Down through the centuries, countless
artists have rendered this moment we call the Annunciation in very
formal strokes, preserving Mary and the angel Gabriel for posterity
in wood, paint, and glass. While their styles and colors have varied,
Mary is always portrayed as the model of demure femininity, dressed
in yards and yards of blue silk or brocade, her golden hair plaited
like a crown around her head, her nails perfectly manicured. She
looks so serene and composed in those portraits that it is hard to
remember that the real Mary was likely a dark-haired, olive skinned,
scared, unwed, teenaged peasant girl with precious little experience
with men, or angels, or the world.
She is usually shown either spinning
or reading at her prayer desk, absorbed in her work when out of
nowhere comes this magnificent angel, as beautiful as she is, dressed
like a prince or a pope with a tiara on his head or a garland of
flowers studded with flames. In most pictures the feathers of his
great, spread wings are white, but in at least one medieval painting
they are the feathers of a peacock, all iridescent greens and blues.
In his hand he holds a lily, an olive branch, or a royal scepter -
signs of the purity, peace, and authority he brings from above.
Somewhere in all those paintings of
the Annunciation, you can usually find a dove, a sign that what is
happening is happening under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. But
down below, everything depends on Mary. Sometimes Gabriel is not
standing over her. Sometimes he’s kneeling in front of the girl
upon whose answer he, and God, and the whole creation await.
But Mary did not really get a chance
to answer—at least not, at first. The angel didn’t ask her right
off the bat if she would like to be the mother of God. He told her
that God had been chosen her, and been gracious to her, that she
would bear a son, and that he would be the king of Israel for ever.
He didn’t bother to ask her how that sounded to her and whether she
would like to try out for the role. He told her not to be afraid. He
informed her of a situation that was already underway.
"Greetings favored one. The Lord
is with you," the angel told her, and Luke tells us that Mary
was troubled by his words. Certainly one of the great understatements
in all of Scripture.
Good Jewish girl that she was, little
Mary would have been familiar with her heritage of faith. She’d
heard the stories of the unusual pregnancies of Hannah and Sarah,
Rebecca, Rachel and :Leah. She had no doubt heard about the Garden of
Eden and had been taught how Eve had bungled things by believing what
she was told by an equally strange creature.
Perhaps Mary did not want to make the
same mistake. The angel was telling her how blessed she was—but one
important question wasn’t being dealt with.
"How can this be?" she
asked. She wanted to know exactly whose idea this all was, and how,
and what exactly would happen. She wanted to make sense out of what
made no sense. God had decided to surrender to flesh and blood-- but
needed her help-- needed her surrender in fact, in order to carry out
the Divine plan.
"How can this be?" Mary
asked, and that is all she asked. There are several other questions
most of us would have asked. Will Joseph stick around? Will my
parents still love me? Will my friends stand by me, or will I get
dragged into town and stoned for sleeping around? Will the labor be
hard? Will there be someone there to help me when my time comes? You
say the child will be king of Israel, but what about me? Will I
survive his birth? What about me?
If such questions occurred to Mary,
she did not ask them. According to Luke, she quietly listened as the
angel waved away her question with not even the barest details about
how it would all come to pass. Just the flat statement that God would
take care of the details. “Nothing is impossible for God.”
Gabriel explained.
And then finally came Mary’s turn to
speak. There was obviously a lot she still didn’t understand.
Something was going to happen-- that much seemed clear. But
apparently Mary did have a choice after all - whether to say yes to
it all, or no--whether to embrace her choice or live it out in anger
and fear--whether to take hold of the unknown future the angel held
out to her--or to deny and defend herself against it however she
could.
Mary wasn’t the only one in the
history of the world who had that sort decision to make. It’s only
that the stakes were so much higher in her case. The Eastern church
calls Mary "Theotokos", "the God bearer," who
consented to carry, to give birth to, to nurse and raise the Son of
God. Only Mary was ever drafted to do that, but still it is hard to
hear her story without hearing something of our own.
