A Little Bit of Tradition

Gymea Anglican Church

Service of Lessons and Carols

Christmas Eve, 2008

The Service of Carols and Lessons has an interesting history - it began, like Christmas itself, in a barn. As the town of Truro (Cornwall, England) had no cathedral at the time, a temporary wooden shed was having to serve in its place. A man by the name of Edward White Benson devised the service, with the main aim of keeping men out of the alehouse on Christmas Eve.

Below is a quick run-through of the Service of Lessons and Carols that we recently celebrated in Gymea Anglican. Sing the carol if you wish... and bring a Bible to the table (for the night we used the ESV). Everything else is pretty well how it was.

Be warned - with eight readings it's a long entry, even with no song lyrics attached.

Welcome, and thank you for coming – Welcome to Gymea Anglican's Christmas Eve Carols and Lessons service.
To anyone visiting, good to have you here - please make yourself at home. You're among friends tonight.

Let's pray; Loving, Heavenly Father, thank you. Thank you for today, thank you that you are the Master of the day. And thank you for this time of the year – and the opportunity to freely and safely honour the birth of your Son, Jesus. Be with us as we sing, as we pray and as we remember this day as we read your word. In Jesus’ name… Amen.

The Lessons and Carols service has been a traditional way of celebrating Christmas since 1880, but the faithful gathered long before that to sing together and to remember, and to once again adore Christ the Lord. Let’s stand and sing our first carol...
First Carol: O Come All Ye Faithful

Ø In The Beginning
In the beginning, God spoke. And as he spoke, the world was made… and as he spoke, it was bought to order… And then he stooped low, and out of the red, rich soil he shaped, moulded and made man in his own image. He breathed his breath, his spirit, into the man’s nostrils, and man became a living being. God gave the man a partner, and gave them both everything that he had made, except for the one thing that the man was not ready for – knowledge of good and evil.
But the man and the woman forgot God. They listened to the quiet whisper of another voice who said “you will be like God.” And so, forgetting God and yet wanting to be like him, they ate…
First Lesson… Genesis 3:7-13
And so we were exiled – exiled by our own desire, and thus exiled from the perfect presence of our Maker. God’s people kept failing, over and over again. And yet he still loved them. The Lord established a kingdom for his people, with a wise and loving ruler in King David, and yet within two generations, that kingdom was broken apart before crumbling, conquered by surrounding empires and all but forgotten by the world.
Exiled by their disobedience, exiled by their desire to have their way and to be ruled by none but themselves. Just like us…
And yet even in the depths of exile, even when at the furthest distance from His presence and his heart, God has sent the voices of hope. In the words of Isaiah and Micah we hear the Lord beginning to reveal his great plan to rescue and redeem his lost children, and to bring peace to them all.
Second Lesson… Isaiah 9:5-7, Micah 5:2
The announcements of the prophets would soon be made by angels, heralding the coming of the King. Let’s stand and sing together,
Second Carol: Hark the Herald Angels Sing

Ø Son of David
Christ by highest heaven adored, Christ the Everlasting Lord. Wesley and Whitefield had a gift for words, didn’t they? Who would be this Christ? Who would be this Messiah to bring God’s people to himself?
Through another prophet, Nathan, God promised David that his kingdom would be eternal. He made covenant with King David:
“When your days are fulfilled,” he said, “and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom… I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a son.”
The kingdom of David faltered and failed, to the point that it would be very hard to imagine how this great promise could be kept. But although the kingdom faded, the offspring didn’t.
Matthew opens his account of Jesus, his Gospel, with a genealogy that stretches from not just King David but Abraham – the man whom God also made covenant with, and promised that the world would be blessed through his descendents. Abraham is at the start of Matthew’s line. It finishes with a man named Joseph.
Third Lesson: Matthew 1:1-24
Here we see Joseph, from David’s line, about to travel to the city of David’s birth… but that’s another story. Remembering the promise made to King David, let’s stand and sing
Third Carol: “Once in Royal David’s City”

Ø Son of God
A king of royal blood can often unify a people. A king descended from kings can raise an army to overthrow the occupiers, repel the invaders and re-establish powerful dynasties.
But that’s not what God’s people need rescuing from. We need rescuing from ourselves.
What king can do that? Where must a king be descended from to have that sort of authority?
The Pharisees understood it well. They would say that only God can forgive sins, only God has the authority to forgive sins. It needs more than God’s authority vested in a king to be able to do that.
Fully God. Fully Man.
Let’s hear what happened.
Fourth Leson: Luke 1:26-38
Son of God, love’s pure light. Let’s stand together and sing a song that turns 190 years old today:
Fourth Carol: “Silent Night.”

