Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I am a virgin?” The angel said to her, “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 Son of God.” – Luke 1:34-35

Of all the miracles ascribed to Jesus throughout the New Testament, the most miraculous to me is still his fulfillment of the prophecy that a Hebrew Messiah would be born of a virgin. My disbelief of miracles such as this was one of the main reasons that for decades of my life I steadfastly refused to identify as “Christian” — and why I used to envy the “faith of my fathers.” Going back a millennium or so ago, it seems as though reconciling empirical knowledge with the miracles described throughout the Bible would have been less of a stretch to one’s credulity. Or so I thought. As it was, belief in the “magical thinking” of the Bible created a litmus test that I simply couldn’t pass — and out of respect for the Christian faith, I couldn’t sign on with a sense of integrity.

My absolutism changed in a moment of epiphany during the most unlikely of circumstances. Carol and I were at a dinner theater performance with some congregation members of All Saints Episcopal Church in Boise, where I had tentatively begun dipping my toes in its liturgical waters. At some point in the dinner conversation, the topic turned to the Immaculate Conception, and I was shocked to hear a respected and long-standing member of All Saints state, very matter-of-factly, that he’d never believed in that particular miracle. “Excuse me,” I remember asking, “but isn’t that kind of a de rigor article of faith?” While I don’t remember his reply, I do remember coming away thinking that the particulars of Christ’s birth ultimately don’t enhance or detract from what really matters most to me today as a professed Christian: the relevance and power of the Gospel Message, and Jesus Christ as the Word Made Flesh…however conceived.

These days, even as we are dazzled by the pace of scientific discovery, I find myself less pushed around by the need to reconcile the miraculous and the scientific. Quite the contrary: that duality itself seems more suspect to me these days than belief in miracles. In fact, the more we learn about the origins of the universe, the more susceptible we should be to the miraculous, and the more our faith should reflect the words of Paul:

“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.”

Lord, you give us solace in our faith. Thank you for sending your Son among us to teach us your will and may the power of the Holy Spirit dwell in us as it did in Mary. Amen.
-Michael Boss

“He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”– Luke 1:32-33

What a promise! Think of being Mary and hearing this promise from God!

He will be great – an encouraging promise for Mary.
He will be called the Son of the Most High – more hopeful, reference to God.
The Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David – Wow!
He will reign over the house of Jacob forever – Better & better!
And of his kingdom there will be no end – His kingdom will last forever!

Can you imagine what Mary might have thought? Or what she believed? The angel’s message was unbelievable, except that it obviously had to come from God. And, so, Mary believed it.

Have you ever heard an unbelievable message from God? Stay tuned—God still delivers seemingly-unbelievable messages, sometimes from an angel, sometimes in a dream, sometimes from another person. Stay tuned for God’s messages to you.

Dear God, help us to stay open to your messages to each of us, so that we will believe and act on your plans for us. Help us to listen! Amen.
-Barb Cheyney

But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus.” – Luke 1:29-31

The story sits on the margin between history and legend, persistent in its ability to tell a story greater than itself. It is 1531, ten years after the fall of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital. The Spaniards ruled, and the Indians were exiles in their own land.

On December 9^th, Juan Diego, an Indian man, was on his way to Mass at dawn. He was met by the hill of Tepeyac by the Virgin Mary, who appeared to him as brown like he, and spoke to him in his own tongue, not Spanish. She asked him to tell the Bishop to build a church in her honor on the place. Who was Juan Diego to make such a request of the Spanish Bishop? But she had chosen him, and he went three times at her bidding. On the final visit, he took with him the sign she had provided, roses of Castile. When he opened his tilma or serape, in which he had wrapped them, the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe was emblazoned on it. The miracle cut the Spanish bishop to the heart, and the next day the Indian man took the Spanish bishop to the place, where a church building was commissioned.

As Episcopalians, what do we do with a story like this? We can read it as an Advent story.  During this time, we read a lot of prophecies of God’s advent in our world, which turns the social order right-side-up, changes the course of human history, and gives birth to a new thing: a remade humanity. Similarly, into the darkness of the world of the conquered, God sends a heavenly emissary, the Mother of God, to give a downtrodden man power enough to change the course of Latin-American history. The powerful listens to the powerless, and a new thing is born: a Christianity native to this land.

God of liberation, give us grace to do justice. Amen.
-Fr. Paul Moore

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.” – Luke 1:26-28

We are jumping from the Old Testament to the Gospel of Luke in the New Testament now. In the previous 25 verses, the birth of John the Baptist has been foretold, John’s father Zechariah has been struck mute for not believing the angel telling him about the impending birth of his son, and John’s mother Elizabeth has conceived him, taking away the disgrace she had endured among her community for being barren.

