The first chapter of Luke contains two of the four appearances of the angel Gabriel (the other two being in the book of Daniel). The first is the announcement of the birth of John the Baptist, where Gabriel appears to John's soon-to-be father Zachariah the priest in the Holy Place of the temple in Jerusalem. The second is the announcement of the birth of Christ to Mary, which takes place in the town of Nazareth in the backwater region of Galilee. There is a lesson to be learned, I think, even in that--the two different settings. God sends the same angel (who is, if you read the accounts of him in Daniel, a very important and powerful angel: not the angel of birthday greetings) to one of the most sacred places in the Jewish faith (the Temple in Jerusalem) and one of the most common, everyday places in Jewish life (a town in Galilee). He is sent to a respected elder among the ordained priests who is, at the time, performing his religious duties. He is also sent to a young woman of negligible social standing (who's only distinction in society was to be her upcoming marriage to a middle-class carpenter from nowheresville, Luke 1:27) apparently minding her own business. God does not make any distinction here between the sacred and the common. If anything, He seems to favor the common more, sending Mary a greater message than was sent to Zachariah the priest.
But for now, I wanted to focus on the reactions both people had to the message. It has always struck me that both people questioned Gabriel (and, implicitly, God, since Gabriel was simply His messenger). Both of them ask Gabriel "How?" Yet they receive very different replies. Gabriel answers Mary's question kindly, but reacts to Zachariah's similar question with anger and strikes the priest mute as punishment. I always wondered why the reactions were so different. Was God cutting Mary some extra slack because she was to bear Christ? Was Zachariah held to a higher standard as a priest of God?
Now, though, I think the difference isn't in Gabriel's reaction, but in the questions themselves. Mary asks, "How will this be, since I am a virgin?" (Luke 1:34). Zachariah asks, "How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years." (Luke 1:18). At first, the questions seem almost identical. Both Mary and Zachariah are questioning the angel's announcement of birth on the basis of known biological facts which would prevent such a birth from occurring. Zachariah's wife, Elizabeth, is an old woman, past menopause and considered barren even before that. Her husband's no spring chicken himself. How could such a pair have children? Mary's situation is even more strange: she's a virgin, and unmarried. While her fertility would later be established by the children she bore Joseph (Matthew 13:55-56), at the moment--and for the foreseeable future--she was...well, lacking an important prerequisite to conception. Both of these births were biologically impossible and both Mary and Zachariah point this out as the basis of their questions.
But from there, the questions are different. Mary asks, "How will this be?" Zachariah asks, "How shall I know this?" In other words, the questions are: "How is this going to happen?" and "How do I know you're telling the truth?" One question assumes that the message is true and asks how it will come about. The other questions the integrity of the message itself. When I realized this, the difference in Gabriel's answer was clear to me. Zachariah has called into question his integrity as a messenger and, implicitly, the integrity of God who sent him. No wonder he winds up getting...err, giving the silent treatment. Mary on the other hand isn't questioning that what God has said is true: she's just questioning how it can come about in light of known biological facts. She isn't questioning the truthfulness of the message or of God, but is asking for more information about His methods. That is a question God may not always answer (Gabriel's answer to Mary isn't terribly specific on how the mechanics of a virgin conception will come about), but it is one that He respects and allows.
I think of this in my own life, reflecting on how I trust God in day to day things, big or small (such as, right now, my job search). Of course, my faith isn't always perfect. As I fill out application after application and wait day after day by my discouragingly silent phone it seems like God's direction in the area of employment is violating some economic "facts" about the scarcity of jobs and the desirability of a recent college graduate (which does not seem to be half as great as it was hyped up to be in college). I begin to question. But what sort of questions am I asking? Am I asking the sort of questions which relate to how God will bring something about, or the sort of questions that cast doubt upon whether or not He will? There is nothing wrong with asking questions of Him, but do I question Him in faith like Mary, or in disbelief like Zachariah? To be honest, I do way more of the latter than the former, and that's not something I want to be comfortable with.
I'll pray for faith, and questions, like Mary's.
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