Sermon: Christmas: The Annunciation:
The Birth of Charity
Pittsburgh New Church
Dec 15, 2019
Rev. Calvin Odhner
Text: Luke 1:28-37
TCR:688
“Rejoice highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!” (Luke 1: 28)
Introduction
Good morning and welcome to the Pittsburgh New Church! Last week we heard that John the Baptist is calling us to prepare for the Lord’s birth! He is crying out in the wilderness of our mind “Hey, the Lord is coming! Are you ready to receive Him? Now all kinds of things are happening. Today, we get to see an angel appear to Mary—let's read about it!
Sermon
Think back for a moment to past Christmases in your life! Such lovely times! There is something so peaceful, so precious about Christmas. It’s a time we set aside to celebrate the Lord’s miraculous virgin birth. We celebrate the life-giving truths He brought into the world. Every year we are touched by the Lord’s birth story.
“Hallelujah, the Lord God, omnipotent shall reign, and His name shall be called wonderful, counselor, the mighty God, father of eternity, prince of peace."
Those who have studied the times and history of the Jews are agreed that at the time of the Lord's birth, there was a universal expectation of His coming. Throughout Jerusalem, Judaea and Galilee, wherever Jews or Israelites met together they would talk of the Messianic prophecies and express their feeling that the time was at hand. The Jews had suffered heavily under Roman rule and it seems, although they expected the Lord’s birth almost as one man…they had turned away from the reliance upon the Lord to a reliance on the sensual—on what they could only touch and feel. They had closed the upper door which love and wisdom freely flowed through. Maybe you have suffered too! For some of us Christmas can be a stressful time, a dark time, a time when our old challenges re-surface as we navigate family, money, and relationships. Holidays sometimes underline loss and“old wounds that bring us down on our emotional knees. If Christmas has more darkness than light for you, now more than ever we need to hear His announcement, that He is coming into the world! That He is at this moment drawing near and we are to reach out our hands to receive what He has to offer. He brings heaven down near to people and He draws people up, to a closer conjunction with Him. There must be a human reciprocal action. The Lord acts but we must react, in freedom, as of ourselves, to the Divine action. We read
“linking is impossible unless it is reciprocal, since a one-sided link not balanced by one on the other side falls apart of its own accord.” (CL 61)
Not only is this true for us but it was true for Mary! Every act of her life had conspired to make her fit to be the mother of the Lord. Her devout study of the Word showed her response to the salutation of Elisabeth, known as the Magnificat; this is made up entirely from phrases of the Old Testament, which must have been in her memory from repeated reading and meditation to be called forth spontaneously, in beautiful order and sequence under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. This Annunciation, this announcement to Mary that she would bring the Lord into the world, gives us the assurance that our constant work toward walking the streets in heaven is not in vain. We know that the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary during this dark time in the world, a time when the light of truth was nearly extinguished. Herod, the dominion of the love of self, like in our lives today, is present and dangerous. His goal is to kill any hint of opposition to his power, any small act of kindness between you and your family. The family carnage he is capable of is not unknown to many of us. But let us go now to Galilee with the angel Gabriel to find Mary. She is young, betrothed and full of hope. She is looking forward to her coming marriage to Joseph. We know she is loved by a “just man” and that she is an obedient woman (AC 4593). Mary represents an affection for truth and so the angel says,
“Rejoice highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!”
Although we are aware of Herod’s presence, we all carry ideals—good ideas about how we should live, how we should love one another. We may be needy ourselves, but we automatically comfort a friend in need, deeply care for the welfare of our children, and many times refrain from making that mean comment. The Lord protects our ideals in Galilee—the quiet part of our natural mind. He guards our innocent affections and heavenly loves despite the turmoil of our natural life. You may not always be in touch with your ideals as they are more or less hidden depending on our state of reception. But eventually, and especially at Christmas, they may long to come forward as Mary longed to marry a “just man,” a carpenter: Joseph of the house of David. Her wish represents the longing to have our gentle ideals wedded to a way that we can apply them to life. Through repentance and the shunning of evil’s that pass through our mind, we seek to bring these ideals into our life. Yet we fail more often than not, which prompts Mary to ask “How shall this be seeing I know not a man?” How can I have charity for the neighbor in my life when I don’t have enough wisdom or understanding to conceive of it? The answer is that the Lord provides for the birth of charity in each of our lives. When there is an innocent affection for truth in our ideals the Lord can now be born.
“The Holy spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you.”
Just as the Lord was born in a dark time in the world the Lord can be born among your suffering, in your sadness, right in the midst of the evils that plague our own natural minds. Take this opportunity with Christmas around the corner, to put your earthly life in order, to focus on repenting from evils you know you are committing, to prepare and wash the birthing area of your mind with the truths of the Word.
Mary discovered that she not only got to marry Joseph and have children of her own, but she was also permitted to be part of the most important event in history, the birth of the Lord.
“Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shall call His name Jesus. He shall be great and shall be called the Son of the Highest.”
She was not only to have her dreams and ideals that she wanted for a happy and useful life on earth, but when we allow the birth of the Lord into our own mind, He gives us His dream for us too. That He will live inside of us forever. Interestingly, Swedenborg met the Lord’s mother, Mary in the other world….
… I once saw Mary, the mother of the Lord, pass by; she appeared overhead dressed in white. She paused then for a moment to say that she had been the Lord's mother, and He had been born to her. But on becoming God He had put off everything human He had from her, and she now worships Him as her God, being unwilling for anyone to acknowledge Him as her son, since everything in Him is Divine. (The Last Judgement 66 continuation)
We too are to get on our knees and worship this Divine Man as Mary does. It takes time to realize a life of merely sensual living, focusing on ourselves, is dry and not worth living. When we discover the uplifting effects of repentance and love to the neighbor, we finally hear the voice of one crying in the wilderness, John the Baptist, "After me will come one more powerful than I, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie.” This discovery creates an environment, where the Lord combines the true thoughts we have with the good things we do—this is the birth of charity towards the neighbor.
When this birth is imminent, the angel Gabriel appears, and we move beyond the love of self!
Childbirth is a painful process as many of you know! During the height of delivery, mothers sometimes feel like giving up. Often this is a sign that the baby is about to be born. The Lord is born in us the same way! Do not give up… Repentance, the giving up of the self, is painful! Yet it brings satisfaction and contentment—the “feeling of Christmas.” Look for the simple ways the Lord reveals Himself in your relationships and connections and remember the Angels words to Mary:
“Rejoice highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!”
Amen