Lowly
/God has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly. - Luke 1:32
The gospel reading on Jonathan Daniels’ feast day is Mary’s song, the Magnificat. They are her joyful words about carrying her baby. Although she is a poor, unmarried woman with no standing in society, she sings out in gratitude for having been chosen by God to bear the Messiah. She thanks God for scattering those who are self-centered, for bringing down the powerful and lifting up the lowly, for filling the hungry with good things and sending the rich away empty. It is a song of God’s love for those who are lowly, and a song of assurance that it is God’s humble servants who receive God’s promises.
But - we know that years later, powerful men on their thrones will end up having Jesus crucified, so it’s not like Mary’s pregnancy, or even Jesus’ life, turned the world upside down and finally brought equality and justice among us. And indeed there is still rampant self centered power, hunger and poverty as constant features among us. So what on earth was Mary so joyful about?
It’s hard for us, in our deeply divided culture, to dwell in a both/and reality instead of an either/or one. Things are either right or mistaken, them or us, the answer or the problem, rational or a myth. But Mary is BOTH poor and oppressed AND lifted up by God. She is both scared of the situation she’s in and excited about it. She’s both incredulous about what the angel told her and ecstatic about it’s implications. And at this moment with Elizabeth, she’s deeply in touch with God’s vision for her as someone being trusted by God enough to bear God into the world.
Our lives, too, are BOTH full of difficulty, stress and everyday concerns AND invited to be a bearer of God into the world. And yet, it’s not like one of those is bad and the other is glorious. As we know from Jonathan Daniels’ story, sometimes being God’s truth bearer can be hard or even deadly. But it is deeply good news, nonetheless, to know that one is aligned with the Creator and can stand in God’s strength, be obedient to God’s power and be filled with God’s good things, even in this difficult world.
When have you been called to stretch into both/and thinking in your life? Have you ever had a difficult choice before you in which no possible direction seemed like obvious the ‘good’ one? Have you ever felt you were called to do something even though it was going to be hard? Who do you trust to help you through this both/and life?
Readings for this Sunday are here. At St. James we read the call of Isaiah as our Old Testament reading. (Isaiah 6:1-8)
