Highly Favored

 

The angel Gabriel told the virgin Mary that she was “highly favored” with God, yet she was “troubled” when she heard this news (Luke 1: 26-29), with good reason. After recovering from the fear and awe Gabriel caused her by his visitation and life-changing news, Mary had so much more to face as the reality hit her of this incredibly difficult yet significant assignment.

As a teenaged, betrothed virgin, she was pregnant, not with just any child, but with the Son of God conceived by the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:30-35). She would face rejection and criticism by her community, and the hurt and bewilderment of her fiancé Joseph, who thought she had been unfaithful and betrayed him (Matthew 1:18-19). She would escape the prying eyes and wagging tongues by traveling to the hill country to reach her cousin Elizabeth, an old woman also miraculously with child (Luke 1:36-40).

Then Mary and Joseph would set off for Bethlehem (Luke 2:4) on a long, bumpy journey with her precious Child bouncing up and down with each step of the donkey. She would wonder why no innkeeper could find room for the promised Messiah or His earthly family (Luke 2:7). She would endure the pain of childbirth in a smelly stable on scratchy hay, without any earthly comfort or help other than that given by her inexperienced husband and the warmth of the animals.

She would wonder why the King of Kings was not welcomed, recognized, and worshipped by most of those He came to save (John 1:10). She would face the pain and fear of knowing that Herod was trying to kill Him (Matthew 2:16-18) and that a sword would pierce Him and her soul also (Luke 2:34-35).

Yet the Bible says she was highly favored. How had she found favor with God? When faced with the impossible, Mary knew she had no strength, wisdom, experience or support of her own, and that the Lord Himself was her strength and her salvation. She turned it all over to Him, accepting His will and her role as “the handmaiden of the Lord” (Luke 1:38) with grace, courage and praise (Luke 1:46-49). He chooses those whom He favors not based on their ability, but on their availability and yieldedness to His will.

How did God show His favor toward Mary? God often favors His chosen servants not with worldly success, power, prestige, comfort and riches, but with trials that He can use to accomplish His will to His glory. Yet if He called you for a specific mission, He will provide all you need to complete it, once you are saved by trusting in His death, burial and resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:1-4) as the only Way (John 14:6) to Heaven..

God sent angels as ministering spirits (Hebrews 1:14) -- He sent Gabriel to Mary to inform her of His plan (Luke 1:30-35); and He sent an angel to Joseph so that He would help Mary carry out this plan (Matthew 1:20-25). He sent Mary to Elizabeth so that they could encourage and uplift each other (Luke 1:39-45). He sent angels to tell shepherds to worship the newborn King (Luke 2:8-20) and He sent a star to lead wise men to also worship Jesus (Matthew 2:2-11), giving Mary confirmation that her Child was indeed the Son of God. He spoke through dreams to protect Jesus from the evil plot of King Herod (Matthew 2:12-23).
 
We can do nothing apart from God (John 15:5,8), but with Him, all things are possible (Matthew 19:26; Luke 1:37).
 
So no matter what our weaknesses or what resources or experience we seem to lack, let’s be yielded to God’s will, and give Him praise as He works through us! His grace is sufficient; His strength is made perfect in our weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9); and to Him belongs all the glory!


Luke 1:28 And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.… And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.… 46 And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord, 47 And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour. 48 For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. 49 For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name.

© 2011 Laurie Collett

Reposted from the archives

“Baba” and Ruth: Following God

Whenever  I consider the book of Ruth, I am always reminded of my grandmother, “Baba,” who helped raise me from the time I was born until she went home to be with the Lord when I was 14 years old.

The first reason the book of Ruth reminds me of Baba is that she donated to her Russian Orthodox church in New York City a large oil painting of Ruth gleaning in the fields of Boaz (Ruth 2:2-9), which occupied a prominent place on a side wall in the main sanctuary. This was no small accomplishment and sacrifice considering her very modest means!

But more importantly, Ruth’s character and life have many parallels to that of my grandmother. Ruth left her home country to follow her mother-in-law to a new land and a new life. She left behind her family, customs, and pagan gods for a new country that worshipped the true God, Jehovah (Ruth 1:6-19).

At 16 years of age, my grandmother left her small village outside the city of Kiev, Ukraine, to follow her husband to a new world in Nova Scotia, Canada, with an entirely different society, form of government, climate and customs. The Ukraine was known as the bread basket of Russia because of its abundance of wheat fields, and farming these fields was the main occupation of her village. So it is not a stretch to imagine Baba as a young girl, gleaning wheat from the fields much as Ruth later was allowed to glean in the fields of Boaz!

In contrast, Nova Scotia was a harsh, unforgiving land, with bitterly cold winters leading to frequent illness, including pneumonia that claimed the lives of Baba’s nine children, leaving only my mother who survived past infancy. Baba’s husband Ivan, who worked as a mining engineer, was at risk for mining accidents and other occupational hazards that had led to the death of several of his coworkers.

One evening, Baba’s joy and relief to see Ivan return safely home from work quickly abated as he told her of an unusual experience he had while in the mine.

“I’ve seen Jesus, and I’ll be going home soon to be with Him,” he said.

Two weeks later, at the age of 35, Baba's husband collapsed and died, apparently from a fatal heart attack or stroke.

Ruth met her husband in her home country of Moab (Ruth 1:1-4), a pagan nation that worshipped Chemosh, also known as the fish-god, god of stone, or god of Baal. Chemosh may have been the same false god as Molech, whom the Ammonites worshipped with infant sacrifices (1 Kings 11:7,33; 2 Kings 3:27).