Ø The Birth
When Queen Elizabeth II visited Australia in the early sixties, she travelled with a great retinue, including support aircraft. My dad first saw Australia when he came out with one of those aircraft – and, fortunately, he fell in love with Australia. But wherever the Queen went, vast crowds came to see her.
Royal visits, state occasions, pomp, ceremony… for the monarch of an empire that had peaked in Victoria’s day and was waning. What grandness should accompany the arrival of the King of the world? What would be the most fitting way to celebrate the arrival of the King who would rescue his people?
Let’s hear as Luke tells us how this mighty King arrived.
Fifth Lesson: Luke 2:1-7
A manger. A cow’s foodbox. That’s how King Jesus came. Not in displays of wealth and influence, but in a way an Indian beggar would be familiar with.Close your eyes and picture it as we stand and sing together:
Fifth Carol: “Away In A Manger”

Ø Witnesses High and Low
We still have a tradition, don’t we? It’s an odd one – if there’s an important document to sign, we need witnesses – so that all parties know that this really happened.
CNN and BBC and Reuters news services are the best at what they do, because their reporters and cameramen go to places to see what’s happening, to report… but we can see that they’re there. We know that they are witnesses.
Angels are the messengers of God. They travel with the word of the Lord, and they make His announcements, as we have already seen a couple of times.
Now they come to proclaim, to break the news, to bear witness. And who receives the news first? Emissaries of Herod’s royal court? Diplomatic envoys for the Roman Emperor Augustus?
We Aussies should love this – the people God chooses to tell first? Sheep farmers.
Let’s hear Luke tell us how God told them.
Sixth Lesson: Luke 2:8-21
There’s only one carol fitting here, isn’t there?
Sixth Carol:“While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks by Night”

Ø Honours Bestowed
On the birth of a son of an emperor, or a king, protocol had it that ambassadors to various countries would approach the palace and offer their countries good wishes to the King. They would then send a dispatch to their own country to let their own rulers know of the happy event.
Matthew shows us something very unusual. Nobody knows who they are, where they came from or where they went. But people came – first to the palace of the Roman-appointed King Herod, then to the birthplace of David, the birthplace of Jesus. Were they sent? Did they come of their own accord? We don’t know.
But they knew whom they sought. And they bestowed honour fit for a king to a child born in poverty. And they never hesitated.
Let’s hear how Matthew records it:
Seventh Lesson: Matthew 2:1-12
Let’s sing about those strangers, who gave such honour to King Jesus
Seventh Carol: “We Three Kings”
This is our collection song (no irony intended)

Ø In The Beginning…
In the beginning, God spoke. And as he spoke the world was made… and as he spoke it was bought to order… And then he stooped low, and out of the red, rich soil… he shaped, moulded and made man in his own image. He breathed his breath, his spirit into the man’s nostrils, and man became a living being. God gave the man a partner, and gave them both everything that he had made, except for the one thing that the man was not ready for – knowledge of good and evil.
But the man and the woman forgot God. They listened to the quiet whisper of another voice who said “you will be like God.” And so, forgetting God and yet wanting to be like him, they ate…
But... but... But before all this, God had seen it all. And He knew. In the beginning was the Word.
Eighth Lesson: John 1:1-17
This is Good News This is the Gospel, the Good Message that brings joy to the world – That from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace; that grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
Let’s stand and sing together our final carol tonight:
Eighth Carol: “Joy To The World”

Photo sourced from http://www.crystalxp.net/galerie/img/img-wallpapers-candle-light_water-priyadarsh-sarwade-7769.jpg

