Dec 21st: If. You. Want., with Rev. Sharon Edwards.
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Rev. Sharon Edwards
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If. You. Want. with Rev. Sharon Edwards. Series: Rediscovering Jesus A Spacious Christianity, First Presbyterian Church of Bend, Oregon. Scripture: Luke 1:33-34.
Come join us this Sunday, online or in person. We will explore what it means to be “midwives of God” in our everyday lives. If you’re curious, questioning, or just needing hope this season, you’re welcome to walk this Advent road with us and discover how Christ might be born in you today.
Transcript:
Sharon Edwards: Hello, friends, what road Are you walking down this season? This is the season of a City Sidewalks Dressed in holiday style, and even roads where strings of street lights and even stock lights blink a bright red and green. And of course, Santa Claus is coming right down Santa Claus lane. In the midst of the glorious sparkle and glittering pathways of the season, there is another road or two that beckons. We revisit the long road to Bethlehem and we walk our own Advent Road, waiting, listening and daring to hope for a star that guides and a baby that brings peace, one of my most favorite poems of the season involves a road, and it was written, believe it or not, by a Spanish medieval monk. But listen to these words from St John of the Cross if you want, The virgin will come walking down the road, pregnant with the holy and say, I need shelter for the night. Please take me inside your heart. My time is so close, then under the roof of your soul, you will witness the sublime intimacy, the divine, the Christ taking birth forever as she grasps your hand for help. For each of us is the midwife of God, each of us, yet there under the dome of your being does creation come into existence eternally through your womb, dear Pilgrim, the sacred womb in your soul, as God grasps our arms for help. For each of us is his beloved servant. Never far. If you want, The virgin will come walking down the street, pregnant with light and sing. Each of us is the midwife of God. Each of us such wild words from a 16th century monk. Or is it these words that are even more interesting, if we want before we greet Mary as she walks down the road towards us, let us remember Mary’s road to Bethlehem started out with an angel in Luke we read the young woman’s name was Mary, and the angel came to her and said, Greetings, favored One, God is with you. But Mary was much perplexed by these words, and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel goes on to tell her God has been gracious with her. Certain things are going to happen and that God is still with her. And then we’re told, she says, How can this be? I think if I was Mary, I would have had quite a few other questions. For instance, will Joseph still love me? Will my family still claim me? Will my friends want to stay friends? Will I survive childbirth? Do I need to go somewhere and hide and by the way, why me? Mary was told what was going to happen. Her life was going to be radically impacted and changed, and it appears she still had a choice to say, yes. To say no, no, thanks. I’ll just pretend this hasn’t happened, and when it does, I’ll just limp along in fear and dread. Or Yes, I’ll be a part of this crazy new god venture, and trust. I’ll still be afraid, of course, but I’ll keep on this road. And then she makes the choice. Here I am. Mary says, Let it be with me according to your will. And so she is Theotokos, the god bearer, as the Eastern Church has called her God bearer. Now back to our road, midwives of God if you want, if you want, Jesus wrote for me this poem invites us to a place of holy imagination, where Mary is not Just a character walking out of our pristine nativity sets, but a fellow human being walking towards us on a city sidewalk or a mountain trail, her feet walking where We walk, she does not symbolically carry the Holy Child. Rather, she carries Christ. In her deep need for assistance and care, she asks to be sheltered, not in a stable or under the roof of our home or a church. Rather, she seeks to be sheltered in our own hearts, the heart often seen as a hidden place, a place where our griefs are tucked away, along with our more vulnerable, wounded and broken, but also precious and even whole selves find cover in First Samuel, we are told, God does not look at outward appearances. God looks on the heart. And this is where Mary wants to quietly walk, and this is where she wants us to grasp her hand. And under the roof of our soul, in the womb of our soul, there the Christ is born, and then when St John calls us a midwife of God. You me, God in flesh is birthed through us into the world. Now, St John is not the only person throughout history who has dared to make such an audacious claim, indeed, another man, Meister, Eckhart, another medieval saint. We are all meant to be Mother of God. What good is it to me? He writes, If this eternal birth of the divine son takes place unceasingly, but does not take place within myself. And what good is it to me, if Mary is full of grace, if I am not also full of grace, what good is it to me for the Creator to give birth to his son if I do not also give birth to him in my time and my culture? This then is the fullness of time, he writes, When the Son of God is born through us. This way of seeing and being as humans goes way beyond the more picturesque version of being the hands and feet of Christ. Birth is messy and hard and complicated and risky and intimate. Birth requires a lot of breathing and a lot of work, but also surrender. To the natural processes that human bodies we are told already know how to do if you want, O midwife of God. And so Christmas happens again and again when we embody hope and love into the world. Creation continues when we shape relationships with peace and joy, our kindness and acts of courage are offerings of forgiveness and workings of compassion. They are all made possible by the Divine birth within us. Barbara brown Taylor, an Episcopalian pastor and writer, says this, we like to think we choose our own life, but more often than not, life chooses us. Terrible things happen and wonderful things happen, but seldom do we know ahead of time exactly what will happen to us. Like Mary, she says our choices often boil down to yes or no, yes, I will live this life that is being held out to me, or No, I will not if we say no, well, then we limp along or become angry or bitter or lament Our unhappy fate or just simply exist if we say yes, we can join the adventure that is not easy. Is definitely messy, but all the way worth it to agree to. As Taylor says, smuggle God into the world inside our own body, if you want. Oh, midwife of God, but we are big, but people, okay, yes. But in the book God improv and the Art of Living Mary Ann McKibben, Dana suggests we are yes, but people and she suggests another way, apparently in improv comedy, there is a rule that when comedians are playing off of each other, one person makes a statement and the other person has to affirm it and then add to it. So rather than saying yes, but it’s yes, and something happens when we change our language from but to and she writes instead of two ideas or two statements being in conflict with each other in either or thinking, it opens up the possibility of a third way, where two seemingly opposing ideas can be both true, but puts a break on possibility thinking, and opens up the window to a myriad of possibilities and ways that haven’t even been dreamed up yet. So yes, I will be a midwife for you. But after the kids are raised, after I’m no longer working, after I feel better about myself, after I get my life together, yes, but or Yes, I will be a midwife for you, and I will mess up, and I will know not always know what to do, and I’ll smuggle God into the world through this body, and I will trust your wisdom and power are within me. I wonder in what. Way will Mary come walking towards us in the days ahead, disguised, probably unrecognizable, who will grasp our hand in need and ask us, O midwife of God to birth God anew in their fragile space of need. The good news is that we will be asked again and again and again. Christ is always present, always arriving, always asking to be welcomed. St John’s invitation stands if we want, Mary will come, and she does not arrive empty handed. She brings a life giving song. She brings light. Friends, may you sing O Holy Child of Bethlehem, be born in us today. May it be so. Let us pray Divine Light, lover of the universe. Love incarnate, love that is alive all over our world today, warm our hearts and melt our indifference. Ignite love within us that is big enough to overcome our seeming smallness and big enough to extend to all the earth and to all our more than human neighbors, luminous love shine Deep within a light that shares the darkness with a graciousness that does not overpower may we, too be bearers of the light, midwives of love. Amen.
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