Living the incarnation

Sermon preached at St Alphege, Solihull at 11am Eucharist, 21st December 2008
Advent 4, Year B

Readings: 2 Samuel 7: 1-11 & 16 Romans 16: 25-27 Luke 1: 26-38


In our gospel reading today we heard the extraordinary story of the annunciation; the moment when the angel Gabriel came to visit Mary and to give her the big news. Gabriel tells Mary that she is to be the mother of Jesus. He tells her that Jesus is to be the Son of God, the inheritor of the throne of his ancestor King David, and the one who will reign forever in a kingdom without end. This is a big deal. It’s a very big deal. It’s the biggest deal of them all. But Mary seems to cope with it extraordinarily well. She asks for clarification about how she is to become pregnant. The angel explains this point and tells her that her relative Elizabeth is also pregnant. Mary’s final comment is, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” And the angel leaves her.
It is an extraordinary encounter, but it is the news that is brought to Mary that is the most extraordinary thing; that God will take on human flesh in Mary; this is the extraordinary thing. It is the great mystery of God in flesh; the incarnation. God grows in flesh in Mary, from a thing so small that nobody knows it is there, to a embryo, to a foetus, to a baby. God takes on a human body and is born into the world. And this has huge consequences and repercussions.
And one of the consequences, it seems to me, is that a way is opened up whereby God can grow in us. Just as God, who is spirit (2 Cor 3: 17), became flesh, so we who are flesh can become spirit; we can grow into the divine, just as God in Jesus grew into the flesh. It is like the incarnation in reverse.
In our baptism we receive the Holy Spirit, and like a tiny invisible seed within us, this has the potential to grow and develop, so that something spiritual and Christ-like can grow in us and can come to maturity. [The way is opened up for us human beings to participate in the divine life of God (c.f. 2 Peter 1:4), to become children of God and co-heirs with Christ, sharing in his sufferings and his glory (Rom 8: 17). We have the opportunity to become children of God, destined to be like Jesus (1 John 3:2).
You might not be aware of it, but this same idea is expressed each time we celebrate the Eucharist, or certainly it is in churches with a more catholic tradition. At the Eucharist, when preparing the chalice of wine, the priest mixes in with the wine a few drops of water and says a quiet prayer, “By this mystery of this water and this wine, may we come to share in the divinity of Christ, who humbled himself to share in our humanity.” The mixture of water with wine is a powerful symbol. It reminds us of flesh and spirit or human and divine. In John’s gospel, Jesus’ first miracle is to turn water into wine at the wedding feast in Cana of Galilee (John 2: 1-11). This miracle reminds us of the power of Jesus to turn humans into a sharing in the divine life of God. There are hints of the same idea when Jesus is pieced on the cross and water and blood flow out (John 19: 34)]
It is very desirable that the seed of spiritual presence of Christ within us grows and develops because this life of Christ in us is eternal life, the life which survives our earthly death. And what do we need to do to make the spiritual presence of Christ within us grow? Well in one way we do not need to do very much. A pregnant woman does not need to do too much to make her baby grow. She needs to keep herself healthy and well nourished and then the baby grows by itself. Similarly we need to keep ourselves spiritually healthy and spiritually nourished, and then the presence of Christ will grow in us, without us needing to worry about it.
And when it comes to keeping ourselves spiritually healthy and well nourished, the most obvious things to do are to come often to the Eucharist, and to set aside time to meditate on the scriptures and to pray. But today I would like to highlight another way of nourishing our spiritual lives and this is the way that we see in Mary in our gospel reading today. When Mary says, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” she is accepting and cooperating with God’s plans for her. This is the crucial for us too, for our own spiritual health and nourishment. Accepting and co-operating with God’s plans for us, God’s vision for us, what God has created us for is so important. Only through this obedience can God’s creation in us come to fulfilment. And accepting God’s plans for us requires many things from us. It requires us to listen humbly in front of God in prayer, to understand the things he wants us to understand. It means being ready to lose our own ideas of what we might be or do. Often it can mean letting go of fantasies; the fantasy that all will be well when we are rich or famous, or a celebrity, or popular. Above all it means following God’s will for our lives. Following God’s will truly sustains and nourishes us. This was true even for Jesus. He said “My food is to do this will of him who sent me…” (John 4: 13). Following God’s will sustains us in each present moment of our lives, as we go about our daily business. If we listen to the still small voice of God in our heart, the voice of love, then this prompts us throughout the day. It shows us how to grow in love for God and for other people. God’s whisper in our heart might encourage us to stop and speak to a particular person, to set aside time for prayer, to visit a lonely neighbour, to complete some task, to come to Mass or whatever. And if we practice following the promptings of God all the time on the little things in life then we can be sure that we will know what to do when the big decisions come.
So let’s try always to listen for and to follow the promptings of God in our hearts showing us how to love. In this way let’s walk, in each present moment of our lives, in God’s will for us, in God’s plan for us. Then, by the grace of God’s incarnation we will find ourselves taking part in the spiritual equivalent of what Mary did. Jesus will grow spiritually within us, with wonderful consequences in this world, and eternal life in the next.