Christmas is a time for surprises. A couple of years ago, Jill was hoping to get a bicycle for Christmas. When Christmas morning rolled around, she was surprised (and hopeful) to find a HUGE box near the tree. It was a little oddly shaped to be a bicycle, but hope springs eternal. She tore into the box, only to find a slightly smaller box inside. The smaller box was opened to reveal a slightly smaller box inside that one too. Snickers from the youngest brother gave away the perpetrator of this demented scheme. Box after box was unwrapped. Jill’s expectations dropped as the boxes reduced in size. Thoughts of a bicycle were erased...she’d be lucky to end up with a pair of shoes...or a Barby doll...or a candy bar. The boxes went from small to tiny. The final wrapper was removed to reveal a plastic box that once held tic-tacs. “Oh great...thanks... what is it?” Jill asked. She opened it and something small and round and black fell out. “It looks like the cap to something,” she said. “Go downstairs in the garage and see if you can find something it fits,” we told her. It was the cap to something...the cap came off an inner tube...which was a part of a beautiful red bicycle.
That first Christmas was brought into being with a big surprise too. Young Mary was the stunned recipient. In artist’s depictions of this scene which we have just heard from the Gospel of Luke, Mary is often pictured reading the Bible...what else would the potential mother of Jesus be doing while waiting around for an angel to show up? It seems to me that Mary was just as likely to have been washing the dishes or talking with her girlfriend on the phone when the angel appeared with the words: “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you! Guess what you’re getting for Christmas this year, Mary?” Mary knew all about where babies come from, so her first response was practical: "How can this be, since I am a virgin?" The messenger said, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called the Son of God. By the way...you might want to check in with Aunt Elizabeth...in her old age she who was called barren has also conceived a son...For nothing will be impossible with God. Surprise!"
Speaking of surprises, Joseph got a nasty one when he came over for a visit that night. “Joseph,” Mary said, “you know how you’ve always said you can’t wait to start a family?...” It was actually much more serious than that...divorce was the only way to break an engagement. And this happened in the part of the world in which “honor killings” for those who shame a family are still common today.
I wonder if Mary ever got over being surprised by her eldest son? She was shocked to find him in the temple after he went missing for two days. She was probably a little surprised when his first sermon almost got him killed...even if they don’t like it, church folk are generally tolerant of kids from their own youth group. And the first time he turned water into wine Mary probably said, “Joseph, can you do something with this kid?” Mary was surprised when Jesus’ ministry took him away from them and at times seemed to make him almost crazy. She was bewildered when the path of salvation led to the cross, and she remembered the words of the angel with dread: “and a sword will pierce your heart too.”
I wonder if Mary was surprised by all the speculation that grew up around that first Christmas and the Birth of Jesus. Did Mary live long enough to hear people talk...did she hear the story grow and take on a life of its own? The earliest gospel didn’t even have an account of Jesus’ birth. It was Matthew who put the bold assertion on paper that Jesus was born of a virgin. Interestingly enough, the “virgin birth” part of the story didn’t stir up much controversy in the early church. What really shook people up was not the claim that Jesus was born of a virgin. What befuddled and scandalized the church was the claim that Jesus, God’s Son, had been born into this world at all. How could eternal, pure Divinity consent to take on shabby, filthy flesh? No way. Absolutely no way.
In time, the mother of Jesus died, but speculation about her role in salvation history and the meaning of the amazing birth mushroomed. I wonder if Mary would have been surprised to hear the figure that she became. She went from being popular to being iconic. By the Middle Ages, Mary had achieved rock star status, and even far more. In the absence of hard facts regarding the birth of Jesus, the Church began to devise theories. Bible stories and popular piety and a dash of folk religion and superstition and popular myth all blended together to create an entire theology about Mary. Today, Mary is the most popular woman on the planet...if the woman who is revered today is the same innocent girl of our morning scripture.
Would Mary, the young mother of Jesus have been surprised at what she became in the eyes of the faithful? Would she have blushed at they decided that she had been “immaculately conceived?” During the Middle Ages the act of conception always carried with it the stain of sinful lust, imparting original sin. Since Jesus was conceived without sinful procreation, he avoided the blight of sin. As the mother of Jesus, Mary needed to be protected from that sin too. As early as the second century, an account known as the Protevangelium, or “Gospel of James” ascribed great holiness to Mary, even from her mother’s womb. The “Gospel of James” was eventually ruled non-authoritative by the church, but the notion of Mary’s immaculate conception took root.
Would Mary, the Mother of Jesus have been surprised when people began to call her “Mary, the Mother of God?” The nature of Mary’s motherhood was hotly disputed in the great theological controversies over the nature of Christ in the 4th and 5th centuries. Was she the mother of the second person of the Trinity or was she mother of Jesus’ human nature only? Some quoted Irenaeus, of the second century, who said that: “the Virgin Mary...being obedient to His Word, received from the angel the glad tidings that she would bear God.” Athanasius of Alexandria, in the 4th Century called her “...the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God.”
Some objected. Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople argued that a human can’t possibly give birth to the eternal Word: “No one can bring forth a son older than herself!” he cried. Nestorius was eventually overruled and official church doctrine from that time on made rejection of the “Mother of God” tantamount to denying the divinity of Jesus Christ.
