TOTHEUNTAMEDHEART.

Pregnant me doesn’t always react gracefully to my emotions. Its a fact. Non pregnant me doesn’t either, but pregnant me SURE AS HECK doesn’t, if that emphasis helps you catch my drift. & lately, to be honest, I have been struggling, ready to throw in the towel on every one & every one who I feel has wronged me, then throw the towel in on myself for being an awful representation of Christ.

 

I pray all the time. But my prayers are like this: “God give me patience” & then I run out of the room growling at everyone around me. Theoretically. But I have mastered the Lion symbolism of God fairly well.

 

So worship Sunday. Yes, we start again in worship on Sunday. I guess that’s the place God has been speaking to me with the most clarity because its the time I stop growling at everyone so I can hear him.

 

I don’t know how it happened. All I know is this is what I heard, this one sentence, & then my brain took that one sentence & turned it into all the rest of this. So. Here we go.

 

Mary was a sinner.

 

Mary was a sinner who carried Jesus within her.

 

Yes, she was a virgin, but she wasn’t sin free. & yet, God.

 

God tells Gabriel to send the message he is placing Jesus inside of Mary.
Mary, the virgin but sinner, to carry Emmanuel— God with us.
Our redemptive key, growing in the womb of Mary. The virgin. The imperfect.

 

I am not saying Mary was the worst. Some serial killer. I’m just saying she wasn’t the perfect goody two shoes who has always lived in my mind when I think of Virgin Mary. She had bad days, too.

 

& yet, God still chose her to carry God within her. To mother the most important to walk the earth. He knew her fully— flaws, virginity, & all— & chose her anyways.

 

So why do we let Satan trap us with his words where we are not enough because we are not perfect? Because we don’t master the days? Because we haven’t mastered our anger or parenting or marriage?

 

Since when is God not to be trusted at His word? Why would we think we are any different than Mary?

 

Sometimes we put words in God’s mouth.

 

For example, sometimes I think we believe He chose Mary because of who she was. A virgin.Therefore, God’s preferential towards virgins. Therefore, me already having messed that up means I can’t be used to the degree she was.

 

Before my message is misconstrued, allow me to clear this up: Yes, God loves purity & obedience. He loves a good, moral decision. But God’s reason for choosing Mary, the virgin, to fulfill this had nothing to do with her.

 

He chose Mary so He couldn’t of been mistaken for any less than the God man he was. He chose Mary so we would feel the weight of His glory, hear the click of his shoes as he stepped off the thrown & walked down to be born next to feeding pigs.

 

If Mary wasn’t a virgin, she probably would’ve dismissed the angel coming to her as another wacky pregnancy dream, & the child mistaken as her husbands.

 

But just because the Bible & every Catholic & Christian makes it clear she was a virgin doesn’t mean she was sinless. The answer is in the fact there was still a need for a cross & Jesus.

 

Mary could’ve been a gossiping queen. A rumor starter. An awful pregnant woman. Joseph could’ve had a bad temper or could’ve been a lazy worker. This is all hypothetical, but what isn’t is the fact they, too, needed a savior. They, too, were struggle buses at times.

 

& this is the beauty of it. While we are still human & mess up, God isn’t ripping His Spirit out of our chests, like, “Oh! Hurry! Gotta go— imperfection!”

 

Sometimes I think we are stuck in the doorway mindset where God is simply straddling the doorway entrance, waiting for our slightest mistake so he can jump back out like a germaphobe. Then we do something good like read our Bible or pay it forward & he steps back into the doorway, looking around in approval at how clean the place is. But he never fully comes in & he never sits down.

 

He is here, though. Right now. All in.
He has already lounged back on the couch beside you, not out of weakness. He simply will do anything to stay. He loves to be invited in & welcomed. He loves hospitality, when we make room for him & don’t give him the boot in our tough times.

 

Just as God said that Jesus paid the price once & for all.

 

Just as God chose Mary, a sinner, to make God in the flesh.

 

Just as God said if we simply believe.

 

Christ is in us, too, love. You & I, just like Mary, carry the hope of glory.

Just. Like. Mary.