“The angel Gabriel came was sent by God to a city in the Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man named Joseph, of the house of David; the virgin’s name was Mary. Approaching her, the angel said, ‘Shalom, favoured lady! The LORD is with you!’” (Luke 1:26-28)
The word “shalom” is a greeting of peace, but is also related to favour or grace. Mary is declared quite simply to have been a virgin (“parthenos” in Greek). There are not two meanings for that word. The meaning is simple and self-evident. But she was a virgin betrothed, not married. Betrothal lasted in those times for one year. It was in that period in her life that the angel visited her.
Her character is revealed in the salutations of the angel.
First in Luke 1:28: “Shalom, favoured lady! The LORD is with you!” And then in Luke 1:30: “You have found favour with God.” In these two lines of salutation we have a portrait of Mary.
Living in Nazareth, with the dark and sinister background of its conditions, in the midst of all kinds of impurity and iniquity; she was endued with favour and grace, and the LORD was with her.
Notice what happened (Luke 1:29): “She was greatly troubled.”
She was greatly agitated at the saying and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this might be. She was agitated at the manner of the angel’s address. She was not agitated at the fact of an angelic visit. To be told by this bright angelic being that she had found favour with God, she could not understand it. She did not know that. She was not conscious of the beauty of her character. That is in itself a revelation.
When presently the angel made to her the great and startling announcement that she was to be the mother of the Messiah without a moment’s hesitation, artlessly and honestly, the transparent simplicity of the woman is revealed when she said to the angel (Luke 1:34):
“How can this be, since I am a virgin?”
Then when the angel had answered that inquiry and more than answered it as we shall see, look at her once more. That quietly bowed head and the words that passed her lips are again revealing (Luke 1:38):
“I am the servant of the LORD; may it happen to me as you have said.”
Mary was the servant of God for the fulfillment of that tremendous office, the mother of Messiah. Behold her, the virgin Mary, never rightly apprehending the truth about him until after the day of Shavuot (Pentecost); a sinning soul, needing redemption through her child, the son of God, and yet radiant in beauty, walking amid the shadows in fellowship with God, in that dark Nazareth.
Now we turn to the story:
The angelic approach (v. 26-29)
The angelic annunciation (v. 30-34)
The angelic interpretation (v. 35-38)
1. The angelic approach:
There came this heavenly messenger to this home, to this girl, and so he spoke. It is a wonderful revelation of the fact that in any of the darkest days of human history, God has always had His elect remnant, He has always had souls that He could approach, through whom He has been able to move forward. He is always needing vantage ground, and has always found it, and mostly where men would not have sought it. The messenger came not to Judea, not to Jerusalem, not to the Temple, but to a home, on the level of the ordinary, to a despised town and rightly despised because of corruption; and to Galilee, held in contempt by the people of privilege; and to one woman walking in the fellowship of God. There God found His vantage ground.
2. The angelic annunciation:
The annunciation commenced (Luke 1:30):
“Don’t be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God.”
This was not a description of her character. This was the description of the high office of that maiden. In human history, in the march of the ages, in the vastness of the economy of God, that fact is emphasized as the reason why she was chosen. Thus the mystery was announced (Luke 1:31):
“You will become pregnant, you will give birth to a son.”
That was heaven’s declaration to Mary.
His name was also announced: “You are to name him Yeshua.” We read it with all the radiant glory and beauty of the centuries of interpretation and understanding and experience beating upon it. And yet we may miss something. “Jesus” is the Greek form of the name “Yeshua”. “Yeshua” is derived from “Yehoshua” (“Joshua”). “Yehoshua” is the combination of “Hoshea” (salvation) and the Name of God “Yah” to mean “Yah is salvation”. Moreover, “Yeshua” is in the future tense meaning “he will save”. I wonder if she leapt to its true significance.
At last, after the running of the centuries, the One was now coming who should bear that Name perfectly and fulfill its meaning perfectly: “Yah is salvation”. His equipment is described in the words (Luke 1:32):
“He will be great, he will be called Son of the Most High.”
Then we come to Mary’s challenge and it was the challenge of faith. It was a perfectly natural question which she asked. She did not challenge the fact, but the method. She said (Luke 1:34):
“How can this be since I am a virgin?”
It is the cold, scientific, biological difficulty, bluntly stated. How is it possible for a woman to bear a child, save as the result of being impregnated by a man?
3. The angelic interpretation:
We read in Luke 1:35:
“The angel answered her: ‘The Holy Spirit will come over you, the power of the Most High will overshadow you.”
That is a tremendous word: “overshadow” (“episkiazo” in Greek); that is, envelop with a shadow, or to envelop in a haze of brilliancy, of light. That was the answer of the angel to Mary.
But there is another problem. In the light of all human history there is a moral question, and Mary did not raise it. Supposing that it can be that a child can thus be born of a woman, how is it possible to escape the contamination of human nature? It is a wonderful thing that when the angel answered her question he went on to answer the other, though she did not raise it. The angel answered the biological question, saying: This thing shall be done by the direct act of God, the power of the Most High, the Holy Spirit wrapping you around, Mary; overshadowing you, producing in your womb the child; and also by that same act, by that same energy, by that same force – the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, that which is begotten shall be held from contamination with the sin of your nature and in human nature. He shall be holy. He shall have being in your womb by the act of God; he shall be held from contamination with the sinfulness of your nature, by the same act of God.
What a beautiful story reminding us how our Messiah Yeshua was born into the world, through a humble yet highly favoured vessel made possible through the power of the Most High. As we read in Luke 1:37, the angel closed out his visit to Mary with these words:
“For with God, nothing is impossible.”
God is not limited by the ordinary; He can do and does do extraordinary things. All it takes is a humble and willing vessel to work with Him in this world. As Mary said in Luke 1:38:
“I am the servant of the LORD; may it happen to me you have said.”
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