Pastor Tom Johnson, December 19, 2021
The angel Gabriel just told Mary that she will give birth to Messiah—the long-awaited Savior who will sit on the Davidic throne forever. She asks, “How can this be, since I am a virgin?” Gabriel tells her she will conceive by the Holy Spirit. Gabriel tells her that her cousin Elizabeth is six months into her pregnancy even though Elizabeth was well into her old age. Earlier in Luke’s account, Elizabeth spends five of those six months hiding her pregnancy. Elizabeth finally has the courage to show that she is pregnant to her community. Elizabeth says that God has taken away her reproach—that is, she no longer has to endure the disgrace, disapproval, and scorn of her community because she was unable to get pregnant all those years. The years of her feeling like she may have done something wrong, or that something was wrong with her, are over. Perhaps that is why her younger cousin Mary leaves her hometown when she becomes pregnant. She is not yet married to Joseph. She will suffer even more disgrace.
The angel Gabriel says, “Nothing will be impossible with God.” Both Elizabeth and Mary’s pregnancies are miracles. Both had to deal with living in a judgmental community. Mary goes with haste to seek refuge with her cousin. They have a special relationship. They now have a special bond. Mary hurries to Elizabeth because they have a shared story and, perhaps more importantly, Elizabeth is a safe place of refuge for this young, unmarried woman. Just as God told Mary that Elizabeth is pregnant, Elizabeth also miraculously knows that Mary is pregnant. When Mary enters Elizabeth’s house and greets her, the unborn child John the Baptist leaps for joy in Elizabeth’s womb. Elizabeth “exclaims with a loud cry, ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.’” She calls Mary “the mother of her Lord.” She believes the fruit of Mary’s womb is the Lord himself. Elizabeth experiences the fruit of her own womb when the unborn John the Baptist hears Mary’s voice. John the Baptist is already full of the Holy Spirit in the womb, Scripture says.
Both Elizabeth and Mary carry unborn children in their wombs. Elizabeth is carrying a prophet. Mary is carrying the King. Elizabeth and her child are full with the Holy Spirit. Mary is filled with both the Holy Spirit and the Word made flesh. These two remarkable women were the first to listen to the prophet John and the first to praise Immanuel, God with us. It could be said that Elizabeth was the first to listen to the prophet John and the first to preach a Christian message. Mary and Elizabeth praise and worship God together. This is the first Christian gathering. Mary sings the first Christian hymn.
Mary and Elizabeth are the Church. The fruit of their wombs is also the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal 5:22,23). They love the Lord. They love their yet-to-be-born prophet and Messiah. They are filled with joy. They celebrate each other’s blessings. They direct their praise to God most high. They find peaceful refuge together. Elizabeth patiently waited for decades. The pregnant women are kind to one another. Elizabeth opens her home in hospitality and generosity. They have faith and trust in God to do the impossible. With gentleness and self-control they quietly support one another for the next three months. You could say that Elizabeth, John, and Mary’s advent season together was not four weeks but three months. All three eagerly awaited the birth of Messiah. All three believed God’s promises. All three were already filled with joy. Elizabeth shouts with a loud cry. John does a back-flip, and Mary sings a hymn.
Together they bear the fruit of the Spirit because of the fruit of Mary’s womb. And so it should be for us. For we are the Bride of Christ. We too are pregnant with God’s promises. We too are great with the Christ Child. There is now a stirring in our womb. The Fruit of Mary’s womb brings nourishment and life to God’s people and to all creation. The same Holy Spirit is born into our hearts through faith, the Word, the water, and the fire of Holy Baptism. God calls our gathering together this morning to be like the reunion of those cousins generations ago—Christ-centered, a safe refuge from the disgrace and reproach of this world, full of shouts of praise, leaps of joy, and the singing of hymns, psalms, and spiritual songs. Like Elizabeth and Mary’s three month sabbatical together, so our gathering together should always be a place of acceptance, affirmation, encouragement, support, and unconditional love.
In John’s vision in the book of Revelation, he sees the Tree of Life in renewed heaven and earth. A river flows through the roots of the tree with its twelve kinds of fruit—and the leaves are for the healing of the nations (Rev 22: 1,2). As in Christ’s first coming we awaited the Fruit of the Womb to be born among us and we now enjoy that fruit in this life; so we await the Fruit of the Tree of Life—Christ who died and rose again who gives himself for heavenly food. And here is the really good news: we enjoy this fruit now. In a few moments we come with haste to this Table to eat from the Tree of Life and drink from the River of Life. We gather together—not as supportive cousins—but as sisters and brothers—as a safe, secure, and nurturing family of God. We go out from here to bear our own fruit—the fruit of the Holy Spirit sent out by the Fruit of Mary’s womb for the healing of the nations.
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