I've got a little game for us to play today, "Name that tune":
Come mothers and fathers/Throughout the land/And don't criticize/What you can't understand/Your sons and your daughters/Are beyond your command/Your old road is/Rapidly agin'./Please get out of the new one/If you can't lend your hand/For the times they are a-changin'
- “The Times They are A Changin'” – Bob Dylan
Imagine there's no heaven/It's easy if you try/ No hell below us/ Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today/ Imagine there's no countries/ It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for/ And no religion too/ Imagine all the people living life in peace, you
- “Imagine” by John Lennon
Oh, deep in my heart, I do believe, we shall overcome, some day. We'll walk hand in hand...We shall live in peace...We shall all be free...We are not afraid
~ Pete Seager, “We Shall Overcome”
But no one knows me no one ever will/ If I don’t say something, if I just lie still Would I be that monster, scare them all away/ If I let them hear what I have to say I can’t keep quiet, no oh oh oh oh oh oh ~ - MILCK, “Quiet”
What these songs all have in common is that they critique the current social order – whether it be war, racism, sexism – and they imagine a better day. Musicians have often played the role of prophet, and prophets have often inspired musical prose. We might consider these themes of today's readings.
The context of the passage from the prophet Micah was one of helplessness in Jerusalem. The chapter actually opens with these dire words, “Now cut yourself, daughters of cutters, a siege is upon us; with a rod they strike the ruler of Israel upon the cheek.” Tradition suggests that this verse describes the moment when the Babylonians begin their siege on Jerusalem. The daughters of Zion are in danger of being taken by the marauding army. The leader of Jerusalem has been humiliated, defeated, perhaps even killed.
As the sieging army waits, the hopes of those inside the walls begin to fracture. First the small fissures in the hope as they see the camps set up outside the walls. A sieging army needs only cut off the city's supply lines and watch as the people inside slowly starve to death. Then the cracks grow into a spiderweb as the storehouses grow empty. Hope is broken when finally, the besieged can conceive of only two options: death or surrender. Often ancient armies would dispatch soldiers to the circle the sieged city and taunt its inhabitants of their impending doom.
But then, inside these walls, with the vast Babylonian army camped outside for as far as the eye can see, hope begins to break in.
But you, O Bethlehem, from you shall come a leader...the prophet describes a coming king, whose origin is of old, who will bring the people home to a place of plenty where they will be secure. “And he shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God. And they shall live secure, for now he shall be great to the ends of the earth; and he shall be the one of peace.”
Hope is the partner of possibility. A siege is designed to close down possibility. But the word of prophecy is like a foot in the door, letting light into the dark room, refusing to close the door of possibility. Into hopelessness our God speaks.
Many years later, we see this prophecy come to be fulfilled. Fittingly, it is borne out of another socio-political crisis. We get anxious talking about religion and politics, but in the first century CE, they were inseparable. Emperor Augustus was considered a divine being and political leader – the phrase, 'Caesar is Lord', was both a statement of faith and professed allegiance to the Emperor and his Empire. The gospel writer, Luke, presents Jesus in contrast to Augustus. He would be a nonviolent king who resists Roman imperialism, a king described in the Magnificat, Mary's song of praise.
According to our best knowledge, Jesus Christ was born around 4 BCE. This year was an unforgettable and challenging year for the Jews. When Herod the Great died in 4 BCE, Jews rebelled all over the land. The Syrian legions under the direction of Rome crushed the Jewish rebellions and burned the city of Sepphoris in Galilee and reduced its inhabitants to slavery. Jesus grew up in Nazareth just 4 miles from Sepphoris. Those who could not hide from the Syrian legions “were killed, raped, and enslaved. Those who survived have lost everything.” Mary and Joseph, Zechariah and Elizabeth must witness this horrific act.
Under the shadow of human barbarism, under the thumb of the most ruthless and powerful Empire ever known, hope begins to crack. It starts with an angelic invitation, it widens as the pregnant cousins meet together, setting off sparks of the Spirit. And then finally the door to hope is flung wide open as Mary declares,
“My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant...He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.”
The Magnificat flips the world order upside-down and dares to imagine God's promises fulfilled. It “is about the unthinkable turn in human destinies when all seemed impossible: “For with God nothing will be impossible” (v. 37). The answering song of Zechariah (1:68–79) is a song of new possibilities...of deliverance/ forgiveness/ mercy/ light/ peace. The old order had left nothing but enslavement/guilt/judgment/darkness and hostility, and no one could see how that could ever change. It will not be explained but only sung about, for the song penetrates (the Imperial Order).
...The transformation is unmistakable. Tongues long dumb in hopelessness could sing again. The newness wrought by Jesus will not be explained, for to explain is to force it into old categories. And in any case the energizing hope comes precisely to those ill-schooled in explanation and understandings. It comes to those who will settle for amazements they can neither explain nor understand.” ― Walter Brueggemann, Prophetic Imagination
We live in a world that values knowledge and understanding above all else. And while I am grateful for the technological and scholarly advances we've made, I think it can be dangerous to assume that we can explain everything (or will one day be able to explain things now unknown to us). Mary shows us that humility enables prophetic imagination. A teenage girl, living in poverty, having witnessed horrific violence at the hands on their oppressors, is blessed. She is to be the incubator of God. Her child would change everything.
It didn't make rational sense, this was not the way that empires were defeated. This was not the way royalty came into the world. But Mary can imagine, Mary can prophesy, Mary can sing: With God, all things are possible.
I don't need to remind you of the times we live in – as a society, any many of us have endured years of hard times. Can we imagine a better day? Can we prophesy? Can we sing the songs borne out of prophetic imagination? What if this season we really sang our Christmas hymns as prophetic declarations? It's easy to sing them without really letting the words speak to us in fresh ways or miss out on how cutting the gospel contained within is to the dominant ideologies and idolatry of our culture.
O Come all Ye Faithful, joyful and triumphant – triumphant over what, whom? Over the powers of this world. Over greed and violence and exploitation and oppression. Come citizens of heaven, of the Kingdom of God, and sing your praises!
The Christ child will lead us, the good Shepherd feed us, and with us abide till on his day. Then hatred he'll banish, then sorrow will vanish, and death and despair flee away. And he shall reign ever, and nothing shall sever from us the great love of our King!
He rules the world with truth and grace, and makes the nations prove the glories of his righteousness and wonders of his love!
Sing a New Song Unto the Lord. Sing our Christmas hymns as prophetic declarations. Feast at the Lord's Table as a foretaste of the Great Feast where all the thirsty may drink, and all the hungry eat until satisfied. Thanks be to God!
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