Adam J. Copeland

FPC Hallock

December 13, 2009

Advent III

What in the World?

Luke 1:39-55

What in the world is God thinking? God must be messing with us. Did you hear today’s reading? Utterly unbelievable. I mean, had Luke gone off his rocker? What in the world is God thinking?

Mary? God chose Mary to bear a son. What in the world is God thinking? Mary was a teenager — maybe 15 or 16.   Mary wasn’t rich. Mary was dating, but not even married. Was God just asking for a scandal?

What an absurd notion — that God would choose a teenager to bear God’s son. What a crazy idea — that God would become human through the weak flesh of an unwed mother. What a ridiculous proposition — that the savior of the world would be cared for by a peasant.

What in the world was God thinking? There surely were better ways, right? Come as an adult and skip over those nasty cloth diapers and terrible twos — that sounds good. Or if God must be born as one of us, at least choose a respectable family. Someone married, with means; a family that has shown good parenting skills and is keeping up with the Joneses. Couldn’t God have found someone a bit more qualified than Mary? What in the world is God thinking?

—

Now I don’t want to presume, but I’m guessing the strangeness of Mary’s situation isn’t always at the forefront of your Christmas mindset. If I’m honest, when I think Christmas my mind first goes to warm apple cider and prettily wrapped presents. Sure, I have Christmas memories of church too, but they’re not exactly revolutionary, not as crazy as today’s story suggests.

I remember growing up, at about this time of year, meeting at the church Sunday evening to go Christmas caroling. We’d split up into groups and sing to members throughout Tallahassee. The trick was to get on a caroling route that didn’t have too many people on it so you could get back quickly and enjoy the chili and cornbread before the line got too long. Sure, we’d sing carols of Jesus’ birth and all, but we certainly didn’t get into any of this revolutionary stuff of Luke’s gospel.

“Gentle Mary laid her child, lowly in a manger” is a far cry from today’s reading; eating chili and cornbread in a warm fellowship hall isn’t quite “bringing down the powerful from their thrown” or “sending the rich away empty.”

Today’s gospel hits us not with Christmas comfort and gingerbread cookies but with Christmas craziness. What if our memories of the Christmas season were more of a revolution, embracing the absurdity of Luke’s story, than the comfortable coziness of most Christmas memories?

—

I don’t watch much TV, so I’m guessing here, but usually about this time of year there’s some talking-heads on Fox and MSNBC debating whether or not we should greet one another with “Merry Christmas” or “Happy Holidays.” There’s probably another debate somewhere about whether a school concert in December can be called a “Christmas Concert” or a “Winter Festival.” In a country that’s both majority Christian and devoted to religious freedom, these questions will always surface. How about whether a nativity scene can appear on public property? Or whether a Christmas Tree at the governor’s mansion can have an angel on top?

Debates like this, though they might be fun entertainment fodder, really just miss the point. Luke couldn’t be less concerned about public trivialities of holiday signs and greetings; he’s about something bigger, much bigger. Mary, too, isn’t swayed by the prospects of public scrutiny sure to destroy her reputation, she accepts the angel’s invitation and willingly becomes the body that bears the world’s salvation.

The Christmas story in Luke isn’t about season’s greetings, but about a whole new world order. That story doesn’t make the network talk shows, and I wonder sometimes if it even makes it in the church. Have we lost sight of Mary’s story? Have we so sentimentalized Christmas, or made controversies out of trivialities, that we miss the point of the gospel? Have we become so enamored with Santa Claus that we’ve lost sight of our own story of an angel and two marginalized women named Elizabeth and Mary?

—

After Mary is visited by the angel and she agrees to God’s proposal she takes off to the country, to Elizabeth’s house. When she arrives, Elizabeth — pregnant herself with John the Baptist — hears her greeting and the child immediately “leaps in her womb.” Then Elizabeth tells Mary she is blessed among all women, and blessed is the child in her womb. They’re not quite sure why this has happened to them — who could be — but they know whom to praise. God.

Mary sings. My soul magnifies the Lord,

and my spirit rejoices in God my savior

for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.

Surely, from now on all generations will called me blessed.

Mary gets it. Who is she to be blessed, she figures. She was just a girl who said yes. A nobody. But God blessed her. What in the world is God thinking?

God’s mercy is on them that fear him

from generation to generation.

He has shown strength with his arm,

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

He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,

and lifted up the lowly;

he has filled the hungry with good things,

and sent the rich away empty.

Did you catch that? God’s got it all upside-down. Scattering the powerful and the proud? What in the world is God thinking? Bringing down the mighty? Lifting up the lowly? Sending the rich away but providing a feast for the hungry? Mary, Mary quite contrary what is this God up to? Sounds like meddling to me. That’ll bring far from a quiet comfortable Christmas.

But that’s the story. That’s the gospel. God chooses the most unlikely of characters to be blessed forever. God raises up the poor, the lowly, the weak and the weary.

As one author puts it: “God is reversing everything: who is in, who’s out; who’s up, who’s down. Who the winners are; who the losers are. Mary seems to charge the world with having gotten things pretty much exactly wrong.” [Christian Century, Dec 15 2009, author not cited]

[Quote continues....]  “Our world says: blessed are the beautiful. Blessed are the rich. Blessed are the successful. Blessed are the secure…Mary said that God is going to turn everything upside down. Why would anyone listen to an unimportant peasant girl?”

Then a guy named Jesus came around and echoed Mary’s refrain, “Blessed are the poor, blessed are the hungry, blessed are the meek.” What in the world is God thinking?

—

Or….or….or maybe that’s not quite the right question. Not, “What in the world is God thinking” but “What in the world are we thinking?” Do we think God is done with the poor and the lowly? Do we think God now blesses the rich and the mighty? Do we think God is done caring for the Mary’s of today with their food stamps and homeless shelters and hungry mouths to feed. Because if we think God is done with that and moved on from those old ideas, then we’re golden. Because last time I checked we lived in the richest country in the world, with the most powerful military, the most millionaires, and the greatest amount of things we don’t really need. Is it about God’s crazy ideas, or ours? What in the world are we thinking?

I have friends, Adam and Sarah, out in California. Sarah’s getting a PhD in theology and spirituality and preaches occasionally. Adam jokes that Sarah’s sermons always come back to the same point: imagination. Sarah says we’ve lost our imagination. That the way we look at the world is so jaundiced by how things are, that we can’t imagine how things might be. Sarah puts herself in this category, as do I. She writes,

“I think we suffer, collectively and individually, from frequent failures of imagination. I’m thinking big things, like not being able to imagine an end to hunger, war or poverty in our lifetime – we so frequently say it will come some day, but mean not this day and not the next day and probably day in our lifetime, but it will come. And I’m also thinking about the smaller failures of imagination. How often do you find yourself in a situation you just can’t imagine getting out of?” [Sarah Walker Cleaveland at http://sarah.walkercleaveland.com/wp-content/sermons/failures_of_imagination.pdf see also, http://sarah.walkercleaveland.com/ ]

Sarah said she once couldn’t imagine ever getting out of finals week. I once couldn’t ever imagine getting through the ordination process. And, I’m sure because we’re all sinful, there’s a lack of imagination in each of us. Collectively, lack of imagination can grow to dangerous levels. It can overtake our faith, it can destroy our vision for the church, and it can kidnap our hope for the world.

Christmas is coming. It’s time to imagine once again. What in the world? Can you see it: a peasant girl bearing God’s own son? What in the world? Can you believe it: that son goes on to show us the way to perfect peace? What in the world? Can you trust it: God lifts up the lowly, the poor, the oppressed? What in the world? Can you live it: God isn’t done with us yet.