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“Pondering These Things in Our Hearts”
Luke 2:1-20 KJV; Luke 1:46-55
Rev. Sandy Nuernberg
Oakland-Cambridge Presbyterian Church, Cambridge, WI
Christmas Eve Candlelight Service
December 24, 2006
Call it instinct, coincidence or
just plain inquisitiveness, the Gospel of Luke is full of detail concerning the
necessity, the joy, the exuberance, and the celebration of the birth of Christ.
For example, this physician, Luke, is the only Gospel writer to include the
Roman Emperor Augustus in the accounts of this amazing and panoramic story of
Jesus’ beginning of life. For this small but necessary detail during the first
tax registration helps us understand the sudden flight of the advanced pregnant
Mary to have her child in Bethlehem. But we also know that Immanuel, the Christ
child born in a manger, was born in Bethlehem in fulfillment of the prophetic
news (Micah 5:2) from the house and family of David. Scholars believe Luke
perhaps knew these details from Mary herself, in order to be so accurate in his
reports. Through all the accounts, Mary pondered these events in
her heart.
I’m sure you have your favorite
time or part of this Christmas season to ponder as well. As a child, I remember
hearing this King James Version of the Christmas story, and then singing in the
church choir, and later in the adult choirs of the churches I attended, all of
the familiar Christmas carols. Some we are singing tonight in our celebration of
Christ’s coming among us. It was much fun and over these many years I have
continuously pondered all of these happenings in my heart for they are so very
much a part of my enjoying this season of the year. For these kinds of
activities remind me of the never-changing birth story of Christ Jesus as God’s
greatest gift to all of the world! It seems that this story is what captures,
for me, what Christmas is all about.
Mary, the mother of God’s only
Son, Jesus Christ did ponder many things in her heart as well. She thought
deeply and deliberately in her heart about the happenings in her life. Probably
in her early life of the twenties at conceiving her child, Mary went to visit
her cousin, Elizabeth, to talk with her about the meaning of all of this; each
was with child and thus they could have ‘heart to heart’ talks concerning their
condition or state. Mary heard, she believed what God had told her, and she
pondered God’s promise to her in her heart, even though the Lukan Gospel tells
us she will be pierced with a sword to her soul (2:35). Yet the child’s father
and mother were amazed at all that was said about him, for he was destined to
the falling and rising of many in Israel.
Mary praises God her Savior in her
Magnificat, meaning to celebrate or to magnify the greatness of God, God’s
wonderful deeds and actions in her favor. Mary was praising God the warrior, and
God the merciful. Being of the poor, this poor woman’s soul and her spirit, her
mind, body, and every part of it is caught up in her graciousness and her being
lifted up into God’s goodness and graciousness. In her female bodily experience,
in her spirituality within, while others wonder at it all, Mary ponders it all,
as from her own womb she gives birth to Christ, a gift from the Holy Spirit. The
angels sing, the shepherds arrive with praise, and glorify God at all that has
happened.
Even after Jesus was twelve years
old and in the temple, lost from his father and mother, Mary pondered these
things about Jesus and her life in her heart (2:50-55). AS Luke states, she
‘kept’ all of these things; in the Greek which means diaterein or to
treasure them, to remember and preserve them in her heart. She was trying, as we
say today, ‘to make sense of it all’ and so probably needed the time make it all
understandable. I remember well in beginning to write sermons at seminary, I
kept pondering the text’s meaning before I could write any words on paper or at
the computer. To this day, my pondering consists of writing down words of the
text that stand out for me, ideas to include for understanding, and themes to
try and work with in the context of the time of the scriptures and in our time
for today’s meaning. It’s a kind of interpreting of her life, as Mary pondered
her own life, those in her life that she loved, and how the Holy Spirit is in
others she loved so much. She was becoming the woman she would be right up to
her Son’s death, in her life of pondering in prayer, in her activities, and her
contemplating the lives of others.
The good news for us is that
Christ is born today, Christ is born and is still alive today! Mary is
fulfilling the Jewish Torah in her conceiving a child of God, the Messiah, and a
gift of the Holy Spirit, on her journey of faith and partnership with God. As we
come to the communion table this night, you and I, let us ponder, let us
remember that God, in Christ, is in us and that we are united in a common church
fellowship tradition familiar to Jesus as he ate with his disciples before his
death on the cross. As we ponder all of these things in our hearts, we receive
God’s joy, peace, love, and hope in the birth of Christ Jesus our
Lord. AMEN
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