Surprise! Surprise!
December 13, 2020
Luke 1:26-38
Start with a description of surprising my wife by coming home a day early bringing our son home from North Carolina . . . .
? The Russian poet Boris Pasternak said, “Surprise is the greatest gift which life can grant us.”
? Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Life is a series of surprises, and would not be worth taking or keeping if it were not.”
Or we can take Jane Austen’s view, claiming “surprises are foolish things. The pleasure is not enhanced and the inconvenience is often considerable.
This year we are looking at some of the characters from the first Christmas story. When we think about surprises, Mary comes to the top of the list. She was doing nothing that seemed extraordinary, she was living her life as she believed she should. Then the surprise came, and along with her surprise was the miraculous mixed in with the ordinary.
Let’s look at her story as Luke tells us in Luke 1:26-38 - -
26 In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth,
27 to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin's name was Mary.
28 And he came to her and said, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!”
29 But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be.
30 And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.
31 And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call His name Jesus.
32 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 father David,
33 and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end.”
34 And Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?”
35 And the angel answered 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 called holy — the Son of God.
36 And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren.
37 FOR NOTHING WILL BE IMPOSSIBLE WITH GOD.”
38 And Mary said, “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.
The annunciation of our Lord Jesus, to Mary is a declaration that is both beyond us, and yet within us. It’s at the same time greater than our life experiences and, yet, descriptive of the events that make up life. Into Mary’s common, everyday hopes and dreams, comes the incredible, the fantastic, and the surprisingly awesome call of God. And that call, changes Mary’s life . . . forever.
With the angel, Gabriel’s first words, the change begins, “Greetings, favored one, the Lord is with you.” Those words ended normalcy for Mary. Have you ever pictured Mary as a care free teenager?
She’s lost in the dreams of a girl waiting to be married. She thinks about her upcoming marriage and the celebration the entire community would participate in. After all, she has Joseph, from the honored line of King David. She spends time writing in her journal Mrs. Joseph, son of Jacob. As she thinks about Joseph and smiles, knowing he’s a good and righteous man. There’s the thrill and anxiety, as she anticipates their wedding. Maybe she’s thought of a few baby names, and how she will announce to her family and friends she and Joseph will have a baby. But they’ll wait a few years, get settled, and put some money in the bank.
Then the angel of the Lord comes and declares, “The Lord is with you,” and her dreams collapse, and change. When the angel says, “Mary, God has chosen you to bear a child,” Mary’s response is pretty impressive, “How could this be? I am a virgin.” And the angel of the Lord declares, “The Spirit of God will cause it.”
We can envision Mary’s confusion and fear. She must have wondered how will this happen? What will Joseph think? He knows the law. Will he believe me? This is illegal, so will he have me stoned. What am I going to do?
What about her family and friends? What about that wonderful celebration, her wedding dream? How can it happen now? And the angel simply says, “The Lord is with you. Fear not.”
Who among us has not experienced the shattering of our dreams? The great 20th century Scottish pastor James Stewart declared: “It is a queer, incalculable thing, this life. For a few, for a very few, does it work out in detail just as they planned. Sooner or later, one fact confronts every pilgrim on the road, the fact of the discipline of hopes denied and plans defeated.”
Hopes denied. Plans defeated. Oooooh . . . did he know about the corona virus? How many plans and hopes have been denied / defeated? How many have lost loved ones? All of us know what it means to have plans thwarted and changed.
Even beyond the virus, consider our lives, consider what we maybe dreamed for in the past, and have had to let go because it was not in God’s plans. Whether it was family, work, school, career, financial, health . . . sooner or later we all will have the experience of not getting what we hoped for.
And then we look to Mary, and we discover that the awesome call of God comes at precisely the right time. We look to Mary, and in our own lives we hear the whisper of angel’s wings and the voice that declares, “The Lord is with you.”
Even in the midst of seeming defeat, during the times of grief and despair, there is a reminder from the Lord . . . . our shattered dreams are pieced back together . . . remade into a life which rests upon faith and hangs on through quiet obedience to the will of God.
It’s incredible, isn’t it, the Bible leaves Mary’s questions unanswered. After speaking with the angel, the road is no less ambiguous than before. There are no assurances given to Mary that Joseph will understand and her family and friends will support her. All is left unanswered. All that is left is one thing . . . faith and trust!
Yet, as we saw in Joseph, we see the same in Mary . . . a courageous obedience. A willingness, and acceptance to say “YES LORD, your will and not mine.”
