You who are highly favoured.
In Luke 1:28-29 NIV, we read how Mary was visited by an angel:
The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favoured! The Lord is with you.” Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be.
I find this passage a little humorous as it seems that Mary is sceptical about the angel’s amazing statement that she is highly favoured, “What kind of greeting might this be?” was her first thought. 😂
It reminds me of me and my dad. Whenever I approach my father with a long “Daaaaaaaaaaad?” (imagine the tone of my voice going up at the end), he knows I’m about to ask him for a favour. His usual response is, “What do you want?” A mix of playful teasing and mild dread at whatever scheme I’ve cooked up.
It is as if Mary, too, was thinking, “What do you want from me?” and it troubled her greatly!
Putting myself in Mary’s place, my first thought was that I would respond differently to the words “you are highly favoured.” Probably something more along the lines of “Wow, thank you!”
But as I pondered on Mary’s reaction, something struck me. Being called by God can be (and often is) both a great blessing and an extremely daunting task.
It is possible to be both highly favoured and greatly troubled at the same time. Mary was.
This doesn’t mean that Mary didn’t trust God or that she was disobedient; she was simply human.
Being a Christian means we are all highly favoured and called to do the good works God prepared for us (Ephesians 2:10), but that doesn’t mean that at times we can feel greatly troubled by the huge task that lies ahead of us. Even Mary, the mother of Jesus, had a moment where she wondered what she had gotten herself into.
friend, do you ever feel daunted by the fact that God wants to use you?