Ruth’s husband, his brother, and his parents had come to Moab from the Hebrew nation of Bethlehemjudah, which had been struck by a famine (Ruth 1:1:2). Rather than trusting God to provide for them at home, they ventured to where the grass seemed greener, even though it could not have been God’s will for them to assimilate into such an evil culture (Ezra 10:11; Nehemiah 9:2; 2 Corinthians 6:17).

Soon tragedy overcame them, as Ruth’s husband, her father-in-law and her brother-in-law died in Moab (Ruth 1:3-5), yet God had a plan that would work all things together for good (Romans 8:28), as we shall see in later posts. Only Naomi, her mother-in-law, and Orpah, her sister-in-law, remained of her new family.

After Ruth and Orpah were widowed, Naomi encouraged them to return to their family and old way of life, and Orpah eventually agreed. But Ruth dearly loved her mother-in-law, and she loved their true Jehovah God even more (Ruth 1:6-15). 

Ruth 1:16 And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God:

Ruth vowed never to depart from Naomi nor from her faith, and she followed Naomi back to her home town of Bethlehem (Ruth 1:17-19), which (like the Ukraine!) means “bread basket.” Bethlehem, in God’s chosen nation of Israel was the birthplace of Jesus, Who is the Bread of Life (John 6:35, 48. 51), so the name is fitting.

Like Ruth, Baba was then faced with an important decision – go home to the Ukraine and her old way of life, or remain in the new world that seemed to have treated her so cruelly. She and my mother chose the latter, although they moved from Nova Scotia to Manhattan’s lower East Side, which had a growing Russian and Ukrainian community.

Praise the Lord that we are not chained to the evil ways or false beliefs of the society in which we were raised! God offers each of us a choice to be made of our own free will – to accept His Son Jesus Christ and His freely given gift of salvation (Romans 6:23), or to reject Him and be condemned to eternal separation from Him and everlasting punishment in hell (John 3:18; Mark 9:43-49). We cannot be saved simply because we were born into a Godly home, nor can we be judged for the sins of our fathers (Deuteronomy 24:16; 2 Kings 14:6).

Once we become God’s children by trusting Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, we can have faith that He will never leave us nor forsake us (Hebrews 13:5), that He will always provide for us (Psalm 37:25), and that He will answer our prayers exceeding abundantly beyond what we could ever imagine or think (Ephesians 3:20). Both Baba and Ruth are a testimony to this, as we shall explore next time!

© 2018 Laurie Collett

 

Highly Favored (repost from December 2011)

by Kelby Roche

 The angel Gabriel told the virgin Mary that she was “highly favored” with God, yet she was “troubled” when she heard this news (Luke 1: 26-29), with good reason. After recovering from the fear and awe Gabriel caused her by his visitation and life-changing news, Mary had so much more to face as the reality hit her of this incredibly difficult yet significant assignment.

As a teenaged, betrothed virgin, she was pregnant, not with just any child, but with the Son of God conceived by the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:30-35). She would face rejection and criticism by her community, and the hurt and bewilderment of her fiancé Joseph, who thought she had been unfaithful and betrayed him (Matthew 1:18-19). She would escape the prying eyes and wagging tongues by traveling to the hill country to reach her cousin Elizabeth, an old woman also miraculously with child (Luke 1:36-40).

Then Mary and Joseph would set off for Bethlehem (Luke 2:4) on a long, bumpy journey with her precious Child bouncing up and down with each step of the donkey. She would wonder why no innkeeper could find room for the promised Messiah or His earthly family (Luke 2:7). She would endure the pain of childbirth in a smelly stable on scratchy hay, without any earthly comfort or help other than that given by her inexperienced husband and the warmth of the animals.

She would wonder why the King of Kings was not welcomed, recognized, and worshipped by most of those He came to save (John 1:10). She would face the pain and fear of knowing that Herod was trying to kill Him (Matthew 2:16-18) and that a sword would pierce Him and her soul also (Luke 2:34-35).

Yet the Bible says she was highly favored. How had she found favor with God? When faced with the impossible, Mary knew she had no strength, wisdom, experience or support of her own, and that the Lord Himself was her strength and her salvation. She turned it all over to Him, accepting His will and her role as “the handmaiden of the Lord” (Luke 1:38) with grace, courage and praise (Luke 1:46-49). He chooses those whom He favors not based on their ability, but on their availability and yieldedness to His will.

How did God show His favor toward Mary? God often favors His chosen servants not with worldly success, power, prestige, comfort and riches, but with trials that He can use to accomplish His will to His glory. Yet if He called you for a specific mission, He will provide all you need to complete it.

God sent angels as ministering spirits (Hebrews 1:14) -- He sent Gabriel to Mary to inform her of His plan (Luke 1:30-35); and He sent an angel to Joseph so that He would help Mary carry out this plan (Matthew 1:20-25). He sent Mary to Elizabeth so that they could encourage and uplift each other (Luke 1:39-45). He sent angels to tell shepherds to worship the newborn King (Luke 2:8-20) and He sent a star to lead wise men to also worship Jesus (Matthew 2:2-11), giving Mary confirmation that her Child was indeed the Son of God. He spoke through dreams to protect Jesus from the evil plot of King Herod (Matthew 2:12-23).
 
We can do nothing apart from God (John 15:5,8), but with Him, all things are possible (Matthew 19:26; Luke 1:37).
 
So no matter what our weaknesses or what resources or experience we seem to lack, let’s be yielded to God’s will, and give Him praise as He works through us! His grace is sufficient; His strength is made perfect in our weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9); and to Him belongs all the glory!


Luke 1:28 And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.… And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.… 46 And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord, 47 And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour. 48 For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. 49 For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name.

© 2012 Laurie Collett

(February 5, 2012):

Fight or Flight?)