Advent IV - The Wishing

For the first decade or so of my life, Santa's list was quite important to me.  For the weeks before Christmas, I would scribble furiously, etch out, erase, copy from other lists - there was no wish too big, but quite a few too small.  Frankly, I think my list was lost somewhere in the U.S. postal system, or else the North Pole system, because Santa always mixed my list up with someone else; someone entirely bereft of underwear and socks. 

Oh well, part of Christmas is wishing for something different in life and it's not just about the materialistic cravings which we constantly feed, or at least the older I get it seems that way; it's the feeling the life can be different.  As I think about the things that I wish for this year, I ponder that first Christmas and imagine Elizabeth, Zechariah, Joseph and Mary having a discussion about the things that they wished for.  Here is a brief, made up dialogue which I have concocted in my own head regarding the first fifty-five verses of Luke.

(At Liz and Zech's house, the doorbell rings - I know, it is anachronistic to put a doorbell in, but it feels good to have it.)

Liz:  (wiping her hands on the dish towel)  Who is it?
Mary:  It's your cousin, Mary.  (they shriek with delight - Liz opens the door and embraces Mary.) 
Liz:  Oh, it's so good to see you (she raises Mary's arms out to the side) You're looking fit.  Been to the gym lately?
Mary:  (blushes) There's just no time.  With Joe at the shop all day, the washing to be done, the cabinets to be dusted - oh, that dust here in the Middle East!  (Joe is loitering behind her)  Come over here, Joseph, meet my cousin Liz.  (they smile awkwardly)
Liz (grabbing Mary by the arm and pulling her into the kitchen but speaks over her shoulder)  Joe, make yourself at home - I think my husband Zech is just back from Temple.  I hear the trumpeters were a little off today; some problems with this contemporary music.  Can you believe it?  They want to get rid of the drums, and have more chanting?  How ridiculous.  I'm going to go to the traditional service, the early one, where all the old people are.  (sits Mary down at the table and goes to make some tea)  Listen to me ramble, Mary.  Tell me how things are going?  You've got a new... (wiggles her eyebrows and smiles).
Mary:  Yes, our fathers picked us out for each other.  We're engaged, but... (she paused) that's not the end of it.
Liz:  (lowering her voice) Do tell.
Mary:  I... uh... I don't know how to tell this without sounding crazy, but...
Liz:  Joe doesn't have six fingers on each hand, does he?  (Mary laughs nervously)
Mary:  A few nights ago, while Joe was in the shop finishing some rocking chairs for the Roman counsel, an angel came to me...
Liz:  That's amazing!  What did it look like?
Mary:  It looked a lot like Fabious, the Roman gladiator, but much scarier.
Liz:  What did the angel say?
Mary:  (swallows)  He said "Greetings, you who are highly favored!  The Lord is with you!"
Liz:  Wow!
Mary:  I've always known that God is around the edges of my life; certain circumstances where life seemed different - thin, almost translucent - is the best way to describe it.  I've never experienced anything like this and then to be greeted with 'Highly favored one!" that's crazy, right?
Liz:  (Liz nods) Yes.  Crazy.
Mary:  There's nothing favorable about me.  I'm just a teenager, I haven't really done anything; my family is not necessarily poor, but we aren't wealthy.  I don't have many talents other than I'm a pretty good singer.
Liz:  Tell me about it.
Mary:  But then he says this, "Don't be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God.  You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus.  He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High, the Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever; his kingdom will have no end."
Liz:  (quiet for a moment, but then a smile spreads over her face.)  You're right, Mary, it sounds crazy.  But there is something welling up inside me, some strange emotion that I cannot put a finger on, something that is telling me to let go and sing!  You know, almost like one of those musicals they've been putting on down at the theatre. I think the newest one is called Les Happy Ones.  God does miracles even today!  For all these years, I've wished to have a child.  Now I've got one! A wish is a dangerous thing, don't you think?
Mary:  But I never wished for this!  It's like I'm setting myself up for a death sentence.  When people find out, they'll stone me, or at the very least, shame me until I have no part of the community.  What will Joseph say?  What will my parents say?
Liz:  You haven't told Joe yet?
Mary:  I couldn't.  I don't know how to bring it up.   He's caring and considerate, he treats me with gentleness, but we hardly know each other.  How do you tell someone you're engaged to:  Honey, can we sit down and have a little chat?  I know that we're new to this relationship and all, but something's come up in my life that will change things a little bit.
Liz:  Yes, and then throw in an angel, an overshadowing by the Spirit and a pregnancy... Oooh (she grabs her belly) my child just leapt within me! It must be a sign!  (starts singing a la operatic style)  "Blessed are you among women and blessed is the child you will bear!  But why am I so favored the mother of my Lord should come to me?"
Mary:  What are you doing?
Liz:  Singing!  I can't help it!
Mary:  Let me try.  My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant.
Liz:  That was magnificent!
Mary:  Thank you, but my one wish this Hanukah is to have Joe believe me.
Liz:  When you open yourself to God's will, God always makes a way.  (She smiles)  How wonderful to see you...

People don't talk this way anymore, I know.  This partially made up dialogue interspersed with twenty-first century fears and doubts is, by and large, an example of how dreams are often expressed.  Wishes are couched in terms of anxiety about what we may miss out if our wishes are actually granted.  For instance, if I wish for a car for Christmas, will I miss out on a sleeping bag?  When we wish for the savior to be born, we automatically think about the things that might have to be sacrificed:  if I encounter Jesus as Savior, I will have to give up a lifestyle, perhaps decadent, perhaps prudish and not centered on love; perhaps I will have to give up those things that distract from the greater good of the people around me. 

But the reality of the Christ wish is not that it we who are sacrificing, but it is God who is sacrificing.  In our wishing, we actually are imagining that we receive something that is missing.  When we wish for Christ's peace this Christmas, it does not mean that we lose out on everything else, it only means that we are transformed, like Mary, from an instrument of waiting to an instrument of God's song in Christ. 

Both Elizabeth and Mary could not help singing, something which doesn't happen as much nowadays.  We listen to the 'stars' of music; we plug our earphones in and are captured by digitally enhanced sound waves, but there is a certain beauty to the un-amplified human voice that makes the darkest soul tremble, even if it is not professional quality.  I have no idea what either Elizabeth's or Mary's voices were like, whether they were like Taylor Swift's or Taylor Slow's.  In this case it doesn't matter, because it is in the lyric of the Magnificat that we find all the joy that the world will need.  No matter how long we have been waiting, or for what we've been waiting, here has come our Immanuel.  God with us. 

This Christmas, as you write out your Christmas list, whether to Santa or some other professional gift buyer in your family, think about what you wish that God would do in your life this year.  How will God unwrap your heart?  How will the Christ child enter in?

What will you wish for?