Sunday, December 23, 2018

A Life Unasked For


sermon preached at Church of the Good Shepherd, Federal Way, WA
by the Rev. Josh Hosler, Rector
The Fourth Sunday of Advent (Year C), December 23, 2018


I’ll never forget that first ultrasound—such an amazing experience, seeing that shape inside my wife’s body of our daughter to come. But being a musically oriented person, even less forgettable to me is the first sound of her heartbeat. I had a newfangled digital recorder in those days, so I asked for silence in the room and made a one-minute recording: swoosh, swoosh, swoosh, swoosh. Of course, I still have that mp3 stored on my computer: a sound that would otherwise go unnoticed, magnified. A vision that nobody on the outside could see, magnified.

“My soul magnifies the Lord.” What does it mean for Mary’s soul to magnify the Lord? The Greek word can mean simply to praise or to honor. But it can also mean to enlarge. Mary helps us see God close up—like a magnifying glass. Mary’s obvious pregnancy is a sign of what we can’t yet see. Mary’s youth, humility, and vulnerability are where God chooses to set up camp.

Today the psalmist gives us words we can use to ask for help: “Restore us, O God of hosts!” We ask for God to arrive and rescue us. The prophet Micah points us to Bethlehem specifically. And then we hear a story of how we can expect God to arrive: in the most unexpected way.

It’s not like we didn’t have hints before. Our spiritual ancestors found God on mountaintops where there was no one else around, and in the wilderness during their worst hunger pangs. They found God in stories, and they found God in dreams—in the strangers seeking welcome, and in a surprise overnight wrestling match. Elijah found God not in wind, earthquake, or fire, but only in the sheer silence that followed.

Sure, there were also times when our ancestors found God in the spectacular and undeniable: in a worldwide flood, in deathly plagues, in the parting of the sea, in the tumbling of city walls, and in the grandest of temples. But they also found God in the midwife resistance of Egypt, in a talking donkey, in the healing of foreign generals, in the feeding of foreign widows, and in a valley of dry bones.

Jeremiah heard God telling him to bury his dirty underwear, to dig it up after a month, and then to tell the people that they were like it. Hosea heard God telling him to marry a prostitute and to give their children insulting names, and then to tell the people that they were like that. When God is around, you cannot expect to be flattered or coddled. But you can definitely expect to be surprised and challenged, and nevertheless to find comfort inside the challenge!

Did all of this run through Mary’s mind that day when the angel showed up? Surely she already knew of God’s penchant for enabling unexpected pregnancies. But those usually happened on the other side of 40, or even 90. And they never happened to girls who weren’t even trying to get pregnant!

When Mary finally got to Elizabeth’s house to share the news with her elderly cousin, she could have just sung a song about how good God had been to her personally. Her song begins: “My soul magnifies the Lord.” But it doesn’t stay there. Mary’s song is a song of apocalypse and justice. Mary’s song pits God against the proud, the rich, and the powerful. Mary recognizes that God has stuck by her people all along, and that even when it doesn’t look like God is with them, faith tells her that God is just around the corner—hiding in a place you’d never suspect. If rich people are still oppressing the poor, if tyrants are still scoring victories, if money still talks and crime still pays, then the story isn’t over yet!

And Mary has the proof—right there in her young body. She can feel God growing inside her, little reptilian-esque buds turning to human fingers and toes, a tiny heartbeat quickening with a life that resists the deadly world around it. Cradled in Mary’s uterus is the creator of creation, the one who stands on the side of those who live against the odds. How many fetuses make it to birth? How many babies make it to adolescence? How small is the chance that this unborn child will become an adult, someone of will and influence? All the uncertainty of pregnancy in the ancient world belongs to Mary. Yet so does a messenger’s incredible reassurance: “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.”

And so one body has become two. Mary has put her body on the line for God with the words, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord.” And now God offers his very own body to Mary and to the world—a sacrifice to us. If God knows all and sees all, then God sacrifices these things to be among us—an offering to us. Love is nothing if not self-giving. “Here,” says God. “I literally give you myself, in the flesh. Yes, I have always given myself to you in so many ways, and many have seen and recognized me. I have made daily visitations to all of you. But I don’t want just to visit. I want to move in with you. Here: I pour myself out to you.”

Jesus is offered in the womb long before he offers himself on the cross. His is a life unasked for—the ultimate unwanted pregnancy. He just shows up: “Greetings and salutations!” Nothing we do can keep him from arriving in our world.

Later in the story, we will ask him to leave, not just impolitely, but violently. All the worst impulses of humankind will fall on him, to beat him, to mock him, and finally to kill him. But even that won’t keep him away. He’ll just show up again: “Greetings and salutations!”

It seems we can’t prevent God using even the most stringent form of birth control. And it seems we can’t make God stay away, either. If Jesus is God in the flesh, then God is indeed making the divine home here among mortals—and plans to stay awhile. Forever if necessary. Until we all come to the knowledge and love of the One who created us!

So the Creator of the Universe will keep showing up wherever we least expect, and so inconveniently! She’ll show up on Pentecost, in flames of fire that speak and understand all the languages we can devise. He’ll show up to strengthen the martyrs as they suffer torture and death in the Roman arenas. She’ll appear to mystics like Hildegard and Julian in a cloud of unknowing. He’ll appear to St. Francis in the birds and in the beggars. She’ll serve as muse for the great writers and musicians. He’ll drive the abolitionists to expand the definition of freedom. She’ll guide the suffragettes to seek equality, and he’ll march alongside Martin. She’ll take every opportunity to call bishops and kings up short. He’ll appear in tents in the woods and question our priorities. They’ll appear in our churches and in our families and question our categories and our pronouns.

God will just keep showing up—whether we’re ready or not. Wherever you see that the small are doing mighty things, that the sidelined are standing up to those who would exploit them, that the humble are exerting a quiet influence that the pompous cannot match … that’s where God is. The home of God is truly among mortals!

And you can also count on God showing up here today as we come to the table. God came into a human body, and now we will welcome God into our bodies as well, to strengthen and nourish us, to give us eyes to see and ears to hear.

Join us here again tomorrow night to welcome Christmas. Welcome Christ into the world with all your heart. Just don’t expect it to happen in a neat and tidy way, but in a way that challenges us all to grow and also provides comfort in the challenge … as if we ourselves are pregnant with all the possibilities of Love. Amen.


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