But then several years ago, I can't remember exactly when, I heard someone call Mary "the first Christian." I remember asking what that meant, and was told that Mary was the first human being to accept Christ, in a very tangible way. I was told that we are all called to be "little Marys," people who accept Christ in the same way that Mary did. So I'd like to explore briefly how Mary became "the first Christian," and how it is that she can be for us not simply a distant model or ideal, but rather a real human being who, in making herself vulnerable to God's presence in the most intimate way imaginable, invites us to join her in making room for the inbreaking of Christ's real presence in our own lives.

I grew up around people who said that they had accepted Jesus into their hearts, and when I made my first profession of faith, at age five, I was taught to pray "Lord Jesus, come into my heart." I was told that my heart had a door and that I was the doorkeeper, and borrowing language from St. John's gospel, my teachers told me that Jesus was standing at the door and knocking, banging on it, pounding on my heart, entreating me to let him in, to accept him as my "personal Lord and Savior." It was a powerful image, for as I placed my hand on my chest, it was as if with every beat of my heart, Jesus was pounding away, beating, beating, beating upon the door of my heart, calling insistently to me to open up and let him in.

That image still holds sway over me, but I have also found myself contemplating what it must have been like for Mary to carry Christ inside of her, and what it might mean for me to carry Christ within me. I have found, however, that instead of relying on my own experience, I need to turn to the stories of women in order to experience vicariously what I can never experience physically: the state of pregnancy.

Many of you know that I worked on a book project entitled Gathering The NeXt Generation. I would like to share two brief passages that shed light on this mystery for me. The first comes from The Rev. Kate Moorehead's essay, "Preparing for Luke: Reflections of a Pregnant Priest," about how her early priestly ministry was affected by the experience of carrying her first child. She writes:

I sat through Good Friday and could not help but wonder how Mary survived seeing her child murdered. That child had come out of her. Didn't she sometimes recall how he had moved deep within her? How his personality and his tranquility were known to her even then? How did she do it? I sat in silence for three hours on Good Friday, feeling my child move inside my belly. Although I couldn't kneel that day, my heart knelt as it had never knelt before.

If we felt Christ move within us in the same way that Mary felt him move within her, I doubt that any of us could remain standing for long.

Margaret Schwarzer, Episcopal Chaplain to Boston University, wrote this about Mary in her essay "Youth's Authority: A Spiritual Revolution":

[Mary] does not call herself to the awesome task of becoming Christ's mother, but neither will she shrink from that call. She is both thoughtful and open to God's possibilities: "How shall this be?" she asks. As she ponders, the future shape of the entire cosmos is suspended, and the universe waits upon the answer of a girl.

What a simple yet awesome power women have, to choose to accept a new life within their very bodies. In Mary's case, her answer didn't just affect her future, which is what I would have expected her to focus on, but has shaped the entire course of history. She is aware of the significance of her choice. "As she ponders, the future shape of the entire cosmos is suspended, and the universe waits upon the answer of a girl."

Mary's response was simple, straightforward, and is the reason why each of us is here this morning, over two thousand years later: "Here I am, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word."

Eastern Orthodox Christians refer to Mary as the "Theotokos," Greek for "God-bearer." Mary carried God within her, and in so doing showed herself to be a true servant of God. We, too, can be God-bearers, bearing God within ourselves and bearing God to a hurting world.

But is the metaphor enough? In the end, I envy Mary that physical closeness, and while I've felt spiritually close to Christ from time to time, I always yearn for something more tangible, more physical. As I reflected on where I might find this yearning fulfilled, it dawned on me that the one who sprang from Mary's flesh in turn gave his flesh to us: in the Eucharist, we receive in a physical way the mysterious and very real presence of Christ. In turn, we become the Body of Christ, given to the world in service to the Lord. For me, the Eucharist has become the source of encountering physically that closeness to Jesus that Mary herself knew. For when we encounter Christ at the altar, we become better equipped to encounter Christ in each other-not merely metaphorically, but physically. As Jesus reminds us: "Insofar as you did it to the least of these, you did it to me." By looking for Christ in friend and stranger, we emulate Mary's openness to God's presence in the here-and-now: "Behold, the servant of the Lord. Be it done to me according to your word."

At the end of the Great Thanksgiving, the priest holds aloft the cup and paten and says "The Gifts of God for the People of God." The fifth century bishop, St. Augustine of Hippo, liked to proclaim at that point in the liturgy: "Behold what you are. Become what you behold."

Mary gave her body to Christ and in turn became a part of Christ's Body. As we behold Mary, may we also see in her what we are called to become ourselves. Amen.