Old Testament: Isaiah 7:10-14
New Testament: Hebrews 10:4-10
Gospel: Luke 1:26-38
Psalm 45
or Psalm 40:5-11
or Canticle 15 (or 3)
It’s odd to think about the Annunciation during Lent. Just as we barrel head first toward the story of the end of Jesus’ short life…we’re transported back in time to the beginning. Back to the dream, the surprise, the invitation, the courage and the world-changing “Yes” with which it all started.
I experienced my own private little Good Friday about nine months ago, when one of my best friends relapsed on drugs and we made the painful decision to close The Abbey’s coffee business. I’d invested an awful lot in that shop. I believed in the power of radical hospitality as a tool for building beloved community, and I was excited by the risk involved. I memorized all the health codes, I practiced latte art, I invested in the staff, and I lost sleep over the financials. On the last day, it was me who made the decision to “pull the plug.” I anointed the body, and laid our dream — temporarily — in its tomb.
A couple of weeks later, as I was sitting in that Abbey tomb, a man in his late 30s named Jeff came and joined me there. At first, he just wanted to help serve breakfast for the community (food and hospitality were Jeff’s love language). Then he started telling me more about his life, and his nine year old step-daughter who had died of cystic fibrosis twenty years ago. In the last few days of her life, Jeff offered to cook her anything she wanted to eat. She replied that she’d always wanted to try marijuana. Figuring it was harmless at this point, Jeff baked pot into everything he served her from then on. “She ate more in those last seven days than she had in the last seven months!” he proudly told me.
Later, it occurred to me that, when his step daughter died, Jeff would have been about the age of Joseph of Nazareth at the time of the Annunciation. In the midst of pain and death, there is life and joy abundant. Jeff’s words, and the deep, holy connection created when sharing them with me, were as startling as cold water! I was sitting in an empty tomb, and the dream and vision lived on right outside it. Looking back, my entire understanding of God’s mission, has been transformed by the birth, life, death, and resurrection of The Abbey dream.
If Mary knew what was coming on Thursday, Good Friday, and early Sunday morning, would she still have said, “Yes!” those 33 years ago?
The Rev. Katie N. Rengers
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