The Holy Spirit's Biography of Christ # 8

The Holy Spirit's Biography of Christ # 8

Mary's Renunciation

Well, we have to come to the really important thing. Where was all this focused? In a simple Galilean woman, whose name was Mary.

You know, for two reasons we have lost something very wonderful in this connection. It is the devil's trick again! satan will always try to get hold of something Divine and discredit it, and satan has discredited this Divine thing by the worship of the virgin Mary. This is a great triumph for the devil, as you will see in a moment or two.

There is another thing that has made us very hesitant to dwell upon this birth of Christ, and I think it is either a right or a wrong sensitiveness. We are so nice and so good, you know, and we do not like to read and talk about the virgin Mary! I wonder how you felt when we read that passage from Luke just now! 'It is very wonderful and very beautiful, but don't let us dwell upon it too much! Let us be very sentimental, very proper, very good and very nice!' Do you know what I mean?

So, for these two reasons, we have lost something that is very Divine, and I think poor Mary needs to be redeemed. She needs to be brought back to her right place, and we have to get a new appreciation of this young woman. I have had to recover something about Mary.

There is a link between that which happened in heaven with the Son of God when He emptied Himself, and Mary. Do not make any mistake! Mary had to make a great renunciation, for she knew what it meant to have a child without a husband. Supposing it became known that this child was born and Joseph was not the father! Who was the father, then? That is something for people to talk about! I am not sure that the people in wicked Nazareth had not already spread a rumor, because at one time some of the enemies of Jesus Christ threw this thing at Him, when they said: "We were not born in iniquity" (John 8:41). Is that not horrible, terrible?

Ah, Mary knew what it meant! She knew that if this thing got out into the world she would be counted as one of the world's most disgraceful people. Everyone would look down upon her. She was afraid, and, more than that, "greatly troubled." The angel Gabriel read what was going on in her soul and said: "Fear not, Mary." Never in all history did a woman need that word more than Mary did that day! She had taken in the situation and realized in what she was involved. The angel Gabriel said: 'Mary, you are a very specially favored woman. God has favored you more than other women.' And the word that the angel used was "grace" - God has put His grace upon you more than upon any other woman.' Well,she considered the whole thing, realizing what it meant, knowing that if she had to go out into the world, and the world knew about it, it would talk (and the world never gives a Divine meaning to a thing like that! You know the kind of world we are in!), and she said - note! - "Behold, the bond slave of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word."

I put a might emphasis upon that word "bond slave!" Did Mary empty herself of a woman's glory? That is what it meant naturally. Did Mary humble herself to be obedient unto death? For, you know, a woman like that would have been stoned in Israel, and she knew it. Did she humble herself and become obedient unto death? Oh, yes, she did. She went down to the lowest place. But what is the word? "Bond slave of the Lord" - the servant of God.

Now the whole Bible is opened up! Before the Bible began the Divine Son was saying: 'I will be Your servant, Father. I will go down to be Your bond slave.' And right from the beginning God has sought to have servants. You have a long line of servants of God in this world's history: Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and on you go to Isaiah, the Prophet, who says: "Israel, My servant" (Isaiah 41:8). They were the people of service.

That is what God is seeking, but it is always a very costly thing. It cost Abel his life, for he was obedient unto death. Enoch found it was no longer possible to live in a world like this, and so you could go on.

What Is Service?

But what do we arrive at? The point is: What is service? What is the meaning of being the servant of God? Can you put your finger upon it? Go to Mary again. What is the law? To bring God back into His world, and that is the only service of God. Service is comprehended in that one thing - making a place for God, bringing God back into His right place, seeing that He is not excluded from His world. The presence of God is the great law of everything in service. Mary brought God back into this world, so she was "highly graced," supremely honored. It was not just an angel, or a little cherub that was sent to her, but the archangel Gabriel was sent from God to this woman Mary, because she was to be the vessel and the channel of bringing God back into this world. Is that not tremendous? Is Mary redeemed now? Has she got a new place? But it is not Mary herself. It is Mary as the bond servant of God. And it is not what we are in ourselves, but just a matter of how much of God is brought back to this world by our being here.

Dear friends, is that what the service of God means to you? It is not the place, nor the person. The place may be a stable and the person a simple woman. It is nothing of the glory of this world. Oh, how men have made a mistake over this! They think that in order to have God present they must have a very elaborate building, with some very important persons, Lord this and Baron that, with a cathedral here and a cathedral there - and the Word says: "The Most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands" (Acts 7:48). Where is God? "Wheresoever two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them" (Matt. 18:20). That can be anywhere, in anything, but the point is this: We are here, dear friends, as the Lord's people to be His servants, and true service is bringing God back where we are. Do you understand that? Why am I here? Why are you here? Why are you wherever you are? Our presence ought to mean the presence of the Lord.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 9)