December 20, 2020. Luke 1:26-38 Sermon. Grace-Vail, Grace-Benson. How do you handle disruptions in life? Disruptions like events being cancelled. Some this year have even had to postpone weddings, or get married without the big party. This year a common disruption has been events canceled. Even weddings that had been planned on that get cancelled and the marriage happens without the party. Or holiday traditions had to get redone a different way. Then there are the day to day disruptions. Someone said they’d meet you and then don’t show up. Even getting stopped by a train and set back 5 minutes can disrupt your plans for a day. When these plan disruptions come, often we don’t respond well. Today as we consider the angel speaking to Mary and creating a major plan disruption for her; we want to grow in the skill of responding to life disruption with versatility, adaptability; a kind that comes from faith in God. Mary started the day like many others. She had her plans for the day, the week, the year. But when an angel appeared, her plans were disrupted. Her first response was fear and wonder at what kind of a greeting she had just received. This is not an unusual response to an angel appearing in the Bible. Usually when people meet angels in the Bible, they fall on their face in fear. Happened to Daniel, to Ezekiel, later on to John. Angels are powerful, angels are pure and remind people of their impurity. Angels are holy, people are not. This story reminds us that angels, though invisible to us, are constantly at work doing what God wants, and if God determined; an angel could appear to you in your kitchen this afternoon. You could come face to face with a powerful, pure, holy messenger of God like Mary did, and it would be a disruption of your plans for the day as well. But the angel told her, “Do not be afraid.” God wanted Mary to know, “I have not come near to hurt you, but to help you.” As he does so often in the Scripture, at just the time when it makes every bit of sense to be terrified, God comes and says, “Do not be afraid.” As the angel continued to deliver the message; he gave details of God’s plan for Mary’s future. “You will conceive and give birth to a son, you are to name him Jesus. He will be great and called son of the most high, God will give him the throne of David, and he will reign over Jacob’s house and his kingdom will last forever.” First part of the plan included a major disruption for Mary. It included: pregnancy before marriage - a potential marriage destroyer. The angel didn’t include the details, “Don’t worry about Joseph, I’ll appear to him in a dream later.” None of that. Just the news that she’d get pregnant, and he would find out one way or another. Endangering her marriage to Joseph. And more than that, the potential label of being the woman who got pregnant when engaged to Joseph, with this crazy story of an angel visit, seems like a great cover up for sleeping around. You could imagine the kinds of names she could have been called, if Joseph would have left her. And the challenge of possibly raising a child alone, hard enough in any culture, even more so in a culture where women getting jobs was far less common. Massive disruptions of her plans. All because God had other plans for her.
Before we get to Mary’s response, how would you respond? If God were to come to you and say, “I have a Savior who is going to grow inside of you, and you are going to birth him into the world, and as result, your marriage plans may change. Your place in your social group, your future economic prospects, all that will change.” And really, that’s not that far from what God asks. You are meant to be a temple in which Jesus dwells. You are meant to bear his name before the world. And that arrangement which God desires does hold all kinds of consequences for your relationships, marriage, social group, money making prospects. So, how do we respond? When we hear Jesus say, “Love your enemies,” and you actually have an enemy; how do you respond? What an inconvenience or even a danger it would be to actually listen to Jesus. Often we are just not willing. Or when Jesus asks us to be honest about our sins and moral weaknesses. Often we are not willing to give up our reputation to be honest as Jesus has asked. When his will for our lives includes disruption, often we don’t want to hear what Jesus says because we sense we won’t like it. We need to learn from Mary. Mary responded to this major plan disruption with questions and with submissive faith. Notice first what she did not question. She didn’t question that this child could be the most high, the son of God, the heir of David’s throne, with a kingdom that will never end. Those are astounding promises of greatness. And she doesn’t question them. She accepts that if God wants to make this happen, he can. That if the angel was sent to announce this, it must be so. Amazing humble faith. But she did have some questions. She didn’t hide her hesitancy, she honestly asked the angel, “how can this be, since i am a virgin?” Aside from the plan disruptions, the logistics of this plan didn’t make sense to Mary. Notice that the angel accepts the question and answers it. The question is welcomed because it’s honesty directed toward God, not away from him. This is a key whenever we have questions. Consider another angel visit not too long before Mary. Why did the angel take away Zechariah’s ability to speak when he had a similar question, while with Mary he patiently explains more? Part of the answer may be that she was simply expressing a desire for more information from God, while Zechariah may have been expressing more doubt and a desire to turn away from God’s plan. In the angel’s response to Mary, God welcomes questions that come from a humble heart. So when you have questions about how God’s will seems to be disrupting your life; you can be honest with him. You don’t have to pretend to be more confident than you are, you can be honest. The key is to direct your honesty toward God, not away from him. If you don’t understand a certain part of his Word, search it out more, not less. Ask him to help you understand. Talk to trusted Christian friends. Direct your doubts, even your skepticism in God’s direction, not away from him. He is not a God who says, no questions ever. He reserves the right not to answer, but we get lots of indication from the Bible that he welcomes honest and humble questions. We get into problems when our questioning leads us away from God, rather than closer to him. Questions directed away from God, as if he wouldn;t have answers anyways, goes hand in hand
