Baltimore Lutheran Campus Ministry

Luke 1:26-38

We have been busy these past few weeks preparing for Christmas.   Even amidst finals and papers, we've been listening to Christmas music and decorating our dorm rooms.  At my house, there have been presents to wrap, cookies to bake, and a tree to decorate. Advent is a time full of preparations.  

And fittingly, our gospel lesson today is about Christmas preparations, too.  Mary’s Christmas preparations.  She was the first one ever to prepare to celebrate Christ’s birth.  But, her preparations didn’t begin when Santa rode by in the Macy’s Parade.  They didn’t begin with the lighting of the first Advent candle.  Mary’s preparations began 9 months before when the angel Gabriel walked in her door to give her a message.

There she was, a young girl going about her work.  Maybe she was tending to the fire in order to cook the evening meal.  Maybe she was headed out to gather water from the well.  Or maybe she was enjoying a very rare quiet moment before she swept the floors of the house.  She was going about her daily preparations when suddenly Gabriel, a messenger from God appears at her door.  

And to this young girl, Gabriel says, “Greetings, favored one!  The Lord is with you.”  Not something you expect to be met with as you’re working around the house.  Not only was this an angel, God’s messenger sent to her, just a normal girl.  No, not just that, but he was saying that the Lord was with her.  

Now, Mary had grown up hearing the stories of God and the words of the prophets.  She knew that God’s presence wasn’t something to take lightly.  She remembered the story of Moses and the elders, when they climbed Mt. Sinai to receive the commandments.  She remembered that they had to fast and prepare themselves for God’s coming and then only Moses was called up into the presence of God.  Meanwhile, all the Israelites were commanded not even to touch the mountain where God was speaking to the people.  God’s presence was serious stuff!  And Mary knew that only one holy priest could enter the innermost reaches of the temple where God was said to dwell.  Only one priest, who had to prepare himself for weeks, was holy enough to stand before God’s presence.

So remembering all this, I doubt that the words, “The Lord is with you” brought Mary a lot of comfort.  The Scriptures say she “pondered what sort of greeting this may be” but I have a hunch she was thinking a little harder than that.  She probably felt a lot like I did when I heard my parents call my name when they returned home from work. She probably wondered what we she had done wrong or what she had failed to do before mom or dad (or in this case, the Lord) came back calling.  She probably wondered what she was in store for.  

And to this worried young woman, Gabriel speaks a word of peace, “do not be afraid.”  There was a sigh of relief that must have escaped Mary’s mouth. “You have found favor with God.”  She’s finally starting to catch her breath when Gabriel starts up again, “now you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus.”  Gabriel goes on to tell her that Jesus will be great and will be given the throne of David and that his kingdom will never end, but somehow I think Mary was having trouble listening by now.  She was still stuck on that “you will bear a son” part.  She was a young girl.  She wasn’t married yet. She wasn’t ready.  This simply wasn’t possible.  

So she asks Gabriel, trying to be as polite as possible (as one should be to an angel) “How can this be, since I am a virgin?”  She was probably thinking- “I know what I’ve done and this just isn’t possible, Lord.  Thank you for the honor, but you must have the wrong girl.”  But Gabriel doesn’t stop.  He tells her that the Holy Spirit will overshadow her and she will conceive a son.  And if she wants proof that miracles happen, she can visit her cousin Elizabeth who has conceived a son in her old age.  As Gabriel reminds her, “nothing will be impossible with God.”

And so, without warning, Mary begins to prepare for Christmas.  She thought she was already preparing for the Lord’s coming- by taking care of the household, by prayer and visits to the temple, and by living a holy life.  She was going about her preparations when God comes to her and tells her that while all these things are good, there is something even better.  The way she has been asked to prepare is to look up from her work and to watch how God can work through her.  

