Most of us probably can’t even remember the first time we heard about her. By the time we were old enough to really understand the weight of her predicament, we likely couldn’t separate her – pregnant and unmarried - from everything else we already understood about the whole story.
For we have special knowledge about this pregnancy.
God revealed much about His coming – long before Jesus was carried inside Mary’s body.
The plan was determined before the creation of the world. Scriptures record prophecy upon prophecy showing God’s forethought in Jesus coming as Immanuel – “God with Us.”
The angel Gabriel reveals even more as he visits Mary and addresses her as one who is “highly favored” by God. She was chosen to be Jesus’ mother – it was a holy assignment, not a random occurrence.
Mary’s pregnancy was many things.
But unplanned? No.
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In Mary’s human heart, though, she must’ve felt human feelings. She was a young Jewish girl. In one day – in one singular visit from the angel – the life Mary thought she had was no more.
This pregnancy would deliver the long-awaited coming of the Savior. And we are privileged to know the beginning and the end of the story. But Mary was not reading the story. She was living it. Mary had a lot of explaining to do to the world around her. After all, the angel didn’t explain the pregnancy to everyone else. Just Mary and Joseph.
God knew their human hearts and met their need in advance through the words of angels. Two messengers, one to Mary and one to Joseph, bringing the same message: “Do not fear.”
Human fear was the natural response; even as God’s perfect plan was unfolding.
The coming of Jesus was divinely planned, but the pregnancy – on Mary’s part – was not planned. Yes, there was much to fear in Mary’s natural flesh.
And so it is today. With all pregnancies. When we look with spiritual eyes – eyes looking deep into Scripture, eyes looking heavenward - we know that life doesn’t just happen. Life is created by a deliberate and all-powerful God.
“She’s facing an unplanned pregnancy,” we say. We use wording we all understand. We can certainly relate to the fear.
But it’s not true.
She may not want to be pregnant. They may not have intended to get pregnant. They may feel they aren’t prepared for parenthood.
A positive pregnancy test brings shocking and frightening news to human eyes. Not so with God. The test comes far after God’s first awareness of the life that is growing inside her.
He already knows the child He is creating.
Tweet This: A positive pregnancy test brings shocking and frightening news to human eyes. Not so with God. He already knows the child He is creating.
In Scripture, God tells us all of our days are known to Him before even one of them begins. God knows us before He even forms us in our mothers.
Pregnancies – even those that begin without holy intention – still result in children created by the hands of a holy God.
There will never be another Mary. Only one pregnancy ended in the birth of Jesus. Just one.
But every day there are women suddenly aware of a pregnancy they didn’t plan. Every day women consider their pregnancies and wonder, “Can I do this?”
The angel’s words apply to all of us non-Marys - Do not fear. There is no such thing as an uncreated life. Our lack of human planning does not lessen the value of life. At all. When we put our eyes on the hands and heart of the Creator, our options for how “unplanned pregnancies” will end – the options we as humans choose – narrow to one. Life.
Tweet This: Do not fear. There is no such thing as an uncreated life. Our lack of human planning does not lessen the value of life.
