2 Samuel 7:1-17
Psalms 72, 111, 113
Titus 2:11-3:8a
Luke 1:39-56
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,
for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.”
for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.”
One of my favorite paintings was done by the artist Henry Ossawa Taylor. It is a painting of the Annunciation to Mary. The angel Gabriel is rendered as a shaft of bright light on side of the painting. On the other side of the painting, huddled in the corner of her bed, using her covers to shield her from the bright light, is a very young girl. She looks, in the picture to be no older than 12. This is Mary as she might truly have been – not the regally dressed, elegant Queen of Heaven, but the young Jewish girl who is about to become pregnant without being married – which was more scandalous then than it is now. In fact, simply by saying ‘yes’ to the Angel’s proposition, Mary was putting her life at risk. In near-eastern cultures, women who get pregnant before they are married don’t fare so well.
Yet, if Mary wastes much time moping about the seriousness of her circumstances we don’t know it. In today’s passage from Luke’s Gospel, when she encounters her cousin Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist, Mary is brimming with praise for the God who has chosen her to be an instrument of His plan for the world. God was doing something exciting and new in the world and even though her choice to participate in His work might have cost her a husband (though it didn’t) and might have cost her her life (though it didn’t), Mary chooses instead to rejoice in the privilege of playing such an important role in God’s plan for the world.
The places where God leads us are always dangerous and never safe. He is always beckoning us to do work for His Kingdom which will bring us face to face with our deepest fears. Will we respond to God’s call begrudgingly, keeping in mind EXACTLY what we have risked in saying yes? Or will we be free with our lives and our praise – rushing foolish and headlong into the plans which God has made for us?
Fr. Patrick Hall