Great Joy
Luke 1:46-55
What does joy look like--real joy--not the giddiness or simple happiness we sometimes substitute for joy--but real and actual joy?
Mary's song is a wonderful example of what joy actually is. It is a song of absolute hope. It is a hymn to existential contentment that her Hebrew and Aramaic speaking kinfolk would call shalom. It is also completely at odds with everything going on around and to Mary.
Keep that in mind.
We tend to limit joy only to moments when there is complete correspondence between what is happening within us and outside in the world around us. The consequence is that we rarely experience anything remotely akin to joy because those moments when our outer and inner worlds are completely attuned to one another are so exceedingly rare as to be miraculous.
And so we settle.
We decide that simply being happy must be joy. Or we make it synonymous with enjoying something--we will declare snarfing down a particularly scrumptious meal "joy" when, in fact, we are simply saying it was a good meal. By reducing joy to some of its cousins, we cheat ourselves from the experience of joy. We will settle for something less because we assume actual joy to be unattainable.
Now look more closely at Mary.
The Magnifcat, the official name for this text, comes at a fascinating moment in Mary's sojourn from Annunciation to Nativity. She is in Jerusalem with her cousin, Elizabeth--the older woman now celebrating the birth of her firstborn, a little bundle named John. While Luke does not say it, we can fairly safely assume that Mary is with Elizabeth because she could no longer remain in Nazareth. She is pregnant with Jesus, whom we know to be the Messiah to be, but whom the wags of Nazareth assume to be the product of a wild night with an unknown stranger. A child out of wedlock was a sentence of adultery. Adulterers were to be stoned to death--ladies first. Even if the neighbors were more gracious, the social stigma would remain, making not only Mary, but all of her kith and kin outcasts as moral degenerates. It is hard for most of us to imagine the hell on earth her existence would have been had she brought Jesus to term in Nazareth--the shunning, the open judgment, the harassing insults, and so on. So, she runs away from home to Jerusalem which on a map does not look all that far, but was far enough for Mary to slip back into anonymity. And safety.
And she sings for joy.
She sings for joy because she knows the presence of God deeply and profoundly. She sings for joy knowing that God's presence is the reason for her predicament.
What?--if this is grace, then we might want something else....
You see, for Mary, God's presence trumps all else. Everything. That presence is redemption incarnate, even if it sets her at odds with the rest of reality.
And that is joy--the ability to see the presence of God so clearly in every moment--ANY moment--that all else falls away as irrelevant. It is knowing hope so well that there is literally nothing that can dim it.
But we might be right where we were--how can joy then be possible?
God is with us just as God was with Mary.
That is the beautiful proclamation of Christmas. Jesus is Immanuel, God with us. That means that no matter what else might be happening, no matter how great or how grievous, God is present with redeeming grace, empowering mercy, and great compassion. Through those gifts, God ensures that nothing else can separate us from God or salvation....or hope. Remember it was Job upon his ash heap in utter ruin who cries out, "I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last, he shall stand upon the earth" (Job 19:25). It was not wishful thinking; it was complete assurance that was joyous and absolutely true. Therefore, even in this moment, one that a great many are enduring as deep and hurtful angst, God is with us--i.e., we can find joy even now, even here. We can find the utter peace of God. We can experience the total settledness of life. We can feel the lightening of our bones within us. We can see the veil lifted. Joy is ours.
Jesus Christ was born to save.
Even you.
Even me.
Now, the further way to fully realize the joy that is possible is to share it. Once we find God with us, we also find our vocation which is only a fancy way of saying we are called to love one another, expressing that love in serving one another. Research reveals that human beings feel their best and declare themselves to realize fully who it is they are to be when they are serving others. Generosity breeds contentment. A generous life breeds joy because it taps us directly into the love that flows continuously from God.
Mary carries the Son of God, knowing she is bringing salvation to the Least of These. Knowing that, she knows her life is exactly as it should be--how could it be anything less? That fires her joy.
It can fire ours.
Love one another.
