Advent 4C
December 19, 2021
Good Shepherd, Wells, MN
Luke 1.39-55
As I was reading the last part of the Gospel, I could barely keep from singing Marty Haugen’s version of “The Magnificat” from the beloved Holden Evening Prayer worship. Don’t worry, I wouldn’t want to clear the sanctuary. The Gospel of Luke is a veritable treasure trove of song: Mary’s song here. The song that Elizabeth’s husband, the priest Zechariah, sings after John the Baptist’s birth. And there’s Simeon’s song at the Presentation of Jesus in the temple eight days after his birth. It makes you wonder why Luke’s Gospel hasn’t been made into a musical (though Jesus’ story has). (Point of fact, all three have been set to music in our worship liturgies throughout the ages. Those of you who remember the first red hymnal may remember Simeon’s song as the Nunc Dimittis, the Latin for the first few words of the song, “Lord now let your servant depart in peace…”)
The songs are sung in the midst of extraordinary events: angels visiting Zechariah and announcing his wife Elizabeth’s pregnancy well beyond her child-bearing years and Mary’s pregnancy through the Holy Spirit. Yet, it’s the ordinariness of Mary as God’s chosen vessel for Jesus that has had me thinking. There is absolutely nothing about Mary that indicates God’s choice. She’s a young woman from an ordinary town engaged to an ordinary man, Joseph, who has “good prospects” as a craftsman as they say, but unremarkable nonetheless. And aside from one or two remarkable but isolated incidents, her life as a mom raising Jesus is pretty typical. Feedings, changing diapers, kissing skinned knees, snuggling at night.
Yet Mary is blessed, named by Elizabeth and future generations of Christians, but not because of anything she does but because God chose this ordinary woman to do an extraordinary thing. It’s easy to get swept up in the sensational parts of this story, for they are marvelous. And we typically look for God to work in marvelous ways because those are the ones that catch our attention. But we forget that more often than not, God works in, with, and through the ordinary, everyday things in our world.
Last week Jaxton was baptized in the name of the triune God. In baptism,, we claim that God’s Word through the Holy Spirit joins with ordinary water to wash us clean and make us beloved children of God in a whole new way. Today, we will claim that ordinary bread and wine will become the body and blood of Jesus and by taking those things into our body we will take Jesus into our very selves. As we do we claim with Martin Luther that we receive forgiveness of sins and where there is forgiveness of sins there is life and salvation. Furthermore, we dare to claim that this humble gathering of ordinary people in an ordinary building of brick and stone becomes a place of God’s presence and blessing.
In all of these cases, and more, God’s extraordinary love is poured out in ordinary places and ways. We enjoy a good love story, especially one that is exciting, dramatic, and “against all odds.” (That’s why Hallmark has two cable TV channels instead of one.) Yet, I think the extraordinary love is the ordinary kind that happens day in and day out for years. The parent who does hundreds of acts of ordinary love each to help their children be good people and the spouse who cares for a failing loved one, wherever that might be, are but two examples. I’ll bet you can think of more.
This week, as you prepare to celebrate God’s gift of love in Jesus, I invite you to look for examples of God’s ordinary love and then savor them for a moment. Not if you see them but when because they will be there. You may not burst out into song (or you might), but you will be blessed as much as Mary. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment