Rejoice oh highly favored one.......

Singing Holden Evening Prayer each Wednesday at Advent worship, filled as it is with the wonderful music of Marty Haugen, fills me with the song of Mary. 

"An angel came from God, to a town called Nazareth, to a woman whose name was Mary.  The angel said, "Rejoice oh highly favored one.  The Lord is with you."

Who wouldn't want to hear those words spoken directly to them?  Perhaps anyone who knows that a living relationship with our Lord is not a promise of easy street and a comfy chair. 

For those who have figured out that God's promise is to be 'with you' not 'to make all things easy for you.' those words are in fact wondrous words of comfort.  For those people of faith who have known darkness, those words are the light and the hope to which we cling, for we do not walk alone.


Again from Holden Evening Prayer:  "You shall bear a child, and his name shall be Jesus, the holy one of God most high."

For anyone who has had to commend into God's loving hands one whom we have loved dearly, those words are poignant and painful.  We too know what is going on in all those scripture passages where Mary 'ponders these things in her heart.'  Mary knows that someday, this child of hers will close his eyes forever.  Our trust is that the God who was willing to empty himself and come to us as a baby also knows the pain of loving and releasing someone special.  That is our light and our hope.

And Mary said, "I am the servant of my God"  - that is the wonder of this season of carols and candles. 
Whenever we offer ourselves into the hands of our God, whenever we take up God's plan (especially when we have no idea what it is and where it will lead), whenever we hold fast to the relationship God offers us, we  press back the darkness and claim the light of life in God's name.

The power of this season is not the church's ability to bring tears to the eyes of the sentimental nor is it in the ability to get folks into the sanctuary for their annual visit.  The true power of this season is manifest whenever one of God's beloved ones - young or old - turns toward God and says,  "Here I am, the servant of my God, in whom I put my trust."

peace