Mary: thy maker's maker

A sermon preached on Advent 4 - just as we went into Tier 4.

Chris Gollon: Madonna and child

Although we stand with Mary at the moment of annunciation, perhaps we are in fact already in the midst of birth pangs. Since March, we’ve waited and labouring to keep people safe love hurts.

This woman who’s response we know by heart; whose story is so well known; the figure who has stored the artistic imagination; the one who calls forth devotion. 

She stands before us: Mary, mother of our Lord Jesus Christ:

faithful.

trusting.

obedient.

joyful.

humble.

She has become a pattern of grace, endurance and hope.

She is receptive to the outpouring of the Spirit, not just today but until the day of Pentecost.

She waits.

She ponders and praises; she protests and prays.

She is one with us today.

One in a community of love and witness.

Sophie Hacker: from Art of Mary (Southwell Minster)

The one who is the fullness of God was born of her flesh. 

She is Theotōkos: God bearer.

In his sonnet series ‘La Corona’ the Anglican priest and poet, John Donne, writes of this intimate mystery of faith and love saying of Mary: thou are now, Thy Maker’s maker, and thy Father’s mother, Thou has light in dark, and shutt’st in little room immensity, cloister’d in thy dear womb.

Her story like ours is a tapestry of joys and sorrows; hopes and fears. We celebrate her character and our lives fill her silences. 

She is often presented as a devoted mother; resilient and wondering; tenderly nursing her son. She is both mother of sorrows and queen of heaven. 

The story of this particular woman is of cosmic significance. The wonder of pregnancy; eternity caught in a span. 

We wait with this woman who waited: nine months before her labour pains. 

Susie Hamilton: from Art of Mary (Southwell Minster)

Today we remember the way in which an angel greeted her with blessing and peace and favour.

She was troubled. She asked questions.

The angel spoke words of assurance, promise and power.

She responds: the Lords’ servant, aligning her will with God’s will.

Then there’s a moment of solitude: there is space and stillness; and yet did her heart beat a little faster, her breath a little shallower. Left by an angel; praying her beloved Jospeh would remain at her side. 

Elizabeth Catlett: Mother and Child

As we look forward to nativity, the Word of God is birthed in our midst. He will leave the cloister’d womb and gasp for air and cry and reach for Mary’s breast, for Joseph’s hand.

He comes in weakness to a world where the inn has no room. 

This Word is speechless now; but will grow up to speak wonders. 

Mary bore him, held him, guarded him fiercely. Her arms a crucible of passion and compassion. How many parable did she shape - stories of a woman’s lost coin, a wedding feast and yeast in bread?

Elizabeth Catlett: Madonna 

This woman bears this child: holding him out to us. 

She presents him as one who disrupts the status quo, who knows our thoughts and fears; who heals and loves. 

He is near to us now. 

May we bear him in our hearts, thou not present in our churches.

For the one cloister’d in Mary’s womb is the one whose kingdom never fails. 

In a moment we’re going to hear a piece by Sufjan Stevens - whose music has a folksy and subversive yet strangely familiar take on Christmas (link at the end).

He sings of longing for blessing; for our hearts to be tuned to grace. Echoing Mary’s song, the Magnificat, he speaks of mercy and praise and unchanging love. 

Echoing Mary’s response to God, he sings to God saying: here’s my heart, take it; that we might bear Jesus. 

An advert by the Savills estate agent reads:

Homes have been a boardroom and a class room, often at the very same time.

Homes that have been both a place of work and the perfect staycation 

Homes that’ve offered a door to shield behind, a room to scream in and a wall to lean on; Homes that have kept us together while we’ve been apart; been workout spaces and worship spaces…

It ends thank you that every home has been more than a home; and as we shield and scream, work and worship, may we remember that this season God chooses to make a home with us; in our hearts. 

Christmas isn’t cancelled. It’s lived out more intimately, yes, but still real. May our homes protect us and be a place where God dwells and out of which we can bear Christ’s love to others. 

© Julie Gittoes

A stanza from John Donne's "La Corona" read at the end of the sermon. 

Annunciation

Salvation to all that will is nigh;

That All, which always is all everywhere,

Which cannot sin, and yet all sins must bear, 

Which cannot die, yet cannot choose but die,

Lo! faithful Virgin, yields Himself to lie

In prison, in thy womb; and though He there

Can take no sin, nor thou give, yet He'll wear,

Taken from thence, flesh, which death's force may try.

Ere by the spheres time was created thou

Wast in His mind, who is thy Son, and Brother;

Whom thou conceives, conceived; yea, thou art now

Thy Maker's maker, and thy Father's mother,

Those hast light in dark, and shutt'st in little room

Immensity, cloister'd in thy dear womb.

