Mary’s Mantra

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

IT WAS A SIGH HEARD AROUND THE WORLD. As if I asked my son to give me his right arm. And maybe a leg too. Pure exhaustion exhaled from his lips, revealing the heavy burden I’d placed on him.

I had asked my son to get the mail.

His sigh, his guttural disgust, poured out in front of me. The song I used to sing to him as a three-year-old to “obey right away” had since gotten lost in the recesses of his still-developing frontal lobe. A quick “Yes, Mom” was all I was looking for.

But before I keep pointing a finger at my beloved boy, I have to acknowledge the fingers pointing back at me. After all, when a colleague asks me to do something that is inconvenient, how often do I sigh in my heart? When my children need me to stop what I am doing to help them, how often do I inwardly groan? When God nudges my soul, how often do I hesitate to obey because I am doing something else?

This is why Mary, God’s mother, is fascinating to me. Not only as a girl did she grow Jesus in her womb, she also handled an encounter with the angel Gabriel like a champ. After confronting Mary—and I’m sure, scaring the living daylights out of her—the angel tells her,

“Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. . . .

“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. . . .”

“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.

Luke 1:30-32, 35, 38, NIV

Did you catch it? In the middle of the angel Gabriel’s bright light, the mystery of this pregnancy, and her confusion, she said, “I am the Lord’s servant.” Her quick, obedient response gets me every time.

She didn’t keep asking clarifying questions or for more understanding.

She took it all in. She let it settle in her heart. She pondered it all.

God had a specific job for her, and it was intense. He handed her a task that looked impossible. He gave her an assignment that no one had ever been given before. And her response is gorgeous.

“I am the Lord’s servant.”

Today, may we memorize Mary’s mantra, repeat her response, and take notes from the grace she displayed so we are ready for whatever God has for us. Let’s practice: “I am the Lord’s servant.”

GRACE REFLECTION: What is the last thing someone asked you to do that you sighed at? Go back to that moment and picture the better response. Ask God to help you become a woman who serves Him readily and easily.