Journey Week 3 Sunday message 12/16/12

Journey Week 3 Sunday message

If you were scared and in trouble, what would you do?  Where would you go?  To whom would you talk?

Mary was scared and in trouble.  She had the strangest experience when an angel came to talk to her.  The angel told her that she would get pregnant even though she was a virgin, and she would be the mother of the messiah.

She was scared and in trouble.

·        Can you imagine being 14 and trying to get your parents to believe this kind of story?  I can imagine Mary’s dad responding with something like, why can't’ you just once, tell us the truth.

·        Can you imagine trying to convince your fiancé?  I’m sure she imagined Joseph just going ballistic when he found out.

·        Can you imagine knowing that, if no one believed you, you might be stoned?

·        Can you imagine the prospect of giving birth when 1 out of 20 births resulted in maternal death?  Not to mention all the other possible complications.  Not to mention just the sheer pain.  That would be scary for anyone, even if you weren’t 14 years old.

My guess is that Mary was scared, really scared.  So scared that I can’t imagine that she told anyone.  After all, maybe it wasn’t true.  Maybe the angel was wrong.  Maybe she misunderstood.  I think Mary probably kept this as a secret.

Because the angel mentioned Elizabeth, however, perhaps Mary thought Elizabeth was the only person in the world who might understand.  Mary just HAD to talk to Elizabeth

Remember that the angel told Mary that Elizabeth was 6 months with child.  We read in Luke chapter one the story of Elizabeth’s child who would grow up to be John the Baptist.  Elizabeth and Zechariah were unable to have children.  When Zechariah was serving in the temple, an angel came to him and told him that Elizabeth would bear a child.  Zechariah didn’t believe the angel so the angel struck him speechless until after the baby was born.  Zechariah came out and of course could not explain what they angel said.  But Elizabeth did, indeed, become pregnant and was in her 6^th month.

.  Mary HAD to see Elizabeth, but it just wasn’t as easy as telling her mom, “I'm going over to Elizabeth’s house for a while.”  Because Elizabeth lived in Ein Kerem, a little village on the edge of Jerusalem.  By air, it is about 80 miles from Nazareth to Ein Kerem.  By foot, going around Samaria, because the Jews didn’t travel in Samaria, it was a lot longer.  It may have taken a week or even longer.  Somehow, Mary convinced her parents to let her go, or maybe she ran away, I don’t know.  Somehow, she finds herself on the road to Ein Kerem.

Can you imagine how long that trip must have seemed?  She was not only worried, and scared and embarrassed; she was also hot, and dusty, and tired.  As you approach Ein Kerem today,  you might first stop at Mary’s spring.  Some Christians say that this is the place where May met Elizabeth.  Up the hill, however, there is a church called the church of the visitation.  In the courtyard of the church, you find this very cool statue commemorating Mary’s visitation to Elizabeth.

 When the two pregnant women met, a strange thing happened.  The baby inside of Elizabeth jumped, or maybe it kicked.  But it wasn’t just a normal kick.  Something was different.  Elizabeth would have been used to kicks to the bladder and jabs in the ribs.  There was something special about this, however.  When the baby kicked, Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and she delivered a message from God.  That message was ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.”  The Plaques behind the statue say those words 42 times in 42 different languages.     This passage is actually the inspiration for the Hail Mary which is often used by our Catholic brothers and sisters.

Hail Mary Full of Grace. Our Lord is with thee. 

Blessed art thou among women.

Blessed is the fruit of thy womb Jesus…

That is a strange thing to say… do you suppose Mary felt blessed at that moment?  Let’s see… we said worried, scared, embarrassed, hot, dusty, and tired.  I don’t see blessed in there.  At that moment, I just don’t think Mary felt very blessed,  

We  normally think of "blessed" as lucky.  If we have everything we need and some of what we want, we consider ourselves blessed.

It might be food, or housing, or money, or material things, or family, or friendships, or spiritual blessings.  If we have what we need and some of what we want, we consider ourselves blessed.

So how is Mary blessed?  Mary was poor, pregnant, afraid she had lost the respect of her friends, the trust of her parents, the love of her fiancé, she might be killed, and on top of that, she wasn’t sure that she wasn’t going crazy!  In our sense of the word blessed, Mary was not very blessed.  Elizabeth was saying something different, however. 

 Biblical blessing has to do with God’s grace resting upon a person or people as they are in relationship to God, and as they participate God’s plan.  You know like, blessed to be a blessing.

When Elizabeth says you are blessed, your child is blessed, and by the way, in case you didn’t hear me the first time, you are blessed, she is telling Mary that God is with her- God is working in her.  Elizabeth is saying, Mary you are part of God’s plan.

You see being blessed is this sense has nothing to do with what we have … being blessed is all about what we offer.  When we are in relationship to God, we are blessed.  When we offer ourselves to God to participate In God’s plan, we are blessed.  When God works in us to use us to accomplish God’s will, we are blessed.  We are blessed.  And we become living blessings.

