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Nicole explores how Mary can enhance your faith by God’s designs
As my new book launched, I became increasingly aware of Protestant friends that would not feel comfortable reading the book because Mary was in it. I felt a nudge to write a God-centered, scripture-centered, reflection-centered invitation to get to know Mary better. I hope if Mary hasn’t been a part of your faith journey, you will open your heart to see what you are missing.
The Old Covenant: 10 Commandments
To do this, we must revisit the Old Testament/Old Covenant a bit. First the Hebrews changed from prosperous and protected to in slavery and in danger in Egypt. Joseph is forgotten and now every Hebrew boy born is at risk to be killed on order from Pharoah. Moses’ mother places him in a basket in the river to save him and Pharaoh’s daughter is the one who discovers Moses and takes him in as her own.
Moses then goes on to lead the people out of Egypt, out of slavery. Eventually, he received the covenant–the ten commandments which the Israelites were to obey in order to receive blessings and protection from the Lord. The stipulations for the ark of the covenant and where that covenant was to reside are very lengthy and particular. Read Exodus 24+.
The New Covenant: Jesus
To establish the new covenant, things start out a bit differently. The Lord prepares an ark of the covenant Himself, choosing Mary to be that. The old covenant was fashioned by human hands, but we know that the Lord Himself would fashion a much more fitting ark of the covenant for His Son, something no human would be capable of creating: a woman without sin. Mary is this way because of God and because He chose her as His Mother.
The Lord has Jesus born into poverty and as an outsider (His family displaced from their hometown and in a stable, no less). This is also to signal that the world cannot possibly provide something to contain anything worthy of Jesus, so God provides the opposite. Instead of having Jesus born into worldly riches, God signals for us–there is something new here. He is not sending an earthly king this time. This time He is sending the King of Heaven and He does not need anything our world has to offer to become King.
The one thing that is given to Jesus that is both of the earth and of heaven is a family: a mother and a foster father. Heaven and earth kiss in the womb of Mary creating Jesus. Mary, essentially, experienced heaven on earth when Jesus was conceived in her womb: becoming one with Jesus, something we are promised to experience in heaven.
A physical exchange between Jesus and Mary
But that oneness does not end with the birth of Jesus, because as we know from God’s design, all human mothers experience Microchimerism. This is when a mother and child’s cells are exchanged during pregnancy, so that the fetal cells are now present in the mother’s bloodstream forever. By God’s designs, a part of Jesus remains present in Mary forever.
If we know what His gaze, words, tassel, touch, and spit can do to people, imagine what His very cells would do to Mary…
While we all have the privilege of calling ourselves daughters of God or sisters in Christ, only Mary can claim the title Mother of God, Mother of Jesus. No one else has this privilege. If the Israelites were called to treat a physical inanimate ark of the covenant with such care and reverence, it is only natural to think that Mary should be held with the same care and reverence. She does not simply carry a set of laws within her; she carries Love itself. And then Love becomes embedded within her physical body.
A lot of people reference when Jesus responds to a woman saying: ““Blessed is the womb that carried you and the breasts at which you nursed.” He replied, “Rather, blessed are those who hear the word of God and observe it.” (Luke 11:28 NABRE) as a signal to how we should view Mary, like don’t pay attention to her, but in fact, it is an affirmation of her.
We know Mary said,”May it be done to me according to thy word.” (Luke 1:38 NABRE) but He is also signaling that we are all called to obedience and should be striving to be called blessed, not simply deferring to the womb that bore Him as blessed. We are all called to life with Jesus, not only Mary.
At the Nativity, we see Mary able to receive all kinds of strangers who are not coming to see her, but are coming to see Jesus once he is born. From poor shepherds to the magi, Mary understands there is something new here–all will be called to Jesus–rich and poor, Jewish and Gentiles.
Mary and Joseph then flee to Egypt, back to where the old covenant first was being played out. The place of captivity in the old testament becomes a place of safety for the new covenant.
I know there is a feeling that if Mary was not sinful, that this somehow takes away from our salvation, but she simply received salvation before because God knew He was using her to bring forth the new covenant. He is omnipresent to all time and therefore, knowing what His Son would do, could bestow that salvation to everyone.
Why then not to everyone? Because not all of us were called to be a part of contributing to the physical person of Jesus. I think God deserves a worthy place to form and be formed, don’t you?
Mary then gets to feed the One who feeds us. She gets to live with the One who shows us how to live. She gets to hold Him even though He carries the world.
As we move into His public ministry, she doesn’t fall off as a bystander. She is there for His first miracle, letting Him know what a mother sees and where she would love to see Him work: “they have no wine.” She is there at the cross where Jesus gives her to us as mother and us to her as children. Never abandoning her Son as He makes the greatest sacrifice, knowing He is paying the price for her as well as for all of humanity.
She is not mentioned in the Resurrection. Why? For His glory. We can look back to my soul magnifies the Lord (Luke 1:46) when she was still pregnant with Jesus and understand that Mary does not need to be present in the Resurrection because Jesus is glorified. No magnification or proclamation of greatness is needed. We don’t see her again until it is time for Jesus to ascend into heaven and then later at Pentecost, waiting with the apostles for the Church to be born. Who better to mother the new Church into the world than the one who brought the New Covenant, Jesus, into the world.
To leave Mary behind is to leave out part of the Gospel. It’s to believe that God didn’t write her name into the Gospel on purpose for a purpose. It’s to ignore part of the truth and beauty Jesus taught us.
If we are to live as He lived, our formative years are to be lived out with Mary as our Mother and then she will be there when God calls us into mission, nudging us along telling us to do whatever He says, and then she will be there at the foot of our crosses, and then she will be there when the Holy Spirit comes upon us. And yes, Jesus is there too. That is why she is there. Because wherever He is, there she also is–she is His handmaiden as well as His Queen, not by worldly designs, but by God’s designs.
Don’t be afraid….Mary has found favor with God.
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