Sufjan Stevens: 

Spices and linen

The final mediation for Good Friday focuses on Jesus' burial: on Nicodemus and Joseph taking linen and spices and placing Jesus' body in the tomb. The reflection on John's Gospel has been accompanied by John Donne's  La Corona It ends with Graham Sutherland's painting too - an image which is stark and lifeless; light and life-giving.

Spices and Linen

[John 19:38-42]

Moist, with one drop of thy blood, my dry soule

Shall (though she now be in extreme degree

Too stony hard, and yet too fleshly) be

Freed by that drop, from being starved, hard, or foul,

And life, by this death abled, shall control

Death, whom thy death slew; nor shall to me

Fear of first or last death, bring misery,

If in thy little book my name thou enroll,

Flesh in that long sleep is not putrified,

But made that there, of which, and for which 'twas;

Nor can by other means be glorified.

May then sins sleep, and deaths soon from me pass,

That waked from both, I again risen may

Salute the last, and everlasting day.

1.

And now after these things.

All is finished.

Jesus is dead.

The grain of wheat falls to the ground.

It dies.

Hope and life are yet to be born.

2. 

And a disciple, a secret one faces fear with his own act of compassion.

Joseph of Arimathea was afraid of others: of power and custom.

Afraid of walking this way of discipleship.

The Disposition by Tracey Emin, 1989. Monoprint on paper. Collection of Stuart and Margaret Evans.

But he faced power in approaching Pilate.

He embraced the responsibility of custom in seeking permission to bury Jesus.

There was a garden near by. A suitable spot.

He wants to humanise the inhumane.

3.

Permission  is granted.

He comes.

He removes the body.

He bears its weight.

He reaches up and embraces him.

The shadows have lengthened.

Is the world hushed?

The clamour has died away.

Do some watch and wait?

Mockery replaced by witness?

The one who saw has testified to all that has taken place.

He tells the truth.

4.

Joseph is not alone.

Nicodemus comes too. One night he had talked at length - teacher to teacher - about the nature of rebirth in the Spirit. Now we brings spices to a grave.

They bear the weight of Jesus dead body together.

Perhaps they did not know until now what their conviction meant.

Why had they sought him out?

Was it just the authority of his teaching? 

Or something more than that they came to see - at night and in secret?

This is a final act of love.

Walking. Carrying. Tending.

Did they have time to wash and wipe away blood and spittle?

Moving openly now, perhaps. It is finished.

5. 

There in that garden a new tomb.

They laid him there.

It was near by.

It was the day of preparation.

6. 

They had taken the body.

They had wrapped it with spices. 

Nicodemus had brought a weight of myrrh and aloes.

An image of Joseph and Nicodemus from Audrey's illustrated journey through John in 80 days

This takes time. 

They can’t be furtive and hasty: this wrapping in linen demands patience and care.

Final acts demand their own ritual and dignity. 

Are their hearts numbed by pain; the eyes spent of tears.

7.

They are not alone. 

Others are wracked by grief too.

His mother and the beloved disciple; his mother’s sister, the wife of Clopas and Mary Magdalene.

These women who’d stood by: watching, waiting and wounded.

Joseph and Nicodemus bear the weight.

Placing the lifeless body in a tomb.

Death.

Death is real.

Here, today, the love of God descends to its very depths.

Flesh enters this long sleep, yet is not putrified.

We long for sin’s power to break; for death to pass from us too.

8

And in this light we wait. 

With the wounded and the faithful.

An uncertain breaking in of dawn. Perhaps.

In the moment that Christ is laid in a tomb, something is beginning.

Moist with one drop of Thy blood, my dry soul.

Salute the last and everlasting day.

This tomb holds one who descends to the depths.

Those who carry his body, shift out of view.

Yet this tomb is straining already: slowly rising. 

Life-less yet life-like.

This is not darkness nor dazzling: this light a setting sun or breaking dawn.

So God loved the world.

He sent his Son.

Not to condemn the world.

But that through him we might be saved.

Graham Sutherland, The Deposition 

Methodist Modern Art Collection

Might our tears be washed away; might our darkness lighten? Will we return to a crown of prayer and praise?

The Word was made flesh.

Dwelt among us.

Flogged, mocked and pierced.

Wrapped in linen and spices.

God loved us so much, his Word became flesh.

His Word gave up his breath, and breathed out his spirit.

What do we see as we watch and wait?

Here is Death. Whom his death slew.

