Bible Reading: Luke 1:28-38
Associated with the
phrase, Go on its Christmas is the idea that because it is Christmas we can
excuse self-indulgence, greediness and relax our normal standards of behaviour. We need to be careful of a message that
although Christmas is a time of giving it is also a time to give yourself a
break from tedious standards of moral behaviour you have to conform to the rest
of the year or the boring routine of having to take into account the feelings
of other people. Even in the church
there is a message that says, “lighten up” on the heavy commitment stuff,
that’s for January.
There is plenty of
joy in the nativity story but it is not found in escaping reality or found in
the superficial. Right in the middle of
the Christmas story we find the call to discipleship.
Jesus said ”If anyone would come
after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me, for whoever
loses his life for me will find it.”
(Matthew 16:24)
When the angel came
to Mary, to say she was chosen to be the mother of the coming Messiah, Mary was
afraid because she faced a momentous challenge. Pregnancy in her circumstances meant
being branded by society for carrying an
illegitimate child, giving birth to Jesus in primitive conditions and then
having to flee for her life as a refugee. It wasn't just the
nine months and the delivery of the baby but she was still Jesus mother when his
brothers were embarrassed by his cult status, when he was the target of the
authorities, when he was arrested, when he was nailed to a cross, when he was
laid in a tomb..
Yet Mary
simply says in verse 38: “Behold the maidservant of the Lord! Let it be to me
according to your word”.
Knowing the challenges ahead, when Mary
meets with Elizabeth she finds cause for celebration. Mary’s song abounds with joy, “My soul
glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour for he has been
mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will
call me blessed for the Mighty One has done great things for me.” There is great joy in true discipleship.
2. A call to conform
There is great pressure on people to blend in with what everyone else is doing. We can feel the need to conform because we fear that others will think we are too full of ourselves if we say we are going to respond to the call of God to act differently but there also may genuinely be a reserve in us that thinks that living a God-filled, holy life, is only for special people.
Mary
was young, poor and female-all characteristics that to the people of her day
would make her seem insignificant and unimportant. Mary found it hard to
believe the phrase “You are highly favoured, the Lord is with you.” Only after expressing her
wonder and dismay, and then hearing again Gabriel's affirmation and promise,
does she manage to summon the courage to believe that God has indeed favoured
her by working in her and through her for the salvation of the world.
When Paul says that God has committed to us
the message of reconciliation to those who have staked their all on Christ and
received new life in his name and that we are therefore Christ’s ambassadors as
though God were making his appeal through us we need to believe that he means us.
( 2 Corinthians 5:19-20)
We fall for temptation sometimes not just
because what is being offered in enticing but because somewhere we have
believed a lie about whom we are. We believe what the world says about us, what
our culture says about us, what our past, our circumstances or the devil
himself says about us. And if we don’t
really believe that we are God’s representatives then we just might as well
blend in with the world and have an easier life.
“From peasant girl to prophet, from Mary to
mother of God, from to denial to discipleship. In a very real way, this is the
appropriate transition from Advent to Christmas. Mary's story moves us all from
who we think we are to what God has called us to be, from observant believer to
confessing apostle.”
(Karolyn Lewis)
3
Call to accept our inability to resist temptation (Karolyn Lewis)
There is an expectation that when people are asked to do something because it is Christmas that they will give in. We assume that failure to resist temptation is the norm. We accept weakness as inevitable and cannot be overcome.
Being realistic about our weakness and inability is far better than the hypocrisy that pretends there is no battle for us to live as we ought. When it was suggested to Mary that she would have a baby who would be called the Son of the Most high, who will be a king, she wasn’t being modest when she said, “How can this be I am a virgin.” she was being honest.
Besides the miracle that would be needed for her to get pregnant without having had sexual intercourse, there must have been the sense of her own inability to be the mother of not just any baby but a baby who was destined to rule a nation.
In the history of the church Mary has often been
portrayed as a kind of misty, otherworldly figure but the Bible makes it clear
that she was very real, with very real doubts, very real questions and very
real faith. And she was honest enough to
know that this thing being asked of her was beyond her natural ability.
The angel's accepted Mary’s words but went on to say
that "nothing is impossible for God" is shown by two pregnancies. Both
pregnancies were equally impossible. One woman had gone through menopause and
the other was still a virgin (Luke 1:36-37)
He doesn’t get much of a mention
this time of year but the Holy Spirit is all over the Christmas story. In
chapter 1-2 of Luke 5 different people were filled with the Spirit. Zacharias, Elizabeth, Mary, John the Baptist
and Simeon. After almost 400 years of silence
about God’s presence and purposes among his people since the final books of the
Old Testament there is now a fresh work of God among his people through the
Holy Spirit.
Verse
38 is key to this encounter of Mary with the angel. “The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the
power of the Most High will overshadow you so the holy one to be born will be
called the Son of God.The gospels and the book of Acts recount how the activity of the Holy Spirit continued to increase, not only through the ministry of Jesus but also as on the Day of Pentecost the Spirit came, baptized and “rested” upon God’s people, with the promise that just as we see in the Christmas story, the Spirit would be for all people, young, old, male and female.
Christians think they are being very humble when
they say, “I’m not very holy.” Or, “I’m only a poor sinner. What an absolute
affront to Jesus Christ who died to make you good and make you a saint. Far from having to give into temptation because we
are too weak to do anything else, God also sends his Holy Spirit to empower us
to be and do all he asks of us.
“Do you trust the Spirit
enough to say: "I am your slave; take me; use your omnipotent power to put
me where you want me, when you want me there, doing what you want me to do"? Do you know why we can entrust ourselves to the
Holy Spirit? Because he exists to exalt the glory of Jesus Christ. Therefore,
if the heartbeat of your life is the glory of Jesus Christ, the Spirit will
empower and help you with all his might.”
(John Piper)
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It’s Christmas – but we could do an Easter
thing and take up the cross and follow Jesus?
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It’s Christmas but we could do a Bible
Sunday thing and believe what the word of God says about who we are in
Christ?
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It’s Christmas but we could do a Pentecost
thing and seek the infilling and empowering of the Holy Spirit in our
lives?
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