There is a lot of talk these days
about all the choices we have, and about how it is up to each of us
to choose our own lives. Notice how nobody does anything wrong or
stupid anymore-- the "make bad choices". The truth is, more
often than not, we allow our choices to choose us.
Our best laid long range plans are
interrupted by life's own plans for us: by situations already
underway. Sudden illness, surprise pregnancies, aging parents, loved
ones’ passing, relationships changing, an unpredictable economy,
addiction and hopefully recovery, unexpected opportunity and
inexplicable tragedy. Terrible things and wonderful things happen
all the time, but seldom do we know ahead of time exactly what will
happen to us.
Like Mary, our choices most often boil
down to a simple yes or no. Yes, I will fully out fully this unclear
future that is being held out to me or no, I will not. Yes, I will
explore this unexpected turn of events or no, I will not.
If you decide to say no, you simply
drop your eyes and refuse to look up until you know the angel has
left the room. Then you smooth your hair and go back to your
spinning, or your reading, or whatever it was you were doing, and you
pretend that nothing happened.
If your life begins to change
anyway—and it probably will, you have several options. You can be
stoic about it. You can refuse to accept it. You can ignore it and
insist in spite of all the evidence that it is not happening to you.
The deepest and most profound prayer
that a Christian can pray is “ May thy will be done.”
Unfortunately when we say that in our prayers, what all too many of
us really mean is “May thy will be changed.”
If that does not work, you can become
angry, actively defend yourself against the unknown and spend all of
your time trying to get your life back the way it used to be. As they
say in AA, denial ain't just a river in Egypt.
Or, of course, you can become bitter,
complain “why me?’ and compare yourself to everyone else whose
life seems to be more agreeable than yours and lament your own
unhappy fate. You might end up doing that for the rest of your life.
If you survive this extended session on the pity pot, your life may
or may not be an easy or meaningful one, but you can rest assured
that no angels will ever trouble you again.
Or you can decide to say yes. You can
decide to be a daredevil, a test pilot, a gambler. You can set your
book down, put your spinning aside, and listen to a strange
creature's strange idea. You can willingly, and either reluctantly or
maybe even joyfully decide to take part in a plan you did not choose,
going places you never would have imagined, doing and learning things
you did not know how to do, for reasons you do not entirely
understand. You can take part in a crazy and dangerous adventure with
no script and no guarantees. You can agree to smuggle God into the
world inside your own body.
You can take that job in a new town.
You can actually join that church that you’ve been visiting in for
the last ten years. You can invite a friend or neighbor or relative
to church. You can become a foster parent. You can become a Big
Brother or a Big Sister or Scout Leader. You can start in the process
of recovery. You can join the Peace Corps or become a missionary.
You can stop living together and actually get married. You can go
back to school. You can change careers. You can change the way your
current career is going..
You can get out of that destructive or
abusive relationship you’re trapped in. You can transform your
current relationship. You can begin to live more generously. You can
begin practicing spiritual disciplines. You can tithe. You can stop
and listen—actually listen to God’s voice for you and your life.
You can say “yes.”
There’s a framed quote on the wall
in my office. It sounds like a Biblical quote but it isn’t. I have
no idea who actually coined the phrase—but it’s one of the truest
things anybody ever said. “The sign of God is that we will find
ourselves where we never expected to go.”
Deciding to say yes does not mean that
you are unafraid, by the way; it just means that you are not willing
to let your fear keep you locked in your room. So you say yes to the
angel. You say, “Here I am. Let it be according to your word. I
don’t understand it all, but I will do my best.” And in saying
that, you become one of Mary's people, one more theotokos who is
willing to bear God into the world.
"We are all meant to be mothers
of God," wrote Meister Eckhart.,
"What good is it to me," he
said, "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 and 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: When the Son of God is begotten in us."
Greetings, favored ones! The Lord is
with you. Do not be afraid. For nothing will be impossible with God.
No comments:
Post a Comment