Are We There Yet? (Advent 4 Sermon)

I preached from notes last week, so I don't have a complete sermon to post, nd the stories I used sounded better in the telling than they do in print ~but here are bits and pieces of it:

Are we there yet?
Anyone who's traveled with kids has heard that cry ~
And the adults often echo them.

What about Mary and Joseph?
In Bible study this week: instead of the lonely couple we usually imagine, we learned that they might have been members of a caravan ~
A caravan with all of its chaos might make you wonder: are we there yet?

Do you suppose that even if they were members of a caravan, Mary and Joseph felt alone?

You know how you can be in the middle of a crowd and still feel alone?
Think about it: they were responding to a call different from any call ever before heard by anyone.
Maybe they felt completely isolated, even in the middle of a caravan,

 I like to think of Mary and Joseph as pilgrims.

And what do pilgrims do?

Not travelers focused only on speed and destination.

Not tourists, remaining apart to view and record.
But deeply engaged, becoming part of the story ~
in this case, partnering with God to create the story

So maybe they weren't at all asking: when will we get there?

Maybe they were soaking up the sights and sounds of each day.
Maybe they were allowing themselves to be completely immersed in their adventure.
Maybe they were savoring each step in the journey - the mark of true pilgrims.

Have you ever said to yourself: pay attention - don't forget this moment?

There it is again, that advent command: Pay attention.

Do you suppose Mary and Joseph said those words to one another?

Pay attention - notice it all - remember - don't forget ~
The sky, air, light, people, animals . . .

That's what I hope for you these last days of Advent.
Don't settle for: are we there yet?
It's tempting ~
But don't settle.

Instead: keep awake - stay alert -  pay attention - be a pilgrim, not a speed traveler or a tourist.

Where is God for you in these last few days ?

Where is Jesus about to be born in your own life?
Where are hope, and light, and love becoming more visible in your own world?

Are we there yet?

I hope not quite.
We have four days left to anticipate and to keep watch.
Four days left to savor the coming of Christ ~
if you haven't quite gotten around to it yet, it's not too late

Look and listen with care.  Let it all soak in.  Let your hearts open.

Prepare the way of The Lord.

Did You Have Other Plans? ~ Sermon (Advent 3)

Oh, Joseph.  You did have plans, didn’t you?

And weren’t they wonderful plans?  You had a trade – you were a carpenter, which in your day, meant that you were a master builder: a stone worker, a woodworker, a mason.  In your small town in the world at that time, no one had the luxury of specializing in one form of construction alone – but your knowledge and skill meant that you were much in demand.  You built houses out of all sorts of materials – and you also made shelving, and furniture, and maybe even some items simply for the beauty of them.  You had a trade that all but guaranteed you the ability to support yourself and a family.

And you had a fiancee’ – that family you hoped for appeared to be more than a mere possibility, but a soon-to-be reality.  Your marriage to Mary was arranged and, as we know, such a betrothal was a serious business.  There had not yet been a wedding ceremony, and you had not yet begin to live together, but for most intents and purposes, the two of you were married. Your families had reached an agreement, some property may have changed hands, and you two were set – as good as married.

Yes, you did have plans, didn’t you?

And then – and then –

Somehow -- and the Bible doesn’t tell us how, or from whom – but somehow word got to you: Mary was pregnant.  Pregnant with a child she claimed had come from the Holy Spirit.  Pregnant in an era in which women did not have babies unless and until they were securely married, to the man of their father’s choosing.  Pregnant despite the fact that she was carefully supervised and sheltered by her parents.  Pregnant with a story as well as a baby – a story that made no sense at all.

And your plans, Joseph?  Shattered. Shattered along with your heart.  How betrayed you must have felt!  How disappointed!  How angry!   

You would have been well within your rights to act upon that anger and disappointment.  Mary’s story?  Highly unlikely.  The law?  Women found guilty of adultery – and what better proof than a pregnancy?  – women found guilty of adultery were subject to the punishment of death by stoning.  No one would have criticized you, had you walked into the center of town and asked that such a sentence be visited upon Mary.

