Tag Archive for: Mary

Christmas Eve–23

Immanuel Lutheran, Chicago

At 9:00 pm on Wednesday December 13th, my extended family welcomed Laura Jane Cooksey.  Weighing in at 8 lb. 5 oz., little Laura is the first child born of the nieces and nephews’ generation. She is angelic, of course, in her first photo, swaddled in a maternity hospital blanket. Mom looked great too! Yes. There is spontaneous and deep-felt joy in welcoming a newborn child. But we know, don’t we, what those happy smiling photos leave out when taken after all the pain, and blood, and vernix has been carefully washed away.

The shepherds went to Bethlehem to see the baby wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger as the angel had told them. Presumably, the scene they encountered was not like the nativity scenes of plastic and wood many of us have in our homes which are likewise far removed from the very raw and very human process of birth. Perhaps we would prefer to leave things such as these out of our Christmas story. But these things must be included if the incarnation is to be real. “…these are the kinds of things that make up our faith: the naked, the primal, even the offensive. And while Mary’s story turned out the way she’d hope it would—with a newborn child in her arms—not all stories turn out that way. What the nativity scene as we’re used to seeing it fails to show us is that our faith is made of that too: the sadness, the questions, the longing, the despair, the anger. Encompassed within the birth of Jesus is the deeply difficult and deeply beautiful, the sacred and the profane, the spiritual and the material. Like our lives, it was fleshly and carnal—and it was also holy.” (Kat Armas, Sacred Belonging: A 40-Day Devotional on the Liberating Heart of Scripture (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2023), 154, 155.)

The altarpiece in our side chapel is one of the most beautiful works of art here at Immanuel and takes us a step closer to beholding what is being said in the lowly birth of Christ. (You’ll have to go into the chapel to see.) The shepherds (unfortunately, not depicted in the photo shopped image on the cover of your worship folder), are poor. Dressed almost in rags, they celebrate in great joy and awe the angelic message that somehow came exclusively to them.

This is the gift and promise of incarnation: the fullness of the presence of God is pleased to dwell in you, just as you are. There is no dress code at the manger. There are no prerequisites you must fulfill to receive this Christmas gift. All the colorful lights, happy-spirited music, parties, sparkling paper, gifts of the season, and high-minded theology tend to conceal the stupendous Christmas miracle: that you and I are always in God’s presence.

The hallmark version of Jesus’ birth is cute, but it cannot help us deal with heartbreak; it cannot deflect the hard, sharp pain of a pink slip, or the death of a loved one, or any of the countless tragedies unfolding in the world today.  If the manger is to be good news, if it is to be good news to us in our hospital room, or in our living room, or in all the places where tragedy may befall us, it must also include all the messiness of our fleshly lives in which God comes again this Christmas to be born.

Of all the nativity scenes in all the world perhaps the most astonishing might be the one displayed this year in Bethlehem, where Christmas festivities have been cancelled due to war. There, the Christ-child lies in a manger of rubble from bombed buildings and destroyed homes in Palestine.  This is the other message wrapped up in the incarnation.  In addition to gift and promise, there is also a call and invitation to discipleship and to loving our neighbors as deeply and fervently as we love ourselves.

Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor recounts listening to Mother Theresa explain why she served the poor. “People say we’re social workers,” she said. “We’re not social workers! We’re Christians who worship Jesus as Lord and therefore serve people made in the image of God.” Taylor thought to himself: “I could have said that too!” But, he wondered, “…could I have meant it?” (Miroslav Volf, A Public Faith, 2011) It’s easy enough to sing Christmas carols and string lights on a tree; that’s what we do each year for Christmas. But sooner or later like Taylor, we must ask ourselves, “do we mean it?” (Daniel Clendendin).

There’s a wonderful Christmas tradition called Las Posadas that I find has special meaning for me this year as we seek to shelter so many families who seek asylum. For nine evenings, from December 16th to the 24th, Christians in Mexico, Guatemala, and parts of the Southwestern United States go door-to-door asking for shelter reenacting Joseph and Mary’s journey to Bethlehem.

It lasts nine days to represent the nine months of pregnancy Mary played host and shelter to the infant Christ.  Mary was the first person to say yes to the incarnation.  Las Posadas literally means “accommodations,” or “inns” and traditionally involves a procession through the streets knocking on doors of neighbors who shout they have no room and slam their doors shut, after which they open them again to join in the procession to the next house. Each night ends in prayer and a party because Mary and Joseph do a find room.

On any given day, it is estimated that 6,139 people, most of them children, experience homelessness in Chicago. (City of Chicago 2023 Point-in-Time Count & Survey Report of People Experiencing Homelessness).  Where will Mary and Joseph find room among us today?

Like those wrapped and waiting for you tonight under the tree, the gift of Christmas must be un-wrapped if it is to be received. We must peel away two millennia of culture, commerce, and holiday traditions—to re-discover the surprising/challenging/wonderful message— God in Christ comes to us again this Christmas. The fullness of the presence of God richly dwells with us and in all the messiness and fleshly complications which that implies.

To each of you is given a gift God has chosen especially for you.  Each of us finds welcome, belonging, joy and love to warm our soul and unfold our fisted minds, hands, and hearts. Mary “treasured and pondered all that was said about Jesus in her heart” (Luke 2:19).  Among those at the first manger in Bethlehem, only Mary followed Jesus to the cross.  You and I, together with Joseph and Mary, are gifted and challenged this night to open our eyes, our ears, and our hearts to behold—a gift wrapped in swaddling clothes and nestled upon straw who fills our life to overflowing with the presence of God that is given tonight—for you.

