A Troubled Mary
The angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And having come in, the angel said to her, "Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!" But when she saw him, she was troubled....Then the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God." Luke 1:26-30, NKJV.
Have you spent much time thinking about Mary? Here is a girl probably about 14 or 15 years of age who was engaged to an older man, as was the custom of the times.
That wasn't so bad. But then an angel shows up in her room and tells her she is going to be pregnant. Put yourself in her place. To say the least, this situation will be difficult to explain. After all, you can't exactly hide a protruding abdomen. Then there will be the baby. And what will Joseph think?
No wonder the Bible says she was troubled. You would be too.
But to get the full impact we need to mentally move back to the first century. Modern promiscuous culture has blunted our thinking on the topic. Let's face it, with 1 million teenage girls each year in the United States getting pregnant out of wedlock, we may not feel the full force of Mary's predicament. It is one thing to have a "problem" in New York City, but in a closely knit Jewish village in the first century the news brought by the angel must have been disconcerting in the extreme. After all, Jewish law regarded a betrothed woman who became pregnant as an adulteress, subject to death by stoning.
When we read the gospel story we need to remember that these were real people like you and me. They lived in communities with the same kinds of gossip mills and social dynamics as we have today. When Jesus left heaven for earth, He came to the mess that we call society.
As I think of Mary, I imagine my own daughters if they had been in a similar situation and my heart shudders.
No wonder Mary trembled. But, the God who knows each of us knew her. And the angel noted that she should "rejoice" because she was "highly favored" and "blessed."
There is a lesson here for me. In my day-to-day challenges I don't see the big picture clearly, I easily get discouraged. But God views the larger whole. He knows that I am at times being blessed when all I can discern is the sky caving in on my life.
Lord, give me the eyes of faith so that I might truly see.
The angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And having come in, the angel said to her, "Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!" But when she saw him, she was troubled....Then the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God." Luke 1:26-30, NKJV.
Have you spent much time thinking about Mary? Here is a girl probably about 14 or 15 years of age who was engaged to an older man, as was the custom of the times.
That wasn't so bad. But then an angel shows up in her room and tells her she is going to be pregnant. Put yourself in her place. To say the least, this situation will be difficult to explain. After all, you can't exactly hide a protruding abdomen. Then there will be the baby. And what will Joseph think?
No wonder the Bible says she was troubled. You would be too.
But to get the full impact we need to mentally move back to the first century. Modern promiscuous culture has blunted our thinking on the topic. Let's face it, with 1 million teenage girls each year in the United States getting pregnant out of wedlock, we may not feel the full force of Mary's predicament. It is one thing to have a "problem" in New York City, but in a closely knit Jewish village in the first century the news brought by the angel must have been disconcerting in the extreme. After all, Jewish law regarded a betrothed woman who became pregnant as an adulteress, subject to death by stoning.
When we read the gospel story we need to remember that these were real people like you and me. They lived in communities with the same kinds of gossip mills and social dynamics as we have today. When Jesus left heaven for earth, He came to the mess that we call society.
As I think of Mary, I imagine my own daughters if they had been in a similar situation and my heart shudders.
No wonder Mary trembled. But, the God who knows each of us knew her. And the angel noted that she should "rejoice" because she was "highly favored" and "blessed."
There is a lesson here for me. In my day-to-day challenges I don't see the big picture clearly, I easily get discouraged. But God views the larger whole. He knows that I am at times being blessed when all I can discern is the sky caving in on my life.
Lord, give me the eyes of faith so that I might truly see.
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