It’s been six weeks since the Way Forward was adopted at the National Synod. As someone who has been an advocate for the ordination of women for decades and who has listened to the pain and suffering of those who have been called by God but rejected by the LCANZ, I thought I would feel joy when the results were announced. However, sitting in the ‘visitors’ section’ of Synod with many other advocates and called women, I felt relief but also grief.

The tears were not yet tears of joy.

We have been so used to disappointment that it was so hard to believe that this time the count was more than 66 percent.

Also in that room were people who do not believe that women should be ordained and who will continue to question the legitimacy of the position that ordained women will fill in the future.

My challenge during the week following Synod was to prepare to preach in my congregation, a congregation which has always supported the proposals to ordain women in the LCANZ and who have formally endorsed women to preach in the congregation. Some of them were wondering why we weren’t ecstatic, others trying to make sense of their own feelings and reactions.

We have been using the Narrative Lectionary, and its gift to me was the two passages chosen for Sunday 13 th October, Samuel 1 and 2 and the Magnificat in Luke 1. As I struggled with my own reactions and feelings to the decisions of Synod and heard the reactions of others, the stories of Hannah and Mary spoke to me of grief and loss and oppression and worlds turned up side down. They also spoke to me of hope and a God who keeps God’s promises.

I would like to share this sermon with you in the hope it will help all of us gradually be ready for the next steps, assured that God is with us.

1 Samuel 1 and 2:1-10
Luke 1: 38-56

When the announcement was made at Synod last week that the vote for the Way Forward had reached more than a 2/3 majority, there was silence.

Then as I looked around, while grasping the hands of those women closest to me, I saw and felt the tears come.

Silent tears for some, deep wracking sobs for others.

Tears for those who have waited so long, for those who have gone before us hoping this day would come, tears for the unfulfilled calls to ministry, tears that wanted to be joyful but couldn’t be just yet. Tears for those of our church family who can’t live with this decision.

Grief, relief and disbelief all on display.

As we began to speak and try and make sense of our reactions, I sensed that for some their world had been turned upside down and for others their world now had the possibility of being the right way up!

While there were many hugs and smiles, we couldn’t understand why we were not feeling ecstatic. There are many reasons for that, but images that a friend used made sense to me. It is like sitting around the table when peace has been declared after war. There is great joy that war is over but there are people missing at that table. We grieve for them. Joy and grief mixed together. It is also like having a live birth after miscarriage or still birth. There is so much joy in the new life and the possibilities, but there is also grief for the lost one, the life that could have been.

This week Oct 15th we mark Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day and remember all who have lost children in any circumstance or have longed to be parents and have not been able to. For all whose world has been turned upside down by dreams shattered and hopes unfulfilled.

Today I want to introduce you to Hannah who knows about grief and longing for a child.

Hannah is praying in the Lord’s house, an unusual thing for a woman of her time to be doing.

Women were not part of the worship rituals, they were to serve at home and to provide children. The children would then carry out the work necessary to be economically viable and continue the family name.

In fact the story of Hannah takes place during the time of the Judges.

The Israelites entered the Land after wandering in the desert and, as they settled, appointed Judges to rule over them, but the judges became more and more corrupt, until we have the extremely disturbing story at the end of Judges of the concubine being cut up into pieces and distributed to the tribes.

A woman completely de humanised.

Hannah lives in this political and religious chaos.

Her personal life is also in turmoil.

She has not been able to conceive. Although her husband seems to care for her, he has taken another wife, Peninnah, to provide children and she taunts Hannah ceaselessly about her inability to fulfill her role as a provider of children.

Her husband asks questions of Hannah which show he doesn’t understand her grief and even though he gives her a greater portion of food, she can’t eat it because she is so distraught. Her religious culture tells her that she is being punished for her sins.

So this taunted, wretched women comes to pray.

It seems that not only is it unusual for her to be praying in public, but her prayer is also unusual.

She is not using a formulaic prayer, but speaking from her heart and with the frustration of so many years of grief and isolation.