Advent 4B–23

Immanuel Lutheran Church

The angel Gabriel said to Mary, the child she would bear “…will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High, (Luke 1:32). She was a young peasant woman no more than 13 or 14 years old.  She had her whole life in front of her. She was to be wed to Joseph, start a family, and take her place among the respectable people living on the little rocky outcrop that is the mountain town called Nazareth.

Gabriel called her the ‘favored one.’  It is a strange blessing. Did she perceive the broad outlines of trial, tragedy, rejection, and hardship, she was to face?  You’ll notice, this Divine favor would not equate with wealth, health, comfort, or ease. Mary’s ‘favored’ status meant the dream of normal family life would be nipped in the bud and replaced with scandal, danger, and the trauma of her son’s crucifixion.

Yet, was there an upside? Gabriel told her “…the Lord God would give her child the throne of his ancestor David…and he would reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of his kingdom there be no end (Luke 1:32-33). It’s hard to imagine more powerful or overwhelming words than these about the future of Mary’s offspring. But rather than being caught up in such glory, she responds humbly and quite practically, “How can this be, since I have no husband?”

Among the many works of art that depict this encounter between Gabriel and Mary one seems to capture the drama of this moment: The Cestello Annunciation painted by Sandro Botticelli in 1489. Today, it hangs in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy. There, Mary is fully aware of the complexity and consequences of her choice. In contrast to the traditional notion of ‘Mary obedient, meek, and mild,’ Botticelli evokes Mary’s internal process of deliberation. She responds to the Angel Gabriel with both awe and angst. The embrace of God’s call would be profoundly countercultural and require her to trust an inner vision that flew in the face of everything her community expected of her. Moreover, it required her to persist in faith long after Gabriel disappeared. Swooning toward Gabriel, Mary is simultaneously vulnerable and gracious. Finally, Mary says yes.

“Where an ordinary woman would dream of a child who would elevate her in this world, Mary dreams of a child who will liberate all the lowly.  Where it might be commonplace to dream of a child whose glory would extend to Mom, Mary dreams of a child who will fill all the hungry with good things.  Where any mother might dream of a child who will grow up and be Somebody, Mary imagines a child who will knock all the Somebodies of this world off their thrones, who will scatter them in their false imaginations and raise the lowly in his new, true world. (Nancy Rockwell, “Fearlessness,” The Bite in the Apple, 12/15/14)

Mary’s glory is almost always connected to her maternity. Mary is Mary because of Jesus. But before she was Jesus’ mother, Mary was a prophet like Isaiah, a person of humble circumstance who lived in a time of political turmoil and military oppression. Like Isaiah, she feels inadequate to bear God’s word to the people. Yet, eventually, both Isaiah and Mary relent and embrace the Spirit’s call on their lives.” (Diana Butler Bass, Sunday Musings, 12/24/23)

Our first reading (2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16) and gospel lesson (Luke 1:26-38) each involve proposals for making a proper house for God. In 2 Samuel, David wants to build a permanent dwelling place for God in Jerusalem to match the glory of his own castle. This plan does not please God. David’s hands are stained with blood from years of pillage and murder, killing women, men, and likely children (1 Samuel 27:11). In this way, the home Mary offers God (in Luke 1:26-38) stands in marked contrast to the bloodstained building David built. Mary offers flesh and blood, and a pure heart. Mary is a shining example for all of us who would wish to love and serve God with our lives. As Meister Eckhart, 13th c. German mystic said, ‘We are all called to be mothers of God – for God is always waiting to be born.’

St. Francis wrote, “we should make a dwelling-place within ourselves where he can stay, he who is the Lord God almighty, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” A dwelling place is not a place one passes through, but the kind that one can take root in. God comes again to take root and dwell in us this Christmas. See, we have become a living stone, the fulfillment of the promise Gabriel made to Mary, part of God’s dynasty of justice and that will last forever.

Thomas Merton added, “Into this world, this demented inn, in which there is absolutely no room for him, Christ comes uninvited.” In a violent world such as ours, the best that we can offer Christ are the small corners. The mangers and the dishwasher cribs. Our hearts. The humble places where he feels most at home. Like Mary, we listen again to Gabriel’s proposition with both awe and angst.

Martin Luther noticed something in Mary’s response to Gabriel that is instructive.  Faith isn’t about knowing the facts.  Faith is the willingness to stake “goods, life and honor” upon the promise of God’s love and the hope that springs from it. Faith always involves at least some risk and vulnerability.  (Is the gift of faith on your Christmas list?) Mary shows us faith must follow the way of the cross as we journey from belief into action.

In this busy holiday season, many of us We feel the pressure to be extraordinary homemakers.  Christmas brings a whole season of decorating, preparing meals, special desserts, parties, cards, and letters to write (can I just say, snail mail is so unbelievably time consuming!) and of course, there are the gifts to purchase, wrap, and display before the big day with family and friends.  Adding to all this are the ghosts of merry Christmases past, now lost; or Christmases present that disappoint us; or perhaps the ghost of Christmases future that haunt us with the dread fear of being alone.

Just when all your effort to make everything perfect threatens to overwhelm you; when all your losses and regrets mount up to make celebrating Christmas seem impossible, the Angel Gabriel’s announcement to Mary comes like water in a dry land, or like light in the darkness. Christmas homemaking is not our job, but God’s free and generous gift.  Our savior’s birth marks the moment in human time when God became flesh. God is not “out there,” but, with Mary, we learn God is always also “in here.” This is Mary’s great discovery.  God is here and everywhere. Through community in Christ, we have become a temple of the living God—a living sanctuary of hope and grace.  You and I are God-bearers by our baptism into Christ.