Gaudate Sunday. Third Sunday in Advent. Gaudate, it’s Latin. Gotta use all those Latin classes for something. I did a little research a few years ago. Here’s what I wrote then. “Pronounced “Gow-dah-tay.” Gaudete. It means “rejoice.” It is an imperative. “Rejoice!” It comes from a 16th Century Christmas carol, published in a Finnish/Swedish collection of sacred songs in 1582. “Gaudete, Gaudete! Christus est natus ex Maria virgine, Gaudete.” (And, mind you, my spell check is throwing a wobbly right now) Which translates as “Rejoice, rejoice! Christ is born of the Virgin Mary - rejoice!” There are verses, but my Latin typing skills are rusty, to say the least, so we’ll leave it at that. Besides it is only in the chorus that the word “Gaudete” appears anyway. The other fascinating thing about this old carol (and aren’t you just fascinated? I know I am) is that this song was released in the 70's by the British folk group Steeleye Span (No, not Steely Dan, that’s someone else - Boomers! Sheesh!) And to this day it remains only one of three Latin songs that made the top ten on the British pop charts. The other two being two versions of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Pie Jesu from his Requiem back in the late 80's.”
I love Wikipedia! Well, this Sunday is Gaudete Sunday. The Third Sunday of Advent is always set apart. It is the one that has the pink or rose colored candle. In some traditions, it is called Mary’s Sunday, and is filled with the story from Mary’s point of view, or is designed to help us honor and celebrate Mary. But in others, it is simply Gaudete Sunday – a reminder, a call, a command to rejoice.
Yeah, it’s that imperative that gets me. Maybe it should be gaudeo, the infinitive - to rejoice. Maybe it should be presented as an invitation, rather than as a command. Rejoicing isn’t really something one does on command. Besides we always get into trouble when we are perceived as telling other people how to feel. Don’t we? Well, you don’t like it when you’re having a bad day and someone comes up and says, “Smile! It can’t be that bad.” Never mind that it is that bad. You want to poke those perpetually perky people in the snoot! Keep your attitudes to yourself, right. You want to have a good day? Well, fine, go over there and have one. Let me sulk over here, in my corner. Bah, humbug.
We’re about feeling this week. I cheated a little bit on the theme song. “Do you hear what I hear” has a line about seeing and about hearing and about knowing (which is next week). But it doesn’t really have a line about feeling. So, I cheated a little bit. This Gaudate Sunday were asking “Do you feel what I feel?”
Luke 1:46-55 NRS And Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, 47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, 48 for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; 49 for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. 50 His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. 51 He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. 52 He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; 53 he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. 54 He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, 55 according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever."
Mary’s Sunday. Gaudate, my soul rejoices, she says. She isn’t telling you to rejoice, she is saying I’m rejoicing. It’s not an imperative, it’s indicative. A statement of fact. You can imagine the tone of voice when she says it. Luke says Mary got her news, via Angel Express, and then headed out to her cousin Elizabeth. It doesn’t say exactly when she went. This isn’t Mark with his penchant for “immediately!” This is Luke, who loves stories, and children, and mothers and fathers. He says, “in those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country.” OK, there’s haste. Once her feet hit the road, she hurried. She ran to Elizabeth’s house. Because the angel molting in her living room told her that Elizabeth, the barren one, was going to have a baby too and God was involved. So, each step got faster and faster as she realized that if anyone is going to understand what was going on in Mary’s life it was Elizabeth.
In those days she set out. The news had to sink in. Her head had to stop spinning, her lungs had to exhale the angelic ozone that permeated her house. Maybe she had to feel something. Something quickening inside her. That’s a great term for coming to life, don’t you think. Quickening. We don’t use it so much any more. But they used to. And what better way to describe this unique conception? She had to feel a quickening inside of her before she could put her feet to the path and find her way to Elizabeth and her own already six month along quickening miracle.
She had to feel something. You don’t get news like this and keep it as an intellectual exercise. Sure there is pondering to do. Scenarios to run. Responses to consider. But part of the considering is how do we feel about all of this? Maybe that’s what she went to Elizabeth to ask. How am I supposed to feel? You wouldn’t think that was a choice. It is just an is. I’m not in control of my feelings. I just feel. Things happen and I feel. Good, bad, happy, sad, they just happen. Right? Of course right. We get an email and our blood boils. We receive a gift and tears come to our eyes. It just happens. We don’t decide ahead of time how we’re going to feel.
Or do we? How did this song that Mary sang to Elizabeth and all of us really sound? Did it come bubbling out of her, like a mountain stream rushing down from the heights? Did it burst forth in a sudden explosion of passion and power and presence? Maybe. It sure could have. It might have built with every quickening step from her house to Elizabeth’s. And when Elizabeth greeted her, or rather when Elizabeth and her baby greeted Mary, because Luke says there was a leap, an internal leap when Mary said hello. Elizabeth was staggered by the enthusiasm of the child quickening inside of her, and spoke to Mary with a breathless wonder and surprise. Maybe that unleashed Mary’s own sense of amazement and excitement and her song rings from the rafters of the parsonage there in the hill country. My soul magnifies the Lord! It starts with the high notes. It starts with the proclamation. My spirit rejoices in God my savior. Bam!
Somehow, though, it feels different to me. It feels ... slower ... gentler ... more reflective. Almost as if Mary is surprising herself with all that is coming to life within her. The baby surely, but something else too. Something that will stay within her even when the child emerges. Something that will sustain her when that child grows and claims a ministry that takes him away from her. Something that will define her even when this miracle, this quickening inside suffers and dies in a particularly horrible way. And that something is hope.
Hope. Real hope. Not the shallow and fleeting hope when espouse all to often: “I hope it doesn’t rain!” “I hope they get here soon.” “I hope I get my wish for Christmas.” There are hopes and there is Hope. These hopes aren’t bad, but they aren’t sustaining, they aren’t transforming. Hope, on the other hand, makes us see differently, and hear differently. Mary sings a song that is not real, but is True. She is blessed to be a part, she says, of God’s turning the world right side up. The grand reversal has already happened. Look at the tenses - He has scattered the proud, He has brought down the powerful and He has lifted up the lowly. Has He? The powerful still seem enthroned. The proud seem to be in the center still. And the lowly? Well, they’re scattered, pushed down, pushed out, refugees and the feared and hated. The world still seems unfinished, still seems upside down.
Yet. Mary chooses to rejoice. Not as a Polly-anna, rose-colored glasses kind of approach, that ignores the harsh realities. But chooses instead to believe that we don’t have to accept the upside down world as it is. We don’t have to listen to the rich and powerful who tell us how to think, who to fear, who to exclude. We don’t have to imagine a prideful world of celebrity and privilege. Of entitlement, of rights that bring destruction to relationships and communities. We can choose to see differently. We can choose to lift up the lowly because they are being lifted up already. The lowly love of neighbor and welcome of the stranger. The lowly service to the outcast and the value of listening instead of making pronouncements. We choose how we feel. We can live in anger as our society seems determined to do. Or we can rejoice in our spirits because we get to be a part of something bigger than ourselves, something healing, something loving, something that will last into eternity. We can be a part of the quickening of the kingdom.
Maybe it doesn’t really work as an imperative. Maybe we can get the world to sing with us, to rejoice with us in spirit and in truth, when we start with testimony. My soul magnifies the Lord, My spirit rejoices with God My savior. Tell how you feel, and others might come feel with you. Of course, we’ve got to feel something first. Gaudate. Rejoice. Let it come to life within you this Christmas season.
Shalom,
Derek
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