Lk1:39-56 FAITHFUL

Sermon

Gymea Anglican

7:45am, 9:30am

Through Luke’s narrative we’ve looked at some very strange happenings, and we’ve kind of contracted the timeline in a way so that we can find our way through some crucial issues that sit around the edges of what we normally associate with the "Christmas Story." We’ve seen an angel sent by God find Mary, a virgin engaged to a man related by birth to Israel’s great King David. We’ve listened to the angel’s announcement, that this child, this boy that Mary shall bear is nothing less than the one that the Lord God will hand the throne of King David to – “The child to be born will be called holy – the Son of God”[1] We’ve watched Mary’s reaction to this news that’s both wonderful and troubling, and we’ve seen her great servant’s heart and her obedience to the Lord her God. And we’ve seen Isaiah’s great prophecy fulfilled.

At the same time we’ve read about the very strange origins of John the Baptist. His father was visited by an angel while he was in the middle of the Temple, and the angel told the old man that he and his elderly wife were to have a baby. Not just any baby, but one who would be marked from birth as a man with a mission.

There are traces of a deeper story here – traces of great pain as Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth have gone from newlyweds to old age with no children. But in Gabriel’s opening words, he tells Zechariah before anything else… do not be afraid, your prayer has been heard…[2] and that even though it would be to God’s great purpose, their prayer of pain would be answered.

Mary hurries from Nazareth to find Elizabeth with plans to stay a fair while. I don’t know whether she went to help Elizabeth through the final three months of her pregnancy, or two ladies with remarkable stories needed to spend time in each others’ company. They were related – how they were related isn’t specified – and I’d imagine that if anybody that I knew had been through what either Mary or Elizabeth had been through, they would welcome the chance to talk to someone with a shared experience.

They make a very interesting contrast, don’t they? Out of the two, Elizabeth is the one we recognise the most from other places in the Bible. Although we don’t get the specific details, we know that she’s not young – she’s well out of child-bearing age. We know that it has been a matter of great pain to her and her husband Zechariah, and it’s a matter that they’ve both constantly brought before the Lord. And in this, we see a reflection of some others throughout the Old Testament.

Sarah heard the Lord’s promise to her husband, that he would father a mighty nation. And – more like Zechariah – she was the one who had trouble believing. Paul tells us that Abraham believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousness. Even when he was ninety-nine years old, not only did he believe what the Lord had promised him, he circumcised himself – and then went on to be a father (now that’s one tough cookie!).
Sarah, however, was more realistic, and when she overheard the Lord and Abraham talking she couldn’t picture it: “After I am worn out and my master is old, will I now have this pleasure?” [3] But the Lord honoured His promise to Abraham, and Sarah gave birth to Isaac.

Isaac’s wife Rebekah was described as barren for twenty years, and again we see Isaac praying on behalf of his wife. She gives birth to the famously-struggling twins, Esau and Jacob.

Jacob had two wives – two sisters, in fact. And from what Genesis 29 and 30 mention, all the problems that go along with that. But Rachel remained barren for a great amount of time, while almost everyone around her was having children by Jacob. Genesis 30:22 shows that she was not forgotten in her misery, though: “God remembered Rachel; he listened to her and opened her womb.” And she gave birth to Joseph. Rachel had one more child, Benjamin, but died after childbirth.

In the book of Judges we see an unnamed woman, the wife of a man called Manoah, described as sterile and childless. The angel of the Lord visited her and gave her instructions very similar to those given to Zechariah, physically marking out the child into God’s service from birth. The child’s name was Samson.

One that we should be familiar with is a woman by the name of Hannah, and we’ve been walking with Hannah and Elkanah through the Old Testamant readings. In the opening verses of I Samuel we see a pretty painful story, and we get a taste of the pain of barrenness. It’s still an issue loaded with great pain today, and I would hesitate before saying something as insensitive as “it was more painful back then.” There isn’t any easy way of living with it. There isn't.

Just to add to this horrible burden, Hannah is placed under the mocking social hammer. On top of the normal burden of wondering what is wrong with her physically is the weight of social judgment – she lives in a world that views barrenness as punishment from God. There must have been something that she had done, some sin committed, that had given God cause to punish her in this manner... It didn’t help that she had a husband that just didn’t get it.

