By Chaplain Mike

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.

• Isaiah 7:14, NIV

It’s time again for the annual “Mary” discussion. This is the one time of year when Protestants are forced to consider her as they read OT prophecies of the Virgin Mother and the NT nativity narratives. For Roman Catholic or Orthodox traditions, Mary is emphasized throughout the year in various ways, particularly through the use of such liturgical texts as the Magnificat. However, for children of the Reformation, the Advent and Christmas season is one of the few times we hear her name or think of her story.

Last year, I wrote this about Mary:

Evangelicals tend to ignore or downplay Jesus’ mother, in reaction to what they perceive as overemphasis or even heretical devotion to her by the Roman church and other traditions. However, the Gospel of Luke gives her great honor, portraying her as the true and ultimate matriarch of our faith. Mary joins and surpasses Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel and Leah, Ruth, and Hannah, and is presented as the mother through whom God brought his redemption promises to pass.

As the Mother of Our Lord herself put it,

My soul glorifies the Lord
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for he has been mindful
of the humble state of his servant.
From now on all generations will call me blessed,
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,”
holy is his name. (Luke 1:46-49, NIV)

On this fourth Sunday in Advent, as we hear Isaiah’s word about the virgin to whom will be born the promised child, Paul’s greeting in which he points us to God’s “Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh,” and Matthew’s Gospel story of the young woman who was “found to be with child from the Holy Spirit,” let us consider how one of our prominent Protestant forefathers thought about Mary.

Martin Luther honored Mary highly. He held her in high esteem for her role in God’s salvation plan. The former monk retained beliefs he had from his Roman Catholic upbringing and training, such as Mary’s immaculate conception (though his views on this are complex) and perpetual virginity. He venerated her as the Theotokos (Mother of God), said that Christians should likewise consider her their “spiritual Mother,” and called her the “highest woman and the noblest gem in Christianity after Christ . . . She is nobility, wisdom, and holiness personified. We can never honor her enough. Still honor and praise must be given to her in such a way as to injure neither Christ nor the Scriptures.” (Sermon, Christmas, 1531)

Though he venerated Mary and even conceded that she prays for the church, Luther’s view also offers a protest against the abuses of Catholicism with regard to over-emphasis on Mary. For example, consider these words from The Defense of the Augsburg Confession (1530):

Granting that the blessed Mary prays for the Church, does she receive souls in death, does she conquer death (the great power of Satan), does she quicken? What does Christ do if the blessed Mary does these things? Although she is most worthy of the most ample honors, nevertheless she does not wish to be made equal to Christ, but rather wishes us to consider and follow her example (the example of her faith and her humility).

One of Luther’s clearest writings concerning Mary is his Exposition of the Magnificat (1520-21), composed for a young prince who had supported and interceded for him. One aspect of this study that may surprise Protestants is that Luther began his exposition with an invocation to Mary herself:

May the tender Mother of God herself procure for me the spirit of wisdom, profitably and thoroughly to expound this song of hers, so that your Grace as well as we all may draw therefrom wholesome knowledge and a praiseworthy life, and thus come to chant and sing this Magnificat eternally in heaven. To this may God help us. Amen.

In his explanation of this great hymn of praise from Luke 1:46-56, Luther noted first of all that Mary was of humble birth and background. She had little to distinguish or set her apart from the ordinary maidens of the land.

The tender Mother of Christ . . . teaches us, with her words and by the example of her experience, how to know, love and praise God. For since she boasts, with heart leaping for joy and praising God, that He regarded her despite her low estate and nothingness, we must needs believe that she came of poor, despised and lowly parents. Let us make it very plain for the sake of the simple. Doubtless there were in Jerusalem daughters of the chief priests and counselors, who were rich, comely, youthful, cultured, and held in high renown by all the people; even as it is to-day with the daughters of kings, princes and men of wealth. The same was also true of many another city. Even in her own town of Nazareth, she was not the daughter of one of the chief rulers, but a poor and plain citizen’s daughter, whom none looked up to nor esteemed. To her neighbors and their daughters she was but a simple maiden, tending the cattle and doing the house-work, and doubtless esteemed no more than any poor maidservant today, who does as she is bidden about the house.

