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Well I don't know how many of you have seen the Ben
Stiller classic—‘There's Something About Mary?’ In this case for these texts,
there truly is something about Mary but in no way connected to the film’s plot
or content, just in name only. It was the hottest day of the year (in Chicago
anyway), August 15th 2009. This was when my husband and I got married at
Bethany United Church of Christ. The date itself, I came to find out is also
known as ‘Mary, the Mother of Our Lord day.’ I thought this was a really
interesting coincidence for like most of the Protestant world, we appreciate
her role in the 'Greatest Story Ever Told,' but we do not attribute anything
more truthfully beyond this fact.
One of the most recent pleasures I've had in the past few
months was getting involved with another spiritual formation group for clergy,
or order called the order of the Most Holy Mary Theotokos. That wonderful word,
Theotokos, is a very ancient term meaning quite literally, the God Bearer.
The Eastern Orthodox Church basically holds the same perspective of her as do
most Protestants. No matter what century we are in now, and how many years have
passed, I think it is still something to marvel at—the God Bearer, this is a
significant aspect of our faith: God, who came down to us. We have come to
understand this further, through the ecumenical Creeds that Jesus is both fully
human and fully divine… But even saying those words next to one another; are we
able to understand that fully? Do we go there in the “here and now” of our
lives to understand this? I think it is a sad thing to hear on occasion, that
some people challenge the relevancy of Christ and the Gospel. Our whole entire
lives however are shaped by our creation and purpose which we know the truth
from our faith.
What all of today's text have in common is talking about
taking a grand leap of faith, as well as harboring a profound trust in God.
Here, we have a young 13 or 14 year old peasant girl in ancient Palestine
basically selflessly and fearlessly saying “YES” to the call of God. On
the other side of this picture we have a young man, a simple working class man,
who is now in the mist of being betrothed to Mary. Being betrothed is
only the 2nd stage of the 3 stages of carrying out the Old Testament
custom of Marriage… It isn’t until he has a dream where God sends him, the
angel Gabriel and tells him that he must stay with her that she is the bearer
of God: God With Us, our Emmanuel. Jesus is the Greek word for Joshua which
literally means YHWH sending salvation. Both understandings and mention
of these names for God’s Son should enliven our hearts to truly know the kind
of God we have.
The understanding and relationship of the Holy Spirit for
both Mary and Joseph were not ‘New Testament,’ in fact they came from a Jewish
understanding of the Spirit being both of creation and re-creation as well as
the revealer of Truth. The Holy Spirit was not only, ‘The Giver of Life’
but it was the very revelation to those to come to realize what God needs them
to know and share. What we have come to understand about the Holy Spirit
comes after the fulfillment of the Cross and the Resurrection.
The one thing that we have to be careful of as the quote
“modern Church” in the world (but not to be of it), is to mistakenly tear down
tenants of faith that DO need to stand and remain those firm pillars. One
of the firm pillars of our faith, is that Jesus is Lord. Perhaps a little known
fact in some of Paul's letters, to take note of, is that he, in essence, penned
the very first Creed: Jesus is Lord. Philippians 2 examples this best.
In today's letter from St. Paul, this particular snippet from Romans,
has him basically speaking to a group of people he never met, he never even
visited their church! It is apparent however, how his devotion to Christ
and living into his calling to spread the gospel, essentially has him to
develop a beautiful confession, theology that we still look towards today in
understanding ourselves in our Journeys as Christ's disciples.
Paul wasn't just starting with credentials as it seems to
sound, but he was making a creedal statement of who he was and his role in
carrying out the Gospel. Some of those words that we see we may dismiss on
first reading and think maybe perhaps Apostle and disciple mean the same thing.
They really don't mean the same thing. Apostle was a very specific title of
indicating someone who is a servant leader as well as someone who was
definitely given a task to carry out. When we see some of these older terms
being used in different church bodies, it's important to think about what they initially
meant. This can also be said as well for how we even touch the subject with any
kind of understanding why God chose to come down into this world to save us.