An Afterward

Salute the last, and everlasting day,

Joy at the uprising of this Sunne, and Sonne,

Ye whose just tears, or tribulation

Have purely washed, or burnt your drossy clay;

Behold the Highest, parting hence away,

Lightens the dark clouds, which he treads upon,

Nor doth he by ascending, show alone,

But first he, and he first enters the way.

O strong Ram which hast battered heaven for me,

Mild lamb, which with thy blood, hast marked the path;

Bright Torch, which shin'st, that I the way may see,

Oh, with thy own blood quench thy own just wrath.

And if the holy Spirit, my Muse did raise,

Deign at my hands this crown of prayer and praise.

© Julie Gittoes 2017

Wood and words

Parts four and five of Good Friday reflections: look at what is before our eyes! 

Wood and Words

[John 19:16-27]

Sonnets from John Donne's series La Corona

With his kind mother, who partakes thy woe,

Joseph turn back; see where your child doth sit,

Blowing, yea blowing out those sparks of wit,

Which himself on the Doctors did bestow;

The Word but lately could not speake, and loe

It suddenly speaks wonders, whence comes it,

That all which was, and all which should be writ,

A shallow seeming child, should deeply know?

His Godhead was not soul to his manhood,

Nor had time mellow'd him to this ripenesse,

But as for one which hath a long task, 'tis good,

With the Sunne to begin his businesse,

He in His age's morning thus began

By miracles exceeding power of man.

1.

Then Pilate handed him over to be crucified.

They took Jesus - he’s carrying the cross by himself.

He went out.

Handed over.

Taken.

Carrying the wood.

2. 

The one who came to reveal love, peace and abundant life is led out of the city; to face the suffering of hatred, rejection and condemnation; to suffer and to die.

The one admired for his teaching; the one who revealed God’s love in signs.

This one had brought new life; he’d restored our vision; he’d abided with us.

This one is now ridiculed for failure; publicly bearing the weight of shame and humiliation. 

He walks this way to Golgotha. To the place of the skull. To a place of desolation. 

Easter 'Banksy'

3. 

He takes up the weight of the wood.

He walks alone. 

He walks through crowds: those who’d cried hosanna or crucify; those who weep or howl; those who’re attracted to a cruel spectacle; those who are helpless now to stop this.

He walks through the places in our world where people are dehumanised and abused; condemned and killed. 

What we see as he shoulders the weight of the wood is the weight of suffering; he shoulders the lost dignity for perpetrator and victim.

Behold the wood on which the saviour of the world was hung.

Behold its weight which would break down barriers.

Behold the wood by which God reconciled all things to himself; reconciling us to each other.

Behold the weight of witnessing to the depth of love and truth. 

4.

Golgotha: this place stands at the heart of human history. 

Here the Son of Man is lifted up: this is the moment when all things are drawn to the love of God.

And he is raised up alongside two others. We know not their crimes or convictions; their stories of loss, injustice, intent or desperation. This is the depths of human desperation and despair. Are we looking at the end?

All humanity is here: the guilty and condemned; those doing their jobs; the gamblers, the curious and the passers by; the family and those who mock.

The horror of human cruelty is a swirl of darkness: unimaginable yet all too visible.

The light that shines in this final hour is embodied in the one who gives his life freely. 

5.

Pilate is challenged about the words he uses. They are intentional.

Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.

We know not how much he understood; did he know himself to be held in the gaze of a heavenly king?

Whatever the limits of his earthly power, he refused to give in, to deny who he thought this man was.

In Hebrew, Latin and Greek: this inscription proclaims a truth to all the world.

Pilate colluded with fear yet in his own way uses the limits of his power to make a prophetic power declaration of love.

Do we kneel before this king? 

The source of truth and love at the moment of self-giving, at this moment of glory which judges the world of condemnation?

6.

Humiliation continues.

At the foot of the cross, this unlikely wooden throne, they are busily casting lots and dividing garments.

They are preoccupied with their own desire to gain in the face of loss: all that we have and acquire we will lose, yet we can at least bequeath things to others; here is the loss of dignity and dispossession; naked and humiliated. 

The Word is laid bare: and this Word speaks of being with us at the limits of human endurance, indifference and cruelty.

7.

Yet there is another moment if we dare to lift our eyes.

A moment of a son speaking to those he cherishes.

A moment when the truth and love our kinship is also laid bare: the tenderness of concern for our intimate acquaintances. The one who’d given birth to him and nursed him at her breast stands alongside the beloved disciples.  He was the one who at the last supper reclined next to Jesus in an intimate bond of love echoing the abiding of the Word with the Father. 

