Christmas is our most important holiday, and its literature is correspondingly rich. Yet until now no adequate bundle of Christmas treasures in poetry and prose has found its way onto the Internet for Winter, Christmas, the birth of Christ, Santa Claus, and so much more..Fear not Mary for Thou Hast Found Favor with God
The thought was not new to Mary’s mind. How could it have been to a mind that from infancy had been filled with the Law and the traditions of her people and her house? She had read. She had listened. The King was to come. He was to be of the tribe of Juda, and of the house of David. She knew that she was one of those to whom the hope of the people looked. She knew, too, that the great doctors and teachers of the law in Judea, and especially in Jerusalem, would despise any hope that came from outside of Judea. And much more would they look down upon any branch of David’s house that came from outcast Nazareth that sat by the highway in the road markets of the great, defiling world. Maybe she had often been saddened, her deep-hidden maiden hope chilled by this knowledge of what the great and wise ones would surely think of herself and Nazareth.
She knew all these things. The heart of the people had been running high through all these years since she had been listening and thinking. The King might be nigh! Nay, he must be nigh, for the need of the people was very great. They labored. They groaned their need to God. They were crushed under Idumean Herod and his master of Rome. Hearts were breaking under the long long waiting for the fulfillment of the Promise. The King must indeed be nigh. Mary had known all these things.
But Mary was troubled, and a great fear came upon her heart.
What preparation, of reading or of thinking, or even of unwhispered dreams, could really have prepared her mind for the awesome, the overpowering revelation that was now breaking upon it? God had seen to it that her heart and soul were ready, were prepared. But only the years and the keeping of things in her heart could really raise the simple maiden’s mind to a full understanding of all that was now being told her.
And the Angel, seeing her fear, stood near so that the Light which came with him from the Throne fell upon her. And her fear fled away, as she listened to his voice saying:
“Fear not, Mary; for thou hast found favor with God. And, behold thou shalt bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus.”
“He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Most High.”
“And He shall reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of His kingdom there shall be no end.”
Then Mary, taking a wondering courage from the assurance of the Angel, raised her head to look into his face, breathing her timid question:
“How shall this be?”
And the Angel, understanding the bewilderment of her mind, told her of the Spirit that should come upon her, and of the power of the Most High that should overshadow her, so that He that should be born of her should be called the Son of God.
And as though a human lesson, too, were necessary for her understanding, the Angel told her the secret of her kins-woman Elizabeth who was prepared to become the mother of the Herald of Mary’s Son. “For with God nothing shall be impossible.”
Now Mary understood. The last vestige of doubt, of lingering fear that perhaps this vision of the youth at her side might be an illusion, left her. She knew something now of what lay before her. She knew that childhood had been left behind in these last few moments. She knew that her way was now ahead, marked out for her by the God of her fathers.
Again that shadow of sorrow unutterable fell across her heart. She felt in that moment that her way was to be the way of the mothers of earth, in grief and bitter woe. Out of the untutored wisdom of her heart came to her the truth that this unbounded glory and joy which her God had prepared for her could not be hers without suffering alike unbounded.
From where she knelt her way led straight to the foot of a despised cross! In startled, clear-eyed vision, Mary saw!
The Angel waited, for the word which he should carry back to the Throne.
But there was no hesitation, no conflict, and no struggle in Mary’s heart. For this moment God had formed her.
She saw, she understood, she knew her way up a path of fearsome, incomprehensible joy, with the bleeding sword of sorrow at the end. And she answered:
“Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done unto me according to thy word.”
Then Mary was alone.
Swifter than the flutter of wing, the Angel was gone from the world and was prostrate at the foot of the Throne. And there at the foot of the Throne was delivered Mary’s answer, the most perfect act of worship the glory of the Most High had seen.
