ACCEPTING REALITY

I was reading in a church teaching manual over the weekend, and came across the following:

"Mary was humble and submissive to the will of the Lord (Luke 1:38, 48). Why is it important for us to submit to the Lord’s will? How can we become more humble and submissive?"

The scriptures they are quoting are as follows:

"And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word. And the angel departed from her.... For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed."

So Mary, accepting the fact that she was pregnant, was humble and submissive.

You know something else it is called?

Accepting reality.

And I think this is important.

So much of our ‘reality’ is only in the space between our own ears.

It’s comprised of things we tell ourselves – things other people tell us – things we believe – things we wish we could believe.

And a great deal of our own unhappiness comes because we would rather keep believing untruths instead of accept reality.

This may sound all nuts when you are talking about the virgin birth of our Savior.

But Mary accepted what had happened.

She didn't deny it - if she got upset about it, she did it in private - or kept it quiet - or simply got over it.

The reality was that she was pregnant - not planned, not even possible, in her case.

And she accepted that.

Now I'm not going to get into divine directives and the whole concept of a virgin birth - although I'm certain she was not left completely in the dark about what was happening.

But she dealt with what was happening.

So should we.