
God. “He has looked upon me with
favour. The Mighty One has done great
things for me.” Mary sees with the eyes
of faith, she names what’s going on, she articulates it and she tells someone,
in this case her cousin Elizabeth.
Then, she makes the connection with the bigger picture. She situates what’s happening in her life in
the bigger story of God. She moves from
the personal to the communal. She
recognizes God’s promise to Abraham that he would work world changing history,
and she sees that world changing activity taking place in and through her own
life.
Then she situates her experience not just in God’s past
promises, but in God’s trajectory towards the future. She has a vision of where God is headed. She declares that God will consider, care for
and act on behalf of the poor, the hungry and the oppressed, and she sees what
is happening to herself as part of that trajectory.
And finally she accepts the invitation. She chooses to become part of the story, not
just a mere observer, not simply collateral damage. She enters into God’s promise to lift up the
lonely, those who mourn, those who weep, and she sings.
Isn’t it remarkable that an uneducated, 13 year old girl, scared
and on the run, has so much to teach us.
Learn to connect your life to the bigger picture by:
Naming your experience of God.
Situating it in God’s story
Seeing the trajectory
And choosing to become a part.
Now I know it’s not always going to be simple. I know life can get messy. I know that it’s tricky discerning what God
is doing in the midst of it all. And
even for Mary, at the time it was probably a bit messier than the 30 verse summary
that Luke gives us. But give it a
try. Learn the story. Get ready for the one who is coming into your
life. And don’t forget to sing.
Amen.
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