Mary was literally carrying the greatest gift God would ever give to humanity, himself.  And because Mary gave herself to God for that task, she was blessed and was a living blessing.

Now Mary’s response is as interesting as Elizabeth’s proclamation.  Mary replies with what we call “the Magnificat,” which we sang as part of the scripture lesson today.  My soul gives glory to my God…. There are two or three sermons just in Mary’s poem here, but let me pull out one thing.

I have always been interested in the reversals in the gospel.  Things like “the first shall be last and the last shall be first.”  Or in Luke’s beatitudes “"Blessed are you who are poor“Followed by “But woe to you who are rich.”

Another is Jesus first sermon where he is citing from Isaiah,

He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
    And recovery of sight for the blind,
To set the oppressed free.

A great reversal is when we discover that God’s values are just exactly inside out from the world’s values.  Where we discover that God does exactly the opposite of what we might expect.

In the Christmas story, for instance God choosing a poor little girl from Nowheresville Israel to be the mother of Christ is a reversal.  Mary sings of that in the Magnificat.

 “My soul glorifies the Lord
47     and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has been mindful
    Of the humble state of his servant.
From now on all generations will call me blessed,

Do you see the reversal: the humble servant being called blessed?

She goes on

 For the Mighty One has done great things for me
    Holy is his name.
50 His mercy extends to those who fear him,
    From generation to generation.
51 He has performed mighty deeds with his arm;
    He has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.
52 He has brought down rulers from their thrones
    But has lifted up the humble.
53 He has filled the hungry with good things
    But has sent the rich away empty.

That’s the part that intrigues me.  He has brought down the rulers and lifted up the humble.  Filled the hungry and sent the rich away empty. 

The Magnificat gives us a pretty clear picture of who God is.  God is a God who turns the world on its ear by siding with the poor rather than the powerful, defending the weak rather than the rulers, choosing the hungry over those who are well nourished.

That is the nature of God.  And that is the nature of the incarnation we celebrate at Christmas.  God could have chosen to appear as a king.  He didn’t.

God could have chosen to appear as a great general.  He didn’t.

God could have chosen to appear even as the emperor of the Roman Empire.  But he didn’t.

God came to turn the expectations of the world upside down.

And God comes to turn our world upside down today.

Here we are in the middle of the Christmas shopping frenzy…  Let me ask you a question.  Think about how much you are going to spend on gifts this season. What is your gift giving budget?  Do you have that in your mind?  Now how much will you be giving to the poor?  It might be through the church or Salvation Army or something else.  How much will you be giving to bless the poor compared to how much you will be giving to those who are comparatively wealthy and really don’t NEED anything?  Most of us are probably getting a little uncomfortable right now.

Let me ask you another question

How much do you think you will spend on food this season?  Include your Thanksgiving dinner, Christmas Eve, and Christmas dinner.  Include anything you spent to host parties, bake cookies and candy, or go out to eat while you are shopping.  If you add it up, it will be more than you probably expect.  Do you have that number in your mind?  Now how much are you giving to the hungry.  Compare those numbers how much give to bless the hungry compared to how much you spend on food for those who could really benefit from skipping meal or two anyway.  Most of us are probably feeling a little more than uncomfortable right now.

Finally, if you can stand it, how much time are you spending decorating your house, shopping for and wrapping gifts, writing and mailing cards, preparing special dinners, going to holiday parties, going to special services and all the other special things you will do this Christmas.  Add up all the hours. Do you have that number in your head?  Now add up the hours that you will spend visiting someone who is lonely, comforting someone who is sick or grieving, doing an act of kindness for someone who might otherwise be forgotten, or raising money for charities that will minister to the emotional and spiritual needs of people.  I’ll even let you add in PRAYING for those people because I am pretty confident that even including praying the amount of time we spend blessing others won’t even compare to the amount of time we spend on ourselves and our celebrations.

Don’t hear me wrong.  I am not telling you NOT to celebrate Christmas.  I am asking you if you are being a blessing this Christmas season.  Are you being a blessing to those who are less fortunate than yourself?  Are you blessing those who are hungry or food insecure?  Are you blessing those who are lonely and forgotten?  Are you acting as an instrument of God for the God who sides with the least and the lost?  Are you giving your life to those who are the poor and the hungry?  Are you using this time to worship and serve the God who

Brought down rulers from their thrones
    But has lifted up the humble.
Has filled the hungry with good things
    but has sent the rich away empty?

Some of you are… but we all have to ask ourselves if we are really being part of blessing this Christmas.

Matthew 25 offers a good way to examine our hearts. Imagine the baby in the manger miraculously speaking …

42  I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

44 “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

45 “(The babe replies), ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’”

Have a blessed Christmas.