Elkanah loved her very dearly – we see that he favoured her, that he tried to look after her and comfort her… but he just didn’t get it. Part of me feels a little sorry for Elkanah as he attempts to soothe his grieving wife: “Hannah, why are you weeping? Why don’t you eat? Why are you downhearted? Don’t I mean more to you than ten sons?” Wrong answer, buddy, thanks for playing... I can’t imagine that helping… but there are certainly times where I don’t get it, and I open my yap, and I get shot, and deservedly so… but the terrible fact is, as much as we husbands try to help our wives with burdens and deep pain, there will be things that we just don’t get, and that won’t be from a want of trying. That’s not a get-out-of-jail card for us husbands, incidentally… but there will be times where a burden is so intensely personal it can only really be dealt with between the carrier and the Lord.


Here’s one of the most painful lines in the Bible. I Samuel 1:10; “In bitterness of soul, Hannah wept much and prayed to the Lord.” That’s hard, isn’t it? “In bitterness of soul.” I know that a lot of people have the most enormous trouble praying when they are in the bitterness of their soul – it’s the last thing that they want to do. But Hannah pours out her pain before the Lord, in the house of the Lord.

And finally we have Elizabeth. The opening lines of Luke’s narrative pretty well give us her story, and we’ve seen Zechariah and Elizabeth last week. “Both of them were upright in the sight of God, observing all the Lord’s commandments and regulations blamelessly. But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren; and they were both well along in years.”

The Lord is faithful. The Lord God is a speaking God: a God of words, a God of the Word, and a God who keeps His word. We remind ourselves of that every Sunday, we gather and pray corporately – together – for all manner of things… as the Prayer Book says, for all sorts and conditions of men. And in churches and in our Bible-study groups and home groups and men’s breakfasts… it’s a wonderful thing to say loudly, and to remind ourselves and each other of this great fact; the Lord is faithful.
But what about when we’re alone?

When we’re in a hospital corridor, waiting to hear a door open and someone to emerge with news?

When we’ve prayed for something for days and weeks and months and years – what then?

When you’re going on months of broken sleep and the kids just won’t stop for twenty minutes?

When nobody calls to see how you’re going, and you just can’t bear to call anyone else and burden up someone else?

What about then? Can we say, with clear mind and straight back, that God is faithful?

There’s one thing I love about the Bible, even though it’s a hard fact, and a hard thing to confront. It is absolutely unflinching when it comes to dealing with pain. We don’t see these women as success-stories - far from it. We don’t see these families as being richly and over-abundantly blessed by God for their obedience or their good prayers or their good works. We see them in their pain, we are privy to their misery, we hear the bitterness or their soul.
Looking at these women of devotion, their long-term prayer, their years of weary endurance, of praying in bitterness of soul… it makes me very wary of people who try to tell me that if you do the things that please God, he will bless you with every blessing that the world can offer. That if you pray believing that it will happen. An American preacher, Mark Driscoll, phrased it pretty well – it’s like Jesus is a big piñata, and prayer is a big stick – and if you bash Jesus hard enough with the stick, lots of goodies will fall from heaven. And your blessings are just such a marvellous sign to others of how pleased God is with you.

I just don’t find it in the Bible. What we do find in the Bible is… people like us. We see that unflinching picture of our own lives. I read these stories and I think of my grandmother, who prayed every single day for years and years and years for her boy and his family to come to the foot of Calvary. Her prayer was always going to be answered – always – but, to be sure, not in the timeframe that would have best pleased my grandmother. And I’m pretty certain that there was an element of suffering in that wait. I pray that there will never be a day when I pray for my kids to come back to the Lord – but if there is such a day, I know that I’ll pray in pain until that prayer is answered.

And that prayer will be answered. God is faithful. But we have to understand that He is faithful to His own plan, His own timing, His own reasoning. And that’s not easy.

