Dec. 21, Lk. 1, 2 Sam.7
Brad Wigger has been working on children’s images of God. Some children correlate Santa and God. (Since I portrayed Santa we may be in trouble, given pastoral egos.) Like God, Santa bestows gifts. As far as I can tell, we do not imagine that Santa’s naughty or nice list contains social justice issues.
Gabriel’s name may be God is a mighty warrior, but the message, that’s the meaning of angel, recall, is one of life not death.annunciation-it is possible that Mary is not of childbearing age yet. so, god ‘s great move depends on a young young woman, so the story of the baptist and Jesus would be framed by unlikely births--her engagement is arranged by the respective families-so again-her range of choice is limited here.Mary is baffled/perplexed/confused/disturb/agitated by the angel’s visit, and the formal greeting, something like all hail, one most favored, O Gifted One When Mary asks how can this be, his answer is indirect. Somehow the Holy Spirit is involved in this new life.The Spirit will be on Mary as the Spirit will be upon the disciples as Jesus says before the Ascension. It is part of a symbolic connection of a cloud, an overshadowing that denotes the presence of God, as in the Transfiguration.
Young or not, Mary knows her Scripture. the prayer of Hannah is an obvious source for her prayer. Her prayer reflects her coming to grips with the miraculous announcement of Gabriel.What a prayer-her whole being magnifies extols the Lord. mega-make great-pray with a megaphone and this is a song, a canticle, poetry in music? Sondheim on urging lyrics and music to be kept together. Mary may hear soft words from Gabriel, but she turns them back into tough words of change. Mary sees the birth of Jesus as heralding a battle of systems.Mary represents the hopes of all of Israel.In Is. 8:17 God was hiding the presence form the house of Jacob,now god’s very self will dwell with that selfsame people. They would walk in the light of the Lord (ch.2) God has carried them, borne them like a mother (ch. 46)
We get two great images of the strength of God.God uses his mighty arm to wrest the mighty from their thrones. At the same time that same strong arm holds on to the people like a parent with a toddler. That same strong arm is not being used in a strong arm tactic of violence.
messianic promise in 2 Sam 7 Just a note on the hope here. We do not know how much hope was placed in a new David, a Messiah at this time. Or passage goes back 1000 years before the birth of Christ. If Luke is using it, others must have continued to hold the promise dear for many years.the angels says he will rule over the house of Jacob,but it will be a different sort of rule. Indeed some more mystical jewish sects had a deep messianic expectation of their leader just recently in New York. Followers of Moon see him as a new Christ figure. Jesus will replay the words of the angel (ch. 18?) Jesus will replay her words about the will of God in the garden agony.From the reading on David, we get a good sense of how expectations can change over time. the word messiah and therefore Christ means anointed one. In our tradition we notice that priests, prophets, and kings were anointed. .This is a good Advent text as it links, past, present, future.7) I like how God, with a moreover, reverses David’s request and decides to be the giver, not receiver of gifts. Again, the issue of giving or receiving gifts is a good piece for spiritual growth.How do those appearin 2014?
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