Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
Text: (Luke 1:26-38)
The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God.
Prayer: Let the words of my mouth, and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Today is a church festival that is called the “Annunciation”, which commemorates Jesus’ conception in his mother’s womb, celebrated exactly 9 months before Christmas, on the 25th March. Normally this day would fall during the week, but this year it happens to fall on a Sunday.
But this event in biblical history is so incredibly important. First of all, it teaches us that life begins at conception. And not only that, but Jesus life began with a conception. Jesus didn’t fall from the sky at age 6 – bringing a body and a soul with him from heaven. But the miracle of his conception is that Jesus took on human flesh from his mother. Often in the history of theology, it was said that Jesus assumed human flesh. He was implanted on the wall of his mother’s womb and he grew just like everyone else, and his hands and feet, toes and fingers were all formed gradually. As it says in Psalm 139: “You knitted me together in my mother’s womb.”
And so when Jesus begins his life at conception, he blessed conception, and blessed our conception, and shares it with us. We are conceived in sin—he is conceived without sin. He gives to us his purity and his holiness and his forgiveness—and he take on our sin right from the time of his conception.
And so when we celebrate the conception of Jesus, we should also remember all those children who have died in the womb, and all the mothers and fathers who have endured the suffering that comes with this. Because in the eyes of God, every child and every human life is precious. As Mother Teresa said: “How can you say that there are too many children in the world? It’s like saying there are too many flowers.”
It should be mentioned here, then, that not everyone in the world shares this opinion and not everyone loves children. If you don’t love children, ask yourself: why not? Jesus himself tells you to take the example of your faith from them: “The kingdom of God belongs to such as these.” And in Matthew 18 Jesus says about children: “See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven.”
Whenever a Christian has an opinion about politics, they are always told to shut up and told some trite nothing like this: “The church should keep out of politics.”
Not true. Christians are citizens of this country like anyone else, and have every right to involve themselves in politics. Since the 1970s and such like, there has been considerable pressure to legalise abortion, that is, the killing of unborn children. Victoria has some of the worst laws in the world with regard to abortion, in that doctors who are against abortion are required by law to refer on a person who asks for one to a doctor who is in favour of it. This is certainly dark times, and Christians should never give up praying against this silent massacre that goes on day after day. Many Christians are weary and tired from this topic, and say that the horse has bolted. But just because this happens so much, doesn’t mean that there isn’t a need for people to defend and pray for the most vulnerable people in our society.
Nevertheless, Jesus Christ knows the danger of the womb—he too lived there for 9 months. He knew about the dangers of unjust laws, when all the 2 year old boys in Bethlehem were killed at the command of King Herod.
But to our text today:
We read: In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Greetings, O favoured one, the Lord is with you!”
In the Nicene Creed, we confess that we believe that God created everything that is “seen and unseen”, “visible and invisible.” Conception is really something that is invisible – nobody ever sees it because it always happens in a mother’s womb. A mother only knows that conception has taken place by noticing what happens on the outside of her body. Maybe she gets morning sickness, or something like that. Some women have only realised that they are pregnant when the baby starts to show! (In some Aboriginal cultures, the place where the mother first becomes aware her unborn child move is extremely significant.)
But it happens secretly, invisibly. No human eye captures this moment.
But at the same time, science can still observe conception, and record it. So when we say “seen and unseen” in the creed, this is not what we’re talking about.
Rather, we’re talking about all the things that God created that can’t be observed by the human eye, and can’t be measured by science, like angels, for example. So here we see an angel, a particular angel named Gabriel, who comes to the Virgin Mary in a visible way, from the invisible realm of heaven, from God’s invisible, unseen kingdom.
In a sense, this is the only conception where the exact moment is known—because the angel comes and tells Mary that she will become pregnant.
It is also said twice here that Mary is a “virgin”. She has not had intimate relations, and probably still lived with her parents. She was also engaged to Joseph, betrothed, which is a very important fact, because if she would have been punished severely if she became pregnant outside of wedlock, possibly even stoned to death. So her engagement to Joseph protects her from this.