For all the years that Abraham and Sarah waited and waited and waited… God honoured them, answered their prayer… but He did it in His time, as part of His plan. And thousands of years later, Paul holds him up before the world in the letter to the Romans as a shining example. “It was not through law that Abraham and his offspring received the promise that he would be the heir of the world, but through the righteousness that comes by faith… Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed – and so became the father of many nations.” [4]

For all the years of Hannah’s enduring barrenness, she gave birth to Samuel at exactly the right time – the man who would be the last judge of Israel, prophet, and the anointer of Israel’s first king, Saul, and her great King, David.

For all the years of Elizabeth’s pain, this wasn’t because she had committed some great sin that God was punishing her for – to the contrary, Luke makes it clear that she and Zechariah had found favour in the Lord’s eyes. But the time and the timing and the purpose and the plan of God was critical. He was faithful, He answered her prayer, but in His time.

And we see it here in Luke 1:41; “When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leapt in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.” Even before birth, the last great prophet before the coming of the Christ begins stirring in the presence of the unborn Messiah, the King who will save God’s people from their sins.

In all of this, Mary is almost the complete opposite, isn’t she? Rather than long periods of barrenness before producing a champion of God or a great heir, she has the holy Ghost come upon her before she’d even been with Joseph. Whereas so many of these people as a married couple prayed constantly to God over many years – in the bitterness of their souls – Mary is made pregnant at a time such a thing would hardly have been socially acceptable. Nothing convenient, nothing that you would normally associate with great joy.
So Elizabeth’s Spirit-filled words of prophecy and blessing must have felt like cool refreshing rain to Mary. “Blessed are you among women – and blessed is the child that you will bear!” There are very few things in the world that beat being told that your kid is good, or smart, or funny, or even polite. But when someone would pray over Fiona’s “bump”… and pray God’s blessing on the belly… well, that was a whole different ballgame. Heck – Mary had hardly put her bags down before Elizabeth opens up. I don’t even know if Mary’s had a chance to tell Elizabeth that she’s pregnant too, before Elizabeth comes out with this extraordinary statement… “Why am I so favoured, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” Already, the unborn child has been identified as Lord – by the mother of the one who will prepare his path.

Here’s something I always find strange – it’s the kind of healing that God’s Spirit brings. A lot of people I know who have suffered long-term pain tend to be very guarded, and spontaneous bursts of joy aren’t always an obvious feature. And yet Elizabeth sounds like she’s jumping up and down on the furniture in her excitemet and her joy. The Lord has given her joy back.

And Mary said...

"My soul glorifies the Lord

and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,

for he has been mindful

of the humble state of his servant.

From now on all generations will call me blessed,

for the Mighty One has done great things for me—

holy is his name.

His mercy extends to those who fear him,

from generation to generation.

He has performed mighty deeds with his arm;

he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.

He has brought down rulers from their thrones

but has lifted up the humble.

He has filled the hungry with good things

but has sent the rich away empty.

He has helped his servant Israel,

remembering to be merciful

to Abraham and his descendants forever,

even as he said to our fathers."

It’s a bit like those scenes in the run-up to the American election, with Barack Obama quietly, gently, asking people in the audience what they, as people, could do. And the great optimistic answer would come back, quietly whispered, but determined; “Yes we can.”
Matt asked the question – “Can we trust God and His Word?” Yes, we can.
Last week the question was – “Do we trust God and His Word?” Yes, we do.

The question worth asking as we look at these great heroes of the Bible – not great warriors or mighty kings, but extraordinarily faithful prayers and women of unimaginable endurance and strength – the question is really – “How can we trust God and His Word?”

With prayer. With endurance when we cannot see the end. With hope even in places and times where there is no hope that we can see. With sure and certain knowledge that God is sovereign, God is in control of everything, and that all things happen according to His plan – even when we’re tempted to think we’re bad planners. But with prayer. Pray when you’re tired, weary, exhausted, frightened, angry, frustrated at the Lord because nothing appears to be working out right… but pray.


The Lord our God is faithful. Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.

His steadfast love endures forever!

[1] Luke 1:35
[2] Luke 1:13
[3] Gen 18:12
[4] Rom 4:13, 18

Image courtesy of http://flickr.com/photos/ingegoesbroadway/2577268694/in/set-72157605088609705/

Lk1:26-38 THE HERALD ANGEL

Sermon
Gymea Anglican Church
7:45am, 9:30am

Christmas is one of the increasingly rare times of the year when there's actually a good level of public awareness of the back-story behind one of the big events of the year. In general, people know more about the Bible's narrative of Christmas than any other story in the Bible. Kids in particular know that baby Jesus was placed in a manger. They mightn't know what a manger is, but they know Jesus was in one.