Perhaps these are the sorts of prayers we are often afraid to pray to God, telling God how we really feel. Telling God our deepest anxieties and needs.
Some of this praying is done silently and when Eli the priest sees this woman weeping with her lips moving he jumps to conclusions and accuses her of being drunk.

So now we can add abuse from a religious leader to Hannah’s burden of oppression.

The weight of her cultural and religious world is closing in on her.

But she does not collapse under that weight.

She has been speaking with God and has let God know what is going on for her. She has made promises to God that she will give her child back into God’s service.

She can promise, because she knows that God keeps God’s promises.

She is courageous and challenges Eli, she speaks up for herself, she has found her voice and she draws from him a blessing which enables her to go home in peace.

I wonder at this point whether Hannah feels that her world is up side down or the right way up?

God is doing a new thing in Israel.

Doing it through an old woman who thought she was voiceless and unable to contribute to the future. Samuel is born to Hannah and Elkana and he is one who will begin to encourage Israel to build a community that is the right way up, trusting in God’s promises.

When Hannah comes back to the house of the Lord she keeps her promise and brings Samuel with her and she will leave him there to dedicate his life to God.

How hard that must have been. Thankfulness for the gift of a child but grief in having to let him go.

In this mix of emotions she has really found her voice.

She sings a song of praise and thanks but also a prophetic song that points to the unexpected ways that God works.

Through the poor and needy, the oppressed and feeble.

Hannah’s heart is able to rejoice in the Lord, even though that heart was broken so many times in her life, even though her world was turned upside down many times. Her prayer tells us that God does the lifting up, not us and that enables her to keep on singing. I wonder if she sang this song to Samuel and how much it shaped the way he thought and acted?

It is noticeable that at times when there are transitions in Israel’s history, when a new thing is about to happen, that women sing.

Deborah, Miriam, Hannah and of course Mary. We have just sung the Magnificat, Mary’s song.

What greater contrast could there be between Hannah and Mary.

Hannah is old and has prayed unceasingly to become pregnant and Mary is very young and is so unexpectedly pregnant.

Mary must have been very frightened even though the angel said ‘be not afraid’.

Her world in a small town with predictable steps of marriage and family, turned upside down by an angel and a promise.

Now she is thinking about divorcing Joseph quietly, wondering if her family will disown her, will the community stone her.

In some ways the religious and societal ‘rules’ haven’t changed very much since Hannah’s day. And yet Mary says yes to God, through her doubts and questions.

But there must have been many questions for Mary as she contemplates her future.

Where does she go for support and comfort? To her cousin Elizabeth, who like Hannah became pregnant in her old age.

Mary goes to where there is supportive community, wisdom and those who hang on to God’s promises. In that setting she can sing a song very similar to Hannah’s but one which ushers in the new world that the Messiah, Jesus will bring. A Messiah who is very different from what was expected.

Jesus born as a human being as a vulnerable baby. Jesus who taught about and embodied love and service, rather than power and control, humility rather than pride, and care and respect for those on the margins rather than banishment and harsh judgements.

So although Mary’s world was turned upside down she could sing of a world where God’s vision of turning the world the right way up again would come through Jesus.

What about us when we have our worlds turned upside down? When we actually don’t know which way is up!! Where do we go when our hearts are breaking or we are afraid.

Some of us will be like Hannah engaging robustly with God in prayer and others will be more like Mary, seeking comfort from others in our faith communities and families.

When the time is right, by God’s grace, we will be able to sing a song of thanks again with the assurance that we are not alone. God walks with us and so does our community whether our lives are upside down or right way up.

What about our church? We’ve passed the Way Forward. Something new is before us. It is hard to emerge from the pain and struggle of many years and to grasp what this new way of being might look like. Is it an upside down world or a right way up world?

How can we help to make our congregations, our church agencies, our homes and beyond a place of grace and acceptance, just as Jesus accepts each one of us.

And I wonder what the song for our transition will be?