with self reliance. When our plans get disrupted, we can get bitter or angry with God. When our lives take major u-turns, we can let skepticism get between us and God. We need to learn from Mary. When we have questions, God has answers. The real question is, are you willing to listen and receive his answers? And notice that his main answer is not a set of teaching, but a teacher. Not a set of rules, but a person. Not a way for you to solve things, not first, but the way that he has solved things. A baby conceived in Mary, that’s his answer. The angel gave more information about God unfolding this plan. God’s power would make this miraculous pregnancy happen. “The power of the Most High will overshadow you, so the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.” This baby that Mary bore, through the uncertainty, the fears, the worry, this baby was the only place for her to find the trust she needed. This was the answer to all of her prayers, all of the hope that God’s Scripture had filled her with would find it’s fulfillment in him. Watching Jesus grow patiently day by day, little step by little step until he grew to be the man that would sit on David’s throne and rule over his people forever.That baby promised to Mary’s womb is the same place you will find the trust you desire. This really isn’t the story of a young woman’s heroic trust. It’s a story of God acting for his people. God is the one who initiated this conversation, sending his angel to talk to Mary. God is the one who hatched this plan in eternity, and revealed details of it as needed to his people in this world. God is the one who has even more details of his divine plan to be revealed in the future. Mary through the power of the Holy Spirit understood that this story was not about her. It was about God. And when God teaches you that your story is not about you but about him, that’s when the trust and confidence comes to face the unknown. Your life is not about you. This Christmas is not about you. It’s about Jesus. Jesus who is the answer to all your prayers and the hopes that God’s Holy Scripture has filled you with. Jesus who does reign over a kingdom that will never end. Jesus who does keep gathering people in one soul at a time into his kingdom. Jesus who assures you that nothing is impossible with God. He proved that God is able to live in a human body. Seemed impossible but he did it. He proved that a man is able to be perfect, spotless. Countless billions have tried, none have succeeded but him. He proved that even when you’re dead, you can be alive again. Nothing is impossible with God. He gave that message to Mary and he gives it to you. Nothing is impossible with God. You have permission to dream big when it comes to imagining the ways God can use you to shape the destiny of the souls around you. Let your mind wander with all the possibilities for your life of service to him. He once used a humble ordinary young girl to do extraordinary things. He will use you too. God is in the business of making the impossible possible. That’s what we’re waiting to celebrate in a few days. That’s what Christmas is about. Your God came to do what you could not,
offer a perfect life in place of yours, so that you could have what you couldn’t get on your own. Eternal life with him. He’s taken care of your biggest need. Can you trust him with everything else? We’re in a good place when our attitudes reflect Mary’s, “May it happen to me as you have said.” May God’s plan for my life happen, not mine. Even if my marriage goes away and labels come, so be it if God wills it. Incredible trust. Incredible submission. Why? Mary trusted that in letting go of the life she could fabricate for herself, she would receive a life way better from God. It was a life with Jesus. Like letting go of a penny to get a hundred dollar bill. In letting go of her dreams for her life, she recieved something far better. And other people did as well. Countless other people. This was not without difficulty. Mary, maybe the most intense part was, having the sword of grief pierce her mother’s heart as her son was cruelly violently tortured and murdered as she watched. Not easy, but to see him alive 3 days later, no joy manufactured by her own version of life could match the joy of recieving her son back from the dead. So for you as well, letting go of your dreams for your version of your life is hard, but the receiving of life from God is so worth it. When you let go and ask God to give you a submissive faith like Mary, you receive a life with Jesus. Don’t be like a person holding onto a penny and unwilling to take the hundred dollar bill offered you. Let God fill you with blessings by giving you his version of your life. Don’t fear when the unexpected happens. Why not? Jesus faced your greatest fear for you. Fear of rejection because of unworthiness. He went through it to give you freedom from such fear. This is who god is, not a sender of angels to destroy, he can and will do that, but his deepest desire is to send angels with messages of Grace and favor. May you and I say like Mary, “May it be just as you have said.” Amen.