They know that there’s a big, bright star, that angels come and shepherds go, that the wise men come (let's leave off how many for a moment), and they all come to worship the baby King Jesus.

That’s a huge piece of Gospel truth right there, embedded so deeply in our culture we almost miss it altogether. The kids know it better than the adults – King Jesus. Isn’t it strange? We wise, knowing adults are ready to question almost every aspect of that great Christian legend of Christmas, whereas the kids are the ones who show us how to hold the truth. No wonder we see Jesus, later on in Luke’s Gospel, saying; “I praise you, Father, Lord of Heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children.” [1]

We’re looking at part of the traditional Christmas story, and it's a traditional time to talk about it. But in reality, this is something that (of course) happened a good nine months before Jesus was born. For those who follow lectionaries and church calendars, the Annunciation (the announcement by the angel Gabriel) is celebrated on March the 25th, exactly nine months before December 25th. So this is 8 ½ months late. Sorry.

Before we look closely at Luke's acount of this event, it's worth having a look at the chunk beforehand. [2] In that twenty-verse chunk there was another story involving the angel Gabriel. And, as Luke notes, that happened six months previous to this… so, figure about fourteen months before the birth of Jesus.

The angel Gabriel appeared to a man by the name of Zechariah. Zechariah was a priest, and on this day his job was to enter the Temple and burn incense before the Lord. Lots of people were outside, but only Zecariah would have been allowed inside. An angel was suddenly inside with him, in the smoke – and Zechariah’s reaction tells us something about angels… Luke 1:12 – “He was startled and was gripped with fear.” The Greek puts it slightly more – “and seeing him, Zechariah was terror-filled, and fear fell on him.”

Ditch the normal mental picture of pretty wings and halos and wearing white pillow-cases. Angels aren’t cute, pretty or delicate. They aren't likely to sit gently on the top of a Christmas tree. Nor are they likely to dance on the head of a pin. Angels are supernaturally powerful, immortal beings. They’re terrifyingly real. And they speak with authority, because they carry messages directly from the Lord God Almighty himself. There’s something about the physical presence of these creatures that is intensely intimidating, too. Gabriel’s first words sum up the human experience of angels right through the Old Testament… “Do not be afraid.”

Gabriel tells Zechariah that he and his wife will have a child. Zechariah asks just one question – “How can I be sure of this?” It's worth noting at this point the startling ability of men to ask the dumbest questions… how can I be sure of this? Because she’ll get a really big tummy, swollen ankles, a frightening temper and a desire for garlic ice-cream at three o’clock in the morning?
Gabriel’s response puts the priest in his place. “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news.” And Zechariah is struck dumb for his doubt, never to utter another word until he has obeyed the Lord's word in full.

Angels generally don’t announce babies, notwithstanding what the gift-card industry suggests. The Word of the Lord hadn’t been heard in the land since the prophet Malachi, four hundred years earlier. So why here? Why now? What was so extraordinary about this child that the Lord God would send an angel? Gabriel indicates to Zechariah that this baby would grow to be unique, filled with the Holy Spirit from birth, like Samuel a child dedicated to God from birth, to become a man who would “go on before the Lord, in the Spirit and the power of Elijah… to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” [3] This was to be one child marked from birth. And when Zechariah emerges, stunned and speechless from inside the Temple, we’re told that everybody realised that he’d received a vision. When his time of service was completed, he returned home. And Elizabeth became pregnant.

Luke 1:26 – “In the sixth month God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendent of David. The virgin’s name was Mary.”

