Mary's Song

It's not what most people think about when they think about Christmas music, and yet this song, Mary's Song, is the first that was sung in anticipation of the birth of Jesus.  It is interesting that what Luke preserves for us here is not a collection of Mary's study notes, but rather that song that welled up in her as she contemplated the story she had fallen into.  And so, one might ask, what was it that made Mary want to sing?  What do we hear when we listen to her song?  How to the notes and lyrics resonate with my own journey?

In the sermon this week, Pastor Ken invites us to take a few moments to reflect on the music, and listen for what was on Mary's heart as she sang, and what is happening in ours as we join her in the song.  If you would like to listen to the sermon once again, or perhaps for the first time, you can access or sermon library here, or listen to the livestream version here.

For further reflection after the sermon, check this link http://sojo.net/blogs/2014/12/08/you-dont-want-be-prophet

One Person's Reflections on Singing Mary's Song

In those soft evenings, the quiet of late December surrounded  me – but my life itself was loud. I did not know how much I needed to settle for 45 minutes into song and silence and hear someone sing about the angel Gabriel and Mary. The first time I heard, you have cast the mighty down from their thrones and uplifted the humble of heart…you have filled the hungry with wondrous things and left the wealthy no part I thought that it was the most radical and beautiful thing I had ever heard. I did not know that it was lifted straight from Luke’s gospel, and not just some Leftist songbook, and I cried the first time I sang it. At the time, I was employed to cook meals for folks with HIV. We had a lovely little cottage called the Acorn Center where HIV positive men and women could come and be with their fellows and eat a warm meal. In the day I would feed emaciated junkies and gay men, many of whom were at the mercy of a heartless government system to meet their needs and on Wednesday evenings I’d sing of a God who fills the hungry and uplifts the humble and singing that made the rest of my week make more sense. I’d soon learn that people all over the world were singing this song of Mary’s and that the Magnificat has always been sung at Vespers, and that when I sang it that Advent, I sang it with all who had come before . . .  of every age, as well as all who gathered, as I was doing, to pray in the Winter of 1996.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/nadiabolzweber/2014/11/my-first-advent/?utm_source=SilverpopMailing&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Progressive%2012%204%2014%20(1)&utm_content=&spMailingID=47554093&spUserID=OTYxOTQ1ODUzNDUS1&spJobID=580736436&spReportId=NTgwNzM2NDM2S0