A tale of two women

At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea, where she entered Zechariah’s home and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. In a loud voice she exclaimed: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear!...” Luke 1:39-42

No man, of course, can even begin to imagine what it’s like to be a pregnant woman. You probably need a variety of words to capture it: frightening, wonderful, awe-inspiring. And when the baby first moves or kicks in the womb – what a moment that must be! To think that the age-old miracle of new life is being acted out inside your body…

It’s commonplace, of course; it happens millions of times every day; it’s the most ordinary thing in the world. But try telling that to the mother! No, it’s the most special, amazing thing imaginable.

The opening chapters of Luke’s Gospel are, among other things, a tale of two pregnant women: Elizabeth and Mary. And each of them is giddy with amazement.

It’s Elizabeth that we meet first. The wife of a priest called Zechariah, she is old and well past the age of childbirth: she and Zechariah’s prayers for a child have not been answered. But Zechariah, going about his priestly duties in the Jerusalem temple, receives an angelic visitor who frightens him out of his wits and then staggers him with a message: “Do not be afraid… your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John…” (Luke 1:11-13).

John – more usually known to us as John the Baptist - is destined to have a short and difficult life; indeed, a troubled and often unhappy life. But he is sent to earth by God for a unique role; he is the one who paves the way for Jesus, the Messiah of the Jews.

And so Luke moves on to Mary and her husband-to-be, Joseph (Luke 1:26). As with Zechariah, the announcement of the angel – named in this case as Gabriel - is alarming to Mary: she knows enough about human biology to realise that something very unusual is going on here. But Gabriel reassures her, and tells her about “Elizabeth your relative”. The encounter ends with a simple statement of trust and submission: says Mary, “I am the Lord’s servant… May your word to me be fulfilled” (Luke 1: 38).

For me the highlight of the story is the moment Elizabeth’s baby “leaped in her womb for joy” as the two women greeted one another. The cynic will say, no doubt, that it was just coincidence that baby John stirred at that precise moment; but I don’t think Luke meant that. No, this was a wonderful prophetic foreshadowing of what was to come – you could say, of what John described more fully in John 1:29.

God is on the move as never before!

So… a story about two women and their husbands. But it has much to say on various levels, and especially much about the character of the God we believe in.

Let’s highlight a few things…

First, God rewards persevering faith.

I think we can assume that Zechariah and Elizabeth had long since stopped praying for a child. And there’s nothing necessarily wrong with that; nothing wrong with reaching a point where we say “God’s answer seems to be No”.

But I think we can also assume that many years earlier they had prayed fervently for a child; and also that they had been a truly prayerful couple throughout their lives, even after that particular hope had died in them.

And now – completely unexpectedly, their prayer is answered after all.

It’s as if sometimes God puts our prayers “on hold”, saving up the answer for the perfect moment known only to him. So let’s ponder this: a prayer you prayed twenty-five years ago – a prayer you have forgotten ever praying – may be answered tomorrow.

Second, God delights to work in and through ordinary people.

Both couples in this story are of humble origins. Though Zechariah was a priest, and that sounds pretty important, we need to remember that priesthood was a status you were born into as a male descendant of Aaron, the brother of Moses, rather than one you were called to, as we tend to think of spiritual leadership today.

Mary comes across as a typical young woman, perhaps little more than a girl, who finds it hard to grasp why God should “be mindful of the humble estate of his servant” (Luke 1:48). And Joseph was a carpenter, a craftsman whose work would have given him a respected place in the town of Nazareth, but not as a leader.

The point being… God loves to use those whose only “qualification” is humble trust in him and glad obedience to him: think David in the Old Testament; think Simon Peter in the New.

And then, perhaps, ask the question: how qualified am I? Who knows what God might have in mind for some of us? How open are we to some possibility at present beyond our imaginations?

I’ve run out of space, and there is more still to glean from this beautiful story. So please re-join me next time!

Thank you, Father, for Elizabeth and Mary and their husbands. As I reflect on their wonderful stories, help me to look at my own very ordinary life and to believe that with you all things are possible. Amen.