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We come, finally, to the fourth Sunday in Advent. Yes, I know it’s also Christmas Eve, but we can’t just skip straight to the birth of Jesus this morning. We’d be leaving out a really important element of this year’s season of preparation. Over the past several weeks, in our Scripture readings, we’ve heard strong, prophetic words from Jesus himself and from John the Baptist, the one who came to publically proclaim the coming of Christ. But this morning’s Gospel reading gives us words from an, at least, equally important figure in the whole story of Jesus’ birth. We need to take the time, before we celebrate later tonight, to hear the words and understand the meaning of the young mother-to-be. Because, at the risk of conjuring up images of a rather strange movie from a couple of years ago – which was most remembered for its inclusion of a small dog in a body cast and a really unfortunate incident involving a zipper – the truth is...there’s something about Mary.
There is something about Mary that we need to remember and reflect on and make a part of our understanding of what Christmas is all about. That something, though, is not solely what religious tradition has given many of us. For a lot of folks here, your religious upbringing taught you to hold tremendous reverence for Mary, the mother of Jesus. How many of you can still say this with me: "Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with Thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of Thy womb, Jesus." See? Now tell the truth...didn’t some of you just start looking around for a kneeler?
Folks who grew up Catholic know about reverence for Mary. Now I wasn’t raised Catholic. I’m obviously not Catholic now. And I have serious doubts that I’ll ever be Catholic. But even those of us from Protestant backgrounds (or no particular background, for that matter) know that Mary is special. There’s something about her that is unique.
Generally, there are three images of Mary that have been given to the world. One is of that revered Holy Mother or, as the name of a large church off of I4 in Orlando, Florida phrases it, "Mary, Queen of the Universe." (I think that sounds less like a title Mary would claim and more like it was meant for the flamboyant character Jack on T.V.’s "Will and Grace.")
Then there is the poignant image of Mary as a grieving old woman with the broken body of her son across her knees, the world-famous Pieta`.
And, of course, there is our sentimental depiction of the young mother, kneeling beside the manger where the newborn baby Jesus is lying. There are, however, a lot of variations even on that theme. Lorraine and I collect Nativity scenes and so there are about 12-14 images of that young mother scattered around our living room right now. There are the usual ones where Mary is wearing a blue robe...which never would have happened since, in her day, blue dye would have been available only to the extremely wealthy. But it looks nice on a little statue. Then we have several ethnic variations. We have an African Mary, a Mexican Mary and a Native American Mary...all of whom probably look closer to the true appearance of the ancient near Eastern Jewish girl than do the many depictions of Mary with blondish hair and blue eyes! We also have a "snow person" Mary, with a carrot nose, a plush doll Mary with a baby Jesus that looks a little like a potato with hair...and there’s one little statue of Mary on our shelf that’s particularly interesting. She’s quite buxom, has kind of "big hair" and is wearing too much make-up. Quite frankly, she kind of looks like a hooker!
And, given the social consequences in her day of being unmarried and pregnant, I’m not sure she would have been viewed very differently than that by her society. And yet we know that there’s something much more about Mary than met the eye of the world in which she lived.
This "something" about Mary is not so much about who she was. Quite frankly, she was a nobody. She is not revered in faith by millions and at least respected by millions more today because of who she was...but because of what God did through her. Her specialness comes only because of God’s grace given to her. She was God’s choice to bear the Christ child. Who knows why?
In the words of Peter Gomes, "We waste our time in seeking out the special hidden, secret qualities that affect God’s choices; to be God means never having to explain why. It is the exercise of the power, what theologians call the sovereignty of God, that allows God to choose what is lowly, ordinary, and of no apparent account to be used for God’s purposes. Any god can make something good out of the exceptional and extraordinary. It is our God who makes something out of nothing; who takes nowhere and makes it somewhere; who takes nobody and makes them somebody, and it is the power of transformation that made prophets of the ordinary people of Israel. It is this power of transformation that made apostles and martyrs of the ordinary followers of Jesus; it is the power of God that makes things that are out of things that are not; and it is this power of God, moving in ways unknown yet not unseen, that confers upon the simple girl of Nazareth the grace sufficient to her new task as the mother of a new creation. God does not choose for grace...but when God chooses, grace surely follows."
Who knows why any of us is chosen by God to be who we are and to do what we are called to do? And yet every one of us has been chosen and called. Just like Mary, we are, in this day and age, chosen and called to be "Christ bearers" to the world. We do that in different ways. None of us can do what Mary did to bear Christ to the world. But each of us can play a part in bringing to pass the words that Mary spoke to her cousin Elizabeth.
She said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior...." I would ask myself and each of you this morning, "How does your soul magnify the Lord?" On the way home from church one Sunday morning, a little girl turned to her mother and said, "Mommy, the preacher’s sermon this morning confused me." The mother said, "Oh? Why’s that?" The little girl replied, "Well, she said that God is bigger than we are. Is that true?" Her mother said, "Yes, honey, that’s true." The girl thought for a moment and continued. "And she also said that God lives in us? Is that true, Mommy?" Again, her mother replied, "Yes." "Well," the little girl said, "if God is bigger than us and lives in us...wouldn’t God show through?" Is God being magnified in our lives...showing through as proof that there is something bigger than we are living inside of us?
Mary also said, "...my spirit rejoices in God my Savior...." We talked last week about rejoicing. Remember St. Paul said, "Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I say, Rejoice!" Mary wasn’t celebrating the fabulous circumstances she was in. She was a kid, really. Unmarried still. Pregnant. Having been told by an angel, no less, that she would bear the Child of God. Talk about a startling and surreal experience! Her future was completely unknown – as, for that matter, is all of ours – and she couldn’t have possibly known exactly what to do next. And yet, she chose to simply trust God. As Elizabeth said, "...blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from God."
That statement is really the first beatitude – a means of blessing or happiness – found in Luke’s Gospel. A major theme of the first two chapters of Luke is that God does what God says. The Scripture is saying that rich is the blessing that comes to those who share in and believe in that truth. When God steps into our lives, we should rejoice and trust that God will do what God has promised.
Mary had no idea why God had stepped so profoundly into her life. But she recognized that, in spite of deeply troubling circumstances, something wonderful was at work and she proclaimed, "...the one who is mighty has done great things for me...." Even before the Christ child was born, bringing evidence of God’s plan, Mary still chose to believe and obey and give thanks.
God would, of course, do exactly what God had said. Through Mary, God brought to the world the One who would forever change the course of human history...who would forever reverse the power structure of creation...who would and does and will, in the fullness of time, bring blessing and vindication to the downtrodden, acceptance and justice to the marginalized and oppressed, peace and satisfaction to the spiritually hungry.
"For Christ is born of Mary, and gathered all above, while mortals sleep, the angels keep their watch of wondering love. O morning stars, together proclaim the holy birth! And praises sing, and voices ring with peace to all on earth."
There’s something about Mary, as the Mother of the Christ child, that we can all aspire to. It’s not her specialness – that was never her’s to begin with. It’s not her particular role. God has a unique role for each of us as Christ bearers to the world. It’s not her time and place and circumstances. We have been chosen and called for our own time and place and circumstances. That "something" about Mary is her openness...her willingness to trust God...her humility and her obedience. All gifts of grace given to her by God. And we can have and be and do those same things...not because of who or what we are but because of who and what God is! Amen.
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