Isaiah 35:1-10 Magnificat James 5:7-10 Matthew 11:2-11
On this one Sunday of advent, the church confuses many of its members every time. You see, the Sundays in advent are dedicated to key aspects of the incarnation story – the patriarchs, prophets, John the Baptist and blessed Mary – and the world’s logical brain says pink equals girls, so today must be about Mary. Not so!
Today we light the rose candle and wear rose vestments because we lighten this slightly heavier season of advent, we press pause on our repentance and celebrate joy…so we lighten the colour purple to pink. Rose. I may’ve been easier to comprehend if the church had chosen lilac. Anyway, today is not pink for Mary. Today is Rose for John the Baptist. Right? Excellent… Except…just to add to the confusion, I’m going to preach on those fabulous words from Mary’s Magnificat, because it is utterly magnificent.
Mary is greeted by an angel, told she will give birth, and her response is ‘my soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices’, and then prophesies about how remarkable and different the world will be once God has come to live among us; the humble will be lifted, the mighty brought down, the hungry will be filled with good things and the rich will be sent away with nothing.
Regardless of what we can or can’t believe about the virgin birth, the truth is, her words are an incredible foresight into how life might be, how we may dare to believe it could be as people trying to follow in the same steps as our blessed mother.
So threatening were these words to world leaders – it was illegal for anyone to recite them publicly in certain countries even until the mid 1980s. In Guatemala, parts of India and other places, rulers and presidents banned these words in fear that the poorest people might hear them, believe them and revolt. If our faith isn’t that terrifying to those who are rich and mighty, we are doing something wrong. We really are doing something wrong.
I was thinking about that this week, whilst also considering whether it is important, essential, possible, to believe in the immaculate conception and virgin birth. We have wondered about this together before. And as I wondered this time, I came across words from my very favourite preacher, Nadia Bolz-Weber, who wrote, ‘I know people get hung up on believing the virgin birth thing, but honestly, the harder miracle to believe is that the angel Gabriel actually found someone willing to say yes.”
She goes on to say that if she had been visited by Gabriel, she would have needed a list of guarantees, assurances of blessing, evidence of personal benefit. She admits she would only have said yes if she understood exactly how God planned to protect or reward her. But Mary receives almost no information, no assurances, no safety net. Mary only hears a bewildering, disruptive invitation — and she responds with unreserved trust: “I am God’s servant. Let it be with me according to your word.”
Perhaps it is possible that Mary’s yes is the greater miracle: the courage to surrender to God’s call before she had clarity, before she could possibly understand what it would mean, before anything looked safe or promising. And that reminded me of something that happened to me last year, that I wondered if I would ever share, but here goes…
Last year, early November, I was walking along Francisco street, coming home from coffee at Kerfuffle. Advent was approaching and I was beginning to consider the advent stories ahead. I was thinking about Mary, and her surprise pregnancy and I found myself thinking about Sarah, and Elizabeth. And about how both those women had babies so late in life. Impossibly late, completely outside of childbearing age. And I wondered how it would have felt to tell their friends, ‘I’m pregnant’. How would strangers have reacted to their growing bump in their 80s or beyond? And as I thought about this, these words dropped into my brain, ‘you’re going to have a baby’. Just that. it was very simple and incredibly clear. You are going to have a baby.
Now, if I had been as devout and obedient as Mary, I would have fallen to my knees right there and then and said ‘here am I a servant of the lord’. I didn’t do that. Instead, I went down an entire rabbit hole of biology and logic. Five years before I had a hysterectomy and my first thought – I kid you not – was ‘if the surgeon left one cell behind in my body maybe a new womb could regenerate somehow’. That’s where I went. For the rest of the walk home. And then I thought no more of it.
Around 2 or 3 weeks later I was handed this sleeping 16 month old baby. Again, I didn’t say ‘ah yes God. Now I understand. ‘Let it be to me according to your word’. I said, ‘just one night’. Then there were days, weeks, of me saying, ‘we can’t keep her…this is impossible…this is insane…we are too old and too busy and too tired and there are a million people who would be better for her’. And then one day I said yes. I said ‘maybe she is a gift for us, from God’. And when I said yes, I remembered those words from Francisco Street. And I said sorry to God and accepted this gift, this call, for however long it lasts.
And I wondered if I would ever tell you that because it might sound like I am saying I am just like Mary. I am definitely not. This event, this whole situation doesn’t set me apart from anyone else who is determined to follow Jesus wherever the path leads.
What I am saying is that Mary’s yes was radical and fierce and incredible AND God still speaks to God’s people, and says ‘I want you to do this thing. Will you do it?’, and the unfolding miracle is twofold – one that God might trust these essential tasks to mere people like us, and two that sometimes we say yes. Even if it is eventually.
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my saviour, Mary sings. And heaven heard the yes it needed. At the end of today’s service we are going to sing Mary’s own words. Will your heart also say yes to whatever it is God is asking? May we be the miracle. Amen.
Holy Adventures 