Advent 4

May my words and my thoughts be acceptable to you, O Lord, my refuge and my redeemer. (Psalm 19:14)

SEASON: Advent 4
PROPER: B
PLACE: St. John's Parish, Kingsville
DATE: December 19,1999

TEXT: Luke 1:26-38 - The Annunciation to Mary
"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. . . . . . .For nothing will be impossible with God."

See also 2 Sam. 7:4, 8-16 - " I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me."

ISSUE: The passage tells of the Angel Gabriel announcement to Mary that she shall bear a son and name him Jesus. For the early church it is the fulfillment of hope that God has not abandoned his people and the promise made to King David is being fulfilled. He will be Son of the Most High. Thus, God shall be his father. The event while implying a miraculous birth still makes it quite clear that it is a human birth through Mary. Jesus comes to and in the midst of the simple and humble. With God it is clearly possible that he can come to the least, the last, and the lost to reclaim them all as his sons and daughters of the Most High.
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Today we begin looking at that beautiful story that Luke tells of the events surrounding the birth of Jesus. I want to preface my remarks by reminding you that the Gospels are not actual biographies of Jesus' life. They are rather proclamations of new news or Good News that God is doing something in the world in order to establish God's reign. In Luke's account of the birth of Christ it is important that we not take in a mere historial sense or in a literal sense. The story is meant to tell us something theological, to express some profound meaning of God's being involved in some wonderful, miraculous, and mysterious way in human life. The story touches and appeals to children as well as adults.
Looking at the background against which Jesus' birth takes place it is important to remember what was going on. God's people, the Jewish people, were a conquered people. The Temple authorities, that is, the religious authorities, Saducees were in collusion with the Romans. The large portion of the population, maybe 98% were poor. Life was very fixed culturally. Not much changed. You lived in the moment without much expecatation. They had little control over their lives. Life was hard. Life spans were short. Infant mortality rate was very high. Diet was meagre. Pain and suffering was prevalent. Oppression was a fact of life. There was probably a longing, and a deep yearning, for deliverance, for some messianic deliverance as the people looked back to a grander time like that of David. But it is likely that there was not really much of a sense of real genuine hopefulness. You lived having to tolerate what was dealt out to you.
Into this kind of situation, Jesus comes to the scene. He begins a ministry of offering hope in terms of some healing and restoration. He challenges various things in the culture. He begins speaking of The Reign and the Empire of God coming as a new power in the midst of worldly powers. He invites a discipleship of men and women to join forces with him. Now as Luke at a later date begins telling the story and putting together the message of Christ, he seems to weave what Jesus did into the story of his birth. The birth story is something of an overture to the life of Christ.
There was a hope and an expectation that a Son of David would come to the world to carry on that dynasty which the Lesson from Samuel is about today which would be likened to a Son of God. At the time that Jesus was born there were already many stories of miraculous birth stories which centered around great historical figures like Caesar and Alexander the great. What Luke seems to be saying is that if you think they were miraculous births, let me tell you something even more grand. I can tell you about something utterly miraculous about how God comes to his people. We must remember that it is only Luke and a small portion of Matthew that tells anything about a birth of Jesus. St. Paul never mentions it. Mark has no birth narrative at all, and John's Gospel account only offers a kind of Hymn about how Jesus is the light coming into the world, that was reluctant to receive him.
There are some who would say that Luke, and also Matthew, weaves this miracle story of angels and virgin birth to kind of spare the early Christians some embarrassment about their extraordinary humble beginnings, being led by this possibly illegitimate itinerant preacher of no honorable status whatsoever. However you interpret it or manage the story, there is the wonder of it all that captures the human imagination, whether young or old.
