It's Amazing

Based on Luke 1:36-45

This is a hard time of year for preachers. It’s Christmas time. And, just like Easter, the Bible stories we hear has been told so many times in so many ways that it is extremely difficult to say anything really new about it. What new twist can be found? What new kernel of wisdom or insight? We have heard the story of Elizabeth and Mary so many times. We almost have the telling of Jesus’ birth memorized. These stories are so familiar to us. What can anyone say about these stories that we haven’t already heard before? It seems all we have left to ponder is the story itself and maybe that’s enough. Maybe that’s all we need, to hear these familiar stories and marvel once again at how God came into our world as one of us, taking on human flesh, in this way, with these women, in that time in history. It is a marvelous story.

Consider how marvelous this story is. Some may even say it is absurd. Mary has just had a conversation with the archangel Gabriel, telling her that she would get pregnant by the Holy Spirit, and will have a boy who is the Son of God. That is some big news for a teenage girl who, according to tradition, had spent all her life within the Temple of Jerusalem, having been offered by her parents Joachim and Anna in service to God, just like what Hannah did with her son Samuel. Of course, when you get news like this, that you are expecting a baby, you don’t just sit on that news. You get up and tell somebody. And the first person you tell is likely the most important person in your life. Notice that apparently it wasn’t Joseph. Maybe that was for obvious reasons. She would have some explaining to do! Instead, Mary gets up and hurries to a small, unnamed village in the hill country of Judea, to a relative who must be the most important person in her life, Elizabeth. Tradition tells us that Elizabeth was Mary’s aunt, which would make John and Jesus cousins. Isn’t that amazing? What a family! Elizabeth was someone who was dear to Mary, who Mary was comfortable sharing such amazing news. In those days, Mary had to slip away from the watchful eyes of the priests in the Temple and run to the village where Elizabeth lived to tell the good news. In these days, Mary could have just called Elizabeth. I doubt if she would have posted it on Facebook though. “I’m pregnant and God is the father.” Would you click the “like”, “love”, or “ha ha” emoji? Would you respond with “congrats”? That would be an odd Facebook post.

With a story like this, that you are expecting, and the pregnancy is the work of the Holy Spirit, this is a story you would only tell the closest people that you can trust; someone who would believe you and not think you are crazy. Elizabeth fits the bill. After all, Elizabeth’s pregnancy was unusual as well. She was barren and an old woman. She was just like Sarah, Abraham’s wife, who although well advanced in years conceived and gave birth to a son and named him Isaac. These ancient stories are coming to life with these women, aren’t they? The word was out that Zechariah, Elizabeth’s husband, had seen an angel that told him that Elizabeth, barren and well past childbearing age, would give birth to a son who is to be named John. Mary surely reasoned that if anyone in the world could understand the message she had received from the angel it would be Elizabeth. In fact, there would be no one else in the world who would understand what Mary was experiencing than Elizabeth. So, Mary had to go to Elizabeth to share her news.

But what happens next is even more amazing. As Mary approaches Elizabeth, John kicks her. Now there is nothing amazing about a baby kicking their mother’s uterus. What is amazing is what Elizabeth says. She doesn’t say, “Oohhh, I felt that one.” Instead, she said, “The child inside me leaped for joy as soon as I heard you say hello!” And, the scriptures say, the Holy Spirit fell on Elizabeth. Now this is something impressive. In those days the Holy Spirit rarely fell on anyone. Only prophets received the Spirit for the purpose of speaking God’s message. And 99% of those prophets were men: Moses, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Micah, etc. But here is elderly Elizabeth, the priest’s wife, who has been granted the blessing of carrying a special child who will prepare the way for Jesus. John is already preparing the way in utero by leaping in his mother’s womb. That’s how Elizabeth interpreted that kick. The one who carries the greatest prophet in her womb becomes a prophet herself.

