After giving her fiat to the angel Gabriel Mary set out eagerly to go and visit Elizabeth. No doubt a part of the motivation for this was to offer what assistance she could to her pregnant cousin. But what motivated her even more than that was the desire to participate in God's plan. She was excited about what God was doing in her and what it meant for her people and she was eager to share that with Elizabeth. So too did she likely desire to see and understand more of what God was doing in the life of Elizabeth. There was a natural motivation based on kinship. But there was a supernatural motivation of two people joined together by a kind of divine conspiracy. There would be few people who would understand Mary after her encounter with Gabriel so well as Elizabeth. And there would be few who would understand the blessing bestowed on Elizabeth as well as Mary would. They were able to appreciate the blessings bestowed by God on one another and join together in mutual thanksgiving.
When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting,
the infant leaped in her womb,
Elizabeth had already been implicated in God's plan by the blessing bestowed on her through the message of Gabriel. Her spiritual sense was thus highly tuned and her anticipation of the redemption of Israel was reaching peak levels. She had not received the blessing of a son as a merely natural blessing but was even then looking to the prophetic role he was to play. Already before being born he made a prophetic gesture that helped Elizabeth to recognize something happening in Mary that could have otherwise been completely hidden. Further indication that she was not operating at a merely human level was the fact that she herself, perhaps as the direct consequence of John leaping within her womb, was filled with the Holy Spirit and moved to speak supernatural words of knowledge about Mary and her child.
and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit,
cried out in a loud voice and said,
“Blessed are you among women,
and blessed is the fruit of your womb.
It was not merely excitement or hyperbole that made Elizabeth refer to Mary as the most blessed among women. It was the Holy Spirit. So too it was him who made her recognize that the child within Mary's womb was her Lord and indeed the Lord of all. She was sufficiently humble to recognize the exalted role given to Mary and to see what a blessing it was for her to visit, above and beyond the favor of a relative during a time of need. She seemed to know that it was the new ark of the covenant that had come before her, and that this ark contained the presence of God in a way that surpassed anything the old temple had ever known.
Blessed are you who believed
that what was spoken to you by the Lord
would be fulfilled.
Mary was not a purely passive recipient of divine grace. She responded with a dynamic accent and a living faith. This was what made the grace given to her begin so quickly to overflow into the lives of others whom she knew. It was the case with Elizabeth as it would be again during the wedding at Cana and no doubt throughout her earthly life and indeed beyond. Because she believed in God's promise to her she was able to confidently participate in his plan for the world. What of us? In the first place, do we know what was spoken to us by the Lord, how many and how great are his promises to us? And then second, do we believe them? Not just that we say that we believe them, but are we willing to stake our lives on them? Are we actually doing so? Mary lived her life in a way that would make no sense at all apart from the promises of God. And she teaches all who will learn from example to commit themselves completely to the Lord. For he is always faithful to his promises.
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful (see Hebrews 10:23).
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