Mary was surprised by the angel’s visit. Who wouldn’t be? Yet, I marvel, and we all should marvel at Mary’s faith. She simply responds, “Let it be done to me as you have said.” It’s the quiet and firm resolve of faith.
As in Mary, so in us, it’s faith that can remake our lives when our dreams have been surprised and shattered. It’s the quiet trust in God’s presence that miracles occur out of hopes denied and plans defeated.
Oh, we can deny the call of God. We can grasp at our circumstances. We can ask 1001 questions. We can flame out and hit the wall by continually asking . . . WHY? WHERE? HOW? all we want. We can cling to our own power. We can look to the heavens and shout out a cosmic “NO” to God. But then there’s no peace. There’s only the growing uneasiness within our heart and soul.
BUT, Mary’s way, Mary’s is the way of obedience. It’s the way of healing. It’s the way of faith that brings eternal peace when the winds of the storm swirls around us, ready to swallow us. You see, it’s our trust in God that can empowers us to make a stained glass window of beauty and grace, out of what seemed to be broken pieces of colored glass.
No matter what situation you find yourself in, we must hold onto Gabriel’s words as a reminder in our lives, “The Lord is with you.” And it’s Mary’s faith that leads her from that awesome call of God which seemed to shatter her dreams as a young bride into the remaking of her life which is the hymn of joy we call The Magnificat.
Luke records Mary’s words later in verse 46, when Mary proclaims --
46 "My soul glorifies the Lord 47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for He has been mindful of the humble state of His servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed,
49for the Mighty One has done great things for me — holy is His name.
50His mercy extends to those who fear Him, from generation to generation.
51 He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; He has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.
52 He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble.
53 He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty. - Luke 1:46-53
This does not sound like a woman who is hanging her head over shattered dreams, hopes defeated, and plans denied. Instead, this sounds like a woman who has changed and adapted her dreams, changed her plans, and recognized that her hopes have become new hopes, her dreams are new dreams, her plans are new plans. So she writes a hymn expressing her joy. Joy to the One who created the changes.
Dear friends - - there are those who sing this hymn of joy. Those who are singing these same hymns as Mary. Those who have found healing - from wounds / scars. The greatest healing we will ever find comes when we embrace the words of Gabriel, who speaks on behalf of God, “The Lord is with you.” And we say Amen!
Yes, friends, the Lord is with us. Whatever you have or are going through, know that nothing is so overwhelming that God can’t bring healing to you. I know people who have confronted affairs, alcoholism, pornography, anger, cold-heartedness, mistrust, death, sickness, job loss, alienated family members and more . . . and they have had the courage to trust in God’s plan, not theirs, they’ve trusted and believed that they have become a new creation in Christ.
We have all been through the seasons of life when OUR dreams were shattered, OUR hopes - defeated and OUR plans - denied. The key word is OUR dreams, hopes and plans. God has plans for us that we don’t understand, and may never have the chance to fully understand, yet, God has something so far above our comprehension to give to us, but
we must trust Him,
we must have faith in Him,
we must place our confidence in Him,
we must accept His plan for us, in fact,
we must embrace His plan for us,
and only when we embrace it, and say to the Lord, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word. Your will, Lord, not mine.”
Then we will sing a new song, and experience a new Christ, a Christ we never knew existed, but a Christ who is waiting for us to take that step.
The Bible is filled with annunciation stories, I have one, and so do you. I would even venture to say some of us have more than one annunciation in our lifetimes. Simply put, our annunciation is God’s call and our response to the call of Jesus. He announced His presence and we said - - YES LORD! Come!
Know that God will walk with you through anything and everything. When God calls you, He promises to be with you, every step of the way. Let Him lead.
When we praise God, these become our Magnificats.
The wonder of the annunciation is that God has declared that the miraculous will come in the ordinary. God has shown us that which is so far beyond us - is already emerging within us; for God has declared that which is far greater than you and I, comes not as we expect, but it comes in the divine presence of the Christ.
Today, I invite you in rediscovering the joy of our faith, through the joy of Mary, whose shattered dreams, hopes denied, plans defeated were remade by God into our salvation.
Surprises! Embrace the surprises of life, God is there. He promises to be there.
As we seek the Lord this week, ask God to make us sensitive / open to His leading. This week, read over these words between Mary and Gabriel and her hymn of joy. Hold onto those powerful words from Gabriel - - “with God, nothing is impossible.”
Mary took the words of Gabriel and was obedient to be what God called her to be. She experienced and personified the impossible become possible.
When God’s will is made clear in life and we obey, nothing is impossible.
With God nothing is impossible . . . So fear not, the Lord is with you!
