Mary said, "I am the Lord's servant,"

Luke 1: 30: " Have no fear, Mary, for you have found favor with God. Luke 1: 38 "Mary said, I am the Lord's servant and I am willing to do whatever he wants. May everything you said come true." (Living Bible)

Mary was the woman God chose to bear Jesus into a lost world. What was Mary like, as a person, to be the one God almighty saw able and worthy to be the Mother of Jesus? Is the crux of it right here before our eyes? She was willing to do whatever he wanted. She says: "let it be done unto me as you say." But these few words speak of deep, riches within her heart.

Mary, in her young life, must have taken very seriously the words taught her concerning scriptures, prophesy and the lives of the great old testament men of God. She must have deeply believed in God and his mighty workings. More than believing the stories in her mind, she must have felt fear and awe about the LORD. God is really big, he is to be revered and certainly not trifled with. I think she knew that very well.

I imagine it didn't take her long to calculate the repercussions of an unwed pregnancy in her day. Yet she had enough knowing, in the depths of her being, to know she really could trust in her God; a God of truth, power, might, intervention and love. I imagine her studies of the scripture groomed her heart to be ready to accept, on the spot, this overwhelming happening upon her life.

She must have been a loving person. Because our Lord is all loving, wouldn't he choose a mother for Christ who saw the true value of loving a lot? I wonder how often she was challenged to love the unlovable. How often, for example, did she hear scorn and insult of those who rejected what she knew was absolute truth -that Jesus was the Son of God, conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of a virgin.

She must have had the humble heart of a servant. She served God: 1)in her joyful acceptance of his will to be the mother of Jesus and 2) in accepting the will of God the Father and Jesus, watching every agonizing step Jesus took on Calvary. Even though her heart cried in travail and retched with seeing the pain Christ endured, she bore with it all knowing she could trust God's will.

God's will was that eternal life be secured for those that believe and follow after Christ. But our sin, in all it huge ugliness, prevented us access into the pure domain of God's kingdom. The pain Christ endured for us, in love: the crucifixion, paid the price so that we have eternal life to look forward to. Think of the excruciating pain the Father suffered giving up his son, knowing his son was the only sacrifice precious enough to pay the awful price of sin. All out of love for you and I.

As she walked Calvary's road with Jesus, I wonder if Mary again spoke the words "I am the Lord's servant, and I am willing to do whatever my Lord wants." And like Jesus spoke in the Garden of Gethsemane, maybe Mary's heart also painfully cried out: "Father, not my will but thine be done ." Luke 22:42

John 15:13 Greater love has no man than this, that a man would lay down his life for a friend.