But – you didn’t.  You decided instead to  “dismiss” her – to break the marriage contract, and to do so quietly, so that she would not be humiliated.  Why was that, we wonder?  Had you already developed some affection for Mary?  Did someone else suggest that option to you?  Or did you yourself find the law overbearing and oppressive, a worse injustice than the act of which Mary was apparently guilty?

We don’t know your reasoning. All we know is: no sooner had you made up your mind, than you had a dream.  And what a dream that was!

An angel.  An explanation.  And very clear instructions:

[D]o not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.

This news did not fit with your plans, did it, Joseph? Plans for work and marriage and children.  Plans to live as an ordinary member of your community.  Your plans did NOT include angels - and mysterious conceptions - and entanglement with God - and a son born to save the world.  You had other plans entirely.

Now, we all know something about that saying, “Life is what happens when you’re making plans,” don’t we?  And sometimes the most amazing things happen!  Things in which we do indeed rejoice and give thanks!

I’ve told you that my niece and her husband adopted a baby a few weeks ago.  Now, they did have it in mind to adopt a baby.  They’d been working on that project for quite awhile.  But they didn’t have a definitive plan, and they certainly weren’t ready – not in the way that you get ready when you have nine months of pregnancy during which to plan and prepare.

Nope – they got a call on a week-end that there would be a baby the next week-end.  And so they started to get organized, and my niece, who’s a teacher, told her principal that she’d be starting maternity in a week.  And they started making lists and planning – planning – to buy paint and baby furniture and baby clothes and baby supplies.  They had a week to get it all finished.

And then they got a call on Monday – the baby will be delivered to you tomorrow!  Tomorrow!

They had other plans. 

A week earlier, they had been planning to host their first ever Thanksgiving dinner in their home.  A day earlier, they’d been plan to furnish a nursery.  And then, suddenly – a baby!  Right then and there, in their arms!

Now, that’s a really good sort of change of plans.  A really wonderful interruption. Craig Barnes, who’s now the President of Princeton Seminary, which is one of our Presbyterian seminaries, but a few years ago was one of my professors at Pittsburgh Seminary – Craig Barnes is fond of talking about when God interrupts our lives.[1]  When God expects changes from us.  And there are, indeed, lots of interruptions and changes, like the arrival of a new baby, even with only a few hours’ notice, that we welcome with great joy, and for which we are willing to change everything.

But we all know that there are other sorts of interruption as well. Other ways in which our plans are altered.  Interruptions which cause us to wonder aloud at this idea that we should rejoice always and give thanks in all circumstances.  Changes which make the holiday season the most difficult time of the year.

There’s the meeting with the doctor, and the diagnosis that will change your life.  You’ll be spending the next month undergoing chemotherapy instead of taking that long-awaited vacation in California.

There’s the unexpected phone call, and the news that someone you love has died.  Your plans change, abruptly and completely, and you pack up the car and go.

The doorbell rings in the middle of the night, and the police are there, your son or daughter in tow, and your plans change to accommodate a court date and increased supervision of a child who seemed to have been doing well.  

All you have to do is open your newspaper or computer, or turn on the television or radio news, to be reminded that there are countless ways in which plans are demolished every day.

The question is not whether your plans will be upended.  They will be.

The question is: Will you see God at work in the interruptions in your life?

And then the next question is: How will you respond?  

Will you say yes?  Will you remain faithful to God?  Will you make room for the surprising grace of God in your life?

Craig Barnes tells us that “it is always at the turn in the road that God is most visible to us.”[2]

I would add: If we are paying attention.  If we are alert.  And isn’t that what Advent is about? Paying attention?  Being alert?  Keeping awake?

Now, what about Joseph?  Do you think that when his own great plans were interrupted, he felt more like my niece and her husband, overjoyed at the prospect before him?  Or did he feel a good deal less enthusiastic?  Worried? Afraid?  Confused?  What about those other words we’ve used – Betrayed? Angry? 

I  would guess that at the outset he felt a lot of the latter.  Isn’t that a natural set of human reactions?  Think of changes in plan which have been proposed to you lately – in your family, in your church, in the world at large.  Have you felt worried and afraid?  Betrayed and angry?  Pretty normal, yes?

