December 21st 2008
Rev. Mark R. Bradshaw-Miller
"Dangerous Poetry"
Fourth Sunday in Advent
Luke 1:26-38, 47-55
It has become cliché this time of year for people to comment about the “loss of Christ in Christmas.” Some have even claimed that there is a “War on Christmas.” I must admit that I am not all that worried about a perceived or even a real “War on Christmas.” I can say this because I believe in a God who is big enough to withstand any threat; real or imagined. Instead, I think a more fruitful use of our time is to focus our energy on one of the actors in the Christmas nativity who understood the power of God. Her witness, while often lost in the Protestant tradition, is a powerful and import one.
What does the scripture, from Luke, tell us about Mary? Who was she? Where did she come from? (Or with deference to my teachers: From whence did she come?) The truth is that in this Gospel, we know little. What we do know is that she is unmarried but betrothed, promised in marriage. Which places her about age twelve or thirteen. She is the cousin of Elizabeth. And, she is a woman, which in the ancient work meant she had no standing in society. In other words, Mary is not the sort of person whom the world would consider “favored by God.”
By our standards, to be “favored by God would mean having some standing in society. She would have had to come from the proper family. We would need an accounting of her royal or at least religious pedigree. But God breaks expectations and chooses someone who has none of the criteria. In fact, there is no criterion at all. The text tells us only that the angel says: “You have found favor with God.” No reason is given.
Some have argued that Mary is a person of no consequence and as such we should pay her no attention. This could not be further from the truth. The choice of Mary reminds us that God has always chosen people of no consequence to change the world. Christmas is a story that reminds us that God acts through people living on the margins of society.
So, Gabriel speaks to Mary and tells her that the world she knows is about to change. From the outset, it appears that Mary really does not have a choice. But that is not the end of the story. Mary’s first response is to simply ask how this is possible. Gabriel tells Mary of the miraculous things that God has done for her cousin Elizabeth. And adds that; ‘nothing is impossible for God.’ Mary’s final words to Gabriel is not an acquiescence too inevitability but instead and affirmation that she is on board. “Let it be!” Mary has had an encounter with the messenger of God and despite not having a clue as to the consequences, or the details, she says yes.
Mary is the first witness to the good news of Jesus Christ. The mother of God gets clued in before the rest of the world. After pondering these things in her heart, and visiting with her cousin Elizabeth, she finally gives a public witness. But her first words of the good news do not come in the form of a sermon. Instead she presents beautiful, powerful and revolution poetry as her witness to Gods action.
In Carl Sagan’s book Contact, made into a movie starring Jody Foster, a scientist, Foster, is sent on in a specially designed space vessel to make contact with life forms in another galaxy. When this scientist first makes contact and visits this unexplored galaxy her first glimpse leaves her speechless. Unable to convey the beauty of what she has seen in merely descriptive words, the comment is made that they should have sent a poet instead. Poetry has the power to convey what simple description cannot. It has the power to help us imagine and describe things which go beyond mere explanation. But, poetry also has the power to alter the world because poetry has the power to help us imagine that another world is possible. And when that happens the established order is in trouble.
This is the power of the words of Mary. She did not live in a world where the powerful had been brought down from their thrones. Mary did not live in a world where the prideful were scattered or where the rich were sent away empty. Mary’s world the world of an occupied province of a great empire is not one in which this poetic vision would have been birthed. But Mary is able to see it anyway. Mary imagines that another world is possible. She imagines this other world not simply because she has encountered Gabriel but because she knows the larger story of the faith. While she lives under military occupation she knows her primary identity is child of God. And, the God who has claimed her and calls her favored is a God who is bigger than any world power, past present or future.
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