News travels through families very quickly, doesn’t it? I think any time there’s a pregnancy, there’s a sense of managing the news before the news just escapes and runs away. So when Gabriel comes before Mary and greets her as one highly-favoured, and tells her the Lord was with her, I’m not surprised that she was a little edgy... especially if she's heard that it was an angel that took Zechariah's speech (and, as a side-thought, possibly his hearing as well; look very closely at Luke 1:62). So we see in verse 29 – “But Mary was greatly troubled at his words, and wondered what kind of greeting this might be.” Gabriel again tells her not to be afraid, and repeats that she has found favour with God.
It’s amazing how the world completely turns on just a couple of words. Simple sentences. “Will you marry me?” “I have your medical results back.” “We’re going to have a baby.” “It’s a boy.” Some of life’s most profoundly moving moments come in the simplest of sentences. The entire world’s orbit is changed forever as the coming of the Son of the Most High, Yahweh, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel is announced…

But it’s announced quietly, to an audience of one.
In response to her question, Gabriel explains in verse 35 what will happen to Mary – that the Holy Spirit will come upon her, and that the power of the Most High will overshadow her – so the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. He reminds her of Elizabeth’s case, pregnant in old age, and reminds her that nothing is impossible with God.

Here’s a thing. Zechariah asks the angel a question - How can I be sure of this? Mary asks the angel a question - how will this be? Why is one question punished harshly, and the other answered so openly and gently?
Zechariah’s question comes from a place of disbelief. He’s a priest, in the temple, and God speaks directly to His priest through a herald-angel. Zechariah has no excuses, as far as Gabriel is concerned, for his disbelief. He should be prepared for the Lord to speak, but clearly is not – and the poor old man is dealt with, in a way that would be recognised very publicly. Big warning-sign… do not doubt the Word of Yahweh!
But what about Mary’s question? “How will this be since I am a virgin?” Is that a question coming from a place of disbelief? How is it possible for a virgin to remain a virgin and yet give birth?
Her question says something of her honour – she certainly wasn’t prepared to break that law, even with her husband-to-be, before it was right to do so. Pre-marital pregnancy was beyond shameful – it would disgrace Mary and her family, as well as Joseph and his. It makes her final word all the more amazing. Verse 38: “I am the Lord’s servant – may it be to me as you have said.”

That’s obedience, isn’t it? She knew full well that she faced the possibility of rejection by her husband, ostracism from society in general and her family in particular. And yet she takes it on.

I realize that I’m going against the trend at the moment. I’m being a highly unfashionable preacher. The current trends, as far as I can tell, is to leave the whole matter of the Virgin Birth alone. It’s an odd thing, it’s outside any scientific paradigm, it’s something that people find hard to believe…
And at points like this, at points where there are difficulties, at points where belief is hard, we are actively encouraged to put our faith in these things aside. "Oh, it’s too difficult. Don’t strain yourself trying to get your head around these things that are too hard. God wouldn't really do that, would he? The Virgin Birth is a legend – a myth. The resurrection isn't really believable... the authors of these books are hardly credible historians, are they?" Sadly – tragically – shamefully - these cries are coming as much from pulpits and bishops as they come from the world outside. Be careful.

So why is it so important? Why make such a big deal out of it?
Matthew records Jesus saying “Anyone who receives you receives me, and anyone who receives me receives the One who sent me”. Matthew records Jesus saying “All things have been committed to me by my Father, and no-one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him”. And, crucially, when Peter declares to Jesus “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God”, Matthew records Jesus saying “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man but by my Father in Heaven”.

What are we to make of these claims that Jesus makes of himself? If, as more and more people are content to believe, he was the son of two humans (no matter how remarkable they were), where do these outlandish claims take us? Certainly, Jesus' sayings and parables show that he deserves titles like “a great teacher” and “influential philosopher” and “wise man.” And, to be sure, most people today are more than happy to accord Jesus that honour.

But can he still be called a great teacher as he makes these claims of himself? Can a teacher be half-wise and half-delusional? If he is a liar, should we trust any of his wisdom? Next question, by logical extension… If this book, these accounts, this Bible, is full of half-truths instead of the truth… can I trust the God that I find in these pages with my soul?