But something happened to Joseph.  Whatever his initial feelings, the feelings that caused him at first to plan to put his relationship with Mary aside, those feelings were dramatically changed by his encounter with the angel Gabriel.

New Testament Professor James Boyce tells us that Joseph is

"a person of strength and purpose. He is committed and faithful to his religious tradition and ready to act on that commitment.  . . .  When the call comes, Joseph speaks not one word either of question or objection. He simply acts directly and immediately in obedient response to the  call.  . . .  . Joseph becomes visibly and audibly an example of the power of God's call to              transform our decisions and our lives."[3]

As you know, we are sharing the Bible study Taste and See[4] with folks from B. Church this week, and I’m preaching on this passage today as a way of elaborating a bit on the Bible study.  And it’s this matter of transformation which the Taste and See study emphasizes.  Joseph’s presumed fear and anger, the natural reactions any of us might experience in a situation as bewildering as the one in which he finds himself, those feelings are transformed by the grace of God.  Transformed by grace into the grace of acceptance and love.  Into the grace of determination and commitment.

Have you ever thought of Joseph as a role model for your own life? Maybe it’s time to do that. 

We don’t really give that much thought to Joseph, do we? Let’s face it: he barely makes it into our consciousness, and only during Advent and Christmas at best. But maybe we need to pay a lot more attention to this man, especially when we have plans which are interrupted.  Maybe when someone suggests that we do something differently, that we follow an unexpected course of action, that we accept a new role in a new set of circumstances – maybe then we need to ask:  Is God the one interrupting my expectations?   Maybe when life falls apart, when what we had hoped for and longed for is disrupted by disaster (and I don’t mean to suggest that God causes disaster – but I do mean to point out that God is present and at work no matter the circumstances) – maybe we need to ask: Is God calling me to change direction?  To rejoice regardless?  To give thanks anyway?

Yes, Joseph, you had other plans, didn’t you? Plans for an ordinary life in Nazareth. 

And yes, you might have hesitated when that angel showed up.  You might have protested.  You might have said, “No way! I have other plans!”  We would have understood, because we usually have other plans, too.

But you – you opened yourself to God’s transformative power, to the movement -- of possibility, of hope, of love – in the universe – and you found grace.  You became the earthly father of the Savior of the World!

To what, my friends, are we called? To what grace-filled transformation does this Advent season invite us?  How is God inviting us into the work of God?

Do you have other plans?  Do you want to cling to the past, to the old expectations and the old ways of doing things? 

Or are you willing to welcome God’s movement in your life?  Are you willing to let fear and anxiety be transformed by the grace of God?  Are you willing to let God change your lives and lead you to possibilities you’ve never imagined?

There is no doubt about it: You are called –like our model Joseph -- to participate in the life of Jesus Christ.  You are called – like Joseph – to exchange your plans for God’s.  You are called – like Joseph – to embrace a new life. 

Rejoice, and be glad!

Amen.

---

[1] Craig Barnes, “When God Interrupts.” Shadyside Presbyterian Church Sermon.  (9/4/2011).

[2] Ibid.

[3] James Boyce. https://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=15 (2007).

[4] Jan Johnson, Taste and See.

Here I Am - A Sermon for Advent 2

An intriguing cast of characters populates our Advent panorama.  Last week, we encountered Elizabeth and Zechariah, the aging couple about to become the parents of John the Baptist, the man who would one day herald the arrival of Jesus. This morning, we hear from John himself, grown to adulthood to cry out the words of the prophet Isaiah -- "Prepare the way of The Lord! Make his paths straight!" -- and we meet the young Mary, stunned by the appearance of the angel Gabriel in her life, and yet quickly responsive to the call from God he shares with her.

This past week, two groups met for our new Bible study and had an opportunity to consider together this event in Mary’s life.  An angel appears to this seemingly ordinary young woman, this young unmarried woman, living in a small town of no particular significance, and tells her that she is to bear God’s son into the world. We imagined the possibilities:

·         Was she inside or outside? What were her surroundings like?

