The Subjunctive Space (Dec. 24, 2023) Luke 1.26-38

I believe that today’s reading is one with which we are so familiar that it has lost its power when we hear it. Oftentimes when I hear an “old familiar story” from the pulpit, my mind begins to wander because, “I have heard this before, I know all about this one.” And when I do this, I am sure that I miss something that would bring the power of the Scriptures to life again.

This is the story of the Annunciation or the Announcement of the coming of Christ to Mary. On this, the fourth Sunday of Advent, it is a time for which we have all anticipated, the announcement of the coming one. The announcement in this text is that the one coming is to be expected and that indeed, the time is now here. The one who is to rule over the house of Jacob, the one who will sit on the throne of David, is to come and in a way most unexpected. And so, with this thought let us take a little bit of a background.

Let’s take another look at the story in the second reading. Imagine with me a time and a place. The time is the very early Roman Empire. The place is a remote province of the empire between Egypt (a major province) and Anatolia (what is now Turkey and also a major province). In this remote province is a people whose religion has earned them some favor with the Romans so that they are allowed to practice it without having to syncretize (or blend) with the Roman religions. While we have always called this the “Holy Land”, to Rome it is really a pit stop on the way to Egypt or Anatolia, a place where one does not want to spend a long time or fraternize with “the locals”. And in this province, there is a town, a village really. A village of no more than 400-500 people, if that many. Here everyone literally knows everyone and their business. If not related, they soon will be.

And in this village lives a young woman of about 14-16 years of age, maybe older, maybe younger. She has no distinguishing marks about her, no known beauty, intelligence, or anything that make her stand out. Just a common young woman doing the jobs in her family that will help prepare her to run her own household. In fact, even her name is common, Miriam, being named after the sister of Moses. But you might know her by her Greek name, Mary.

Now one day Mary is doing her work, just like any normal day. And suddenly there is someone, a messenger, or angel, from God named Gabriel, before her saying “Greetings favored one.” Now if you are like me, the response by Mary as told by Luke seems a bit…calm. She was “much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be”. I wonder if there might have been bit more…anxiety about this. Angels come with power and almost everyone who sees one is fearful. Speaking for myself I am sure I would have been. In fact, earlier in the chapter we find that Zechariah was fearful when the very same messenger came to visit him.

And here is where the familiar comes into play. Here we see the announcement with which we are so familiar. Here we find the words that are so familiar that we tune them out and let our minds wander. Mary is told that A) she is going to bear a son, B) that this son will be called the Most High and rule over the House of Jacob, and C) that this son will be conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit. This last is very important as Mary is a virgin when this child is to be conceived. There would be questions because, let’s face it, these people might not have known the science and biology that we know today, but they knew where babies came from. His name will be Jesus, which is the Greek for Yeshua, or Joshua, which means God is Salvation. And one more thing with what Gabriel tells the young woman: nothing will be impossible with God.

Again, Mary’s response to this is that of one who is perplexed or troubled. This is in response to the announcement but could also be in response to how she knows the village might react. In the world of this time, an unwed mother could be put to death. At best, she would be ostracized, and her life would be one of hardship and loneliness. And what of her child? The child would face the coolness and separation of the village as well, especially if it was a boy. Philip Yancey in his book The Jesus I Never Knew, states that small towns (or villages) are not kind to boys of questionable parentage. Mary had to face all of this with this announcement. A heavy weight of responsibility for a young woman in her teens.

But Mary is also told that she has found favor with God. The word used here is the word that many times is translated as grace. Mary found grace with God. And it was not because of anything that she did. Mary was not of noble birth. She was not a priest. She was not one of the powerful. She was a teenage girl in an out of the way village in an out of the way province, of a people who were the least in an empire of many. The grace was given to her by God who can, and does, extend grace to those who are the most unworthy. If you do not believe that grace can be extended to the unworthy, take a look at all of us who are gathered here today. We are unworthy of grace and yet God extended grace to us.

Mary asks how all of this is possible since she is a virgin. As stated before, she knew how babies were made and this was definitely not in that picture. A virgin would not be able to have a child without the aid of a man. But the messenger, the angel, tells her that 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 holy; he will be called Son of God.”[1] The one who is to redeem Israel is to come from the Most High. And just to prove the point, the angel tells her that her relative Elizabeth, one who was thought to be barren, was with child. For with God nothing is impossible.

Mary’s response is not one that I or many would give. She states that, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”[2] I believe that most of us would not have the same response because the word “servant” would be best translated as “slave”, a word that would make us all uncomfortable. But this is not as a passive slave that Mary comes. She asks questions and she makes valid points about what this announcement means. She is not a weak vessel. She is one who is, when she makes her decision, one who is ready to say yes. One commentator states it in this way: “Her servanthood is not a cringing slavery but a submission to God that in OT times characterized genuine believers and that should characterize believers today.”[3]

This is the Sunday when we light the candle of love. Love shown by God in calling the virgin who, when she could have said no, said yes to God and the son that would be carried by her. She is the one who the Church called Theotokis, mother of God.

It is also a time when we still await the Advent of Jesus. We know that he came as a baby and we celebrate that every year on this day, Christmas Eve. We know that he grew as a man and that he died, was raised from the grave, and ascended into heaven. But we still await an Advent. A time when the one for whom we wait will come again in his glory. And we wait.

And the time we live in between is two spaces, what Theresa Cho calls the indictitive space and the subjunctive space. The indicative is what we know as factual statements that were and are made about what has happened or is happening. In the subjunctive, we live with all the nuances of possibilities and potentialities. The indicative says “I go there” while the subjunctive says “I could go there”, “I would go there”, “I might go there.” In the indicative we live in what roots us in reality and the truth of who we are. In this time, we look for and see what we can prove, what we can touch and feel. But in this time, we miss alternate possibilities that can make us feel trapped and stuck in a world where we accept a reality that does not have to be. In the subjunctive we can imagine not only the possible but the impossible. And when we grasp that God can and will do the impossible, we realize that there are no bounds on what God can do. No despair is too deep. No pain is too unbearable. No situation is too hopeless. No sin unforgivable.

We are to hold on the indicative of who God is and fully embrace who we are. But we must also embrace the subjunctive of what God can do. Like Mary and Elizabeth, both who were mothers of extraordinary children, we are called to reach out to the God we know and have known, and the God who is guiding our future. Let us look to the impossible. Let us realize that what we think and know is impossible will never be beyond the possibilities of God. Amen.

[1] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1989. Print. [2] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1989. Print. [3]Liefeld, Walter L., and David W. Pao. “Luke.” The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Luke–Acts (Revised Edition). Ed. Tremper Longman III and David E. Garland. Vol. 10. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2007. 61. Print.