Isaiah 35.1-2; Luke 1.39-56
It all began with simple “Yes!” …
The angel of the LORD came to Mary, with a suggestion, and Mary said, “Yes!”
And so it came to pass - that Mary, a young lady, perhaps no more than 14 or so, became the mother of Jesus …
She said “Yes!” …
A friend of mine recently wrote - “Say yes until you have to say No!”
I celebrate with you today all those who have said Yes to life … who said, “Yes” to you … to me …
In my senior year in Grand Rapids Christian High School, as graduation neared, my Bible teacher, the Rev. Morris Faber, invited the seniors to come to the front of his classroom and share some plans.
One after the other, this and that, and college and career, and all the dreams that a high school senior enjoys … and, then, it was my turn.
I told the class, I was going to Calvin College, and enrolling in the pre-seminary course … and with that, the class broke out into laughter … I mean, serious, raucous, uncontrolled, laughter, and I was laughing right along with them … I’m sure some thought it was a joke, but it was no joke. I had decided that I would be a minister.
Now, just some backstory - I was not what would have been recognized as “clergy” material … I’ll not bore you with the details, but it can be said, that if there were a picture of what a high school senior headed into the ministry should look like, it wasn’t me.
So the class laughed, and so did I.
When the laughter died down, the Rev. Faber turned to me … all 5 feet, 5 inches of him - and said, “Tom, I believe you will do it.”
I’ve never forgotten that moment, as you can tell … that was in the spring of 1962 - that word of encouragement, the power of Yes, has stayed with me all these years.
Twenty years later, I was in Grand Rapids for some study, eating at a Russ’s Restaurant, a local chain famous for its hamburgers … and there, a few booths away, was the Rev. Faber and his wife.
He was recognizable - small in stature with a gnome-like face … there he was, having lunch.
I left my table and walked over to them, introduced myself … the Rev. Faber looked at me with that thousand-yard stare common to dementia.
His wife explained to me, and I told her my story … then I thanked the Rev. Faber for his confidence in me. His wife thanked me for coming over, and I thanked the LORD that I had the chance to see him again, to thank him personally for his goodness … did he understand what I said?
Probably not … as I left, he picked up his hamburger and continued eating … his wife, with tears in her eyes.
A simple yes …
Mary said it to the angel … the Rev. Faber said it to me …
Say Yes until you have to say No.
I’ve been thinking about this for the last several weeks.
Yes is a dangerous word … it gets us into things we didn’t plan on, and sometimes into things where we don’t belong.
I’ve learned over the years to be a bit more cautious with my “Yes” … but on the other hand, caution needs to be thrown to the wind, and maybe more often than not.
One of the components of Yes is a simple trust in life … that life will provide the ways and means of getting something done … that God is involved in all of this … and, yes, we can do it …
It may be difficult … ask Mary how easy it was to bear the child of our salvation … recalling what the Angel said to her, what the shepherds and wise men said … wondering what her son would become, and when he began his ministry, Mary’s concern: his wandering, his preaching, threats against him … until finally, his arrest, a quick trial, and a public execution …
Yes opens the door to all kinds of things … and some of them will be downright difficult.
I think of Bonhoeffer and Barth in Nazi Germany … they said Yes to Christ, and No to Hitler … it cost Barth his job … he was deported to Switzerland, where he spent the remainder of the war years … it cost Bonhoeffer his life … he was hanged in the Flossenbürg Concentration Camp, as the war neared its end.
The power of Yes …
Yes is the heart and soul of joy …
It is Mary’s Sunday, we light her candle, and it’s pink … my thanks to Marjean Thomas and to Arlene Bennett for the light of the day …
Mary’s Candle, Hail Mary, full of grace, the LORD is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners, now, and at the hour of our death.
Joy is saying Yes to God!
But let me quickly make something clear … joy and happiness are not the same thing … they can run together, and often do, but there’s a difference … a difference between joy and happiness.
Happiness is circumstantial … I’m happy if the Dodgers win … I’m happy when my children are happy … I’m happy in the company of good friends … I’m happy on a vacation in Napa Valley.
Things can go terribly wrong, and they can, and they will … happiness will disappear like a splash of water on hot summer sidewalk … happiness is a variable … joy is a constant …
Joy is deeper … less of the moment … more of a shaping, a long-term shaping of the soul … joy is quiet, calm, strong …
Joy grows slowly … it requires a lot of Yes …
Adults who come from difficult circumstances often look back to one or two people who loved them … someone saying Yes to them … so they made it … scars on the soul, scars on the body, but the power of Yes, the power of someone’s Yes in the midst of craziness and sadness …
“You can do it!”
“I believe in you!”
Isaiah 35.1-2; Luke 1.39-56
God is saying Yes to us all the time.
I have found it to be true: joyful people are joyful because they tend to say Yes to life’s requirements … they learn the important lessons of trying something new … they learn the important lessons of failure … they can say Yes to the incomplete, the unexpected, the less-than-perfect realities of life.
Something worth doing is something worth doing badly … playing the piano, running cross-country, writing an essay, or learning how to dance.
The first piano recital may go well, but afterward, the budding pianist will rehearse it all over again … the weak spots, the missed notes, and so on.
Running cross-country, you may come in last.
A baseball star hits 330 … which means only one hit per three at-bats … two-thirds of the time, there’s no hit.
Learning to dance is no easy task.
The piano player goes back to work … the baseball player talks to the coaches … and Mary is the Mother of Jesus.
It’s all begins with a simple Yes …
Hallelujah and Amen!
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