·         How, in the small and crowded world in which she lived, did she happen to be alone?

·         What did it mean for a young, unmarried woman of her time, a person whose status was entirely dependent upon husband and children, to be confronted with a surprising pregnancy before her marriage?

·         What did her face look like when she heard this news?  What would yours look like if you received news like that?

·         How did she feel?  How would you feel?  “Perplexed” is the word our text gives us.  What about – also – surprise?  Fear?  Shock?
 

And we marveled at how quickly she moved from her astonishment at Gabriel’s announcement to acceptance of the honor bestowed upon her.  “Here am I,” she says, “the servant of the Lord.  “Let it be with me according to your word.”

Now that’s not how we would be likely to react, is it?  Imagine yourself having just received surprising news – shocking news, even – that is about to transform your entire life.  News that will cause everyone you to know be skeptical of your story.  News that will alter all of your relationships.  News that sets you on an entirely new and completely unexpected path.  How likely are you to say, “I will live in accord with your will, God?” As Pastor Dave pointed out in one of our classes this week, aren’t we more likely to say, “What about MY will? What about MY plans?”

But Mary says, “Let it be with me according to your word.  Here am I.”  Or, in words with which I’ve taken a bit of liberty, “Here I am.” 

“Here am I.  Here I am” – as we’re going to sing those words at the end of our service this morning.  These are the words of prophets.

Isaiah speaks them; the song we’re going to sing in based upon the words of the prophet in Isaiah 6:8, as he responds to God’s call: “I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ And I said, ‘Here am I; send me!’”

Listen again to Mary: “Here am I.”

They are the words of Samuel, last of the judges and first of the prophets of Israel, when as a young boy he hears the voice of God calling in the night and, thinking that it is the elderly Eli calling for him in the dark, responds, “Here I am!”  And then, do you recall, that after Eli understands that God is calling, he instructs the young Samuel in how to respond, and Samuel does so, saying, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” (I Samuel 3:1-20)

Listen again to Mary: “Here am I, the servant of the Lord.”

The words of a prophet.  The words of someone responding to God’s call to speak and to show God’s people how God is moving among them and how they are themselves called to respond.

And make no mistake about it: Mary is a prophet.   

In her words, and in her very body, Mary is engaged in the prophetic task: faithfully trusting in and responding to the call of God, showing what God is doing in the world, and modeling for us the way in which we, too, are called to answer God’s movement in our own lives.

Not sure?  Yes, she responds as Samuel did, and as Isaiah did: “Here I am.  I am your servant, Lord.” Yes, she carries the Son of God into the world.  But there is more, in words we did not read earlier but will hear now, in the words she speaks to her cousin Elizabeth.

Remember, the aging Elizabeth, is herself, also surprisingly, pregnant, awaiting the birth of the baby who will become John the Baptist.  Mary, quite naturally, upon learning that she, too, is most surprisingly pregnant, rushes to visit her cousin Elizabeth, who is delighted to receive her. And Mary says to Elizabeth – and I want you to listen carefully here -- Mary says:

[God’s] mercy is for those who fear God

   from generation to generation.

 God has shown strength with God’s arm;

   God has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.

God has brought down the powerful from their thrones,

   and lifted up the lowly;

God has filled the hungry with good things,

   and sent the rich away empty.

God  has helped God’s servant Israel,

   in remembrance of God’s mercy,

according to the promise God made to our ancestors,

   to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’ (Luke 1:50-55)

Are these not also the words of a prophet?

There is a long prophetic tradition in the Old Testament, a tradition in which those called by God are called, not to predict to the future, as we today so often think of prophecy, but called to assure those in need, those who are poor and hungry and sick and disenfranchised, that God is laboring for them. And called to warn those who are powerful and wealthy and in political control that their ways are not God’s ways, and that their power will be toppled and their wealth destroyed -- in favor of God’s new creation in which all people are called into a kingdom of peace and love.

And is this not exactly what Mary says?  And does? 

