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The Retirement of Mary, Mother of Our Lord

11/4/2019

Scripture gives us little information about the retirement of Mary the mother of Jesus. By retirement, I mean her life and work after the resurrection of Christ. In my particular context as pastor at Christ the King Lutheran, retirees are a potent force in the church and larger community. Many of CTK’s members claim to be more active in their retirement than they were before. I agree with them. Retirees get things done. I believe that the same was true for Mary. Our last glimpse of her in scripture is the mention of her in Acts, where she is among the faithful awaiting the coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost (Acts 1:14).
Just as Mary mothered Jesus through his terrible twos, contrary adolescence, and into adulthood, she is among those nurturing and tending the young church.
While scripture has little else to say about Mary’s retirement, Christian tradition offers us additional stories about Mary’s adventures following the resurrection. In fact, there is such a rich store of extra-biblical legends about Mary that they sometimes bump against each other. There are multiple sites which all claim to be the location of Mary’s last decades of life, her death, and her bodily assumption into heaven: two in Jerusalem, one in France, and one on a mountain near Ephesus, Turkey. As pilgrims we visited this last location: the House of the Virgin Mary located at the top of Mt. Koressos.

Once again, our Bible has nothing to say regarding Mary’s retirement to Asia Minor now Turkey. What we do have is Jesus’ commendation of Mary into the care of his disciple John from the cross and the visions of at 18th century mystic.
Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, “Woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home. (John 19:25-27).

From this passage we learn that in the face of unbelievable loss, John, the beloved disciple, and Mary, the Mother of Jesus, adopted each other. John is believed to have traveled to Ephesus to spread the gospel, naturally taking his adopted mother Mary with him. So some say.
Enter the mystic. Anne Catherine Emmerich, a Roman Catholic nun lived from 1774 to 1824. During her life she experienced a number of visions about the Virgin Mary, which were published after her death. In the late 19th century these visions led to the discovery of a small house on the top of Mt. Koressos. And pilgrims have been pilgriming there ever since.

Whether Mary spent her retirement in Jerusalem, France, or on top of a mountain in Turkey is anyone’s guess. What matters is the tradition of adoption that inspired Anne Katherine Emmerich to dream Mary all the way to Turkey. “Woman, here is your son…here is your mother”.
Even before the Holy Spirit was tearing through Jerusalem setting everyone’s hair on fire, the church has been about creating family in the face of loss. At the foot of the cross, John was there for Mary to cling to as her son hung in agony. Mary was there for John weep with as he watched his friend dying by inches. Jesus saw this sharing of pain and sanctified it from the cross: “Woman, here is your son.”
The House of the Virgin Mary honors this kind of love, the love of people who have been placed, drawn, or even thrown together, and are richer for it. For instance, Mary’s House is a unique holy site in that it is visited and cared for by both Christians and Muslims, since both faiths honor Mary.

Our visit began with a visit to Mary’s House itself. We were given a chance to enter, pray, and light a candle if the Spirit so moved us. From there we gathered for a brief worship service nearby. We read the Annunciation where Mary learns that she will conceive and give birth to the Messiah followed by Jesus’ commendation of Mary into John’s care from the cross. We talked about what it meant to love and care for one another in the face of loss. We sang the Magnificat, and celebrated the Lord’s supper.
Afterwards we went down a series of steps to a sacred spring believed to have healing qualities. Near by, there is a wall where both Christians and Muslims are able to write down prayers on bits of ribbon and tie them to a wall. At Mary’s House, our longings are named together.

I don’t know much about healing springs, but I do trust in God’s claim on me through baptism. So, I dipped my hand in the waters, made the cross on my forehead, and then splashed my parents, who are fellow pilgrims on this trip, for good measure. May their retirement be as rich as Mary’s.

You see as pilgrims, bus-mates, and friends, we, my parents, my roommate, all of us on this trip, are bound to each other, commended to each other as Mary and John were commended to each other. Placed, drawn, and even thrown together we are richer for each other. The care and kindness we offer each other is more than mere courtesy. It is the same kind of love Christ sanctified from the cross and the same love which is honored at Mary’s house: the love of people who have adopted one another in the name of Jesus and in honor of his mother.

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The Places of our Planting

11/1/2019

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Ancient Corinth is dominated by the Temple to Apollo which sits above the town center. Below sprawl the remains of shops, colonnades, and even the bema, or speaking platform, where the Apostle Paul was once accused before the proconsul Gallio.

Paul was a resident of Corinth for some time. He worked in the city as tentmaker alongside fellow believers Aquila and Priscilla. He spent time in the local synagogue, going there regularly. The spirit of God even urges Paul to continue to stay in Corinth, sharing the gospel of Jesus. For a time, a year and more, Corinth is home to Paul.

And Corinth like any city, town, or village was a chaotic mixture of sin, grace, and redemption. Paul’s words were heard by many: sailors just in from the sea, prostitutes plying their trade, Jews, God Fearers of various backgrounds, Roman officials, Greeks, and soldiers.

As Paul walked through this town, now little more than rocks with a history, he encountered humans at their best and their worst. Beggars extended their hands to him, Roman soldiers shoved past him, prostitutes beckoned him, slaves hustled by, and Believers, coming from any and all of these groups, greeted him with thanksgiving.

Paul must have had some misgivings when he first came to Corinth. It was a city of great wealth and power with a reputation for luxury and excess. What interest could God possibly have in a place like Corinth? Surely any word of Good News planted in such a place would be choked out instantly by the greed, pride, and vanity that permeated the city’s very air.

And yet, for a year and half and probably longer, Corinth was home to Paul. He worked there, preached there, and lived there in community with other Believers. God planted Paul in Corinth and bid him put down roots and the church grew and flourished.

Just as God planted Paul in Corinth for a time, God plants us too and bids us flourish for the sake of the Gospel. We may also have misgivings about the place of our planting. Perhaps it is somewhere that disappoints us or frightens us. Maybe the place of our planting is not what it used to be or should be. Whatever the place of our planting, God is the one who put us there and God is the one who puts us to work enriching and renewing a tired, cynical, and despairing world.

Rarely is the place of our planting what it should be, but that is the very reason that God plants us there. We are not spectators to the coming kingdom of God, we are involved, rooted in God’s saving work.
Paul’s time in Corinth shows us what it is to claim the place of our planting. Jesus’ life on earth does the same. We are invited to love the soil where God has placed us, care for the people growing up around us, and claim the community God has given us to tend. This community will not be perfect. It may even be a place of disappointment, frustration, and discouragement. However, we have the assurance that this will not always be so. God is at work renewing and recreating our world and we are involved: in our homes, in our towns, in the places of our planting.

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The Gospel in Scales

The Retirement of Mary, Mother of Our Lord

The Places of our Planting

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