Be careful what you wish for
Resources & Research
Check out this excerpt from the latest Anglican Board of Mission devotional, Caravan — a stunning book of incarnational stories based on Jesus’ birth, set in an Australian landscape, and written by The Rev’d Canon Stephen Daughtry for group or individual reflection
Luke 1.1–25 and 39-80
Mary
I didn’t know where else to go. After the “visit”, I couldn’t stay at home. The angel had told me Elizabeth was pregnant, and I thought that — if it was true — then maybe I was as well. The whole family had felt sorry for Elizabeth. She’s lovely. But we all knew she couldn’t have children.
I took a backpack, and I caught the bus. I told mum I was going, and asked her to tell dad. I wrote to Joseph, explaining as little as I could. The bus dropped me in front of Zec’s church, but they told me he wasn’t there, so I walked out from the town. The people didn’t know me, and they probably assumed I was on a working visa and looking for jobs. When I got to their gate I started to shake. At first, I thought it was exhaustion. 25 kilometres with a backpack is hard work. It wasn’t fatigue. It was fear. It was all the fear I’d been carrying in my body being shaken out into the dust. The moment I stepped through the gate it felt as if I had come home, I had stepped into a zone of welcome. A flock of cockatoos whirled raucously above me as I started up the driveway. One of them peeled off and landed in the dust beside me. He hopped from tree to shrub, all the way to the house, keeping his eye on me. The air was alive with sound and the bush shone in the afternoon sun. I had read Elizabeth’s books when I was a child, and I saw that this was where they had been born.
I knocked on their door and started to wonder if the whole trip had been a mistake. Maybe I’d been fantasising? When it opened, I didn’t have time to speak before Elizabeth had wrapped me in a hug. I could feel her “bump” and I could feel something moving inside it, pressing against me. It was exciting and terrifying. Her miracle was true. So, maybe, was mine.
Our first meal together was full of tears and laughter. It seems to have set the tone for the whole visit. They were the first people I’d told my story to. I knew they loved God, and stories, and mystery, but I wasn’t certain that even they could accept what I had seen and heard. When I explained about the angel, they just looked at one another and laughed/cried some more. Zec went and got a little illustrated book he’d made. I could tell it was his because it was so simple compared to Elizabeth’s work. As I turned the pages and read his words I wept so much that they had to take it away from me before I ruined it. It’s a very good feeling to know that you’re not mad. Or that, if you are, you’re not mad and alone.
“Same angel,” I said. Zec hugged me. Not mad, and not alone.
Since then, I’ve been singing. Zec has an old guitar, so I tuned it up and started writing songs. It’s what I do when I have time, and I have time. Now. I sing for my son, who I have come to believe in. He is growing within me. I know that now. Elizabeth calms me by just being. She faces her fear down and teaches me to trust the One. Some mornings, I sit with Zec and we pray the light in, in silence. Most days the cockatoo is there. Watching. He is one of us. I try my songs out on him. If he doesn’t like a line, he squawks!
I have written a song for myself and my son — and for Joseph, if he will still love us. I wrote to him yesterday and told him the whole story. I told him I’d be home soon. That he need not reply. That I would understand if he could not accept that these things had happened and that everything had changed. I told him that I loved him, but that I would not blame him, if … he no longer wanted me or the baby.
So, I sing my song. It is a song of hope and defiance and belief. It is for all the people, especially those who, like me, feel as if we must matter. As if we are seen and heard.
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,
who has looked with grace on my weakness.
Surely, all generations will call me blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is that name.
Mercy is for those who embrace God
from generation to generation.
The strength of God’s arm
has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
The powerful are brought down from their thrones,
and the lowly are lifted;
the hungry are filled with good things,
and the rich sent away empty.
God has rescued we servant people,
in remembrance of promised mercy,
according to the promise made to our ancestors,
to the Elders and their descendants for ever.”
Our country is occupied and passive. Evil walks among us. So many people have chosen to treat darkness as the natural state of things. If we are quiet, we are allowed to live quietly. Usually. But there is no peace. Justice is unknown.
John and Jesus have names. Elizabeth and I carry within us both light and hope. She is too old, and I am too young, but we have been chosen to believe. Our boys will change this world in ways we cannot understand but dare to dream of. My song will be their lullaby.
I sing it to John as he is born. He comes into the world fiercely and screaming. It is time for me to go home.
Elizabeth
You cannot be prepared to meet flesh of your own flesh. I hold him against me and breathe him in. He suckles at my breast, snuffling and burping and smiling and crying. Zec has been told he will be a great prophet. He’s certainly loud enough. But for now, he is mine. Mine and Zec’s. He rests in his father’s arms, the sight breaking my heart with roaring love, as the phone calls come in, asking what his name is. “John? No-one in the family is called John.” Indeed, but that is his name. No, you can’t talk to Zec, he can’t speak.
In the end, I use my phone to video Zec writing on a large piece of cardboard, “His name is John”. I send it to all of them.
Zec comes up behind me and puts his arms around me and the boy. He nestles his head into my neck and whispers, “His name is John.” John chooses that moment to vomit all over us.
We are indescribably happy.
Zechariah
My voice is lazy from lack of use. I have no real desire to train it up again. I think that my days of speaking to the crowd are behind me. I love listening to Elizabeth and to the Lord. I hold my son in my arms, the son we never expected and yet have spent our entire lives preparing for, as the dawn reveals the mist rising from the land. I hold him as the first rays stream through the gums, illuminating negative space, coating the world in gold. I let him hold my finger in his, as God begins again to sing the world into being. Elizabeth sleeps. John sleeps. I whisper my prayer to my son, I whisper it into the morning, knowing that it will be heard. Knowing that it, too, is a gift.
“Blessed be the Lord God,
for he has looked favourably on his people and redeemed them.
He has raised up a mighty saviour for us
in the house of his servant David,
as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old,
that we would be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us.
Thus he has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors,
and has remembered his holy covenant,
the oath that he swore to our ancestors,
to grant us that we, being rescued from the hands of our enemies,
might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness
before him all our days.
And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High;
for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways,
to give knowledge of salvation to his people
by the forgiveness of their sins.
By the tender mercy of our God,
the dawn from on high will break upon us,
to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace.”
John wakes, and his eyes reflect the sun. The cockatoo calls.
Prayer
You are the God of all broken land,
God of healing.
You are the God of all broken people,
God of relationship.
You are the God of all broken hearts,
God of love.
You are the God of all broken dreams,
God of refreshment.
You are the God of all broken promises,
God of integrity.
You are the God of all broken sleep,
God of the bright morning.
May we always welcome
prophets and angels and mystics and frightened kids.
Silence us
that we might be forced to listen to you in all things.
Still us
that we might perceive you in all things.
Speak to us through sky and scrub,
bird-song and babies.
May it be as it is in heaven.
Amen
Editor’s note: This is a brief excerpt from a longer chapter, titled “Be careful what you wish for”, in Caravan: Incarnational Stories Set in an Australian Landscape. This eight-chapter devotional is ideal for Advent to Epiphany and makes a great Christmas gift. Order yours online for $12 a copy, with $12 postage, regardless of whether you buy one copy or 100. Professionally recorded audiobook versions of all the stories can be heard online at the Anglican Board of Mission’s YouTube channel.
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