Election, Discipleship, and Joy

Fourth Sunday of Advent, Year C
22 December 2024

Micah 5:2-5a
Luke 1:46b-55
Hebrews 10:5-10
Luke 1:39-55

It was in 1987 when I first came to Canada. I had come to study here, but while I was studying I was also taking in scenery, culture, and politics. You cannot feel at home in a place unless you understand the culture and the politics of a place. I had arrived at the end of August. The following February I attended a conference in Halifax. Having grown up in a country that could fit into British Columbia almost four times, it was hard to fathom that one could fly for six hours and still be in the same country. But what I particularly remember is that, unlike Vancouver, Halifax has a visible history, not unlike the land in which I was born. In Vancouver nothing, with the exception of trees, was older than 50 years, and it was probably during my year at the Vancouver School of Theology that the discussion about the replacement of the Georgia Medical Building had begun.¹ I can’t say that I remember a lot about the discussion, because at least at that time it wasn’t my city. And I do understand that older buildings can often require high maintenance costs, are not energy efficient, and were not designed for the kind of offices that occupy them today. But that is the very thing that usually decides whether something has to go. The word for this is efficiency.

There is a philosopher I follow on YouTube² who recently spoke about Artificial Intelligence. A basic definition of ethics is how we live together, and how we form the kind of character required to live together well and for life to flourish. He gives the example of waiting in line somewhere that requires an ethic of respect for others, understanding one’s own place in a community, but also that the needs of some would allow us to let them go ahead. Who of us, standing in line, hasn’t had people let them go ahead, or has allowed others to go ahead? His warning is that since the only thing that matters to Artificial Intelligence is efficiency, getting from A to B in the quickest way possible, there is no room for a common ethos, as there is no room for beauty or the arts , or for inefficiency (AI art is not art because it is born not of experience but of algorithms). If you feel people are being left behind now, AI will only accelerate that.

And this is how we come to Elizabeth who is old and barren, therefore inefficient and of little use in a society in which the ability to procreate not only preserved the family name but was also of economic importance. In an economy of efficiency, Elizabeth did not matter. Yet in God’s economy Elizabeth matters, all Elizabeths matter, not only those who bear her name. Elizabeth mattered before she conceived and not because she did. And as Mary can sing, not only Elizabeth matters but also the hungry and the lowly, among whom Mary counts herself. For if God can bless Mary is such inordinate way, this has implications for the world!

It’s been said that “Mary was a disciple of Christ before she was his mother, for had she not believed, she would not have conceived,” and further, that “Mary’s faith too is not the achievement of merit, but the gift of divine grace.”³
That Mary was a disciple of Christ before she became his mother is undoubtedly true, yet she also was his mother, who is worried when the boy Jesus stays behind at the temple, who at the beginning of his ministry tells him to spare a newly married couple the embarrassment of running out of wine at their wedding. Yet as a disciple she remains with Jesus to the end when Jesus entrusts her to John, one of the twelve.

Mary has often been seen as a model for women but that is false. That would assume that because only women can conceive, only women can respond like Mary, and her “yes” to Gabriel would be misunderstood as subordination to men. Of course, Gabriel is a male name, but what sex and gender are angels anyway? To say that Mary is a role model for women fails to understand that her “yes” is freely offered. It is not an expression of “being a woman” but of being a disciple.
Therefore, Mary is not an example for women but an example for us all, perhaps in ways we do not wish, for Mary likely did not wish for the gift God gave her.
What Mary agrees to in the annunciation is that her life serve God’s purposes. There is no word of self-fulfillment, of following her own dreams, nothing about being true to herself. Mary only agrees to be true to God. That is offensive to our modern ears who in the name of self-realization would rather follow the masses. To live to do God’s will is an insult to modern ears because in our time life is centred on the individual and autonomy is everything.
Mary’s act of obedience shows a different path. It is the reason we venerate Mary.

There is a third thing in the story that deserves our attention.

Mary proclaims God’s reign, God’s economics, and God’s justice. She anticipates what God will do in Jesus.
An important way to read the scriptures is to notice God’s presence.
At the very beginning God walks and talks in the garden. When the first human beings by their own actions have lost this intimate relationship with God, God works tirelessly to restore it.
This begins when God makes a covenant with Noah, with Abraham and Sarah, successive patriarchs and matriarchs, and with the people of Israel. Finally, in Jesus a new covenant is made that includes all people.
Remembering the story of Israel, we remember God making covenant with the people at Mount Sinai. The law is the sign of the covenant and the two tablets on which the commandments are written are kept in the ark of the covenant. The ark of the covenant travels with the people on their sojourn to the promised land. The ark represents the presence of God.
When finally the ark of the covenant enters Jerusalem (the temple has not yet been built), King David does two things: He dances before the Lord (2 Samuel 6:14) and a little earlier we learn that on that day David was afraid of the Lord and said “How can the ark of the Lord come into my care?” (2 Samuel 6:9)
When Mary arrives at the house of Elizabeth, Elizabeth exclaims, “And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me?” (Luke 1:43) We see that Elizabeth echoes King David’s exclamation about the ark coming into his care. ‘How can it be?’
Elizabeth then says, “For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy.” (v.44) John the Baptist leaping in Mary’s womb echoes the dance of King David before the Lord.

And so what Luke is telling us here is that Mary is not merely pregnant, but that God is with her, she has become the ark of the covenant, holding the presence of God in her womb.
In the words of the Apostle Paul in Colossians, “For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.” (Col. 1:19-20)

Today is the fourth Sunday of Advent, time of our waiting and of God’s coming. Together with Mary we anticipate God’s reign, and together with Elizabeth we exclaim, ‘why is this happening to me, that our Lord comes to us?’ And together with John, we leap for joy.

Amen.