Study, Learn and Grow: Looking into the lectionary

SUBSCRIBE \ ABOUT \ DONATE \ CONTACT

Luke 1:26-38 — December 20, 2020

4th Sunday of Advent

I’ve never had much interest in British royalty and know next to nothing about them. But in our pandemic-related isolation, the Genches have been watching “The Crown” — the Netflix series that chronicles the life of Queen Elizabeth II.

One of the things that has most captured my attention is the peculiar way in which she is consistently addressed – as “Your Royal Highness” or “Your Majesty” – by everyone from servants of the royal household to the prime minister of England. “Highness” and “majesty” strike me as odd appellations for mortals. But given that we are all made in the image of God, it got me thinking: What if we were to address all our fellow mortals as royalty? When we get up in the morning, we could greet our spouse, partner, children or any other housemates as “Your Majesty,” perhaps even bowing a bit as we do so. As we enter our workplaces or places of worship (when we can safely go back to them!), we could hail the receptionist, the custodial staff and colleagues as “Your Royal Highness.” Those on the receiving end of our greeting would no doubt take it as a joke or satire, even sarcasm. This is certainly how Mary takes this greeting on the fourth Sunday of Advent.

I find it more than a little intriguing that in Luke’s story of the annunciation of the birth of Jesus to Mary, the Angel Gabriel addresses her with the appellation “favored one” — the ancient equivalent of “Your Royal Highness” or “Your Majesty.” In “When Momma Speaks: The Bible and Motherhood from a Womanist Perspective,” this is Stephanie Crowder’s astute take on Mary’s reaction: “Mary does not say, ‘Thank you.’ … Mary does not say, ‘Yeah, I do kinda got it goin’ on, don’t I?’ On the contrary, the text says that Mary is perplexed and confused. She is shaken and is shaking her head, ‘Are you talking to me? Is there somebody else in the room? Maybe there’s another Mary.’ ” The angel manages to alter Mary’s perception of her status, for she will soon sing her Magnificat, a hymn of praise, exclaiming “God has looked with favor on the lowliness of God’s servant.” As some scholars note, “lowliness” does not entail humility or meekness, but rather conveys a social sense of humiliation and marginalization, making the juxtaposition with royalty even more striking. Yet it is precisely this juxtaposition of royalty and humiliation that we are invited to ponder this week.

As Mary well knows, life has a way of bearing down on us, even humiliating us, and when we, in our context, find ourselves in those places, we are reminded that stand-alone self-sufficiency is an illusion. Yet in “Vulnerability and Glory: A Theological Account,” theologian Kristine Culp contends that vulnerability is the pivot of salvation — the point at which salvation occurs. This notion is hard to grasp because nobody wants to be vulnerable. We want to be strong and self-sufficient. Yet in Advent we ponder the mystery of incarnation – the mystery that God risked the vulnerability of becoming human, born to Mary, the lowest of the lowly, in a feeding trough no less – in order to restore us to our rightful place as bearers of the image of God. Or, as Psalm 8 puts it, we are just a bit lower than angels and crowned with glory and honor. The Gospel of John reminds us that God not only became human, God became “flesh” (sarx in Greek), which is a far broader reality than humanity. We are not a solo species and God’s incarnation was “a deep incarnation into the fleshly biological life of the Earth,” as Robert Shore-Goss wrote in “Global Perspectives on the Bible.” Thus as theologian Ian McFarland observed in the “The Divine Image,” the “incarnation creates a situation in which the whole material realm” is “pressed into the service of imaging God.” The proximity of vulnerability and salvation is God’s way of redeeming the whole creation.

This kind of vulnerability and solidarity is not often on display in our world — one in which the prideful retain their positions by humiliating others, and the humiliated long for revenge. In fact, at first blush, Mary’s Magnificat might sound a bit vengeful when she sings of a God who has “brought down the powerful from their thrones,” “lifted up the lowly,” “filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty” (Luke 1:52-53). But Sharon Ringe notes that a leveling, rather than reversal, is in view as God’s action moves us to a common middle ground — as “an economy marked by competition is replaced by an economy of generosity in which all have enough.” In other words, a prideful world where winner takes all is transformed into one in which all have a place at the table. This is Luke’s vision for the world: the humiliated are restored to their rightful place and the prideful must make way for others.

The question is, how do we experience that kind of transformation? Theologian Wendy Farley highlights the importance of finding a balance point between pride and humiliation. When, by the power of God’s Spirit at work in our lives, we are unhooked from pathologies of selfishness and self-negation, we discover that we are capable of being compassionate and just-seeking “God bearers.” As we discover this, we can dismantle the polarities that bounce between self-inflation and self-negation. God’s Spirit empowers us to discern this balance, enabling us to become compassionate and justice-seeking God bearers — people who live by the Great Commandment, striving to love God and to love neighbor as self. It is important to note that suppression of self-love is not what is required, but rather love that is rightly ordered, for “only those who love God above all else can love God’s creatures, including themselves, as they should,” as Sondra Wheeler wrote in “What We Were Made For: Christian Reflections on Love.” As we listen to Mary sing, perhaps we can overhear the good news of God’s leveling work within and among us, enabling love of God, love of others and love of ourselves.

Thus, in the closing week of Advent, we are invited to reevaluate both how we see others and how we see ourselves. As the saying goes, if you think of yourself as a hammer, everyone else looks like a nail. But if we are formed by God’s Spirit to see others as royalty, crowned with glory and honor, then respect, love and compassion is their due. Thomas Merton’s “Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander” provides an oft-cited account of the moment he was graced with this kind of revelation. In Louisville, Kentucky, on business in 1958, upon leaving a meeting and stepping back onto the street, he looked at the people about him and realized that he loved them all and that he was connected deeply to them. He notes the joy he felt at being a member of the human race in which God became incarnate. He realized that we “are all walking around shining like the sun. … It was as if I suddenly saw the secret beauty of their hearts … where neither sin nor desire nor self-knowledge can reach … . If only we could see each other that way all the time.” What Merton experienced that day is akin to what we celebrate in Advent: God becoming flesh to remind us that we are all created in God’s glorious image. So perhaps we should greet one another with royal appellations as a reminder of the truth about who we are as bearers of the image of God, for this is precisely what incarnation is about. Greetings, Your Majesty, Your Royal Highness!

As you reflect on Luke 1:26-38 this week:

1. If someone greeted you with royal appellations like “Your Royal Highness” or “Your Majesty,” how do you think you would respond? Can you imagine addressing others in this fashion? Why, or why not?

2. Mary is perplexed to hear the angel Gabriel address her as “favored one.” Does this surprise you? Why, or why not?

3. What do you think about the connection between vulnerability and salvation?

4. What does it mean to you that God risked the vulnerability of becoming human in order to restore us to our rightful place as bearers of the image of God?

5. How does loving God form you to love others and yourself?

6. As you go about your daily life, does it ever occur to you to see the people you encounter as “walking around shining like the sun”? What would it mean for you to think of everyone you meet as a “God-bearer”?