The Women Speak ~ A Sermon in Eight Voice

Rev. Kristi Denham
Congregational Church of Belmont
February 1, 2009

-Continued-

My name is Sarah. I had been stricken twelve years before with a constant flow of blood. It meant that by Jewish law I was unclean and must stand apart from all social settings. I could not go to worship in the synagogue. I could not visit with friends. I had no friends. When I went to the market for food I had to be careful never to touch another person or I would be brought up on charges before the priests. I had spent everything I had on doctors searching for a cure. None was found.

And then I saw Jesus walking through a crowd. I knew that if I could just touch the hem of his coat I would be healed. I knew.

To get to him I would have to push through the crowd. If I was wrong I would be in even more trouble. I didn't care. I knew Jesus would change my life.

I can't explain to you how or why I knew. I just did. And I was right. But more than right. I didn't know that Jesus would do more than heal my body. He healed my heart.

When he felt me touch him, when he looked into my eyes, when he made me stand and told me that my faith had saved me, I realized he wasn't just a miracle worker. He was a lover of my soul. He taught me in that shining moment that I mattered, that God's love was made for women too, that no priest could block me from receiving that love.

From that day on I have found my strength, my courage, my power to be a loving and creative human being. I've become a healer in my own right. Jesus healed me and taught me, through love, to heal others. My name is Sarah.

My name is Mary. Jesus was my son. I knew even before he was born that he would be an incredible man. I knew because there were so many signs. I knew the way a mother always knows. My child is important. My child is sacred.

When Jesus was born he looked into my heart with his clear pure vision and I knew. He wanted me to trust myself, to believe in myself, to live up to the calling I had as a woman, a mother, a human being. My love for him made him strong. His love for me made me stronger.

Jesus was no ordinary man. He challenged every person he ever met to become much more than ordinary. Loving him and walking with him the path of courage and transformation that he walked, I learned life is precious. I learned that love is a gift; that courage is the face love wears when it confronts oppression. Jesus taught me courage, or perhaps I taught it to him.

I had to face the world as an unwed mother, pregnant by no certain father, unclaimed until Joseph chose to stand beside me. I had to raise my brilliant, gifted child as a peasant, wife of a carpenter, born into poverty. I had to find someone to teach him to read, to be the teacher I knew he was called to be.

I had to watch as his words of power got him into more and more trouble with the authorities, until the inevitable happened. I had to watch as my own child was condemned, tortured, and crucified. No mother should have to watch her child die. But I did.

And when he rose, when his body disappeared and all those people spoke of seeing him alive, on the road to Emmaeus, in the upper room, I had to smile. Something in me always knew. He was unstoppable. Death was just a door. And my son, Jesus, would show us all. God's love is bigger than death, bigger than anything. God gave me my own words of power. God made me magnificent. I am Mary of the Magnificat. My own son saw me as wonderful, beautiful, and powerful. And so am I. My name is Mary.

All Voices Together: We are only some of the women who knew Jesus. We have so much that is worthy to hear. Why did the church tell us to keep silence? Today, we speak together as one voice: God loves us. We are blessed. We are wonderful. We will be heard.