St. Andrew’s Pictou, NS December 18^th 2005

 

The Virgin Birth

 

Luke 1:26-38

 

When I thought about putting together a short message for this Sunday giving the Sunday School time to arrange their much awaited pageant, I didn’t think that I would get into talking about “the virgin birth” of Jesus.

 

My main pivotal understanding about this birth was that the word “virgin” back then simply meant that Mary was “a young girl.” In other words, Mary was not 30 or 40 years old, but she was a young girl more like 12 or 13 years of age. It would have been expected that a girl of this age, being engaged to be married would not have been sexually active with Joseph or with anyone. The issue back then was property driven: having intercourse with a man before marriage would cause great consternation for the families involved because it could derail property ownership which passed through the males. A woman, who was considered a piece of property herself, (who gives this women to be taken by this man?) could foreseeably get pregnant by one man, and immediately marry another that would allow the first’s man’s son to inherit the second man’s estate because the woman was married to the second man. (Talk about upsetting the apple cart!!)

 

Now I suppose the simple issue today is that with all that modern science tells us, we can’t accept that Mary was made pregnant by the Holy Spirit and that it had to be a genuine, bona fide, physically present male who made the pregnancy happen. It couldn’t be “a spirit,” it just had to be “a man:” Joseph or someone else.

 

To dismiss the issue so simply and fast does the text a grave injustice and hinders us from seeing the deeper theological issues for humanity and individually for each and every one of us.

 

The conception of Jesus Christ happened in a context of profound historical and religious significance. The Jewish people had been waiting for a Messiah for thousands of years and they were then occupied by the Romans. This birth happened in the context of a people who were enslaved and in dire hope of being rescued by God. Jesus represented the hope and desire of humanity for a Saviour.

 

So you can’t just take these two verses 34 and 35 of Luke 1 and just toss them away. Hundreds of thousands of words have been written on these two verses and it would take someone greater than me to summarize two thousand years of study on what these two verses mean to us today. We only have time to scratch the surface.

 

First of all, you should know that the text follows a two stage formula found in the Old Testament for announcing a special birth. This “two stage declaration made to Mary, Jesus and his future role are set forth. In the first stage (vs 32-33) his extraordinary character is set forth in terms of his Davidic and messianic role with clear illusions to the dynastic oracle of the birth of Nathan found in 2 Samuel 7.” (Joseph A. Fitzmyer p.338)

 

You may be used to the title, “Son of God” but the Angel Gabriel was the first to use it, although the Dead Sea scrolls refer to “my son” in 2 Samuel as being of the line of David and to sit on the throne of David and save Israel. The angel’s text brings two ideas together: that Jesus was to be both of David’s royal line and “son of God” as well.

 

The Dead Sea scroll talking about the Manual of Discipline (Fitzmyer p. 339) of the Qumran Community speaks “of God’s begetting the Messiah,” although there are various interpretations and possibly metaphorical understandings not directly related to verse 35.

 

It could also be understood that Mary became pregnant through God’s intervention, so that Jesus is not only of the Royal line of David, but also “the Son of God.”

 

We also have the concept of the birth announcement made by a divine being, so we have four elements: Son of God, power, Spirit of holiness, and Davidic descent.

 

While all of the text in the Gospel of Luke was written sometime after the event, we can see how the people were struggling with the identity of just who Jesus was in writing this text.

 

Do you and I not go back and later re-interpret things? I recently read an article in MacLean’s Magazine about a man who has purchased 40 seats on the New York Stock exchange. This first one cost 3.2 million US! When I was in Toronto, I knew this man, sat in his office, talked to him, was invited back for coffee, and he even preached for me at my church for an anniversary service. He now looks miraculously different when I see this story in MacLean’s. Had I know all of this, would I have asked him to come to my church and speak for $125.00?

 

Another issue of context for Jesus’ birth announcement was that it had just followed another birth miracle: the pregnancy of Elizabeth in her old age with John the Baptist.

 

So how did we get this story of Jesus’ conception? We can only speculate because we weren’t there. (We have a video of JFK’s death and we still don’t know who killed him!)

 

Was the story based on:

-family secrets passed on,

-a deduction made because he was known as the Son of God, and they worked backward?

-borrowing from pagan stories about virgin births?

-there was a tradition of virgin births as Isaac was born of Sarah without the assistance of Abraham?

 

If we use Biblical texts and study, in the end we find no conclusive proof one way or the other as to whether it was a virgin birth or not, and we are still as Christians simply left to our faith and belief as to what really happened. (Fitzmyer p. 342)

 

The problem would be if we get bogged down in this question and lose the meaning and purpose of the whole text which is that the announcement of his birth is to identify Jesus as a Messiah of the line of King David and that he is also the Son of God.

 

The problem would be if we argue about the virgin birth and miss the point that God sent us Jesus because he loved us! We lit the candle of love today, and we don’t want to miss the love issue.

 

The point is that Jesus was who we were waiting for: he is of the Royal line of David and he is the Son of God.

 

With regards to the virgin birth, I guess the question is, “Do you believe in miracles?”

 

Now to me it is almost a stupid question because I meet people who don’t even believe that they can change their minds, much less believe in miracles!

 

I meet people who don’t even believe what is provable even if you give them the evidence!

 

I meet people who don’t believe that their spouse or child can change, improve, or get better!

 

If we really believe in God, we can believe in miracles.

 

I believe in miracles because I have seen them.

 

I was invited to an AA meeting on Friday to witness a man receiving his medallion for 20 years of sobriety. You have heard about Jesus raising Lazarus who had been dead in the tomb for four days? I was in a room with 80 or 90 Lazaruses; miracles every one of them!

 

Shortly, you will see children portraying the Christmas story, and it will be told by sons and daughters of the living God, and it will be a miracle.

 

Love is always a miracle.

 

We need to believe in miracles to stretch our small minds so that they can be big enough for God’s reality and the possibilities that life can bring.

 

We need to be like Mary and in faith, to accept and embrace and be honoured by God’s miraculous nature, to be honoured by God’s favour, calling us to share in the love experience of the glory of God, since we were created for glory.

 

Why would we ever refuse such a miraculous offer?

 

AMEN                         Rev. Alan Stewart