The man called his wife Eve,
because she became the mother of all the living.
Eve was meant to be the mother of all the living. She and Adam were meant to bequeath the gift of life to their offspring. Yet although Cain, Abel, and Seth received life in the physical sense from their mother there was obviously something missing. That there was something missing was already apparent to Adam and Eve, now that they felt exposed and vulnerable, and felt the need to hide themselves and wear clothing. It was doubtlessly evident in that the birth of those children would have been among the first experiences of physical pain for Eve, evident in those events which should have been entirely joyous. It was evident too when Adam had to struggle to provide for them, no longer having everything to meet his needs ready at hand, no longer feeling confident and therefore also unsure of his competence in his purpose. It became far more evident in the second generation when Cain murdered his brother. The human family did not wait until old age caused us to have our first encounter with death. Instead, we chose to enlist him in our service. To be mother of all the living sounded so full of promise. But in a world now marked by sin and death to what did that promise amount?
I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
He will strike at your head,
while you strike at his heel.
God did not create death (see Wisdom 1:12). It was never part of the destiny he envisioned for his creatures. Yet he allowed our first parents to choose it, creating for us a world that has been marked by it ever since. From then on God invited us to return to him, to choose the life that we were meant to choose at first.
Today I am giving you a choice of two ways. And I ask heaven and earth to be witnesses of your choice. You can choose life or death. The first choice will bring a blessing. The other choice will bring a curse. So choose life! Then you and your children will live (see Deuteronomy 30:19).
The right choice seemed obvious enough, but in practice, as a race, we consistently failed to choose it. Our choice more often followed the pattern of the choice of Adam and Eve, the choice to decide for ourselves how to live, to decide without reference to God, to choose the broad way that always leads destruction. The Garden was more narrow in that sense than the wider world. And foolishly, we would not accept a paradise that we perceived to confine us, even if the rest of the world was by comparison the driest of deserts.
Fortunately we know that God foresaw the choice of our first parents and every subsequent sin of ours. He knew all of these and had a plan, even from before the first of them, to reverse them, restore us, and to show forth his mercy in a greater way than had we never sinned at all. O Happy Fault is more than a nice sentiment or exaggeration, it is the key that makes sense of history.
When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved,
he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.”
Then he said to the disciple,
“Behold, your mother.”
Jesus came that we might believe in him and have life, to have the fullness of life that was lost in the Garden. As a part of this plan he chose Mary to be his mother and our own, to become the mother of those who were living in the true and deepest sense. This is why when we read about the woman clothed with the sun and crowned with twelve stars in the book of Revelation we also read about her offspring, who are "those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus" (see Revelation 12:16).
Just as Eve was meant to have something to gift to her descendents, of which she could finally only offer a tainted semblance, so too does Mary have gifts for us, but untainted by sin. Eve's gift to humanity was, more or less, her no to the command of God. Mary's gift to us is her yes to his invitation. All that she does by her powerful intercession is ordered toward helping us make that same acceptance of God's call.
All these devoted themselves with one accord to prayer,
together with some women,
and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.
Mary said yes to Gabriel and the Holy Spirit came upon her and the power of the Most High overshadowed her (see Luke 1:35) in what can be thought of as a Pentecost before Pentecost. Because she was thus intimately familiar with the Spirit she was also present in the upper room to help the Apostles welcome him. This Holy Spirit is himself the new life we are meant to receive, and Mary is in a privileged place to help us receive him. Let us turn to her for help, to the mother of those who truly live, as we open ourselves to choose the fullness of life that Jesus himself came to bring (see John 10:10).
And of Zion they shall say:
“One and all were born in her;
And he who has established her
is the Most High LORD.”
No comments:
Post a Comment