According to Your Word

I’m Only Human

I’m not going to play you my whole mix tape, but I’ve got a song I’d like us to listen to. I want you to listen to it a little differently than it was intended though. As you hear this song, I want you to imagine this being directed at God.

https://open.spotify.com/track/58zsLZPvfflaiIbNWoA22O?si=831655b86eee4a4f

I want to draw your attention to the middle verse. It says

Don't ask my opinion Don't ask me to lie Then beg for forgiveness For making you cry Making you cry 'Cause I'm only human after all I'm only human after all Don't put your blame on me Don't put the blame on me

The message here is, don’t ask for information you don’t want to know. I’m not going to meet your standards, so don’t get mad at me when you push me and I don’t meet your standards. I’m only human after all. And if we’re honest with ourselves, with each other - that can sometimes be our attitude toward God and toward the things we hear here. We receive encouragement to be in personal devotion consistently, we receive encouragement to reach out with the Gospel, we receive encouragement to be in the Word more often, to be in community together more often - and our mental response is something along the lines of “don’t ask me to do those things, don’t push me - because I’m going to disappoint you God. I’m only human after all.”

We know we’re all human, we all have a limited capacity to follow God, and when we’re pushed on that the temptation is to say “I’m only human, don’t put that on me.”

Don’t Put That On Me

Mary might’ve struggled with that temptation - just take a second to think about the situation that she faced.

Mary was a righteous lady, she had found favor with God. Whatever piety looked like in Galilee - she epitomized it. I’m sure she spent daily time in prayer and devotion, I’m sure she went to temple regularly, I’m sure she was doing everything she was supposed to. Then one day, she’s confronted by an angel. And that’s terrifying. This isn’t some non-threatening guy with two wings, a halo, a white robe, and Chacos. She’s sitting in her house and a heavenly monster appears. This entity with wings and more power than she could possibly imagine appears in her house. The angel tells her to calm down and then tells her that she is going to have a child. You know what that means in her head? She’s going to have to go through the pains and trouble of pregnancy. She’s going to walk around town and be judged, harshly, when the pregnancy becomes visible and she’s not married yet. She’s going to have to bear a child at a time in history where that wasn’t something everyone survived.

And after all that, she was going to be responsible for raising the Son of God.

With all of that laid out before her, I can only imagine that there was a temptation to say “I’m only human, don’t put that on me.”

. . . technically

But that wasn’t her response. Instead, she simply asked how?

And Gabriel’s response kinda reminds me about countless conversations I’ve had over the years. Maybe you’ve been a part of conversations like this, maybe you’ve been on the receiving end of a conversation like this with me. It goes something like this:

Someone might say to me, “I can’t lift that fridge all by myself.” I would then respond something to the effect, “sure you could, just dedicate yourself to going to the weight room six days a week for a few years, then come back and you’ll be able to lift that fridge all by yourself.”

Or someone might say to me, “I can’t afford that Ferrari.” I would then respond with something to the effect, “yes you could, you might have to go rob a bank first.”

I always get a kick of taking something someone says is “impossible” and drawing attention to the reality that it’s frequently possible - it just requires more of an investment of time or money or less moral fiber than you’re thinking with. So I imagine Gabriel got some satisfaction out of responding to Mary’s question by saying “it’s God - it’s possible.” Which is a blessing, because the task that Jesus came to earth for is on the relatively short list of things that are actually impossible for man. He came to bridge the gap between God’s perfection and our broken humanity. Gabriel says “the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you: therefore the child to be born will be called holy - the Son of God.” It is that holiness that makes His task possible, it is that holiness that makes His sacrifice enough to save.

And Mary responds saying “I am a servant of the Lord: let it be to me according to your word.”

Grace in the World

For that, we give thanks to God. Because her service led to the birth of Jesus. His birth led to His ministry; led to His death; led to His bearing the punishment for every sin, mistake, failure, and shortcoming we have ever done; and led to His victory over death.

A great image for this is the image of a chasm and a bridge. Imagine, if you will, a chasm. This chasm is so deep that the light doesn’t reach the bottom. If you walk up to the edge, you can look straight down the cliff walls and never see the bottom. Not only that, the chasm is impossibly far across. So far across that the other side isn’t visible. So far across that the chasm seems like nothing but the edge of the world, the edge of despair. Now imagine that you have to reach the other side, or spend a long time finding out how deep the chasm is. But you look to your right, and there happens to be a bridge - so you walk across the bridge to the other side.

The chasm is the distance between us and God. The chasm is the difference between His perfection and our humanity. The chasm is the break in our relationship with Him. We cannot cross it, we cannot even see the other side. Until Jesus bridged that gap. We get to cross, not by our own effort, not by our own intelligence or wisdom, but because He built a bridge and offers to carry us across.

Jesus saw our plight and responded in the Garden of Gethsemane saying “I am a servant of the Father: let it be to me according to your word.”

Echo

Each and every one of us is only human after all, this much is true. We hear the challenges of Scripture to strive for righteousness and our only hope is to rely on Jesus. And in that reliance, we see those challenges in a new light. We no longer see those challenges as a way to earn our righteousness, but as an invitation to God’s way of doing things. Brothers and sisters, let us echo Mary when God’s Word challenges us to be better and reply “I am a servant of the Lord: let it be to me according to your word.” Amen.