Gabriel's Gospel to Mary (Lk 1:26-56)

Backstory: God had called Abraham and had promised him multiple descendants and a homeland to bless the world (Genesis 12:1-3, 15, and 17). His descendant ended up in Egypt for 400 years and became enslaved. God rescued them through Moses and brought into their homeland under Joshua, though they didn’t fully possess it until God made David Israel’s king. They were to be God’s ‘treasured possession’ and be God’s ‘holy nation’ (Exodus 19:4-6). However, instead of being a ‘light to the nations’ they became idolatrous like the other nations. The Northern kingdom was defeated and scattered by the Assyrians and later the Southern kingdom was taken into Babylonian captivity. God restored them to their land after 70 years because God was determined to bless the world through Abraham and make a ‘Son of David’ king over God’s people forever (2 Samuel 7:12-14). They returned to their land under the Persians, but they remained dominated in their own land. Then at the time of the Roman Empire they were longing for God to send a ‘conquering king’ to liberate them and God sent them Jesus (Isaiah 42:1-9, 61:1-3)!  

²⁶ We are told that in Elizabeth’s sixth month of pregnant, the Lord sends the angel Gabriel, who had told Zechariah that he would have a ‘great son’ who would go before the Lord and prepare a people for the Lord’. Now Gabriel is sent to Nazareth of all places; an insignificant place and of ‘poor reputation’ (John 1:46). Moreover, Gabriel goes ²⁷ to an ‘unknown girl from this insignificant village’ and she’s a virgin somewhere between 12-14 years old and her name is Mary.²⁸ The angel greets Mary calling her ‘highly favored’ and telling her that the ‘Lord is with her’. ²⁹ This troubled Mary and she wondered about the meaning since she’s not used to thinking of herself in such ‘blessed’ terms. ³⁰ The angel assures Mary’s that need not be afraid for she had ‘found favor with God’. ³¹ Then Gabriel tells her that she would have a son, to be named Jesus, and that her ³² great son would be called the ‘Son of the Most High’. In addition the Lord God would give him the throne of his father David, ³³ and he will reign over Jacob’s house forever with no end to his kingdom. 

Now Mary responds with faith, but she wants to know how this is going to happen since she is a virgin. ³⁵ The angel says this will be the work of God’s Holy Spirit and that this would come about when the ‘power of the Most High’ would overshadow Mary. As a result, the ‘holy child’ to be born to Mary would be the very ‘Son of God’. ³⁶ Mary wanted to know how this was going to happen. She didn’t ‘doubt’ and she wasn’t asking for a ‘sign’ or ‘for proof’, but Gabriel gives her something to follow-up on. Gabriel tells Mary that her elderly and ‘barren’ relative, Elizabeth, would have a child in her old age. She could check it out because Elizabeth was already in her sixth month of pregnancy. The inevitable explanation or conclusion to all this was that ³⁷ ‘nothing is impossible with God’.

³⁸ This makes Mary the ideal example of New Testament faith! She sees herself as the ‘Lord’s servant’ and she wants God’s will done in her life. She embraces God’s will and she does so knowing that others would doubt her story and would consider the child to have been conceived out of wedlock. She answers Gabriel saying, “May it be to me as you have said!” Mary’s reaction to Gabriel’s announcement is very different than Zechariah reaction to his ‘good news’ about his son through Elizabeth. Zechariah wanted to be assured since he and Elizabeth were elderly. However, Zechariah as a priest and he would have known scripture well. God had the womb of Samson’s mother and had also opened Hannah’s womb. Also Hannah’s son, Samuel, was a prophet who ‘anointed David King of Israel’ which in a way prefigured what John would do for Jesus. Moreover, Israel had come into existence through the barren Sarah, who gave birth to Isaac when Abraham was 100 and Sarah was 90. Zechariah should have none that this was ‘not impossible for God’.

On the other hand, Mary was an illiterate girl from the village. She would have heard these stories in the Synagogue, and she believed the angel’s announcement. However, nothing like a ‘virgin’ birth had ever happened or would ever happen again. She believed, but she needed addition explanation and once she received it she accepted as God’s will for her life, no matter what hardship may have resulted. So after Gabriel’s explanation she headed off to find Elizabeth. ⁴¹ Upon arrival Mary greets Elizabeth, and at the sound of Mary’s voice the baby in Elizabeth’s womb leaps for joy. Elizabeth is filled with the Holy Spirit and she goes into ecstatic praise of God.

We are given this incredible picture of John, in Elizabeth’s womb, jumping for joy. We also see the Spirit of God filling Elizabeth and producing joy in the child in her womb. Ironically, her husband’s mouth had been closed but the Spirit fills Elizabeth enabling her to proclaim in a loud voice that ‘Mary was blessed’ and that Mary’s ‘child was blessed’. But even more amazing is Elizabeth’s question as to why she is so favored that the mother of Elizabeth’s Lord would come to her? There is this amazing picture of the ‘Spirit-filled’ baby John in Elizabeth’s womb worshiping the ‘Messiah Jesus’ who is in his Mother’s womb as well. With Zechariah’s unbelief in the background Elizabeth tells Mary, ⁴⁵ “Blessed is she who has believed that what the Lord has said will be accomplished!”