Mary is not a simple peasant girl waylaid by an angel.  Mary is not a meek and mild young woman called to quiet submission to things as they are.  Mary is a woman of prophecy, a woman who proclaims through both her very being and through her words, that in her son,

·         God scatters the proud

·         God brings down the powerful

·         God lifts up the lowly

·         God fills the hungry

·         God sends the rich away empty

·         God fulfills God’s promises.
 

Friends, the world is in need of prophets today.

·         The world is in need of people who insist that the hungry be fed.

·         The world is in need of those who insist that the sick be made well and the injured be healed.

·         The world is in need of those who stand in the streets to cry out against injustice.

·         The world is in need of those who work tirelessly to reform our criminal justice system.

·         The world is in need of those who persist for peace, for an end to war, for an end to all forms of violence.

·         The world is in need of those who say. “Here I am, Lord.  Here I am, your servant. Let it be with me according to your will.”

This world is in need of prophets who say, with Mary:

·         Here: In this time and this place.

·         I: This person, me, this person you, my God, created with these gifts for this time and place.

·         Am: Right now, present tense, responding with what I have to give, to your call in this time and place.
 

“Here I am, the servant of the Lord.”

So says Mary. 

So, God asks, say we all.

Amen

Cinnamon and Panic (Friday Five)

"From today's RevGals Friday Five:   As we prepare in our churches and our homes for Christmas to arrive, it is a time of waiting, expectation, and preparation,  However, it is also a time of stress and worry.

For this Friday Five, share how you are in this transition of Advent to Christmas.  As the Savage Chickens show us, we alternate between cinnamon and panic.  Write about five aspects of cinnamon and panic you are experiencing or whatever is in between; maybe mention how you are reminded to stay in the present holy moment."

 

I think I'm about 100% in between.

 

1.  With a new church, I am surrounded by people I don't know, some of whom are delighted or relieved that I've arrived, and some of who are filled with anxiety by my presence, and acting out strongly in response.

 

2.  With a former church, I find myself looking back with some longing as Christmas cards arrive with little notes and bits of news. 

 

3. With a cat in transition herself, I'm a bit frazzled.  She appeared in the church parking lot last night, bones jutting out all over the place, and practically leapt into my arms.  The Lovely Daughter says that she'll give her a try, which means an introduction to her well-established cat, but the kitty first needs a visit to the vet, so she'll be here for at least awhile.

4. With my children in holiday-mode transition with first jobs and little time off (and myself also with little time off), I'm frustrated and irritated.  Their increased winter time on the road for quick trips home plus a flying trip down to southern Ohio to see some of my family mean another dose of stress.

 

5.  Oh, and the big one:  my college students finish up their final exam ~ a take-home essay and a short objective section today ~  this afternoon, and grades are due Monday.  I'm about to finish this Sunday's sermon so that I can turn to those 24 tests and start thinking about Tuesday night's sermon.  The students have been driving me crazy with emails and requests to read drafts; I will be grateful when we are down to one last stack of papers.

 

So . . .  I'm not panicked, but I can't say that I smell cinnamon either.  (Not that I would anyway, because I have no sense of smell! ~ and so, even from a metaphorical standpoint, the concept of smell doesn't do anything for me.)  I have experienced little of the holiness of the season; despite what I had to say in my last post, it's a hard, hard time of year.

 

But here is my speck of cinnamon (whatever that may mean):  Last week we went to a concert sung by the Clare College, Cambridge Choir.  (The link is to a review of their evening here.) They are spectacular and, if you want some O Antiphons music for these last of Advent, their new CD, Veni Emmanuel, is the one you're looking for.  As they sang the "O Adonai" piece, with the singers spaced throughout the sanctuary and the sopranos up in the choir loft, I thought: If there were angels on the first Christmas night, this is exactly what they sounded like.

 

I can't find a video of this particular concert, but here's their recording of a familiar piece.

Justice and Joy ~ A Sermon for Advent 3

If I asked you to talk about Mary, the Mother of Jesus, what might you say?

Maybe you’d say that she was very young?  She was probably only about 14 when she discovered that she was unexpectedly pregnant, pregnant with the Savior of the world.

