Well, Merry Christmas! I’m super excited for this holiday season, because I’ve already had a lot of fun with it. I’ve enjoyed getting fun, personal gifts for my family to show them I love and appreciate them, and I always look forward to hosting events and activities for my friends to be able to spend quality time with them.
With Christmas coming up so soon, I knew that I wanted to write a piece celebrating the birth of Jesus, but I wanted this to be something that I learned from, not just copying down the story and publishing it without actually diving into it. For a while, I’ve actually wanted to learn more about Mary, because I believe that her perspective on the story of Christmas is invaluable and unique. From what I’ve already learned, she was a girl that displayed amazing levels of trust in God and obedience in His plan, and we can all learn a lot from her story of how God used her to fulfill the Gospel.
Why Mary?
In the book of Luke, Mary is simply stated to be a virgin betrothed to Joseph. She had no special status, and held no position of power. In fact, we can infer based on the time period where this happened that she could have been anywhere from fourteen to sixteen years old! This sounds completely unreasonable in today’s context, but conditions were much different then. The average lifespan was significantly shorter than it is now, and so many girls often got married and began bearing children as soon as they were physically able to. However, Mary was still vastly inexperienced, seeing as how she had never had children before this.
So, why did God choose Mary to give birth to and raise the Savior? God could have picked a mother who had lots of experience raising children, because then Jesus would have been raised with a high-quality of living from someone who knew exactly what they were doing. He could even have lived a luxurious life, safe from any impending dangers of the world.
I think it is beautiful that God knew this, and still chose an average-looking teenage girl for an extremely important task. He chose Mary, not because of any amazing child-raising abilities she had, but because she displayed an incredible amount of trust in God’s plan, and obedience in carrying out His will, and we see it here in the Gospel of Luke:
“In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, ‘Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!’ But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. And the angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.’
And Mary said to the angel, ‘How will this be, since I am a virgin?’
And the angel answered her, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy-the Son of God. And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.’ And Mary said, ‘Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.’ And the angel departed from her.” (Luke 1:26-38)
How astounding is this?! Mary is suddenly given a task far bigger than she could have imagined, and her response is “‘I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.’” These are the words of a wise woman who knows her Lord well and desires to submit to Him in every way. This trust is what set Mary apart, and made her the right person to be mother to Jesus Christ himself.
In life, we are given tasks, just like Mary. God gives us an opportunity, sometimes disguised as a challenge, to help build the kingdom of God. I know that it can be scary, but if I’m going to be honest, none of us are ever going to be asked to do something like be the mother of the Savior of the world. If Mary was able to take on such a task as this with immediate obedience through faith in God, we are surely able to obey whatever the Lord tells us to do in our own lives.
Prophecy Fulfillment
It seems strange to talk about prophecies while learning about Mary, because the only Christmas prophecies that are seen talk directly about Jesus. I never thought about it, until I recently did some research and learned how many different things had to happen in order for every prophecy to be fulfilled. In fact, a lot of these were centered around Mary, and they stand as a testament of God’s power and omnipotence. I am going to go through some of the biggest ones that I can find, and hopefully you are able to see God’s handiwork throughout the entire Bible to get to Jesus’ birth.
Mary’s lineage
At the time of Luke 1, Mary was betrothed to Joseph, who is listed in Matthew 1 to be in the genealogy of Jesus Christ, related to people such as David and Abraham. The prophecy in Isaiah 11:1 states that “There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse”, and this proof of Mary’s lineage through her betrothed fulfills this.
Jesus’ location at birth
Micah 5:2 says this: “But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.” This prophecy was fulfilled in a somewhat unusual fashion, because Mary and Joseph were traveling to Bethlehem right when she gave birth. Luke 2 records that Mary and Joseph had to go there to be registered, which was not something that was common or happened often. Something that seemed like chance was actually God’s meticulous plan.
Mary’s virginity
The fact that Mary was a virgin is one of the reasons that she was chosen over experienced women with many children. I wrote about this a lot in last year’s Christmas post, but her virginity was proof of Jesus being fully man, yet fully God, since Mary could not yet have a child in the traditional sense. This fulfills the prophecy in Isaiah that says that “the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.” (Isaiah 7:14).
Mary’s hometown
The Old Testament states in Isaiah 53 that Jesus would come from a humble place that didn’t have a great reputation, and John 1:46 proves that (“Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”) Mary had not been planning this her whole life, but it instead was God, who had brought Mary to where she needed to be years and years in advance. This is proof of God’s divine being.
I love that I have been able to spend some time learning about Mary’s story, because it gives a new perspective to the Christmas story. I admire her complete trust in God’s plan, even when she doesn’t fully understand it, and I want to mirror that same type of obedience that she showed in Luke 1 when God tells me to do something.
I hope that you were able to learn a bit more about Mary’s character, and that it inspires you to do a bit more digging in her story to learn more about her. I hope you all have a great Christmas, and that you are able to experience peace and joy this holiday season! <3
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