Thus, Luke tells of the Anunciation, which is the reading for today. There is this young girl, whose name is Mary. So far as we know she had little honorable standing, and becomes betrothed (not engaged) to a carpenter, an artisan, also with little or no standing. Mary has nothing going for her. She lackes all the credentials that most people would think important. She's too young; too inexperienced; she's a woman, she has no marital status; and she is powerless. This situation is the epitomy of the mundane, if not absurd. Little could be expected from the union of these two people. What's more it will appear that Mary is the bearer of an illegitimate child which would put her in a position of dreadful shame, and might even call for her being stoned to death by the community. But God acts. The Angel Gabriel, messenger of God who had come with messages for Daniel, comes to announce to Mary that she will be overshadowed, that is protected by God as a husband protects his pregnant wife. She will bear a son, and though the child may appear to be illegitimate, he will be truly from God: he will be God's Son, and he will come as hope for his people.
What Luke is weaving in his birth story is the understanding that the world looks to the powers of the world for miracles and wonders. They are often a dreadfully disappointing and inflict real devastation. But God, in Luke's story, does his miracles and powers among the least, the lost, the last. God's powers are often worked among those you would least expect. It is Joseph, and a very young girl who is suspect of being quite shameful, that God acts. Through the acceptance of their role real love is revealed. Bad situations become redeemed. What seems dishonorable becomes honorable. What seems to be impossible happens. God comes to reclaim and restore his lost people. He enters into the human condition in a way that will reach and toudh human hearts, making them responsive. Jesus is born of a woman with all that that implies: morning sickness and painful birth. Yet to that human condition is comes hope and redemption. God comes to his people in all of their imperfection, uncertainty, and anxiety. He comes in a real genuine way that is initmate. God has not and will not abandon his faithful people.
It has been pointed out that the one event in all of our Christmas preparations that so beautifully portrays the real genuine theological content of the Christmas story is the proverbial Christmas Pageant. In some cases they are elaborately prepared and rehearsed. Yet still the angel wings get bent and their halos become crooked. Shepherds stumble and the sheep get loose. At least one child will cry and at the last moment some completely withdraw from the drama. Yet inspite of that imperfection, the message still comes through clearly. Jesus Christ gets born again. God comes in the midst of the fray, and no one misses that point. God comes and acts inspite of us. And that is because some folk and children in and with all their imperfections have the courage to offer themselves and simply to say, "Lord, use me."
The point is also made in the story by Dr. Seuss of "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas." Inspite of the loss of all the stuff, the decorations and presents, it is still Christmas. Hearts are still touched, and even the evil contentious Grinch becomes himself is converted, if not redeemed. God is still acting and entering into the human condition.
At Christmas many of us try to enter into a kind of fairyland. Even people who live in Southern Florida dream of a white Christmas. We deluge and indulge ourselves with presents, and decorations. Underneath it all we know it doesn't always snow on Christmas. Not everyone gets home for Christmas, and sometimes there are depressions, great losses and sadnesses that are re-enforced and realized as a result of the season. While the ovens in Germany were be stoked during World War II, military officers sang "Silent Night" -"Stille Nacht Heilege Nacht." Human suffering can and does still abound.
The world and each of us in it so desperately need Christ at various times in our lives. We need to feel loved. We need a sense of hope. We need forgiveness and reconciliation. We need to be found and redeemed. In our brokeness we need healing and hope. Christ has come, and must come again, and will come. Luke leads us to believe that Christ's coming to us is inevitable. God simply acts. We need to be responsive to him with open hearts, minds, and souls. May each of us be willing to be the mansions prepared for him, and to allow Christ to be reborn is each of us again, inspite of our imperfections. Let God in Christ reshape and remold us remembering that God is the potter, and we are the clay that can be reshaped, reformed, renewed. Mary accepts through faith the inevitable. God will work in and through her. Nothing is impossible. The barren get new life. The powerless become the daughters and sons of the Most High. "Then Mary said, 'Here I am Lord; let it be with me according to your word,'" Luke weaves a powerful story that is the overture to the whole ministry of Jesus Christ that he is truly God's Son, and light for the darkness of the world. He is the shepherd of the lost sheep. He is our hope.