Masks and Meaning

              Masks and Meaning
Luke 1.46-56
Intro: Humpty-Dumpty sat on the wall, Humpty-Dumpty had a great fall
All the kings horses and all the kings men could not put Humpty-Dumpty together again. Those of us in the older generation were taught this little nursery rhyme. Mother's read it to children because their mother's had read it to them. But few mother's a fewer children who heard it every found out the meaning it masked. It was a way of teaching theology to children.
Think of the masked meanings found in Swift's Gulliver's Travels. in which king's and magistrates were being poked fun at? How many have read modern day novels like Lord of the Flies or Catcher in the Rye and have missed the fact that each novel deals with what the older theology called original sin. Masked meanings are all around us. Most of us walk through life like a child without realizing that the rock we have picked up is a valuable jewel. How many times have we thrown away an old book, or an old piece of furniture only to reminisce, My we should have kept it, it would be a fortune. now.
Masked meanings are all around us. People do certain things for other than obvious meanings. Children tend to be better during the Christmas season—why? Santa Claus. A man buys a huge library. He is not well read. He has always wanted to be an intellectual. He is disappointed with his achievement. His library masks a meaning.
One wonders what meanings are masked in the violence that is often unleashed in our cities. One wonders what meanings are masked in the marijuana parties that take place in our neighborhoods.
We have lived through a variety of disappointing times. Our present generation forgets the idealism of its forefathers. The war to end all wars was fought in 1917 The development of world order was sought in the League of Nations prior to the beginning of the second great war. Hidden behind beards, dirty faces, dirty clothes are masks for personalties not yet willing to come out to find meaning in a world that has always held out hope, and has always had dreams of idealism.
I. Our hope has become spoiled.
A. Creative factor of foresight and expectancy.
1. irrigation engineers saw fertility in the desert. That's foresight. A Sculptor sees a statue in a block of stone, that's expectancy. They saw the sands masking a meaning. The sculptor saw the stone masking an expression.
2. Yet modern day hopes are not so ambitious. look at a vast wasteland and hope it does not become any more blighted than what it already is.
3. The creative factor of foresight and expectancy is the source of the religious life. God blazed life thru men in the
OT. He sees masked in an enslaved people, a people whom he will call his. And those people see masked in the desert that burns their faces a vision beyond to a land flowing with milk and honey.
4. Yet even this glorious story seems to be spoiled. Mary and