Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen
The text for this meditation is written in the 1st Chapter of the Gospel according to
St Luke: Verses 39 – 56:
In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, 40 where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. 41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit 42 and exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. 43 And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? 44 For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy. 45 And blessed is she who believed that there would be[a] a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”
Mary’s Song of Praise
46 And Mary said,
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,
48 for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 His mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
52 He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.
54 He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
55 according to the promise he made to our ancestors,
to Abraham and to his descendants forever.”
56 And Mary remained with her about three months and then returned to her home.
Women in our culture are too often celebrated for what they look like, instead of for who they are. The airwaves are inundated with ads for diet pills and plans, cosmetics and calisthenics, collagen and cosmetic surgery, all aimed at showing women what they can truly be if only they would improve their appearance. Magazines in the grocery store feature an endless parade of the latest models and celebrity sensations. Hollywood encourages superficiality and celebrates the lives of the young and beautiful. In many cases, these starlets, having no grounding, meet tragic ends. In any case, such superficiality keeps all of us from recognising true beauty.
In today’s text, we meet two women. Luke never bothers to tell us what they looked like. He doesn’t mention their high cheekbones or their hourglass figures. He pays no attention to their sense of fashion. Nevertheless, he shows them for what they are: truly beautiful women.
The first of these women was probably quite young, perhaps a teenager. Her name was Mary. As was the custom of the age, she was engaged to a somewhat older man, a carpenter by the name of Joseph. And, as you know, she found herself to be with child. Not because she had put the cart before the horse. No, the angel proclaimed that her child would be conceived by the Holy Spirit. Mary, a virgin, had been chosen to be our Lord’s mother. And she received this news with beautiful humility, saying, (Lk 1:38) “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord”.
The angel proceeded to tell Mary that her cousin Elizabeth would also bear a child. And no doubt young Mary knew that Elizabeth would be a good mentor as she prepared for the difficult task of motherhood. So, bursting with youthful energy, Mary hurried up into the hill country to visit with Elizabeth and to tell her the good news.
Elizabeth was married to Zechariah, a distinguished priest who served in the temple. Unlike Mary, she was advanced in age. But she was no less beautiful. Luke tells us that she was a righteous woman, blameless in all her ways. As such, she exhibited a true beauty of character, the kind of beauty that is more precious than jewels.
Now, as soon as Mary entered Elizabeth’s house, she excitedly told Elizabeth all that had happened: about the angel, about the conception by the Holy Spirit, and about the child whom she would call Jesus, which means, “The Lord saves.” Yes, she had good news in every sense of the word. And at this greeting, how did Elizabeth react? Was she perhaps a little jealous that Mary’s news was greater than her own? Was she hurt or put out by the fact that this young girl, and not she, would give birth to the Saviour? After all, Elizabeth was married to a respected priest who served in the temple. Mary, on the other hand, was only a simple girl, set to marry a simple carpenter. But no! There was no jealousy in this beautiful woman. In fact, she was honoured, saying, (v 43) “Why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?”. At Mary’s good news, Elizabeth’s heart was gladdened, and she exclaimed, (v 42) “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!”.
Then, wonder of wonders, Elizabeth’s child got into the act. As Elizabeth added, (v 44) “For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy”. In holy mirth, John the Baptist was already pointing to the Lamb of God, who would take away the sin of the world. Yes, here is a picture of infant faith and a vivid reminder of why we baptise infants. The child of Elizabeth was already looking forward to what the child of Mary would accomplish. The infant John was rejoicing that our Lord had become a little babe, just like him.
Yes, in today’s Gospel we see that human life in all of its stages has been sanctified and touched by the beauty of our beautiful Saviour. Yes, there is beauty in the unborn child. Beauty in the godly mother. Beauty in the one who grows older in the wisdom of the Lord. All human life is made beautiful by the Lord through whom the world was created, by whose death the world is redeemed, and by whose incarnation the world is sanctified.