How will this be, since I am a virgin? Can a Virgin Birth be proven? Can I give you scientific, rock-solid, absolutely irrefutable evidence that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit instead of by normal human agency?
In an age of science and reason, where scientists declare that if it can't be proven it cannot be said to have happened, I have to say... no. There is no scientific, rock-solid, absolutely irrefutable evidence that would satisfy these criteria that I can provide for you.
What I can do is point to the Scriptures. And there are one or two things that should be considered here. Even the harshest secular literary scholars agree on one thing. If these writings about Mary and Joseph and Jesus' miraculous birth were an invented myth, devised by the early Church... they shouldn't look like this.
* It's not myth – certainly not in the classical vein of mythology. Remember, Luke was writing to Theophilus, and whereas most of the classical mythical writers (like Homer) wrote highly-stylised poetry or lyrical stories for oral story-telling, Luke and Acts bear all the hallmarks of a written factual account in documented form.
There were certainly many myths concerning Greek and Roman gods who used all sorts of tricks to sleep with humans – and often in these stories a child happened afterwards. Traditionally, the resultant unwanted child would often become a nemesis to the father (look up the origin of the word nemesis!). Luke and Matthew make it completely clear that there is no accident – the direct will of God the Father brings forth the Son of God in flesh. The Father loves his Son, and the Son remains obedient to the Father - even to his death. That flies in the face of any mythological pattern that I can recall.
*It's overly simple One of the greatest arguments in favour of the truth of these Gospel accounts is, quite simply, that they are so simple. Matthew and Luke simply state what was. If it were a literary invention, there would be far more explanations attached, and a far-larger back-story. The thought that it was a First-Century addition actually creates more problems... why would you add such a strange, outrageous, unproveable, unbelievable portion?
The old 1662 Book of Common Prayer puts it just as simply. Being of one substance with the Father – who, for us men and for our salvation came down from Heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was made man. There is simply nothing remotely like this anywhere else. Matthew and Luke don't give any stylised details of how this might have happened. It was enough to note that it occurred. The how is utterly irrelevant to them.

The why becomes apparent as you read the Gospels – only the Son of God has the authority to forgive sins. The Pharisees were absolutely right about one thing – only God can forgive sins. Only the Son of God can take every sin and place it upon himself. Only His blood, shed at great cost and pain, can atone for me and my rebellion against God the Father. Only the Son of God can save... me.
That’s why the question is so important. That’s why we bother working through the difficult bits. That’s why.

Mary’s reply to all of this amazes me every time I read this. Verse 38: “I am the Lord’s servant. May it be to me as you have said.” Simple belief, despite the enormous impact that this will have on her life. Great risk, great cost. I look at the difference between Zechariah’s terrified disbelief and Mary’s quiet, thoughtful, understanding acceptance and obedience. I find myself wondering what I’d do, what I’d say if I found myself in Zechariah’s place. Would I do any better?

*Here’s a question. If you were visited by a herald angel, what would you do? Would you freeze with fear? Would you do what Zechariah did and have great trouble believing the message of the Lord? Would you be like Gideon, who needed to see proofs before he’d believe that the angel spoke the word of God?
Because that, in essence, is the choice that we're given when we approach the Word of God. We read it. We study it. Sometimes we are perplexed by it, sometimes we don’t understand all of it. And that’s fair enough – I don’t think that there are too many people who would be brave enough to put up their hand to say “I understand all of the Bible.”
But here’s the real question. Do we trust it? The question isn’t “Can we trust it” – Matt looked at that one last week – but “do we trust it?” Do we accept what this book says about Jesus, what it says about God, what it says about us as fallen men and women? Do we trust it?

Children around the world are poking at Nativity sets, either in churches, front lawns, living rooms or in shopping centres. They know Santa, and they probably know the names of all the reindeer. But…
They know that the shepherds came to Bethlehem to see the baby King Jesus.

They know that the wise men came with gifts and worshiped King Jesus.

They always know which one the Virgin Mary is, and that Joseph stands right beside her.

And they know that in that little nest of straw lies King Jesus. They don’t see the irony of the King of heaven and earth lying in a cow’s feed-box. But they know who the King is.
The most important question we can possibly ask as we approach Bethlehem through this week and the next, is “do we know the King?”

“Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”

[4] Let me encourage you over the next couple of weeks... be childish this Christmas!

Amen.

[1] Luke 10:21
[2] Luke 1:5-25
[3] Luke 1:17
[4] Luke 18:16-17