24 December, Advent 4: 2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16, Romans 16:25-end and Luke 1: 26-38
Wham may have made it to Christmas number one (39 years after they debuted ‘Last Christmas’), but Mariah Carey has been repeatedly accorded the title “Queen of Christmas”.
On the one hand she’s attempted to trademark the monika and been denied; on the other she’s said that she’s neither created nor wanted the title, that that was other people. She told Zoe Ball on BBC Radio 2, that Mary is the “Queen of Christmas”.
For someone who started making music out of necessity - to survive and to express herself - Mariah Carey says that creativity not only gave her a sense of worth, but also taught her that ‘all things are possible with God.’
Divine possibility.
That is where we find ourselves on this final day, in the final hours of Advent.
There is the possibility of life where there was none.
In the ordinary, there is an unexpected greeting.
In the face of confusion, do not fear.
But it doesn’t begin there and it doesn’t end there either.
It begins with God’s love for the world: calling into life with creativity, freedom and possibility; choosing a people, inviting obedience, recalling to mercy.
David longed to build a house of cedar as a temple for the Lord. But a wandering people had trusted in a God who was with them, behind and before.
So instead, he was to build up a people in his name, establishing a kingdom.
Included in this household and lineage of rebellion and blessing, of exile and hope, was Joseph.
And into the life of his beloved Mary to whom he was betrothed, there comes a moment of divine possibility.
The God who had dwelt and moved amongst a people now dwells with us, pitching a tent, tabernacling with us in our flesh.
We know the story so well that the remarkable risks sounding inevitable: the greeting, the doubt, the plan, the questions, the reassurance, the consent.
Possibility hovers in the gaps in the story - humanity had waited in time for our Lord and Saviour; the eternal one waits for Mary’s “yes”.
We rush to crown her “Queen of Christmas” rather than letting the divine possibility unsettle us a little.
First, Mary is greeted as “favoured one”. She is perplexed; she turns the words over in her mind.
She is told not to be afraid; that she has found favour with God. Why? Because she will conceive a son who fulfils the hopes of David’s line.
And yet, for all the hope of an everlasting kingdom, for this young woman such favoured status meant risking everything: her marriage, her reputation, her community, her life. At the very least she would be shamed and shunned, accused and abandoned.
There’s a carol, popular at school services, called “Mary did you know?” It asks if she knows that the child she will deliver, will soon deliver her.
To answer those questions with a “yes” holds together the angel’s words with an inner conviction, trust, imagination and vision: the stuff of her heart and the stuff of the divine possibility formed by scriptures, history, prayers and hopes.
That “yes” was courageous: from first trimester to pangs of labour; from Jesus' first sign at a wedding in Cana to the scandal of the cross he carried; from his last breath and burial to his risen body breathing peace.
Second, Mary asks a question - how? How can this be? - before she gives her consent - letting it be, according to God’s word.
In a moment depicted by artists whose paintings hang in galleries and are reproduced on Christmas cards, time stands still: weighty, spacious, the epitome of a pregnant pause, the possibility of life where there was none.
We too imagine her body language: eyes down cast or turning towards the door or closing slightly; hands clasped or holding a book, beckoning or silencing; leaning into the doorframe or a chair taking her weight. Eternity in that moment crowns her queen; but painters give her time to think, refuse, reconsider just as the angel gives freedom to consent.
The Holy Spirit moves in those moments - overshadowing, conceiving the holy; the creator created within her womb. Did she know, the child would be the great I am? Yes, just as divine possibility had brought life out of Elizabeth’s barrenness.
Nothing is impossible. All things are possible. With God.
But then the angel departs as she utters her yes, here I am: servant, handmaid of the Lord; espoused, expectant mother.
This is where we find ourselves on this final day, in the final hours of Advent.
The possibility of life where there was none.
Did she know that her baby would save us?
She certainly knew enough: enough to keep saying ‘yes’ to God; to sing her own song, to pray for a changed world; to labour to bring God’s speechless word to birth.
The mystery has only just begun.
Kept secret for long ages and now disclosed; told by the prophets and made known to us gentiles.
Mary, Queen of Christmas models obedience of faith. Teaching us what we want for Christmas, the one thing we need - our great salvation in Jesus Christ.
She teaches us to say ‘yes’; to sing our songs of justice; to pray for a changed world; to labour in love for a lasting peace. In the power of the Spirit, to seek the everlasting kingdom of Christ. Amen.
