Nothing Will Be Impossible with God

Rebecca Sheridan
Wednesday, November 30, 2022
Luke 1:26-45

    At my age, I have two daughters who will be teenagers before you know it, and my prayer is, “please God, don’t let them be like Mary.”  That is to say, I’d rather not be a grandma with a teenage mother in the house.  We believe Mary was likely a teenager, maybe as young as thirteen, and is probably fleeing to Elizabeth for protection.  At this point in Mary’s story that we just read, Mary finds out she’s pregnant and then goes “with haste” to her cousin Elizabeth’s house, who is pregnant in her old age with John the Baptist, Jesus’ cousin.    A woman in Mary’s position engaged to someone but pregnant by another means could be stoned or burned to death.
    As we think tonight about the angel Gabriel’s promise to Mary that “nothing will be impossible with God,” let’s recognize that this is not a verse to use when we aren’t getting what we want from God so that we don’t lose hope.  Notice that the angel doesn’t tell Elizabeth this, who wants a child so badly, but speaks these words to Mary.  I would guess that Mary really didn’t want to be in this situation – pregnant with God’s child, trying to explain that to people, and trying to hang on to her marriage to Joseph, her family and community’s view of her, not to mention risking her own life to carry God’s purpose through her.  Perhaps the angel’s words are actually an assurance that Mary can do this very difficult thing – to have a baby at a young age, raise him, and preserve her reputation with the help of faithful family members like Zechariah and Elizabeth.  
In this season of creating and fulfilling Christmas wish lists, we might think about the presents we always wanted but never got, or the joy we have had in seeing a loved one’s face light up when the gift is just right.  As we get older, like Elizabeth, we probably focus less on stuff and more on things that may indeed seem impossible – hope for the hopeless, peace on Earth, cures for illnesses that are currently incurable, babies for families that want them desperately and loving homes for all children, especially when we think about unexpected pregnancies like Mary’s.  
Both Mary and Elizabeth tonight show us how to trust in God’s possible future for us that may be different from what we plan.  We like to plan things and have God go along with us; Mary’s story shows us God’s reversal of our plans.  Elizabeth tells Mary, “Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”  We trust that in Jesus, God will fulfill what we deem even now to be impossible.  Hope, peace, love, joy, and healing are possible – not in the ways we imagine these things to come about, but in God’s imagination.  Mary, at such a young age, shows us great wisdom when she says, “let it be with me according to your word.”  Certainly she endures suffering, hardship and pain in agreeing to be a part of God’s great plan of salvation in being the mother of Jesus, but she believes it is worth it, and allows God to work in her and through her.  Tonight, we ask God to give us faith that nothing will be impossible with God, and we place ourselves into God’s hands, to let us be bearers of hope and light in a weary, cynical world.  Amen.