"Why Me?"

Luke 1:46-55

Third Sunday in Advent + December 16, 2012

Reverend Dr. David C. Brown

Pilgrim Congregational United Church of Christ

400 Glenwood Drive, Chattanooga, TN 37404

“Why me?” I can’t imagine anyone who has not asked themselves that question at some time in life, probably several times, maybe even many times. “Why me?” Certainly for Barbara and for me the past year or so has been filled with “Why me’s?”  Where can we find the strength, the hope, the faith to deal with what has seemed like an avalanche of family crises: a teen-aged grandson needing a kidney transplant; his mother facing possible breast cancer and a difficult divorce; a granddaughter, soon to be married, in a relationship about which we have serious doubts; a son in jail and his son left an orphan of the storm; Barbara’s former husband, close to their children, dying of cancer; her daughter’s husband facing serious cancer; a daughter-in-law struggling through a difficult pregnancy. “Why me?” “Why us?” “Why now?” “Why at all?”

“Why me?” The question does more than ask for reasons. The fact that we ask at all suggests an underlying recognition that some things in this world just don’t make rational sense and never will. In our dark night of the soul we may agree with Macbeth: “Life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing.” That was the conclusion of twentieth century Existentialism: life is meaningless, so get over it. Is that the last word for humanity? Life ending not with a bang but a whimper? I don’t think so.

When we ask “Why me?” it is an affirmation of faith, not doubt. While we will never have a fully satisfying answer to our cries of anguish, our questions affirm our faith that somehow, somewhere, someone hears the questions. We are not alone in our pain. God hears us and cares about us. In some strange way, the pain in our lives directs us away from our meager human rationality to the truth that can only come from God, in God’s own time, in God’s own way.

Some things in life just don’t make rational sense and never will. Mommy says, “I love you.” The child asks, “Why? I just broke your favorite crystal bowl.” “I love you more than a bowl,” says Mommy. Some things in this life defy reason, things like forgiveness and love, not to mention faith.

When the angel Gabriel stands in front of this 15-year-old country girl named Mary and tells her she will become mother to the Son of the “Most High,” and this child to be born will be the Son of God, no wonder Mary asks “Why me?” She is too polite. She could just as well have said, “You’ve got to be kidding” or, as kids say today, “Whatever!” But however we may ponder Mary’s question – “Why me?” – Mary found herself called to do the will of God and not the whims of Mary.

One way to approach an answer to Mary’s question to the angel – and a good many of the deeper questions of our own lives – is to remember who the story is about. Did you ever think about the fact that the story of your own life, with all the experiences you have collected over time, that in each and every circumstance including this one as you sit here today, the story is really not about you or me? Our purpose for being, our birth, our life, our loves, our traumas, our relationships, our memories, all are only secondarily about us. I believe that in this story from the Bible, as in the sweep of the stories of our lives, the story is about God and what God is doing or working through us to do.

This story is not about Mary, it is not about angels, it is about God and the purposes of God. The reason we remember it better than the mundane stories of our own or others’ lives is the spectacular response of Mary. I heard someone once ask, “I wonder how many other stops Gabriel made that day before he found a young girl who would say yes!” We’ll never know if there is an answer to that question because the Bible is only interested in the question to Mary and her answer.

Now, if you are like I am, you will find the thought that Mary’s story and life are about God and not about her to be disturbing. Even more disturbing is the suggestion that our own lives are not about us but about God. What silliness this appears to be on the surface. Our culture leads us to believe that in our lives we are free agents who do all the choosing for ourselves. This may be one reason that today’s missionary initiatives of the Christian faith are leaving western culture behind and finding itself more at home in countries where more people accept the idea that some things, perhaps most things, are out of their control. They must trust that God will answer and provide in God’s own way and in God’s own time.

Like Mary we do not choose to be part of God’s work in history so much as we are chosen. Mary was taken by surprise to learn that God had a plan for her, one that we know from this side of Jesus’ death and resurrection was not without pain for this young mother. Tough love, really tough love.

But why Mary? Why any of us? How can this be? In the end, we do not know why God chooses. It is clearly not because we are special. In fact, when God chooses in the biblical stories, it is often in spite of some characteristic which the world might find disqualifying: Moses was guilty of murder, David was too young. Peter was a simple fisherman, Paul had been a persecutor of the very One who called him. One thing we do know; God works in particulars. God does not choose us in general, but chooses us in particular in the here and now. When we are chosen, as Mary was chosen, and we ask how this can be, we never get a very good answer. But then, it isn’t our story; remember, it is God’s call and we are asked to be part of it as Mary did.

Friends, we are chosen by God. That is why we are here. How can this be? We may wonder together, but we will never get a fully satisfactory answer. We will simply know that it is so, because God makes use of people in particular – rather than everybody in general – to make the good news alive in our world.

We Christians believe that God is up to something in our world. Those who carry the name of Christ are more aware of our shortcomings than we are of our possibilities. But, as the angel reminded Mary, we too are reminded: “With God all things are possible.” Thank God. Amen

This is the irrational season

When love blooms bright and wild.

Had Mary been filled with reason

There’d have been no room for the child.

-Madeline L’Engle