Mary, Mother of God

It’s time for some disagreement! Yesterday was August 15, which is one of the most widely celebrated Christian festivals, for one of the most well-known people in the Bible.  Millions and millions of people all over the world are talking about Mary this weekend. But we don’t even agree on what to call the day! The Roman Church calls it “The Assumption of Mary” from the belief that Mary was bodily assumed, taken into heaven instead of dying. The Eastern Orthodox observe the festival as the “Dormition of Mary,” meaning that she was taken bodily into heaven directly after her dormition, or “falling asleep,” meaning death.  

And Lutherans? Well, it’s complicated.

First, scripture itself is silent on whether or not the blessed Virgin Mary was assumed into heaven, so we can’t say definitively one way or another. However, many early Lutherans held on to the Feast of the Assumption in the liturgical calendar, recognizing it as a pious and spiritually wholesome thought. But due to the bitter fights between the Roman church and the Lutheran churches, that practice gradually disappeared and was totally gone by the 18^th century.

It wasn’t until 1978 that a special day just for Mary came back on Lutheran calendars. And I, for one, am glad because instead of defining ourselves by what we are against—Roman Catholic abuses around Mary-- we can celebrate what God has done in this amazing young woman. After all,  Martin Luther certainly held Mary in high regard, as the quote on the front of your bulletin shows—higher regard than many of us modern Christians, that’s for sure!         

See, for Lutherans,  Scripture is the only rule and norm of the faith, and thus we are free to believe or deny such things as the Assumption, as long as they’re not explicitly forbidden in the Bible, and also as long as we don’t insist that it’s something you HAVE to believe to be saved. But not every Christian looks at things that way. Roman Catholics, for example, hold the Assumption as a fixed doctrine, an infallible belief, binding for true faith.  And many non-liturgical protestants insist that no special reverence or attention should be paid to Mary at all, ever.  So you see what I mean when I say there’s big disagreement!

Except.

There is one area where Lutherans and Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox and even most Protestants absolutely agree. And that is, we are all clear that Mary is the mother of God. That may be jarring to you, to hear Mary called “mother of God.” Maybe you’ve heard her officially referred to as “mother of our Lord” or “mother of Jesus,”  but let me walk you through this:  

1) Jesus is God. 2) Mary is Jesus’ mother. 3) Mary is mother of God.

See how that works? There should be no debate on this issue. For Mary not to be mother of God, she must either: 1) Not be Jesus’ mother or 2) Jesus is not God.  Both of those assertions are contrary to Scripture. Period. Therefore, Mary is indeed the Mother of God.

A few years ago, I was involved in a heated online discussion among some pastors.  One pastor scolded some of us for referring to Mary as mother of God. He begrudgingly conceded the logic that I laid out earlier, but still argued that we were somehow going beyond Scripture. He pointed out that Elizabeth referred to her cousin only as “the mother of my Lord.” Therefore, he said, Mary should only be called “Mother of the Lord.” Of course, the discussion went on about the meaning of the word  “Lord.”

If our friend had known Church history better, though, he would have known that this argument had been dealt with at the Council of Ephesus in 431 AD. At that great church council, the title “Mother of God” was used to argue against the Nestorians. These were people who followed the teachings of a man named Nestorius, who said that Jesus was not really fully God. That, of course, is wrong. Jesus is fully God. 

Our Lutheran confessions, following the teaching from the Council of Ephesus, refer to the Blessed Virgin Mary as “mother of God.” The fathers of the Church, Doctor Luther, our Book of Concord, the centuries’ long train of our Lutheran theologians right down to our time, teach this biblical and confessional truth: Mary is the mother of God.

Well. By now, you may be wondering why this is important. A lot of people think that church is history is dull and dry, irrelevant to the modern church. “Can’t we just read the Bible and not worry about all that old stuff? People don’t need lectures in history, Pastor, they just need to know that Jesus loves them.”

To that I say, Yes, let’s read the Bible -- every word of it, many times. Let’s dig into it and study it in the original languages. And let’s read it along with the Early Church and the Reformers. But let’s also study the Bible with an eye toward false teachers like Nestorius, to avoid their errors and heresies.  Because how can we tell people that Jesus loves them if we can’t articulate who Jesus is, what sin is, why Jesus was born of a virgin, and why this all matters?

If we cannot clearly say that Jesus is God and his death saves sinners because he is God, then what are we left with? If we can’t clearly articulate the role of Mary his Mother, then what are we left with?  Basically, opinion and emotion. And emotion is easily manipulated by propaganda, or politics, or whatever feels good to us.

We are seeing in real time in our culture what happens when people don’t study history, forget our collective heritage, and prefer their tribe’s narrative to facts. We are seeing exactly what happens when critical thinking is not taught or learned.

This is why my words today are a bit more about history and disagreement in the church about Mary. She matters because Jesus matters. What we say about Mary reflects on what we say about Jesus. Precision in language matters because it defines who we are, and who we are not; what we believe, and what we do not.

Mary is the mother of Jesus, who is God himself and our brother.  How could we fail to respect and honor our brother Jesus' mother? And if she is Jesus' mother, and he is our brother, then she is also our mother, too. If you really think about that, you see Mary not as a 2D figure in the ceramic nativity set, but as the instrument of God in the world and in our lives, too.

Now. Was she bodily assumed into heaven either before or after her death? Maybe. We can’t say for certain. Scripture doesn’t say. You’re free to believe that or not. What Scripture does say clearly, though, is that through her, God enters human life with all its evil and violence and corruption. God loves us so much that he chose this woman 2,000 years ago to announce not only that she would become pregnant, but that her baby would be the hope of all humankind, the one to break our chains, the one to assure our salvation and deliver us from sin and death.

God did not abandon us, but sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, born to die so that we might not be his slaves, but his children. And heirs of eternal life.

So we boldly confess Jesus as true God and true Man. We cherish the Incarnation, when the Word became flesh through the flesh of a young teenage girl. We confidently honor Mary not because of herself, but because of God.  We, too will one day fall asleep in Jesus.  Let Mary’s words be on our lips, then: “Here I am, the servant of the Lord. My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior!” Amen.