Yes this is an act of practical care - formation of a new household; sharing all that we have and all that we are.

Lynne Kiefer Kobylecky: Scriptural Stations

The eloquence of the silent word turns again to speech. He can make not physical gesture, save perhaps to look on those he loved. 

In this moment of entrusting  disciple and mother  we see not finality but unity.

Oneness of Father, Son and Spirit is reflected in the oneness of a household; Mary and John reflect a new bond of love. The momentum of self-giving is extended and our vision of kinship is expanded - the giving of life to mother and friend, to share in love and communion. 

8.

With his kind mother, who partakes thy woe. 

The Word has spoken: in eloquent silence with confronts power and invites self-reflection.

The Word has spoken: in words of compassion which draw others into his self-giving love.

He exceeds the power of man: he knows our woes and weakness deeply.

He bears all this: in wood and words.

Hyssop and Spear

1.

Jesus knew that all was now finished: I am thirsty, he said.

Thirst: perhaps the most fundamental human need is for water. The physical sensation of being ‘parched’, dried up and running out of strength and energy.

In this heat; in this pain; the agony and isolation is intense.

He has entrusted those whom he loved into mutual care: their consolation is a lens onto this devastating physical suffering.

Dignity, capacity, autonomy, vitality and companionship: all the things we cherish have evaporated.

In thirst and anguish, life ebbs away.

2. 

His cry is heard.

There’s a jar of sour wine: a hint of humanity by those who pass by, those who’ve seen this scene oh so may times before; those who mock. 

Sour wine to quench thirst with bitterness: a touch that humanises or a means of extending this agony?

3. 

A branch of hyssop is dipped in it. 

It’s an herbaceous plant with antiseptic properties; a sign of medicine or balm in distress.

It’s woody stem and straight branches; it’s dark green leaves and fragrant flowers.

Here in human hands creation speaks of healing.

4.

And they soak the sponge: they raise it up to his mouth.

An act of compassion.

He receives it.

The crowd is silent: no taunts that the one who saved others is unable to save himself.

Hyssop and wine.

Received on parched lips.

And then he spoke.

5. 

And then he spoke: It is finished.

He bowed his head.

He gave up his Spirit.

Finished. Fulfilled. Accomplished. 

Words we associate with success; with completion; with our human achievement.

Here is sounds final. 

And yet, maybe,  a new work is begun.

This breathing out is a giving up of his spirit.

But this last act, Jesus breathing out… does it foreshadow his breathing out of Spirit?

He gave up his spirit.

He will give the Sprit.

Breath. Ruach. Life. Pneuma. Spirit.

6.

Human activity does not cease at this moment of finality or of breathing out.

We are taken back to the practicality: what is seemly on the day of preparation?

Humiliated and degraded bodies, stretched out and agonised are not to be left on the cross. Not on the day of solemnity. 

Pilate from his position of power understands this custom. He asks that the legs of the condemned men be broken.  Already exhausted and in excruciating pain, to hasten death by asphyxiation is brutal. 

When the come to Jesus he is already dead. They pierce his side with a spear.

Cold metal pierces flesh.

Blood and water flow.

What do we see?

They will look on the one they have pierced. And so do we.

7. 

We look on as water and blood flow. As love and life pour out.

It may seem too soon as we stand and gaze: and yet life is being transmitted to us.

This self-giving becomes of us a sign of rebirth: healing, cleansing, forgiving.

At this very point of finality - when cruelty has cried its last - there is a glimpse of something else.

Water a sign of spiritual thirst being quenched, perhaps?

Blood a sign of reconciling love, may be?

Dare we hope that in the midst of pain, the blood of Jesus, which will become a source of life?

Grain of wheat dies to bear much fruit: grapes crushed to produce wine.

The Word made flesh confronting hate, violence and all that separates us from God and each other.

The Word made flesh bears the weight of this sin and cries out, empties himself. For love.

He’d given us a sign of this: brokenness and healing; bread and wine. 

8.

On the night that we was betrayed; at supper with his friends.

He took, blessed, broke and gave.

This is my body - and we gaze on him who was pierced.

Blood and water; bread and wine: given for heath and healing and reconciliation. 

Our wounded hearts find her compassion and hope.

Our dry souls cry out for one drop of his blood.

What do we see before our eyes?

Our Saviour bears the weight of ambitious hate and the weakness of our will; he bears the times our compassion turns blind and cruel.

Condemned he bears the cross: lifted up he draws us to him.

The infinity of God’s love and life; held in this brief span; poured out.

This exceeds the power of sinful humanity.

© Julie Gittoes 2017