Scriptures: Proverbs 8:22-31; I Samuel
2:1-10; Wisdom of Solomon
God delights in creation. God delights in the beauty of the earth, in the vastness of
the sky, in the depths of the ocean, and in the goodness and love that is in you and me.
God delights in creation and is filled with hope in its goodness.
Every scripture lesson we are reading today is one of delight in God's creation, God's
wisdom, and God's love for us.
From Proverbs we read of the wisdom of God, called Sophia, that delighted in God and
creation from the beginning of the world. She was with God as a master worker, says
Proverbs, helping to draw a circle on the face of the deep, to set the sky in the heavens
and to bring up firm land from the sea. She was with God daily, rejoicing in the inhabited
world and delighting in the human race. Her words in Proverbs are those of joy and hope
and possibility. Wisdom has hope for the world God has created.
From the Wisdom of Solomon, we read Solomon's prayer that Wisdom would be sent to him
and teach him what is pleasing to God, what is wise and right, and guard him with her
glory. Once again, we are struck not only by a sense of awe and majesty at God's
greatness, but by a sense that every dimension of God delights in the beauty, the glory
and the possibilities of the divinely created world. Wisdom has hope for the world.
From I Samuel, we hear another song of hope and joy from Hannah who has felt despised
and ashamed because she has not had children with her husband, even after many years of
marriage. God has answered her desperate prayer and her first-born son, Samuel, will be a
prophet dedicated to God and to God's people. So Hannah sings of joy and hope:
"My heart exults in the Lord. The bows of the mighty are broken, but the feeble
have become strong. God raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash
heap, to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor. Not by might does one
prevail, but by faithfulness and by the hand of God."
These are words of joy in answered prayer, words of relief from the bottom of the pit,
words of vindication from one who knows God honors faithfulness and goodness, words of
hope for a world of goodness and peace, where justice will roll down like water and
righteousness like an everflowing stream. Hannah has hope for the world.
And what about Mary she whose words we have already heard sung this morning and whose
words we, ourselves will sing before we leave today that they might echo within our own
heart and become our words as well?
Even though Mary's life will be turned upside down by Jesus' birth, when the Angel
Gabriel tells her the miraculous news that she will bear the Messiah, she responds,
"yes" to God.
We know it is possible to say "yes" grudgingly to God:
Yes, I'll be kind but I'd rather have revenge.
Yes, I'll live simply but I really want those gadgets.
Yes, I'll bear what comes my way but I reserve the right to be bitter.
At such times we say "yes" to God with only part of our being because we do
not trust fully in the promises of God. We do not recognize the great joy and love God has
for us and for the world. We withhold the deepest part of ourselves from the wisdom and
hope of God, and both we and the world are worse for it.
Unlike our "yes's" at such times, Mary's "yes," was full of joy and
hope and the wisdom that comes from God. It was a full yes, from the depth of her soul and
the bottom of her toes. It was not a dewy-eyed, passive "yes," but a
"yes" filled with strength, and with her eyes wide open to the difficult road
that lay ahead.
"Yes, whatever the future is that you have in mind, God, I want to be part of it,
for I trust in your promises and your hope for the world.
Yes, this is unexpected, but you do miraculous things, and if I can be part of bringing
about life and good and love and justice, then sign me up right now. If you're willing to
use someone even as small as I am, then you can truly do anything. And if you can do
anything, then:
My soul magnifies the lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior. For God has shown
strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He
has brought down the powerful from their thrones and lifted up the lowly; he has filled
the hungry with good things and sent the rich empty away. God has kept the promises made
to Abraham and Sarah, and to all the generations who have hoped in God."
When God's Wisdom was poured out upon Mary, she knew this son would be the hope of the
world. She felt God's joy in this creation, God's longing for good to overcome evil, and
God's hope that this child would turn our hearts to God and good. "Let me be part of
your great and glorious work," she prayed, "for in you and because of you, I
have hope for the world."
God came into the world in Mary's son, Jesus, "not to condemn the world, but that
the world might be saved through him." (John 3:17) God sent Jesus into the world
because God loves the world and has delighted in its beauty and wonder from the first day
of creation. God sent Jesus into the world because God created us and delights in the
goodness and love that lies within each one of us, and longs for us to be brought into the
fullness of life for which we were created. "God so loved the world that he sent an
only Son, that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but shall have eternal
life." (John 3:16)
God delights in this world and has hope for it. In the midst of the world's pain and
sorrow, in the face of evil and oppression and the specter of war, in the reality of
whatever burdens you carry, remember that God so delights in the world, that Christ was
born of Mary, a humble, poor woman whose faithfulness gave birth to the hope of the world.
As Mary said, "Yes," to God, so too, may God grant us the wisdom and grace to
say "yes," not grudgingly and half-heartedly, but fully and completely, from the
depth of our soul with our eyes wide open, so that God's love and joy and hope for the
world will be reborn in us, and through us, this day and in the time to come. Amen.
