December 10, 2024
“…the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too.” (Luke 2:35, niv)
As someone who has spent years teaching and attending women’s Bible studies, I’ve scribbled my way through multiple workbooks featuring women in the Scriptures. Ironically, though, only one such study has included the fourth most described person in the New Testament: Jesus’s mother, Mary.
Considering that Mary is the only primary witness of the Incarnation, the Crucifixion, and the Resurrection—three events on which Christianity’s core doctrines are built—such an omission is a major oversight. To neglect Mary is to miss an important figure with much to teach us.
In an early scene from Jesus’s life, we find Mary with Joseph taking Baby Jesus to the temple to dedicate Him. And there an elderly man, Simeon, took the child in his arms, offered praise, and predicted Jesus would be the light of the Gentiles and the glory of Israel. But then Simeon offered Mary a grim prophecy: “This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too” (Luke 2:34–35).
Three decades later, when a Roman sword pierced her son’s body, Mary stood watching as a sword pierced her soul. And that was not the first time following Jesus exacted a price from her. Yet from the beginning Mary had determined to do the will of God, as seen in her words to Gabriel, “I am the Lord’s servant. . . . May your word to me be fulfilled” (1:38).
The One who “abhorred not the virgin’s womb” told His disciples that in the world they would experience trouble (John 16:33). Doing His will may bring soul-piercing pain. Yet Mary’s choices remind us that it is worth any cost to follow Jesus. We can even be merry—because He has overcome the world.
Dr. Sandra Glahn
Professor of Media Arts and Worship