Perhaps you’d wonder about the mysterious matters attributed to her story.  A visit from an angel.  A pregnancy without a husband.  The activity of the Holy Spirit.

And if I asked what she was like?  I wonder if words like “demure,” “modest,” “retiring,” and the ever-famous “meek and mild” – would those words come to your lips?  I imagine that you have Christmas cards in your house right now that depict Mary as a quiet, unassuming girl, gazing peacefully at her newborn baby boy.  Am I right?

Well, today, I want us to consider together what she was really like.  Let’s start by setting the stage for our passage today, the passage known as the Magnificat.

Mary has received a visit from the angel Gabriel, who has made his announcement of God’s plans, God’s hopes and dreams for her life: That she will become the mother of the baby Jesus, the baby both divine and human, the child come to set things right, to inaugurate the beginning of a new reign, a new creation, in which all that is broken will be restored and all who are estranged from God will be reconciled to God. 

And now, bearing this unexpected child in her body, Mary has headed for the hill country, to spend time with her cousin Elizabeth.  Elizabeth is also unexpectedly pregnant, although in her case the unexpectedness has to do with her advanced age, and the unlikehood of her ever mothering a child at her age.  

So here they are, these two women who find themselves in rather surprising predicaments.  And they are so happy to see each other!  Of course they are.   Any woman who has ever been pregnant can recall the camaraderie she felt with other women in similar circumstances.  Other women who will understand the bewildering combination of joy and sadness.  Other women who know what it’s like to complain about newfound aches and pains while simultaneously marveling at a body expanding with life.  Other women with whom to share stories and experiences and plans.

But this encounter goes beyond the usual.  As Mary approaches Elizabeth with words of greeting, Elizabeth feels her own child leap for joy within her.  We know that Elizabeth’s child will become John the Baptist, the man who will someday head for the wilderness to herald the coming of Christ and to urge the people to prepare the way of the Lord.  We know that ~ but at this moment in the story, this moment of mutual greeting between two expectant women, all of that lies in the future.  What they know is that something extraordinary has begun to unfold, something that stirs a response of joy within each of their hearts.  

And then: and then Mary begins to speak.  Mary begins to speak in words that debunk any notion that she might be a shy and retiring girl, a meek and mild mother-to-be.  Oh, no – it’s time to erase those images from our minds.  For Mary: Mary speaks the words of a prophet, of someone called to proclaim the future reconciliation of the world to God.  The world in which the lion will lie down with the lamb.  The world in which water will surge forth from the dry and dusty desert and fill the land with flower blossoms.  The world in which those who are lame and speechless will not merely walk and speak; they will leap like deer and sing for joy.  

Last week The New York Times published an article on homeless children in America, focusing its story on a young girl named Dasani who, with her parents and younger brothers and sisters, lives in a room in which mattresses and clothing are piled on the floor,  in a crumbling, roach-and-and-rodent infested shelter in Brooklyn.  The article tells us that “One in five American children is now living in poverty, giving the United States the highest child poverty rate of any developed nation except for Romania.” In Cleveland,  the school district served over 3,600 homeless students last year.  Children!  Some of them kindergarten children who live wherever their parents can find a bed, or something resembling a bed, for them.  Elementary school-aged children, many of them supported by working parents, but even more of them struggling because their parents have fallen victim to drug use and have become unemployed and turned to crime as a means of support.

Do you hear Mary’s words, as she proclaims to her cousin Elizabeth that “God has lifted up the lowly?”  Do you hear what she is telling is about God’s priorities, about the coming reign of God?   Do you hear what gospel joy means?

Dasani, the young girl in the article, lives in a city in which tremendous renewal has taken place over the past decades:  new high rises, new parks and bike paths, new businesses.  And her plight is due not entirely to her parents’ inability to function, but also to policies enacted in that city, policies which have cut benefits and housing opportunities with the goal of making the poor homeless more “self-reliant.”  Policies which have left huge cracks in the system through which families like Dasani’s fall.  Policies made by well-dressed and well-fed people in comfortable offices and board rooms.

