The story of Mary is one that we know well. A young woman engaged to be married has an encounter with an angel who tells her that a true miracle is happening within and around her. Mary asks questions but it is clear from Luke’s telling that she is a woman of faith.
Mary is told that the unimaginable is going to happen – she who has never been intimate with a man – is going to have a child. In the same breath the angel points to other proof of God’s ability; that her cousin Elizabeth is expecting a child well past natural child bearing years. While these are obviously different miraculous events it is clear that Mary is impacted by what she hears.
Her response to her visit from the angel is to go and visit Elizabeth. In fact, the Scriptures seem to indicate that it was a little bit out of the way to get to where she was headed; the hill country of Judea. This is faith. You hear that God is doing something miraculous in yourself and that something miraculous has already occurred among a friend and relative and she heads out to be challenged and encouraged by what is happening in their lives.
What is God doing in your life right now? Does anyone else know? Have you made a trip to visit someone and asked questions and marveled in the unexplainable?
Let me show you a way that you may have done this without fully realizing what was happening. When is the last time that you sat in a church service? Now, with COVID-19 a reality some of you may have not done this for a while, but think of the last time that you were in a meeting like a church service.
Who was there with you? Would you believe the number of miracles that are happening in that gathering right then? Now I know as a member of a Southern Baptist church we have a tendency to only think something miraculous is happening when someone walks down the aisle or a baptism is celebrated. Certainly these are to be celebrated but as someone who sometimes faces the congregation the real miracles are sitting in the pews, watching via TV, or listening via podcasts sometime later.
What has brought that unique collection of individuals together to worship God together when there are so many barriers that would normally keep them apart? To willingly commit to be together with others, others whom are different, whom are challenging to us, this is a commitment of faith in the miracle working God of Heaven and Earth.
If you’re able, leave your seat; virtual or real, and spend sometime talking with and communicating with others. You will have your faith encouraged and be challenged in your belief in the One who is able to make all things well.
Surely salvation has come to Israel and the world.
