Praise

Mary’s song is probably familiar to many of you. It is a beautiful song of praise, and a song of revolution. Mary sings of the great things that God is doing in her life. She sings of how God has looked favourably on his lowly servant. Mary was young, poor, and now pregnant. Mary, an unmarried pregnant teenager from a small religiously conservative town, has the courage, the insight to sing this song of praise. Mary sings of the blessing of being a servant of God. Being a servant of God could get Mary killed, that is what happened to ‘girls like her’. Being a servant of God could have led to her being excluded from her family or her marriage to Joseph being called off.

In what ways is God calling you to be a servant? Do you feel blessed that God is calling you?

Mary’s song is also about Israel and the world, about how God was turning the world upside down, or right side up. As with Zechariah’s song, Mary sings of what is yet to happen as if it has already occurred.

I wonder how we sing Mary’s song today. I wonder if we can, because every person here is well off, I doubt anyone here is living below the poverty line, I doubt anyone here is without a place to live, I doubt anyone here is in fear of their lives.

So as the powerful, and the rich, for by world standards we are; how do we relate to this song? Does it prick our conscience? Or do we let it flow over us because we think of ourselves like Mary, rather than the people she says will be humbled.

This radical song from Mary is about the new reign of God, about a future, that has begun, where justice, hope and peace will reign; the realm of God where the powerful, the proud and the rich will be removed from their places of privilege; the realm of God where the oppressed and the hungry will be lifted and fed.

Is this a song we are comfortable with?

What song of praise do we sing?

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[2 minutes silence]

Mary’s song is a song of praise, and this the third Sunday in Advent is the Sunday of joy. This week I have found a website that has a different version of the Hallelujah chorus each day. So far there has been a handbells choir, a banjo solo, people with signs, and the one you will see shortly. As you watch it, I want you to think about when and where and how you sing praise to God.