“But the Angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end.’ The Angel answered, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.’ ‘I am the Lord’s servant,’ Mary answered. ‘May it be to me as you have said.’ Then the angel left her.”
Luke 1:30-33, 35, 38
The season of Advent is once again upon us. It is a time of preparing to celebrate the birth of Jesus the Christ - the One spoken of by David and Isaiah. The One who’s purpose is the restoration of mankind’s relationship with God. The One who makes a wonderful life possible by giving us a purpose that brings hope.
In the beloved Christmas movie It’s A Wonderful Life – George Bailey has lost sight of his purpose and finds himself hopeless and bitter – life doesn’t seem to wonderful until Clarence the angel fishes him out of the water and with some divine help shows him what life would have been like if he’d never been born. You see George’s purpose was to be the nice guy in town, the good banker - the guy who helped out those no other banker would help. His purpose was to be a loving husband and father.
George isn’t so different from the rest of us – sometimes life beats us up and when it does we can lose sight of who God made us to be and do. Sometimes when we are feeling like we are of no earthly good, God will send us someone to let us know just how valued we are. In this week’s passage Gabriel is sent by God to a young peasant girl named Mary. We don’t really know too much about her except that she was a small town girl, engaged to be married when Gabriel turns up with his strange greeting and tells her something unimaginable, more than a bit scary and yet life changing and wonderful. Gabriel let her purpose be known, a purpose that let her know how much she was valued by her God and that purpose that would make life wonderful and filled with hope. Ok we should probably stop for a minute and get real – even a purpose and hope filled life can be difficult, after all Mary would eventually see her Son beaten and crucified. But she would also see Him risen and ascended to His proper place in the throne room of heaven.
If Mary had never been born… well let not dwell on those possibilities. Each one of us has a purpose in life, a purpose that brings hope. Even when the entire world seems to be against us, as it seemed to George Bailey – we still have a purpose, we can still impact others so that the light of Christ shines into the darkness.
Purpose brings us hope… So it’s a wonderful life.
A Prayer
Father, you give each of us purpose and for that we are thankful. In those times when we lose sight of our purpose and lose hope, forgetting how valued we are by You – send someone to remind us that our world would not be the same without us in it. Renew our vision for what you have for us to do, because your purpose for us brings hope and that makes it a wonderful life. In the name of Jesus, whose own life made ours wonderful, we pray – Amen.
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