Why on Earth would He pick a young girl in the midst of a complex arranged
marriage setting to basically implant her with God's son?
I think one of the most important things we need to keep
in the back of our minds, at all times, with anything we do when we are
journeying in our faith is to realize that we are truly— a faith seeking
understanding. When I was in the Diakonia program over 10 or so years ago, I
read a wonderful book that was talking about our struggle with rationalizing or
“coming to terms” with why God came down to us. Today is a profound revelation
for our faith in these texts: God incarnate. God comes down to us to be born of
a peasant girl, in the middle of nowhere Palestine, in order to begin a very
fully human life, as well as a carrying, and living into, a fully Divine task
of taking all of our sins, everything and putting them to death through that
cross.
What was it about Mary that made God decide to choose her
to be His vessel? It goes beyond what the concept of Virgin means, in fact in
some senses, you could say that is being trivial about it. Her purity was
something that God felt could be used for His purposes of realizing or becoming
incarnate fully human and fully divine. I know one of the text we may be
reading at some point during this Advent season going into the Christmas season,
of celebrating Jesus; we will hear the words of ‘The Magnificat.’ A wonderful
fact I came to discover in reading up to join in discussion with my
colleagues in this particular order, was what is known as Mariology.
Mariology is completely a Roman Catholic “phenomenon”
that grew out of the Middle Ages, and in specific, from Luke's Gospel. These
medieval monks, theologians, Bishops, Friars, Deacons and Nuns, in their
journeying to understand Mary’s role, created a wholly unique theology around
her. They, in Essence, elaborated an extremely creative perspective or to use
one of those $20 words, a hermeneutic lens of why and how the Holy Spirit came
to choose her and made her the God Bearer, the Theotokos. So maybe, in essence being an even
greater leap of faith, we need to return to leaving some things, as the mystery
of God and not try to explain what we don't understand completely or may never
understand till we meet Jesus face to face someday. Why we consider the
Bible the Living Word of God is that it does reveal profound truth deeply
within it especially when we come to study it on many levels.
Keeping this in mind just imagine poor Joseph here… okay
he's been placed in this arranged marriage to a nice young girl, sweet and
innocent, he just passed the first stage of the engagement and he's in the
betrothed phase of the marriage and she comes back from seeing her cousin
Elizabeth and she's already 4 months pregnant! In a dream God's spirit came to
him, gave him a message and said, you must stay with her, she will be bearing
the savior of the world, the light of the world and you are to name him Jesus.
This past week we heard and saw God's messenger for the coming
of the Messiah, being made through John the Baptist. The wonderful transitional
figure of Hope from the old, to the new, pointing towards a New Creation,
re-creation of a people longing to be restored. This week, now we hear of that
very moment when reality strikes and it is apparent that, God is here with us,
will soon be born, from this young virgin girl to grow up and lead in a
ministry to save the world! Here we have one
of the gracious mysteries of our faith, the Incarnation. This text calls us to
rise and follow God's call not knowing where the journey will take us or the
path that God has set before us.
Let us Pray,
Gracious and Loving Lord Jesus,
We are truly thankful for the reality of You
God is truly With Us
May we be disciples, seeking to build our Faith
May we be grand leapers, in this very gift of Faith
A faith that You have established through Your Grace
May we come to appreciate the mystery of the God Bearer
Be in awe of how Your Holy Spirit has come to work in our
very lives
May we always be grateful—
AMEN
December 18th,
2016; 4th Sunday of Advent; Year A; SOLA Lectionary
Sermon By:
Reverend Nicole A.M. Collins
Psalm 24;
Isaiah 7:10-17; Romans 1:1-7; Matthew 1:18-25
The link below is from a special evening service at the Grace Hub's house church on Thursday December 15th, 2016, 7pm:
https://youtu.be/M9GMh04uiRk
https://youtu.be/M9GMh04uiRk
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