Advent 4c

LOVE

Texts for Worship

December 24, 2006

When Are You Due?

The fourth and final Sunday of Advent this year also happens to be Christmas Eve Day. The texts for the day that I'm using at Fruitvale Presbyterian Church portray the deep irony and great reversal theme that seem to characterize the way in which God works and acts in the world. Micah 5:2-5a was most likely written during the time of the Exile when Israel had been crushed, destroyed and deported by the Babylonian Imperial Power. In the midst of their oppression to a foreign power, Micah prophesies that the long-awaited and dreamed of King will be born to the imprisoned people - not in the gold-encrusted nursery room of a mighty castle-fortress in the capital city but rather in a small, completely ordinary town by the name of Bethlehem.

The other scripture for the day tells the continuing story of Mary's miraculous and mysterious pregnancy, her time with her cousin Elizabeth, and records her song of praise. Luke 1:39-56 is loaded with images, metaphors and powerful words, all of which advance that God is undoing the things of the world, reversing the order of power and the way in which we understand who is powerful and important. In our western culture today we often value the "underdog," telling stories of revolution, reversal, and renewal...but in the days of Jesus' birth and Micah's ministry, such themes and ideas were rare if not impossible. We miss the poignancy of Mary's Song because to our ears it often seems trite, like some sort of Hollywood-Musical with some spify special effects set in the wilderness outside of Nazareth.

In the Orthodox Tradition and Church Mary is often known as the "theotokos," which in English translates as the "God-Bearer" or the "Mother of God." It's a striking theological notion - one that extends not just to long-ago Mary but to us today. God uses and even depends upon us to be "God Bearers" to give birth to God in our world through our lives, words, actions, relationshiops, work, and rest. Mary is not just a paragon of perfect mother-dom, but rather the first in a long line of Theotokoses or Theotokoi of which we are invited to join. Being a God Bearer addresses the ways in which we are called to "birth" or testify to God in our lives. How are you a God Bearer? How is the Spirit of God preparing you to be a God Bearer? Where and with whom in your life are you being invited to be a God Bearer? How are you responding?