The Real Mary

The message given in the United Methodist churches of the Wheatland Parish on Sunday morning, December 4, 2022.  The Bible verses used are Luke 1:26-38.

            Mary is one of the most famous and most revered people in the Bible.  And deservedly so.  She took on the responsibility of being the earthly mother of the divine Son of God.  That’s pretty incredible.

            But I think it’s unfortunate that we’ve kind of built up a mythology around Mary.  There are a lot of things we think we know about Mary that the Bible does not actually tell us.  Things that a lot of people say as if they were absolute facts, but which we have no way to know are actually true.

            For instance, you’ll often hear it said that Mary was very young, in her teens.  That may be, but the Bible does not tell us that.  The Bible does not give any clues about Mary’s age.  You’ll often hear it said that Mary was poor.  Again, that may be, but the Bible does not tell us that.  The Bible gives no clues about Mary’s wealth or social status.  You’ll hear it said that Mary was a beautiful woman.  She may have been, but the Bible does not say anything about what Mary looked like.  You’ll hear it said that Mary was perfect, sinless.  The Bible does not tell us that, either.  Mary was a human being, and so I assume she was as susceptible to sin as all human beings are.

            The reason I point this out is that I think making Mary this mythological, larger than life figure makes it hard for us to really relate to her.  We put her on a higher plane than the rest of us.  And that’s too bad.  It makes it hard for us to appreciate how remarkable the real Mary was, and it also makes it hard for us to think about what her story has to say to us.

            Mary is minding her own business, probably just doing her daily chores.  And the angel Gabriel appears to her.

            Did you ever wonder how that happens?  I mean, does the angel just suddenly appear–boom!--out of nowhere?  Does the angel kind of materialize gradually?  First you see something, but you don’t know what it is, and then it starts to take shape, and eventually it becomes a full blown angel?  Or does the angel not appear in front of our eyes at all?  Maybe we don’t see the angel appear, it appears out of our eyesight and then comes up to us.  I don’t know.

            But however it happened, there Mary was, with the angel Gabriel.  And Gabriel tells her that she’s going to give birth to a Son.  And not just any son, her Son was going to be the Son of the Most High, the Son of God, and He will receive the throne of His ancestor David.

            And this is all told to Mary as a statement of fact.  Gabriel does not say “Is this okay with you?  Are you on board with this?”  Gabriel just says this is what’s going to happen.  But Mary does agree to it.  She says, “I am the Lord’s servant.  Let your word to me be fulfilled.”

            I wonder if she really understood what it was that she was agreeing to.  I mean, it’s probably a pretty powerful experience to be in the presence of an angel.  You’re probably scared, you’re probably in awe, you probably cannot totally believe what’s happening.  And so, you probably would agree to whatever the angel said.  It might not even occur to you that you had a choice.

            But then Gabriel leaves.  And Mary starts to think about what just happened.  She starts to think about what Gabriel told her, and what she’s just agreed to.  And all the implications and consequences of this start to sink in.

            Mary, a single woman, is going to have a baby.  You know what everybody’s going to think.  Sure, she can tell them about this conversation with the angel Gabriel, but who’s gonna believe that?  Would you?  Seriously, if you knew a young woman who was going to have a baby, and she told you this story, would you believe her?  I don’t think anybody would.

            And then she thinks about Joseph.  The man she’s supposed to be going to marry.  How’s he going to react to all this?  Is he going to believe it?  Probably not, and why would he?  Is he going to go through with this marriage, knowing that she’s going to have a baby and the baby is not his?  The chances are he’s going to call the whole thing off.

            Then she thinks about her family.  They’re not going to believe her, either.  And they’re probably going to disown her.  After all, in their minds, she’s brought disgrace to the family, having a child when she’s not married.  Mary was looking at a real possibility of raising this child completely alone.

            I wonder at what point she said anything to anyone.  She may not have, at first.  Maybe she even started to wonder about it herself.  Maybe she started wondering if maybe she’d dreamed it all.  But of course, eventually, Mary could not deny the situation, and she could not hide it from anyone else.  She had to face the reality of the situation and deal with it.

            She must have been scared.  And yet, if she ever regretted what she’d agreed to do, we don’t read about it.  The Bible does not give any indication that she ever had any second thoughts.  The Bible does not tell us that she was ever sorry she had said she would do this.  As far as we can tell from the Biblical account, Mary was determined to go through with what the angel had told her.  And not only that, she was convinced that somehow, all of this was going to be to the honor and glory of God.

            And that is why God chose Mary.  When God was looking for someone to be the mother of the divine Son, God was not looking for a woman of a specific age.  God was not looking for a woman with a specific socio-economic status.  God was not looking for a beautiful woman–God knows how unimportant physical beauty is.  God was not looking for a woman who was perfect–God knows that perfect human beings don’t exist.  God was not looking for any of those things.  

            What God was looking for was a woman of great faith.  And that’s what God found in Mary–a woman of great faith.  A woman who could look at all the implications and all the consequences of what God had asked her to do, and say, it’s okay.  I’m going to do it anyway.  I’m going to do it, and I’m going to trust God to bring me through it.  If God wants me to do this, then God is going to see me through it.  I may not know how, but God will.  I’m going to trust God.

            Faith.  That’s what God was looking for in the mother of His divine Son.  And that’s what God looks for in you and me, too.  Faith.

            We talked last week about how God is asking each of us to do something.  But actually doing what God asks us to do takes faith.

            Sometimes the things God asks us to do will not be easy.  Sometimes no one will believe that what we’re doing actually is what God is asking us to do.  Sometimes, doing what God asks us to do may cause people to shut us out and leave us alone.  Sometimes, we may start to wonder ourselves if this is really what God is asking us to do.

            But if our faith is strong enough, we’ll be able to do it anyway.  We’ll do it with our eyes open, just as Mary did.  We’ll recognize all those implications and consequences.  We’ll know that it might not be easy–in fact, it might be really hard.  But we’ll be able to say, as Mary did, that it’s okay.  I’m going to do it anyway.  I’m going to do it, and I’m going to trust God to bring me through it.  I may not know how God will bring me through it, but I trust that God will.  I trust God.

            The mythological Mary, the perfect, sinless Mary, may seem beyond our reach.  But the real Mary is not.  The real Mary was, as far as we know, an ordinary person in many ways.  But she was an ordinary person who had great faith.

            The faith Mary had was great, but it is not beyond our reach.  You and I are entirely capable of having the same faith Mary had.  There is no reason we cannot trust God as much as Mary did.  The question is not whether we can.  The question is whether we will.

            That was the question for Mary, and it’s the question for us.  Mary was able to say yes.  I will trust God that much.  I do have that much faith.  Let’s decide, today, that our answer will be yes, too.