Gabriel doesn’t give Mary a whole lot of help about how to handle all this.  No clear cut rules.  In fact, Gabriel only gives Mary one command on how to prepare for Christ’s birth.  He tells her, “do not be afraid.”  He tells Mary to hear and live this command.  “Do not be afraid.”  Now this was nothing new, this command actually appears more than any other in the Scriptures, more than 300 times in the New Testament alone!  It’s not the command to get back to work, it’s not to be holy, it’s not even to love our neighbors.  The command is simply, “do not be afraid.”  It calls us not to do more, but to simply let go of that which binds us.  To let go of the fear that drives us away from brothers and sisters that we are called to love. Let go of the fear which makes us want to hurt other people or other nations so that they can’t hurt us.  Let go of the fear that we won’t get everything done and the fear that we’re not strong enough for what God calls us to do.  Let go of the fear that makes us so worried about what may happen that we can’t experience the joys of the present.

“Do not be afraid.”  Imagine that.  Preparing by simply not fearing what will come or where we will go next.  Mary’s Christmas preparations were simply not to fear what God was doing.  They were simply instructions to stop and wonder at how God was working inside her, watching each change and reveling in each kick and movement of the life inside her.

Wonder.  That’s what Mary did as she prepared for Christmas. She didn’t just take Gabriel’s message and file it away as useful information.  You just can’t do that with an announcement like this.  No, Mary wondered.  Throughout the story of Christ’s birth, you always find Mary wondering. After she heard Gabriel’s message, she ran to her cousin Elizabeth, her old cousin who was carrying another miracle child within her.  She ran to Elizabeth to wonder together with her, to be amazed at what God was doing with both of them.  And after she left Elizabeth, I’m sure she kept wondering.  I bet her wondering woke her up at night, it came to her as she went about her chores, she thought about it as she ate and as she prayed.  Mary spent 9 months full of wonder, amazed at the life inside of her and how she was chosen to bear the Son of God.

Of course she wondered.  Can you imagine God sending a messenger to you to proclaim that you are to bear the Son of God?  Imagine being told that God will live and thrive inside you.  I’m sure many of us have wondered how we would react if we were in Mary’s place, if Gabriel walked through our door to tell us that we had been chosen to bear Christ.  But the thing is, even though Gabriel hasn’t come calling, we have received that same word from God.  Those are the words that God gives to us in our baptism- that the Spirit has come upon us and we will bear Christ in our very beings.  That is the promise we receive when we come to the table, as Christ comes to live in us through the bread and the wine. God comes to dwell inside us and we become ones who carry God within us. We have reason to stop and wonder at how God has caused such a miracle to happen.  

So, maybe the story of Mary isn’t completely foreign to us.  We have the chance to respond to that same amazing message that we have been chosen to bear the Son of God.  And during this busy Christmas season, maybe we are called to prepare for this life inside us the same way that Mary did.  Our preparations don’t have to be about doing things.   We can prepare for Christmas by letting go.  By letting go of fear and insecurity and the concern that things won’t be right.  Putting down our list of things to do to stand before our God and wonder.  To listen to the amazing words that God sends to us.  “The Lord is with you.”  That God is with us, inside of us, and we are being asked to bear the Son of God in our very beings, to live so that God may be visible in all parts of our life.  We are all pregnant with God, filled with the love of God, chosen by God to bear the Spirit.  

To all of us called, like Mary, to bear Christ, don’t think about it.  Just stop and let go of the fear.  Stop and be amazed that God has chosen to work through you. We don’t know how Mary took on this huge task.  We don’t know what she felt.  We only know that when Gabriel was done speaking, she said., “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”  She just said, “Ok, here I am ready to bear your son for the world.  I don’t know what this means or how this will happen or how I’ll have the strength to do it, but here I am.  I will watch your life move and grow inside me.  I’m ready to be amazed by your presence.  Go ahead, Lord, I’m ready.”

So as we bear God within us, God simply reminds us, “do not be afraid.”  Do not run from the possibilities.  Do not hide the God that dwells within you.  Do not spend your time denying that it can happen.  It has happened, and though we can’t explain it, God continues to dwell in us.  Stop and feel the movement of God in your life.  It may not be as easy to feel as a baby’s kick, but God is at work.  God is moving in your life- so stop and experience the wonder of it.