And so the angel says: “Greetings, O favoured one, the Lord is with you!” But [Mary] was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”
The angel says that she has found favour with God. She hasn’t done anything to earn God’s favour—that’s not what’s being said here. God simply has chosen her to be blessed with this great honour. He has looked on her in her low estate. He has taken notice of a simple nobody of a young girl in Nazareth, and has made her the most blessed among women. God has simply regarded her, looked upon her, smiled at her and chosen her for this special task.
Also, the angel quotes here from Isaiah 7: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and he shall be called Immanuel.”
And so the angel says: “You will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.”
You might wonder why the angel doesn’t instruct her to call the child “Immanuel”. Immanuel isn’t simply a name, but it is a reality, a description of who Jesus is. Immanuel means: God with us. And when Jesus is conceived, God is with us in a way that he has never been with us before. He becomes one person with a human body. God unites himself to the person of Jesus so intimately, so that when Jesus the man touches a person, it is God himself who touches them. When Jesus is in his mother’s womb, it is not simply a human child who is there, but God in all his fullness, confined in such a tiny space. In the history of the church, Mary has often been called “the Mother of God”—and this is a right thing to call her, because Jesus is true God. Of course, she didn’t give birth from eternity to God the Father—that’s not what “Mother of God” means. But she gave birth to Jesus, who as a tiny baby was also truly God.
And so the angel says: He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.
Even though, Mary is a poor, insignificant girl, Jesus will be great, the angel says. And also, even though he will be Mary’s son, her son, the angel says: He will be called the Son of the Most High God. There are not too Jesuses here. There is not one Jesus who is Mary’s son, and another one who is God’s son. They are one and the same person. Mary’s Son is God’s Son. And God’s Son is Mary’s Son.
But as we prepare for Easter in the next couple of weeks, think about what it means that Jesus will be called great. We recognise that he is great not because we see his greatness, but because we believe that he is great with the eyes of faith. When we see him weak, naked, and helpless, dying on the cross, we still say that he is great, and that he is doing a great thing, just as it is a great thing when on Easter Sunday morning he stands up and rises from the dead. In the same way, Jesus is great and wonderful even when he is not even the size of a 5 cent piece, still enclosed in the darkness of his mother’s womb.
But lastly, we read: And May said to the angel, “How will this be since I am a virgin?” [Literally: since I do not know a man?] And the angel answered here, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God. And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who is called barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.” And Mary said: “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.
This is the great miracle of this occasion, which we need to come to terms with and need to impress on our minds. Jesus was conceived without the cooperation of a man. There was no act of intercourse. There was no artificial insemination. Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God.
The Holy Spirit is always works in a secret way, in an unseen way. And the Holy Spirit works in a real, substantial way—he can even make a virgin pregnant. Here the Holy Spirit comes upon Mary is such a way that God and man come together in one person, and that his human flesh is made holy in such a way that that human being himself, that little child with real skin and bones is called God’s Son. This is one of the foundations of Christianity: that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit. This isn’t just pious clap-trap that church people invented. This is a reality, a reality that is outside of our experience, but that doesn’t make it untrue.
And so Mary says: “Behold I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.”
The angel speaks about the Holy Spirit. Mary speaks about the angel’s word. That’s because the Holy Spirit always works through the Word of God. And by submitting to the word of God, she submits to the work of the Holy Spirit.
In the church today, we also submit to the Holy Spirit when we say Amen to God’s Word.
The pastor says: “I baptise you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” And we say: Amen. Let it be to me according to your Word.
“I forgive you all your sins”. And we say: Amen. Let it be to me according to your Word.
“Take and eat, this is my body given for you. Take and drink, this is my blood shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” And we say: Amen. Let it be to me according to your Word.
Yes, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of the living God. I believe that you are God and man in one person, God with us, Immanuel. I believe that you were conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary. I believe that nothing will be impossible with God.
I am the servant of the Lord. Let it be to me according to your Word. Amen.
Lord Jesus Christ, we thank you for your conception by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin Mary. Send us the Holy Spirit according to your Word, and let your power come and overshadow us, so that we may walk as children of light and citizens of heaven. Amen.
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