Mary's Prayer

Mary’s Soul Exalts the Lord and Her Spirit Rejoices In Her Savior, Recognizes Her Blessings, and Realizes God’s fulfilled Promises.

Mary’s Soul Exalts in the Lord.

So

soul n. — the immaterial part of a person which is the actuating cause of an individual life; the site of all the psychological faculties (such as the heart, mind, and conscience).

Exalt to increase honor ⇔ magnify v. — to cause something to be held in greater esteem (with oneself or others); conceived of as physically enlarging it.

Lord - (kyrios) Master

When you put these three together you get The very core of Mary’s being, Holds the One who Master’s her in great esteem. Mary has recognized that the Lord is the one who reigns in her life. This is why she is able to experience God in a way that is intimate. 26 Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth, 27 to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the [s]descendants of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. 28 And coming in, he said to her, “Greetings,favored one! The Lord is with you.” 29 But she was very perplexed at this statement, and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was. 30 The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have found favor with God. Mary was favored by God not because she had accomplished great things in life. It was not because she was born into royalty. It was not because she was a woman of great wisdom. It was because she put her relationship with the Lord as a priority in her life. I imagine that her prayer life was consistent and truthful.

Might I suggest that to the degree that we place the relationship with our Lord will determine how deeply we experience Him. God is much more interested in our relationship with him than He is what we do for Him. As a matter of fact Jesus even reveals this in 4 Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. 5 I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. We must first abide with Christ before we can do anything for Christ. This means that we must have a time where we communicate with Him consistently. The more we communicate with Him the better we get to know Him. The more you pray the better you can listen. Our prayers must be honest and not just meaningless repetition of things we always say or cliche’ic things we have heard others pray. “And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words. We must learn to articulate in prayer the deepest feelings and meaning that we know how to express. Nothing is to be hidden from the Lord.

Mary found that her exaltation of the Lord was found in her priority of God in her life. We too must make the Lord priority in our life. Is He your priority today? How about tomorrow?

Mary’s Spirit Rejoices In Her Savior.

Spirit -soul ⇔ spirit n. — the soul understood especially according to its composition: being made of a transcendental, immaterial existence known as spirit.

Rejoices - to exult (feel joy) v. — to feel extreme happiness or elation.

Savior - savior n. — someone who rescues something from danger or violence; especially used of Christ as the one who rescued His people from their sins and the resulting danger of judgment.

Mary’s being finds extreme happiness in her God that has rescued her from the punishment of her sins.

I find it very interesting that Mary’s happiness did not come from worldly sources. Her happiness came from knowing that she had been saved from eternal damnation. Understand that her happiness was not dictated by her worldly position or circumstance. She found her joy in the Lord. Her salvation is something that the world could not take away from her. She looked beyond this life to eternity.

Might I suggest that if we desire satisfaction of the soul, then we too must not base it on worldly sources. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are halfhearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased. C.S Lewis John Piper explains it this way, “Never in my life had I heard anyone say that the problem with the world was not the intensity of our pursuit of happiness, but the weakness of it. Everything in me shouted, Yes! That’s it! There it was in black and white, and to my mind it was totally compelling: The great problem with human beings is that we are far too easily pleased. We don’t seek pleasure with nearly the resolve and passion that we should. And so we settle for mud pies of appetite instead of infinite delight. Lewis said, “We are far too easily pleased.” Almost all of Christ’s commands are motivated by “the unblushing promises of reward.” Based on “the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak.”

Piper, John. The Dangerous Duty of Delight: Daring to Make God Your Greatest Desire (LifeChange Books) (Kindle Locations 247-254). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Piper, John. The Dangerous Duty of Delight: Daring to Make God Your Greatest Desire (LifeChange Books) (Kindle Locations 243-247). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

When we find our pleasure in things like partying, sex, and worldly success our pursuit of pleasure is too weak. It only gratifies for the moment. Our pursuit for pleasure should be found in the discovering of God! It is in the discovery of God that there is an impact that goes beyond our flesh and into the depths of our soul. Not only does it reach the depths of our soul, but it goes beyond the moment and lasts for eternity.

I am a strong proponent of John Piper’s statement,” God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.”

Piper, John. The Dangerous Duty of Delight: Daring to Make God Your Greatest Desire (LifeChange Books) (Kindle Location 221). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Mary Recognizes the Blessings of the Lord.

She says that the Mighty One has done great things for her. She was a woman of poverty that had very few rights. She was insignificant in her culture, she was oppressed by a roman government, and about to be disgraced for being pregnant out of wedlock. This seems like the Lord has not blessed her. One thing she does is looks beyond her current situation to her future promise. The mercy of the Lord is on her because of her fear of the Lord, He has scattered the proud, He has removed the oppressors, and He has supplied her needs.

She knew that her sins would be forgiven and she would spend eternity with God. She knew that in her humble state (some would even say disgraced) that the Lord would vindicate her by all generations calling her blessed. She knew that the oppression of Rome would be overthrown by the reign of her son Jesus. She knew that the Lord would care for all of her needs. There was a confidence in her Lord because she knew His goodness.

Friend we too should look on the goodness of the Lord and count our blessings. It is in prayer that we can focus on what the Lord has done for us and have a heart of gratitude. When things appear to be hopeless in our lives it does good for us to look to our future and the promises God has made to us.

Mary Recognizes God’s Fulfilled Promise.

Mary sees how God has dealt merciful with Israel. In their rebellion He never abandoned them. He would discipline them for disobedience by allowing them to be captured, but never abandoned them. They would draw near to God. God would bless them. They would get comfortable in their blessing and forget God. They would fall into lifestyles of sin. These lifestyles would cause great oppression in their lives. They would call out to God and He would rescue them. And then the cycle would begin again. This time God made a cycle breaker. Those that would place their faith in Jesus would find the promises made to Abraham fulfilled in Jesus and realized in those that place their faith in Jesus. All of our sins are forgiven and we are transformed into the likeness of Jesus.