The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.” (Luke 1:35)
Christmas is a magical time of year - or so the songs in all the stores and shopping malls are telling us. Yet there was nothing ‘magic’ about the incredible power that gripped Mary’s life that day and turned her onto a path she could never have foreseen. There was also nothing ‘magic’ about the response that came forth from her lips, “I am the servant of the Lord. Let it be done to me according to your word.” That was all her, pure faith. Somehow we forget that Mary was actually taken aback by this random stranger appearing with his outlandish message. Wouldn’t you be? Think about it: ‘Hey Mary, you’re about to get pregnant with God’. Cool! Sweet! Too easy.
God seems to love operating in the unexpected though, doesn’t he. After all, no-one expected a king to be born in a stable, least of all three rich astrologers. No-one expected a bunch of shepherds from the hills to get the first selfie invitation, least of all King Herod. And no-one expected a virgin to give birth, least of all Mary! But this is the way God turns up in our lives – unexpected, surprising, wearing different clothing. And when He does, we too like Mary can scratch our heads and wonder.
At the end of the day however we only have two responses to choose from. Either: “Yeah, nah… That’s a bit too much God. Thanks, but no thanks.” Or the same response as Mary; ‘Have it your way, Lord. I submit to you. Lead the way.’ Mary in this moment became the first Christian disciple, because she was the first one to invite Jesus to enter her life by an act of radical faith. Not magic - faith.
Yet things went alot further than ‘inviting Jesus into her heart’, didn’t it. Imagine being so filled with the Holy Spirit that you became literally ‘pregnant with God’? The reality is, this is something we are all called to do, not just Mary. The guys reading this are probably struggling a bit now, but hear me out.
Attracting god’s attention
For a start, rewind the story and we see that Mary challenges us to set our lives apart in a way that ‘attracts the attention of God’. That’s what Mary was doing right up until this moment - not filling her twitter feed with updates - but living a life of holiness, prayer and service. “You have found favour with God” the angel said. That’s what I want an angel to say to me when he turns up! So the question goes begging, who are you when no-one’s looking? Because the truth is that someone is; Someone wonderful. And what He is looking for is humility, holiness and hidden service. “Don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing”, as Jesus said.
Second, when God reveals His call to us we need to not resist, no matter how strange the invitation might be. Just say ‘yes’ and work the rest out later. “Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!” a woman from the crowd once called out. “Blessed rather are those who hear the Word of God and obey it”, Jesus said of his mother (Lk 11:28).
So it seems that we need three things:
To live a life SET APART that attracts Gods intention
To say YES to God’s radical call when he comes knocking
And then what? Simply this: to be so filled with the HOLY SPIRIT that we give birth to Christ in the world. Not Mary: You - Me - Christians everywhere. We need the power of the Most High to ‘overshadow us’, like He did at the dawn of creation over the dark waters, before the first word of faith was spoken and light broke forth. For what purpose? To become so filled with the Good News that we can’t keep it “like a fire inside my bones” any longer (Jer 20:9), but we have to share it with the world. Pregnant with faith, bursting with hope, giving birth to the kingdom! That’s our challenge this Christmas.
What’s the end goal? Simply this. To be so filled with the Holy Spirit that we ‘give birth to Christ in the world’. Not Mary: You - Me.
When we rewind the Christmas story, we find that it all began right back here, with a young woman surrendering her life to the power of the Holy Spirit. My proposal is that in order to become the ‘mother of earth’s children’, the Christian Church once again needs to do the same. But, like Christmas, it’s not going to happen by magic. It’s going to start with each of us, individually. And so this season, I invite you to pray this prayer with me:
‘Come Holy Spirit. Overshadow me today with your power, that Christ may be conceived and born into the world through my life. Mary, intercede for us, that the Church would be open to the surprise of the Holy Spirit, and that each of us would surrender to his radical action in our lives, as you did.
We pray in Jesus’ name, amen.’