Compare this beautiful biblical scene with the ugliness of sin. The ugliness of sin is constantly looking admiringly in the mirror, without a thought for others. The world says, “A woman should not have to carry a child that she doesn’t want. Especially if it (i.e., the child) gets in the way of her own plans, her own career.” In the ugliness of sin, life is all about “me, myself, and I.” We judge others by how useful they are to us. And woe to anyone who gets in our way—whether that be an inconvenient child, a person suffering with a handicap, or an elderly person who requires “too much” of our care, attention, and love. So goes the ugliness of sin and vanity.
How much better is it for us to ponder Luke’s beautiful scene. Here we see a wonderful affirmation of life. Here we see beautiful faith as it is given by God. Consider Mary. At hearing that she would be the mother of our Lord, Mary did not succumb to vanity or engage in empty boasting. She has no ideas of self-promotion or self-fulfilment. Instead, she finds herself raised and graced by what the Lord has done. She finds her fulfilment in what the Lord has promised. Yes, Mary’s beauty is in her humility and trust. In response to the angel’s word, she said simply, (v 38) “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word”.
This was not blind obedience or passive ignorance. No, Mary trusted in the Lord because she knew that he is, in fact, trustworthy. Throughout the ages, our Lord had kept his promises. He has a long history of raising the lowly and showing kindness to the poor. Mary knew that through her child, God would do great things.
And so in great joy, Mary began to sing her wonderful song: (vv 46–48) “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant. For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed”. Yes, in her Son, she would see the proud scattered and the mighty knocked off their thrones. In her Son, she could see the humble exalted and the hungry filled with good things. In her Son, she could see the salvation of Israel and her own exaltation as well.
Maybe that’s the point of all of this. Mary had the right point of view. Society teaches young women to look in the mirror and judge themselves by appearance. But what’s the result? Either vanity or despair. Because, finally, there’s nothing there. Mary and Elizabeth, on the other hand, were women of substance. They did not vainly look in the mirror but were happy for each other, and more important, they put their focus on Christ. Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, was most excited by the fact that Mary would give birth to the Saviour. And because of that, Elizabeth could rejoice with Mary, apart from jealousy. Nor was Mary vain. Rather than look at the mirror of her own loveliness, she looked at what God had done for her and saw the One who would come forth and save her. Yes, the attention of both Elizabeth and Mary was on our Lord.
Because they were focusing on Christ, they were beautiful women. They looked into the face of the Lord and reflected his beauty.
So, what does this all mean for us in our world of superficiality and vanity? I suppose that in this season of Advent, we do well to take some time out of our busy schedules and reflect once more on what it’s all about. We all do well to look beyond the tinsel and Christmas lights, fixing our eyes on the Christ Child, finding our glory in the cross that he would take up on our behalf.
This means teaching our children the counter-cultural values that Mary sang about in her Magnificat. Earthly beauty is a gift from God. And cosmetics are fine. But earthly beauty fades. Jesus calls us to move away from the vanity of the mirror and the ugliness of pride. to adorn ourselves with Him and to put on his Spirit of holiness. We do better to place Christ before our eyes and before the eyes of our daughters and sons.
Sure, our Lord could have chosen to be born in beautiful Jerusalem, or, for that matter, in glorious Rome. Instead, he chose to be born in lowly Bethlehem, least among the cities of Judah. He could have chosen to enter into the family of the high priest or be born into the imperial family of Emperor Augustus, but instead he chose to be born into the family of a carpenter, with a poor young maiden as his mother. I have no doubt that Mary was beautiful and that she had a beautiful child. More important, he became a beautiful Saviour, willingly bearing the scars and nail marks. As Isaiah would say of him: (Is 53:2) “He had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him”. Ah, but that’s true beauty! As he endures the ugliness of the cross, we indeed see the true beauty of His heart!
No, our Lord did not choose to enter into some perfect and ideal world. He chose, instead, to enter our world, with all of its flaws and blemishes. Why? Because he loves us, with all of our flaws and blemishes. Indeed, he comes to wash away the blemish of our sins. He presents us, his Church, as his Bride, clothed in baptismal splendour, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that we might be holy, without blemish. Now this, my Friends, is true beauty, the beauty of the incarnation, the beauty of Christmas. Amen
The love and peace of our Great Triune God that is beyond all human understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, this Christmastime and forever. Amen
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