Are you feeling caught up now? Good! Moving on…

An angel comes to an unmarried teenage girl in Nazareth who is engaged to a much older man. It is probably a good thing that the angel’s first words to her are that she is favored and that the Lord is with her because I cannot imagine the terror she would be feeling at a heavenly visitor suddenly appearing to her. The message he (the angel) is bringing is one that could potentially threaten her life or undo the marriage arrangement that was supposed to be happening because it was a huge stain on the family if a woman was found to be pregnant out of wedlock.

Ignoring the societal realities at play here, we are about to receive some amazing news: God is coming to dwell with us! God is putting on skin (paraphrasing the words of the Lutheran pastor, author, and speaker Nadia Bolz-Weber) and coming to live with us! The amazing part? God isn’t just descending on earth with a huge light show and a massive choir of angels visible everywhere. Instead, God is coming in the womb of a teenage girl in the backwaters of some obscure Roman territory. What does it say about God that the “favored one” is someone who has some of the least power on earth?
Thank you, God, for turning the expected order of things on its head and sending Jesus to come to one without status or prestige. Amen.
-Jen McCabe

The Lord! His adversaries shall be shattered; the Most High will thunder in heaven. The Lord will judge the ends of the earth; he will give strength to his king, and exalt the power of his anointed. – 1 Samuel 2:10

The word that comes to mind when I see this passage is “braggadocio”. Also, the name of a font found in Microsoft Word, it means “empty boasting, arrogant pretension: cockiness” according to the Merriam-Webster website. My mental picture of this word is a combination of the song “We Will Rock You” by Queen, an MMA fighter trash-talking their opponent, and the yelp Tim Taylor makes in the TV show “Home Improvement”. I mean, Hannah sings about the Lord’s adversaries being “shattered”—that is not a mild statement!

In the context of the rest of Hannah’s song, however, it works well. Much like today, she was perceived to be weak as a woman, and there were political powers at play where she lived that threatened her and her people. Israel had judges, but they would frequently stray from the path dictated by the Ten Commandments and the 613 laws in Leviticus, resulting in the Lord sending some foreign nation to rule over them for a bit to punish them. At any moment, some massive foreign power could come in and rule over them again. I mean, the last verse in the book of Judges talks about how “in those days there was no king in Israel” and “all the people [doing] what was right in their own eyes.” (Judges 21:25, NRSV) There is about to be a takeover, and Israel might not come out on top in this one. The belief that the Lord was going to “shatter” the adversaries would be incredibly comforting because it meant that the Lord was in control and everything was going to work out in the end.

Is our world that much different today? Are we living in a situation where we feel like we are being ruled by enemy forces in the form of the other political party? What side is the Lord on, anyway? We need to take heart that the Lord has a plan for all of this and what is right will triumph in the end.

This is my Father’s world;
Why should my heart be sad?
The Lord is king, let the heavens ring;
God reigns, let the earth be glad!
Lutheran Book of Worship #554
-Jen McCabe

He will guard the feet of his faithful ones, but the wicked shall be cut off in darkness; for not by might does one prevail. – 1 Samuel 2:9

I was betrayed by a friend. It happened years ago. The details aren’t important, but I was betrayed and left for dead. Darkness surrounded me on all sides; there was no light to be seen or perceived. It was such despair that the platitudes of God always being there – footprints in the sand – God being on the side of the righteous – none of that mattered.

None of that “God is there even when you don’t see him” would be true for me until I reached the end of that part of my journey. It wasn’t until I had hit the other shore that I could look back and see that God, indeed, had been there. But if you had told me that in the midst of my grief, the midst of my travail, I would have made some unsavory suggestions of what you could do with your platitudes and good cheer. Despair frightens all of us, with good reason, but we should not sugar-coat it, hide it, or deny it. It is a critical part of the human experience – the detritus out of which the real presence of Christ can grow.

It isn’t until one is past the night that one can see the dawn begin to break. I kept the faith, not because I had any, but because God kept it for me. That allows the prayer of Hannah to become the prayer of my heart.

God, you guard the feet of your faithful ones. Even if we don’t feel it or believe it, you guard us all because of your great love. When our lives grow dark, be there with us. We do not need the light as long as we are held in your warm, strong embrace. Let us not worry about prevailing, but about staying deep within your soft hands! Amen.
-Keith Axberg