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Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Brothers and sisters, the text for this morning comes from the Gospel reading. You may be seated. One of the most beautiful biblical teachings that God has revealed clearly in the Bible is His presence with His people. And His presence with His people is not an abstract concept that we’ve got to conjure up or contemplate or dream of. It is a very concrete presence.
Now, it didn’t start off concrete. It started off with, well, burning bush, maybe, pillar of cloud and pillar of fire, maybe. But as they wandered in the wilderness, God asked there to be this tabernacle set up, which was basically a glorified tent, as they traveled for 40 years. That was where the presence of God would be defined. If someone said, “I want to pray to God and find Him,” they would go, “He’s in that tent.” There’s where the Ark of the Covenant was.
Enter the Old Testament reading where David is thinking, “I need to make God a house, a brick-and-mortar house, instead of that crazy old tent that He’s been living in for so long.” And God reminded him very clearly, “It’s not what you think that needs to be done, that will be done, it is what I will do. And my desire to have a presence among you will be far more profound than the brick-and-mortar of a temple.” In fact, the very brick and mortar temple that was built by David’s son Solomon was also torn down and destroyed. And the final one, when the people came back from their exile to Babylon, was also torn down and destroyed.
And in fact, today, at that same exact holy site, the nation of Islam has erected the Dome of the Rock, where supposedly the prophet Muhammad ascended into heaven. Enter the Gospel reading. The words of the angel to this virgin, betrothed and married to Joseph, when she’s told that she will be the very vessel of God, that His presence will be with humanity not in an abstract way or even in a tent-like structure or brick-and-mortar structure, but in flesh and blood, bones and sinews. Life… And death is God with His people.
From the moment of the angel’s message to Mary, when the message was told to her, that was the creative word of God, just as when the moment God said, “Let there be,” was there. So the moment that God proclaimed this through the angel Gabriel, did Mary conceive Jesus. And the presence of God moved from the tabernacle to Mary’s womb. And tonight we celebrate when it left Mary’s womb and He dwelt outside of Mary’s womb and has been and will be forever, but with flesh and blood as only God the Son can be clothed. You might say, Mary got pregnant through her ear. She heard and believed.
Now, this goes back to the Old Testament in that God made a promise to David that his kingdom, a throne of him bearing his name, would always endure. Well, you and I know that it doesn’t, according to the earthly way of thinking of a kingdom, but according to the lineage, the mother of our God is a descendant of David. According to His flesh and blood, He reigns as the son of David. He fulfills that prophecy of which God spoke to Nathan to tell David. We profess it: true God of true God, very God of very God, and yet, true man born of a virgin.
You remember how God chose David? All the other brothers were lined up and they were not chosen. And then finally, this scrappy, scraggly, the youngest child, the least likely to be chosen, is chosen by God to be the one. David. And so God chooses the least likely way that any human would think of God becoming present with His people in a profound way as flesh and blood.
Now Mary’s reaction to the angel’s message really should be our reaction. She was greatly troubled because of what was told to her and what that meant for her spiritually and physically for that matter. It also says that she tried to discern what sort of a greeting or proclamation this was to her from the angel. You know that great question in the catechism, what does this mean? It’s what Mary had to ask. What does this mean?
She began to grasp, though never fully grasped, no different than any of us, that this was the fulfillment of all of those Old Testament prophecies, and in particular the one of which we read this morning from Samuel. That he would be the presence of God among his people, but not in brick and mortar, and not in leather and wood of a tent, but in flesh and blood, bone and sinew, life and death and life again. But it was what was for her.
That this… a child that she would bear, who would live and be sustained from her inside of her body and outside as she nursed him, would be God who gives her life and saves her very soul. Every time an angel comes and speaks with anyone, there is always the need for the angel to say to the person unto whom they speak, “Do not be afraid.” That’s just an angel dealing with humans. Can you imagine if God revealed Himself in such a way? And yet, He revealed Himself in such a way that man was not fearful of Him whatsoever. In fact, so bold and full of hatred, they crucified Him.
Here He comes, this flesh and blood Christ, who comes to choose to dwell among us as a human being to give us life. All of us are sons of Adam and daughters of Eve. We’ve all been born through the womb of our mother and our mothers all have the womb of Eve, which is a dead and dying womb. It only gives birth to death. It is in Christ Jesus that fills the womb of Mary that brings life.
The church is the mother of our souls. She’s the one who has given birth. She does not give death. She only gives life. And the womb in which you and I are contained is the church. That’s our joy in the midst of this fear-filled world.
But it was the angel Gabriel’s statement to Mary, after which it said, “Try to understand what it meant,” was what you and I can kind of pass by, and that is, the angel Gabriel said to Mary, “The Lord be with you.” It was after he said that, that Mary is recorded in Luke’s account that says she tried to discern and was greatly troubled.
Well, you would think that it must have been about the earlier rather than the later, but the Lord be with you is a very profound statement. It’s not really a way for the pastor to say, “Hey, y’all, get ready for prayer, so I’m going to say the Lord be with you. You say back, ‘And also with you,’ then we’re going to pray.” It’s not something as simple as that. It is profound, for it is the very words of God to the angel to give to the mother of our God, Mary.
And it means that I am with you, but I am not with you in some memory of yours. I am not with you in some good time that you had in the past. I am not with you because you can pull out of your brain and avoid thinking about the tragedies that have come upon you. I am with you because I bore flesh and blood just like your flesh and blood. That if cut, bleeds. And that if the heart stops, dies. And if God chooses to raise from the dead, life comes again.
We rejoice in such a flesh and blood presence. So when Mary asks, “How can this be?” Yes, it is for her own sake that she asks such a question, but consider this: it really is for your sake and my sake that she asks such a question. Because we too question the benefit of this miracle of flesh and blood God. How can it be for me?
Because no other religion talks in terms of the deity condescending to the creature to redeem the creature. All other world religions are about the creature trying to reach the deity and never knowing whether or not they get there. This is the only religion that brings confidence because God descended to become one with us.
When she confesses, “May it be done unto me as you have said, I am the Lord’s servant,” it’s not because she went through all of those years of instruction. It’s because she believed and trusted in things that she could not understand or explain, but which God said, “This is true.”
So consider this. Just as God spoke His creative word through the angel Gabriel, and by that word did flesh and blood knit itself together in the womb of Mary, so God speaks His same creative word in the words of institution and flesh and blood are with bread and wine. Is that not the same thing?
In the same way that God said, “Let there be,” and it happened because God’s word is powerful and effective and it doesn’t have to make sense. So is it not when God says, “This is my body and this is my blood,” is body and blood with bread and wine? Yes. And our God is with us.
He doesn’t need a building like this to be with us. I can assure you, He was with me in Iraq on the back of a Humvee full of dirt and grime. As much as He is in a silver chalice, not because of who’s doing it, and not because of where it’s happening, but because of God’s Word that makes it happen.
No different than, not because Mary was favored above all other women, and we ought to pray and think that she has salvation for us, but because she was merely the vessel that God used. God’s creative Word made Christ come into her womb. And so God’s creative Word makes Christ come in bread and wine.
And your God is with you. So when we say, “The Lord be with you,” we know and believe He really is. Because His word is planted in our ear as it was planted in Mary’s. And His living and breathing flesh and blood is upon our lips and in our gut and brings presence, life, and salvation.
Rejoice with this flesh and blood presence of your God in Jesus Christ in His Supper. In the name of Jesus, Amen.
The peace of God which passes all understanding. Keep your hearts and your minds on Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.
