The Path

This is the message given in the United Methodist Churches of the Wheatland Parish on Sunday, December 14, 2014.  The Bible verses used are Luke 1:26-38.

            This is the second week of our sermon series “Angels Among Us”, looking at the role angels played in the Christmas story.  Last week, we look at the angel Gabriel and his conversation with Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist.  Today, it’s six months later, and we hear from Gabriel again.  This time, Gabriel talks to Mary, the mother of Jesus.

            Many of us know the story, but even so, I don’t think we ever get tired of hearing it.  Mary is a virgin.  She’s engaged to a man named Joseph.  We’re not told how old Mary was, but many scholars believe she might have been fairly young, maybe a teenager.  She’s minding her own business, doing whatever it is she did, and all of a sudden Gabriel shows up.  Gabriel says, “Greetings, you who are highly favored!  The Lord is with you.”

            We’re told that Mary “was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be.”  That’s all we’re told, but I suspect there was a lot more going on in Mary’s mind than that.  Like, what’s going on here?  Who is this?  Is this really an angel?  Why does an angel want to talk to me?  Did I do something wrong?  Is God out to get me?  I mean, if that was me, I’d probably be so freaked out by what was going on that I would not even hear the first words the angel said.  My head would be spinning.

            And maybe Mary was a little freaked out.  Because again, just like we talked about last week with Zechariah, the angel tells Mary not to be afraid.  It must’ve gotten a little discouraging for Gabriel, you know?  Gabriel must have wondered “Why is no one ever pleased to see me?”  Because every time Gabriel appears to someone, they’re scared to death.

            But Gabriel goes on to tell Mary what’s going to happen.  She’s going to give birth to a son.  The son’s name is supposed to be Jesus.  He’ll be great.  He’ll be called the Son of the Most High.  God will give him the throne of David.  His kingdom will never end.

            Mary asks one question, or at least one question that we know about.  She asks how this all will be.  That always strikes me as kind of remarkable, that this is the only question we’re told that Mary asked.  Again, I’d think she’d have a lot more questions.  Like, why me?  How am I supposed to do this?  I’m not much more than a child myself, and now I’m supposed to raise one?  And not just raise any kid, but a child who’s the Son of the Most High?  And how am I going to explain this to anyone?  How am I going to explain it to my family?  How am I going to explain it to Joseph?  What am I going to do if they don’t believe me?  How am I going to raise the Son of the Most High if I’m left on my own?

            There’d probably be a lot more questions Mary could’ve asked.  But she did not.  She did not ask any of those questions.  Mary simply asks, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?”

            And Gabriel really does not give her much of an answer.  All Gabriel says is that the Holy Spirit will come to her and that no word from God ever fails.  And Mary agrees.  She says, “May it be done to me according to your word.”  And Gabriel leaves.  Mission accomplished, at least from Gabriel’s perspective.

            I wonder, if Mary had asked any of those other questions, whether Gabriel could’ve answered them.  We said last week that one of the things angels do is give people messages from God.  But how much did Gabriel actually know?  Did Gabriel know how this was all going to play out?  Did God tell Gabriel or any of the other angels what was going to happen?  Or did God just send Gabriel out to give Mary the message, giving Gabriel only the information Gabriel needed and no more?

            There’s no way to know.  But sometimes I imagine Gabriel getting this assignment and wondering about it, you know?  Because it is a pretty strange deal, when you think about it.  Gabriel may not have said anything, but I can imagine Gabriel thinking, “Okay, let me make sure I have this straight.  I’m supposed to go this young, unmarried girl, who’s a virgin, and I’m supposed to tell her that she’s going to have a baby.  And the baby’s not going to come about the normal way.  She’s still going to be a virgin when he’s born.  And the only thing I can tell her about how all this is going to happen is that it will be by the power of the Holy Spirit.  But I’m also supposed to tell her that this baby is going to be the Son of the Most High and will have a never-ending kingdom.  

“And--that’s it?  That’s all I can tell her?  Okay, then.  But what’s God up to?  What’s going to happen?  What’s the plan here?  What’s this all about?”  You know, when you think about it, Gabriel may have had just as many questions about all this as Mary did.  Maybe more.

We talked last week about how God has a message for each one of us.  Those messages come in all kinds of ways.  It could be that we get a direct message, in words, from God or from an angel, but there are lots of other ways.  Sometimes God sends us messages through prayer and meditation.  Sometimes God gives us messages through other people.  Sometimes God gives us messages through things that happen to us.  Sometimes, we don’t even realize that we’ve gotten a message from God.  Sometimes we just have a feeling that we should do something, or say something, and we do, and we’re not even aware that God was involved in it.

We also talked last week about how, when God gives us a message, it shakes our lives up, either in big ways or in small ways.  One of the reasons that shake-up happens is that, while God may tell us everything we need to know, God does not tell us anywhere near everything we’d like to know.  We have all kinds of questions, just like Mary probably had and like Gabriel may have had.  We wonder, “Why me?”  We wonder, “How am I supposed to do this?”  We wonder, “How am I going to explain this to people?”  And “What am I going to do if no one listens to me?”  Or maybe we get confused by it.  Maybe we wonder, “What’s God up to?  What’s going to happen?  What’s the plan here?  What’s this all about?”

Gabriel may have had no idea how things were going to go.  Mary certainly did not.  And yet, Mary went ahead and agreed to it anyway.  Even though Mary had no idea what was going to happen next or how this could possibly all work out, Mary was still able to say, “I am the Lord’s servant.  May it be to me according to your word.”

It takes a lot of faith to be able to do that.  Mary started out on a path not having any idea where it was going to lead.  Gabriel convinced her it was what God wanted, and she was willing to do it, but still.  Most of us, when we start out on a road, want to know where the road is going.  We want to have an idea of what direction we’re headed and what’s going to happen along the way.  Mary did not know any of that.  She was willing to start down a road when she had no idea where that road was going or where it would ultimately take her.

That’s a lot of faith.  And yet, that’s the faith that you and I are asked to have.  Because when God gives us one of those messages, God will not tell us everything we’d like to know.  God asks us to start out on a path without having any idea where it’s going to lead.  That path may be a physical path, a certain place we’re supposed to go, or it may be a metaphorical path, a thing we’re supposed to do.  But either way, God is asking us to start out on it without knowing where it’s going to lead.  And the questions is whether we have enough faith to start out down that path.

And what that comes down to is a matter of trust.  Do we trust God?  Do we trust God enough to start out down a path that could lead anywhere?  A path that could take us to the last place in the world we’d go on our own?  A path that could lead us to do something we’d never dream of doing on our own?

Gabriel gave Mary a message that perhaps Gabriel himself did not understand.  It was one that Mary almost certainly did not understand, at least in detail.  And yet, Mary agreed to it anyway.  Mary agreed to start out down that path, not having any idea where it was going to lead.  Mary trusted God enough to believe that if God wanted her to start down that path, then it must be the right path.  Mary trusted God enough to believe that if God wanted her to start down that path, then God would take care of her along the path and would take her where she was supposed to go.

That was the faith and trust that Mary had.  The question is, when God gives us a message, will you and I have that kind of faith?