Spiritual Hiccups - Mary's Costly "Yes"

If the Catholic Church has venerated Mary, we Protestants have largely ignored her, which is most unfortunate.  Not that I want to add "Ave Maria" to our choir's repertoire, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't acknowledge her shining example of discipleship as depicted in Luke's gospel reading today. 

Most Christians know the story.  The angel Gabriel comes to the young Mary, telling her that she will conceive and give birth to a son named Jesus.  The problem with this plan is obvious to Mary, who explains to Gabriel that she is a virgin. But of course this is no problem with God involved.  As witnessed by the old and barren Elizabeth who is now pregnant, "nothing will be impossible with God."

Now I assume that Mary enters into this a bit like all parents.  No prospective parent fully realizes what will be required of her once the baby comes, once the terrible twos arrive, once the child becomes a teenager, and so on.  But I have to think that Mary knows this will not be easy.  Saying "Yes" to God will leave her pregnant before she's married, and, as she will learn shortly after Jesus is born, "a sword will pierce (her) own soul too."  But still Mary says, "Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word."

Since nothing is impossible for God, things proceed as Gabriel has said.  But what if Mary had said, "No" instead?  The story doesn't really consider that option, but still it seems that God's impossibility requires Mary's "Yes," just as it will continue to require a "Yes" from those Jesus calls to follow him.  I've never fully understood why God works this way, but God's plans, God's future, God's hope for a new day, all seem to require a "Yes" from people.  And that "Yes" almost always gets those people mixed up in all sorts of difficulties.

Over the centuries, Christians have sentimentalized the Christmas story, turned it into something all sweet and lovely.  But Mary's "Yes" turns her life upside down, and it will include watching her own son die horribly on a cross.  She can't possibly know all that when she speaks with Gabriel, but she seems to know her Scripture, and so she knows that whenever you say, "God, I'm your servant; do with me as you see fit," life is about to get messy.

And in the end, maybe this is why it is more palatable for Catholics to venerate Mary and for Protestants to regard her as little more than a teenage baby incubator.  Neither requires us to take seriously what it means to say "Yes" to God.

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