Christmas Eve (Year 2, NL)

What a relief it might be to middle-class America to be sent away empty.

Our busyness at Christmas hides God's busyness for us—but Luke's Gospel reveals it.

This story is full of echoes—most famously, Mary's song echoes Hannah's. But there is another echo: Elizabeth's praise of Mary, which gets taken up into the Hail Mary, is an echo of Deborah's song in Judges 5.

There are many ways we receive the gift of Jesus badly.

Mary is a jazz singer, improvising on a familiar tune.

It is not as though Mary and Joseph have a choice.

Would it be that we all could sing our souls. I think Mary helps us. I think we should read her song, and preach it, and sing it over and over again.

Sampling Isaiah, Mary's song sings of mercy, strength, humility, and the truest meaning of charity. Her song hears in each of these virtues a gift of God, and a sign of God's desire for all.

Mary’s song marks a transformation from seeing her condition’s weight to receiving a new power within the situation. And then, finally, she is a participant in the work of God’s spirit.

John 3:16 or Matthew 25? Both. Neither.

Vivaldi wrote his Magnificat for a choir of female orphans to sing for their supper. They were truly singing Mary's song.

Like many pastors, I remember clearly the first sermon I ever preached. It was during my second semester of seminary, and I probably worked on it for 50 hours. Each detail was written and rewritten until I was confident I had produced the greatest theological document by a seminarian in quite some time.