Joy to the world.
What does joy look like--real joy--not the giddiness or simple happiness we sometimes substitute for joy--but real and actual joy?
Mary's song is a wonderful example of what joy actually is. It is a song of absolute hope. It is a hymn to existential contentment that her Hebrew and Aramaic speaking kinfolk would call shalom. It is also completely at odds with everything going on around and to Mary.
Keep that in mind.
We tend to limit joy only to moments when there is complete correspondence between what is happening within us and outside in the world around us. The consequence is that we rarely experience anything remotely akin to joy because those moments when our outer and inner worlds are completely attuned to one another are so exceedingly rare as to be miraculous.
And so we settle.
We decide that simply being happy must be joy. Or we make it synonymous with enjoying something--we will declare snarfing down a particularly scrumptious meal "joy" when, in fact, we are simply saying it was a good meal. By reducing joy to some of its cousins, we cheat ourselves from the experience of joy. We will settle for something less because we assume actual joy to be unattainable.
Now look more closely at Mary.
The Magnifcat, the official name for this text, comes at a fascinating moment in Mary's sojourn from Annunciation to Nativity. She is in Jerusalem with her cousin, Elizabeth--the older woman now celebrating the birth of her firstborn, a little bundle named John. While Luke does not say it, we can fairly safely assume that Mary is with Elizabeth because she could no longer remain in Nazareth. She is pregnant with Jesus, whom we know to be the Messiah to be, but whom the wags of Nazareth assume to be the product of a wild night with an unknown stranger. A child out of wedlock was a sentence of adultery. Adulterers were to be stoned to death--ladies first. Even if the neighbors were more gracious, the social stigma would remain, making not only Mary, but all of her kith and kin outcasts as moral degenerates. It is hard for most of us to imagine the hell on earth her existence would have been had she brought Jesus to term in Nazareth--the shunning, the open judgment, the harassing insults, and so on. So, she runs away from home to Jerusalem which on a map does not look all that far, but was far enough for Mary to slip back into anonymity. And safety.
And she sings for joy.
She sings for joy because she knows the presence of God deeply and profoundly. She sings for joy knowing that God's presence is the reason for her predicament.
What?--if this is grace, then we might want something else....
You see, for Mary, God's presence trumps all else. Everything. That presence is redemption incarnate, even if it sets her at odds with the rest of reality.
And that is joy--the ability to see the presence of God so clearly in every moment--ANY moment--that all else falls away as irrelevant. It is knowing hope so well that there is literally nothing that can dim it.
But we might be right where we were--how can joy then be possible?
God is with us just as God was with Mary.
That is the beautiful proclamation of Christmas. Jesus is Immanuel, God with us. That means that no matter what else might be happening, no matter how great or how grievous, God is present with redeeming grace, empowering mercy, and great compassion. Through those gifts, God ensures that nothing else can separate us from God or salvation....or hope. Remember it was Job upon his ash heap in utter ruin who cries out, "I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last, he shall stand upon the earth" (Job 19:25). It was not wishful thinking; it was complete assurance that was joyous and absolutely true. Therefore, even in this moment, one that a great many are enduring as deep and hurtful angst, God is with us--i.e., we can find joy even now, even here. We can find the utter peace of God. We can experience the total settledness of life. We can feel the lightening of our bones within us. We can see the veil lifted. Joy is ours.
Jesus Christ was born to save.
Even you.
Even me.
Now, the further way to fully realize the joy that is possible is to share it. Once we find God with us, we also find our vocation which is only a fancy way of saying we are called to love one another, expressing that love in serving one another. Research reveals that human beings feel their best and declare themselves to realize fully who it is they are to be when they are serving others. Generosity breeds contentment. A generous life breeds joy because it taps us directly into the love that flows continuously from God.
Mary carries the Son of God, knowing she is bringing salvation to the Least of These. Knowing that, she knows her life is exactly as it should be--how could it be anything less? That fires her joy.
It can fire ours.
Love one another.
Joy to the world.
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