Meditations on the Virgin

Today is the Coptic Orthodox Feast of St. Mary!!

Abouna has been presenting a wonderful sermon series on St. Mary often comparing her to Old Testament fathers and figures. The common tie between them has been obedience, over and over.

Like Abel the righteous who obeyed and offered the acceptable sacrifice to God, St. Mary obeyed and offered her life as an acceptable sacrifice, serving God in the temple, in the house of St. Joseph, and finally in the early church.

Like Noah, St. Mary received an impossible message--a virgin birth?!--and took action based on her faith. Noah built an ark on dry land and waited for the rain. St. Mary heard that her cousin Elizabeth who was barren would give birth and dropped everything to be with her.

Eve was deceived by the serpent and disobeyed God. St. Mary's unwavering obedience was the start of undoing the damage.

I'm not very good with obedience. I was always one of those kids who wore out mom and dad with "why." Thank God I had a father who always explained the why behind everything to a satisfactory degree. But still the phrase in Arabic is "Ibn al-ta3a ye7ell 3aleh el-baraka" or "To the obedient son falls the blessing."

I'm always worried that blind obedience = naivety. I don't want to be naive, to be taken for a fool. Especially since there are plenty of tough Bible verses about fools. The book I'm reading finally explained the kind of obedience God wants.

God doesn't ask us to trust to everyone and everything. He asks us to trust HIM. He asks us to be as simple as children when it comes to His requests for our life. What that means is that we should obey the commandments of God blindly. We should love our neighbors with abandon. Keep our tongues from evil and our lips from speaking lies and not worry about the fallout. Bless those who revile and persecute us and do it with gladness of heart. Give tithes to God without wincing or flinching or whining, knowing that with the same measure we use, it will be measured back to us (Luke 6:38). Or as Abouna said today, do our taxes honestly without trying to cheat--even if everyone else is cheating.

St. Mary trusted God and obeyed Him without question and received the praise of nations and generations. We can do the same and expect great blessings in our lives. May we be worthy to hear and to act...