Elizabeth is a prophet because as soon as she saw Mary and felt John leap in her womb, she knew that Mary was pregnant. Mary had not yet told anyone she was pregnant. She just found out herself! But Elizabeth already knows. The Spirit had revealed it to her. And right away Elizabeth sings a song of blessing over Mary and the baby in her womb. Mary follows up by singing a song of her own which, by the way, seems like an improvisation of the song Hannah sang after she gave birth to Samuel. Go back and look at 1 Sam. 2:2-10 and you will see the similar theme of how God turns things upside down, lifting up the poor and hungry and lowering the arrogant and greedy rich.

And there you have it, two women carrying two miracle babies in their wombs. Here, in an unnamed village in the hill country of Judea, you have an old woman and a young woman embracing each other with joy and singing songs of blessing. One has inside her womb the greatest of all prophets. In the other, the Son of God, our Lord and Savior. Amazing.

Why did it happen this way? This is why some think this whole story is absurd. Here is the account of how the greatest prophet of all time and the savior of the world came into being. It isn’t among the powerful. It isn’t in Jerusalem, Athens, Alexandria or Rome. It isn’t among the elites. And men are only ambiguously involved. Zechariah is only involved by divine intervention and is not allowed to speak because he didn’t immediately believe what the angel said to him. Joseph had nothing to do with it at all! This amazing event, an event that turns the tide, that ushers in the salvation of the whole world, is first experienced and shared by an old woman and a young girl in a small village in the hills of Judea. This is how God decided to break into our world. And we are left to puzzle why, of all the ways God could have come into our world, that God chose this particular time, in this particular place, with these particular women.

As hard as you may try, the question of why this way and not another can’t be answered except to conclude that this is how God does things. God tends to act in ways that we don’t always expect or notice. God’s thoughts are not our thoughts. God’s ways are not our ways. God has a bigger view of things than we will ever perceive. It’s almost as if God intentionally chooses to act in unexpected ways among unknown and marginalized people to further demonstrate just how amazing God is. We are all left to marvel at how it happened, that two women on the margins of society are the first to realize how it is that God will come to save the world. Not only do they know how it will happen, they are instrumental in its unfolding. It’s just amazing. I don’t know what else to say about it.

If there is one message we can take from this, it is that God can work through anyone who has a heart open to God. It’s not just the wise people, or the people of great talents, notoriety, and wealth. It is anyone who is open to the possibility that God could use them for ministry. And it’s not the size of the ministry that counts. It is true that large ministries can have large impact. People who have successfully grown ministries from just a few people to the participation of thousands can be inspiring and may have some things to teach us about God and about the practicalities of growing a ministry. Leaders of these large ministries have people coming up to them all the time asking for guidance or encouragement. They have tons of Facebook friends and thousands of Twitter followers. They command a lot of influence for good. God definitely uses people like that and the large ministries they shepherd. But if the Bible shows us anything, it is that God tends to work through people who are not well known or well connected. Elizabeth and Mary were ordinary people, at least on the outside. But on the inside, they were open to the possibility of being used by God to accomplish amazing things. We can follow their example by allowing ourselves to be open to what God may want to accomplish through us. Whether God’s intention is for you or me to one day birth a massive ministry that reaches thousands or even millions or it is to bless just one person today, that is up to God. Who God is looking for is people who are open to God’s leading, who are willing to say “yes” to God, no matter how challenging or even ludicrous that invitation may be. Elizabeth and Mary said “yes” to a couple of mind blowing and life altering invitations. They are ordinary people, like you and me.

Elizabeth carried a prophet in her womb. Maybe you have a prophetic word inside of you that needs to be expressed. Mary carried in her womb our Savior Jesus. We believe that by accepting Jesus Christ as our Savior that he dwells in our hearts. As Mary carried Jesus in her womb so we carry Jesus with us in our hearts. Every day we have opportunities to share Jesus with others, by what we say but mostly by what we do. We can announce the good news that no matter what, God is with us. Perhaps this is something we can take with us as we rush toward Christmas: that when it comes to being available to be the means through which God blesses the world, all of us are included. When God is looking for faithful servants, God is looking at you and me. Just like Elizabeth and Mary, you and I can be in on what God is up to, something that most people miss entirely because we aren’t famous. Being famous isn’t required to be selected by God to do something that can literally change the world, at least the world of one person, maybe even your world.