Everyone seems to have an opinion this Christmas about Mark Lowry’s song “Mary Did You Know?”
“She knew!”
“She didn’t know!”
“It’s just a song. Get over it!”
I do not know how much she knew or how much creative license we should give musical artists, but I am intrigued by how Mary responds to the message she receives prior to the conception of Jesus. Her response is instructive to us as Christ-followers and those who help others mature in Christ.
In Luke’s gospel, both Mary and a priest named Zechariah are facing impossible odds of having a child (Mary’s being slightly more impossible). Despite this, they both receive a message from the Lord via a messenger that each will have a son. The impossibility for Zechariah is that he and his wife Elizabeth have been unable to conceive and now find themselves well beyond the age of bearing children. Luke leads us to sympathize with Zechariah and Elizabeth’s hardship. We can understand Zechariah’s hesitancy to believe the angelic messenger. Given their lifelong struggle with infertility and their current age, it makes sense to us that he asks for a sign. However, God expects him to believe the message. So
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