The stories kept growing...People spoke of Mary’s role in visions and miracles. Her labor was painless; Her countenance was said to have been radiant. While celebrating Christmas mass in a small Italian cave, St. Francis brought in a baby crib and used it for an altar. As he preached, he experienced a vision of the Christ child in the flesh. Soon, everyone had a crib (or a creche) in their his or her at Christmas.
Did someone say Surprise? How could humble Mary have ever guessed that Christians would one day come to believe that she was an actual covenant partner with God for the redemption of all believers. Mary, the second Eve, cooperated with God, stood beside her son at the Cross, shared the suffering of the Savior, and with Christ gave birth to the Church. Jesus may have come from Mary’s womb, but the church was born out of Mary’s broken heart. This doctrine is still popular in many parts of the Roman Catholic church, and some Catholics wished to Mary as co-redemptrix accepted as official church doctrine as late as the 1990's.
I wonder if Joseph’s young bride would have been surprised to learn that one day millions of followers of her Son would look to her as an Intercessor in prayer? In the Middle Ages, the divinity and holiness of Jesus was so emphasized that he became distant and unreachable in most people’s minds, residing somewhere in highest heaven. Where could a regular person go to find a loving reception in heaven? How could you do better than to find a loving mother to help you make the connection? And how could Jesus, the judge, really understand what it feels like to be a weak, tempted human being? But Mary...mother Mary...was real life flesh and blood. She might take pity on us. So people began to pray to gracious, compassionate Mary, asking her to relay requests to her Son. And what Jewish boy would deny his own mother’s requests?
In the absence of hard information about Mary, many surprising and even disturbing beliefs about the Mother of our Lord took root. I think Mary would have been shocked at the veneration, hype, and in some instances near-deification on the part of so many followers of Christ. Would Mary have ever dreamt that she might supplant Jesus in the affections of some of His people? Still, it’s easy for those of us outside the Roman Catholic or Orthodox traditions to stand back and take potshots. But I wonder if Mary might not have also been surprised by the stony silence and lack of respect that she engenders in most Protestant circles? Protestants and non-Catholics or Orthodox, for the most part, don’t know what to make of Mary, the mother of Jesus, and not wanting to encourage her adulation, they generally ignore her completely. Alright, calling Mary God’s co-redeemer of the world goes too far. Relying on Mary to mediate our prayers is further than most of us are comfortable or confident saying. So what can we say about Mary?
“Blessed is Mary among women, and blessed is the fruit of her womb!...Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her by the Lord!” Do those words make you nervous? Why should they? Why should “all generations call Mary blessed?”
Mary is blessed because she stands as a witness to the fact that God has made a home among us. God’s coming by way of the Virgin’s womb tells us that he loves us deeply, that He came to share our human flesh, to walk the earth in human history, to experience hunger and pain and loneliness and even rejection and suffering.
Mary’s humility also stands as an example to us all. I think Mary would be surprised and very likely aghast at her cult status in much of the church. But we ought to celebrate and learn from her humility. Mary’s place was always on the periphery; she was the Lord’s handmaid. She didn’t always understand what was going on, but she always pointed the way to her son Jesus. She accepted the sword in her side in order that she might do the Lord’s bidding, and she was willing to decrease as her son increased. Mary told the angel that she wasn’t worthy to be used by God. That wasn’t misplaced or false humility...she was just telling the truth. But when God saw her faith and her tenacity and her love, he knew it was enough.
Mary may not have risen to be co-redeemer of the world, but when she said “may it be to me as you have said,” God knew he had chosen the right person. And God gave her a gift...unlike any ever given before or since. There in a dank stable, exhausted from her labor and surrounded by filth and danger, Mary, the mother of our Lord Jesus Christ, became the first human ever to touch the face of God.
David Steinmetz points out that the fullness of Mary’s witness also shows us the wideness of God’s love for us. God didn’t love and come to Mary because she was useful as a Co-Redemptor or because he was too busy or remote to receive prayers himself. He incorporated her into his plans because he loved her. And he lover her in all her humanity. Mary was obedient...but she was also a meddling mom. Sometimes she didn’t understand the ways of God. Sometimes she spoke when she should have kept silent. Sometimes she tugged on Jesus’ family ties when she should have learned to be faithful instead. Praise God...we’re only human too...but God can still use us.
And perhaps that is the final surprise God has for us this morning. As incredible as it may sound, God has also chosen each one of us to bear his Son Jesus Christ. He asks you and he asks me to carry him into our families and jobs and relationships. The Lord asks us to bring Christ into our decisions, into our joys and sorrows, into our pain and grief, our fear and longing. He asks us to give life to Christ by living as his follower.
If that makes you nervous or overwhelms you, that’s understandable. It shook Mary up 2000 years ago too. But after the initial surprise, this young girl, from a non-descript family, in a one-horse town, in the back bywater of a has-been nation said “Yes” to God. “Yes...I will open up my life and receive whatever it is you have for me, Lord.” She was puzzled. She was afraid. She didn’t know how this could possibly work out. But she held on and trusted God to lead her one step at a time.
God wants his Son Jesus Christ to be born in you as well. You can ignore it. You can reject it. Or you can say with Mary, "I am the Lord's servant; May it be to me as you have said."
O Holy Child of Bethlehem,
Descend to us we pray;
Cast out our sin and enter in;
Be born in us today.
