Pondering Mary

“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” 
- Luke 1:38

Today as you reflect on this humble, simple response by Mary to God’s crazy, wonderful, dangerous, costly plan, use these two tools to help you think about your response to God this season. The first is a painting by the Haitian artist Ismael Saincilus to ponder (What surprises you in it? What comforts you? What is it saying to you about Mary?); the second is a poem/prayer by an Old Testament scholar, Walter Brueggemann (Pray it quietly to yourself).

In our secret yearnings we wait for your coming,
And in our grinding despair we doubt that you will.
And in this privileged place
we are surrounded by witnesses who yearn more than do we
and by those who despair more deeply than do we.
Look upon your church and its pastors in this season of hope
which runs so quickly to fatigue
and in this season of yearning which becomes so easily quarrelsome.
Give us the grace and the patience
to wait for your coming to the bottom of our toes,
To the edges of our fingertips...
Come in your power and come in your weakness
in any case come and make all things new.
Amen.

-Walter Brueggemann