Do you hear Mary’s voice, announcing that “God has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts?”  This is not a timid girl; this is a woman prepared to speak truth to great power!  This is a woman who knows that joy in God leads to justice among God’s people!

Here in Ohio, the number of those who are literally, physically, hungry continues to increase.  Around the world, especially in areas in which droughts have taken hold, or the disruptions of warfare and internal national conflict have displaced people onto the road and into refugee camps, hunger and starvation are prevalent.  And what are the consequences of chronic hunger?  Higher maternal and infant death rates.  Higher rates of infection and illness.  Depression and other mental health issues.  On a global scale, extreme vulnerability to crisis.

And what does Mary declare?  That God has filled the hungry with good things. As the reign of God pervades the earth, the hungry will be satisfied, and starvation will be no more.   Joy and justice will abound.

Do you wonder about these claims, these promises?  Sometimes it seems as if they will never be fulfilled.  And yet here, at BPC, in just a couple of hours, the kitchen and the fellowship hall will be filled with food and our guests will have arrived for our monthly community meal ~ a small but significant step in God’s filling of the hungry with good things. 

As the new girl in town, I’ve been listening and reading and learning, and one of the things I took a look at last week was the several pages of instructions for the community meals.  Wow!  That was my response.  Do you all know what goes into offering those meals each month?  The Food Bank contributions, the trips to the grocery to purchase what’s still needed, the organization of the preparation and cooking and serving, the clean-up, and the plan for the next month ~ it’s all an enormous undertaking, involving many, many people. I wonder . . . when Mary exclaimed that God would fill the hungry with good things, could she have imagined that 2,000 years later her words would take effect in the form of meals prepared all over the world ~ because of her son? 

The low lifted up, the hungry well fed ~ that’s what Mary preaches.   And the powerful shall be brought down, and the rich shall be sent away empty.  What does it all mean?  Does God really mean to reverse all that exists as we know it?  Is Mary really telling us that our goals and priorities are not God’s goals and priorities?  Is Mary telling us that God will bring us joy in ways completely different than those the stores and commercials tell us to seek?

I teach an introductory religion course at JCU, and one of the topics my students and I have explored together is justice.  Just day before yesterday, they were raising questions about their own goals for future success, especially future financial success.  They and their parents have invested a great deal in their college educations, and many of them have told me in no uncertain terms that they are in college so that they will be able to make good living.   Yet yesterday, and in weeks past, they have come face to face with questions about what justice means in God’s way of seeing things.  What does it mean to be an advertising executive using the media to manipulate people into buying your products?  What does it mean to sell products that have been manufactured in developing countries by factory workers who make less than $100 a month when huge profits go to the corporations employing those workers from afar ?  Is becoming rich and powerful the goal God has set for us? 

Do we still think of Mary as meek and mild?  Do we still think of her as the silent, adoring mother whose task is to raise a son who will know his scripture and be prepared to help others? 

Or do we see her for who she really is?  Do we hear hers as the first voice in the gospel narrative proclaiming the joy of a creation restored to justice?  Do we hear her fearlessness?  Do we hear in her the kind of joy and courage that comes with the movement of the Holy Spirit in our lives?

Do we hear her voice, in the intimacy of a family moment with her cousin echoing down the centuries and crying out that the words of the prophet Isaiah will be fulfilled?  The weak will be strengthened.  The deaf will hear and the blind will see.  The lame will leap, the speechless will sing, the desert will become a lush and verdant land, all the earth will be restored, and all people will know the healing hand of God.

The next time you look at Mary, quietly seated in a manger scene, remember that this is a young woman who proclaims both justice and joy.  When you struggle to understand poverty and homelessness and hunger, when you wonder why a young lady like Dasani, a girl with a quick and creative mind and a resourceful spirit, is trapped in the cycle of homelessness in New York, remember that God is even now among us as Jesus comes again, lifting the lowly and filling the hungry.  And when you prepare to serve a meal in just a little while, know that you are responding to the words of that very young and courageous Mary, two millennia ago, and that the Mighty One is doing great things!

Amen.