Day 18 Advent, 12/21/23: Can you feel the joy in this Gospel passage? (Luke 1:44)

I would not have connected this familiar Christmas passage of Mary visiting Elizabeth with David bringing the ark of the covenant back to Jerusalem (2 Sam 6:12). "...in the hill country of Judea" (Lk 1:39) was where Obed-Edom apparently lived between Kireath-Jearim and Jerusalem. This is in the Judean highlands when he housed the ark for 3 months (2 Sam 6:11; 1 Ch 13:13-14; 15:25), which is 9 miles from Jerusalem.

I also would not have connected John the Baptist leaping for joy in Elizabeth's womb (Lk 1:44) with David dancing before the ark of the covenant as it was brought to Jerusalem (2 Sam 6:14; 1 Ch 15:29).

I do find both connections plausible and reasonable and quite interesting.

Lord, regardless of my life circumstances, help me to always have David's joy and gratitude in his dancing in worship before the ark of the covenant.

Thursday, December 21, 2023 Third Week of Advent Luke 1:39–45 Friends, today's Gospel tells the marvelous story of the Visitation. At the Annunciation, the angel had told Mary that the child to be conceived in her would be the new David. With that magnificent prophecy still ringing in her ears, Mary set out to visit her cousin Elizabeth, who was married to Zechariah, a temple priest. No first-century Jew would have missed the significance of their residence being "in the hill country of Judah." That was precisely where David found the ark, the bearer of God's presence. To that same hill country now comes Mary, the definitive and final Ark of the Covenant. Elizabeth is the first to proclaim the fullness of the Gospel: "How does this happen to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?"—the Lord, which is to say, the God of Israel. Mary brings God into the world, thus making it, at least in principle, a temple. And then Elizabeth announces that at the sound of Mary's greeting, "the infant in my womb leaped for joy." This is the unborn John the Baptist doing his version of David's dance before the ark of the covenant, his great act of worship of the King.