Together the Handmaid

(a homily)

Today we celebrate the Annunciation of the Lord. The story is told that the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary to tell her that she would bear the Son of God. The conception was to be the work of the Holy Spirit. Though the news puzzled her, she accepted the word of the angel and declared, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.”

Not being the kind of human that would be able to bear a child, I admit that I tend to struggle with how to place myself in this story. Who am I? Certainly I'm not Mary; really, none of us are. Neither am I Gabriel, though this particular morning I am supposed to bring a message. But perhaps part of the problem for me to conceive of my place in this story is that I'm trying to find my place, my individual self. If we're going to read ourselves into this story, we need to do it together.

It is true that the story depicts one particular event in history. However, the Word of God still speaks today, still "stories" those who read and hear it. The Annunciation is announced among us today, even here in East Tennessee. Today, an angel tells us, the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the will of the Son of God will dwell in you. We must respond, "Behold, we are the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to us according to your word."

Christ is among us in our gathering. We receive the bread and wine, his body and blood, and the grace of God is conceived within us and among us as we are made anew the Body of Christ. We even are made messengers, heralds of the impossible made actual. And thus, by God's empowerment, we too can say, "Here I am, Lord; I come to do your will." We may not be Mary, or Gabriel, or even Joseph or King Ahaz, but by the Word of God, we fellowship with them, we are incorporated into their stories together. Hopefully we will respond well to the signs given to us, a response made possible by the one sacrifice of the Son of God, a response that reverberates throughout all our lives, individually and communally.

(Feast of the Annunciation of the Lord: Isaiah 7:10-14; 8:10; Psalm 40; Hebrews 10:4-10; Luke 1:26-38)