Magnificat
The Song of Mary opened my eyes today. It’s easy in retrospect to see how right her praises are, that she was blessed for all generations and that God had shown powerful mercy to her.
But you have to remember that when she sang that, her life had just fallen apart. She was single, pregnant, probably presumed adulterous, and she’d just walked a mountainous and bandit-ridden road to her relatives’ distant homestead to get some space to think and avoid gossip (or stoning) and figure out what was next. At this stage, as far as we know, Joseph probably either didn’t know she was pregnant or was planning to divorce her. Life as she knew it was over.
Think about the decisions she must have made. She set her focus on God so intentionally that she could see her demolished life as a magnificent blessing, the envy of the generations. In the middle of personal crisis, unexpected pregnancy and hard work,1 what did it take to make the time to let God’s viewpoint infuse her?
See, it’s not about denial, some flaky positive-affirmation self-help that says the pain isn’t real. That’s just stupid. But if God is real and good, and if he made you for a reason, it’s equally stupid to say that the pain is where it ends. God did not create people as containers for problem-cluttered days. He has given each one of us a role in the renovation of the universe. Don’t let the pain blind you to the adventure.
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1 Middle Eastern village ladies don’t get a lot of leisure time. I’ve lived with some.
