December 24,
2006
Text: Luke 1:39-55
Magnifying
Heat and Light
A story, in the foreground, of two
biblical women. That, in itself, is
something. Women didn’t take center
stage too often in that culture. And
here, not only at the center, they are alone, with time on their hands for
themselves and each other. According to the verses leading up to this morning’s
part of the story, Elizabeth’s husband Zechariah had been struck dumb because
he didn’t believe his aging wife was miraculously going to get pregnant. So he wasn’t presenting much of an
interruption. And Mary had apparently
come alone – we have no idea how she had managed the trip, or where Joseph
might be. And the very next verse
indicates that Mary stayed with Elizabeth for three months. Talk about your Christmas company! Two women, then, talking – as one writer
describes them, “pregnant crone and the unmarried, pregnant bride suspected of
adultery” [1] --
learning together, leaning forward, and looking beyond.
And while much about them seems
dramatically different, Mary and Elizabeth have much in common. Neither of them, as that previous description
hints, is supposed to be
pregnant. For Elizabeth, pregnancy comes
too late; for Mary it comes too early. And
yet here they are, surprised, perhaps, but happy. Elizabeth’s joy isn’t all that hard to
understand. Parenthood is presumably
something she has always wanted to experience.
And if “late” really is better
than “never,” she has good reason to smile.
The fact that her husband has become a mute in the process probably
hasn’t changed all that much about their day to day life. If he is like most men, he probably didn’t
say much or communicate very well in the first place. At least now he has an excuse.
Mary’s mood, however, is a bit more
amazing: an unwed mother in an extremely
traditional society in which non-virgin brides had been known to be stoned,
taking on an incredible burden, and yet nonetheless delighted. Here is a
teenager who either just doesn’t get it, or who miraculously, inexplicably does.
Whatever her sense of morality or family obligation; whatever she might
have felt about propriety and social stigma; whatever burden she might have
felt about “doing the right thing” or “lying in the bed you’ve made,” Mary’s
reasons for embracing this pregnancy seem grounded in a very different
conviction: that God was doing something new
and powerful in the world, and that she was called to participate. No longer simply peasant or daughter or subject
or wife, this was now her vocation. “My
soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior…”
I’ve
been intrigued by that word as we’ve made our way toward the Christ
Candle. Magnify. The Bible dictionaries will tell you
that it means to “exalt” but our more familiar – less “churchy” – use of it may
be more descriptive. When we talk about
“magnifying” something we are referring to the process of making it larger,
more visible, more intense and vividly strong.
I remember the hot afternoons I would crouch down on our front sidewalk
with a newly found or acquired magnifying glass to see if I really could set a
leaf or a paper on fire, with only the light of the sun – intensified. I remember the hours in science class, edging
a specimen slide under a microscope lens and adjusting the magnification. What would it mean, in that way of thinking,
for Mary’s soul to “magnify the Lord” – other than to make the Lord larger,
more vivid, more dramatically apparent in her midst; to see the wrinkles and
pores on the face of God’s will in clear and more luminous detail?
If
Mary’s soul, then, magnifies the Lord, what does it enable her – and us – to
see? Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German
theologian killed by the Nazis, reflected on the song that Mary sings by way of
an answer, and wrote: “It is at once the
most passionate, the wildest, one might even say the most revolutionary Advent
hymn ever sung.”
He’s right
about that. It is a song, after all, and
conspicuously absent from her holiday song is any reference to candles or holly
or mistletoe or bells. Nothing is said
of snow or tinsel or lights or trees. I
get no taste of wassail or chestnuts or figgy pudding. And based on this, I have no idea when to
expect Santa Claus, or by what means he travels.
But that said, I do get some sense
of what’s important, and what God, at least, looks for under the tree. It’s there, beneath the tree, that the song
becomes revolutionary, indeed. For it
isn’t an X-Box or a Playstation 3 or a Tickle-Me-Whoever or an MP3; it isn’t a
this or a that that is obsolete by the time it’s unwrapped or another
nick-knack to sit on a shelf. What God
is looking for is a radically different way of life.
Like any good protest song, Mary’s
is pretty hard on the status quo – on life the way it commonly is – and she
imagines it turned a bit upside down. As
a person who would have to consider himself among the rich – with a pantry full
of food; generally, if benignly proud of who I am and what I’ve done with my talents
and opportunities; as one hardly powerful but who enjoys some small measure of
influence – I can’t help but feel myself to be among the judged in Mary’s
song. Her music implies that our
familiar descriptions – prosperity, strength, influence, satisfaction – aren’t
necessarily givens, entitlements, but rather something more like trusts.
And so the nagging question Mary
pricks in me is to what end am I using the assets at my disposal? What is my soul magnifying? If I have some political capital, what and
who am I influencing, and toward what end?
If I have some financial capital, on what am I spending it? If I have some educational capital -- privileged
to attend school, earn degrees and gain significant employment – how is the
world better off because of its investment in my growth?
If you
think my questions unnecessarily or uncomfortably or even inappropriately
personalized, look at what happens in Mary’s own song. She starts out talking about herself and what
is going on within her, but very quickly and dramatically globalizes the
implications. Almost effortlessly,
seamlessly, she makes the connection that what is happening in and through her
– in a poor, young, pregnant Jewish peasant girl – will change the world.
And that arrests me. When, I want to ask, did we stop thinking about the larger
implications of our small, personal actions?
When did we stop recognizing
that what we do – the decisions we
make, the votes we cast, the actions we take – have ripple effects that are
real and consequential, whether we can see them or trace them or not?
What brain synapse shorted out our
ability to link my car’s poor gas mileage with national energy consumption with
global politics with environmental risk and decay? Those really aren’t hard lines to follow, but
we seem to have become incapable of doing so.
Or the cycle of low prices. On the one hand, who doesn’t like to pay less
for what we want? But we know, do we
not, that reductions come from somewhere – systemic efficiencies in some cases,
but also low wages to employees and manufacturers in others, resulting in
higher societal costs like health expenses and family support, that translate
into higher taxes that offset the savings we claimed with the purchase.
Or the impact of my consuming and
disposing on the long-term health of the planet. When did we become inured not only to the
truth, but to any awareness of the fact that my actions – our actions; what
happens to us and through us – do not occur in a
vacuum; that what I do has to do with you and in some real, though perhaps
indiscernible way, the whole of creation.
Mary, on the other hand, somehow manages
to recognize that what is, at this point, little more than an embryo within her
will radically shake things up – thrilling some and agitating others – with the
proclamation that what God desires is that we care for each other, feed
each other, look out for each other, protect each other, encourage
and forgive
each other. What God desires is that our
souls magnify heat and light for each other, that the frozen darkness
of the silent night between us might become the radiant dwelling of God’s own
day.
Rejoice, rejoice, take heart in the
night,
Though dark the winter and
cheerless,
The rising sun shall crown you with
light,
Be strong and loving and fearless;
Love be our song and love our prayer,
And love, our endless story,
May God fill every day we share,
And bring us at last into glory. [2]