Furthermore, any honor Mary received comes solely from God’s grace, by which he gifted her with the great privilege of being Christ’s mother.

Mary confesses that the foremost work God wrought for her was that He regarded her, which is indeed the greatest of His works, on which all the rest depend and from which they all derive. For where it comes to pass that God turns His face toward one to regard him, there is naught but grace and salvation, and all gifts and works must needs follow. . . . And that Mary herself regards this as the chief thing, she indicates by saying, “Behold, since He hath regarded me, all generations shall call me blessed.”

Note that she does not say men shall speak all manner of good of her, praise her virtues, exalt her virginity or her humility, or sing of what she has done. But for this one thing alone, that God regarded her, will men call her blessed. That is to give all the glory to God as completely as it can be done . . . .

From this we may learn how to show her the honor and devotion that are her due. How ought one to address her? Keep these words in mind and they will teach you to say: “O blessed Virgin, Mother of God, thou wast naught and all despised; yet God in His grace regarded thee and wrought such great things in thee. Thou wast worthy of none of them, but the rich and abundant grace of God was upon thee, far above any merit of thine.”

Next Mary also freely ascribes all to God’s grace, not to her merit. For though she was without sin, yet that grace was too surpassing great for her to deserve it in any way. How should a creature deserve to become the Mother of God! Though certain scribblers make much ado about her worthiness for such motherhood, I will yet believe her rather than them.

She says her low estate was regarded by God, nor was that a reward for anything she had done, but, hath done to me great things. He hath done this of His own accord without any doing of mine. For never in all her life did she think to become the Mother of God, still less did she prepare or make herself meet for it. The tidings took her all unawares, as Luke reports ( Luke 1:29). But merit is not unprepared for its reward, but deliberately seeks and awaits it.

Finally (and here I quote from another sermon by Luther on this passage), Mary remained a humble, faithful believer, even with the great honors God bestowed on her. In his remarks on Luke 1:46 (“Mary stayed with Elisabeth about three months, and then returned to her own house”), the Reformer commends her as an example of one who lived out the grace of God by remaining faithful in her ordinary vocation.

See how purely she leaves all to God, and claims for herself no works, honor, or reputation. She behaves just as she did before any of this was hers–seeks no greater honor, is not puffed up, vaunts not herself, calls out to no one that she is the mother of God, but goes into the house and acts just as before–milks cows, cooks, scrubs the kettles, and sweeps the house like any housemaid or housemother in the most menial tasks, as if none of these overwhelming gifts and graces were hers. Among the other women and neighbors she was esteemed no more highly than before and did not ask to be. She was still a poor townswoman among the lowliest. What a simple pure heart was hers! What an amazing person she was! What mightiness was hidden below her lowliness! How many there were who met her, talked with her, who, had they known, would have been overpowered in her presence.

• From “Visitation,” in Martin Luther’s Christmas Book (ed. Bainton)

One of the greatest Latin hymns is known as the Stabat Mater. There are two forms of this hymn, the Stabat Mater Dolorosa (The Sorrowful Mother Stood), and the Stabat Mater Speciosa (The Beautiful Mother Stood). The first describes Mary’s sadness at Jesus’ death, the second her joy at the birth of her Son. A few stanzas from this great hymn may complete our meditation on Mary today and help us to enter into the fellowship of her joy in God’s gracious Gift.

 

The beautiful Mother
stood joyously at the crib
in which her child lay

Through her exultant soul
Dancing with joy
Went a song of rejoicing

O how jubilant and blessed
was the immaculate
Mother of the Only-begotten

O how happy and laughing
And exultant did she watch
The birth of her divine son

Who would not rejoice
If he saw the Mother of Christ
In such comfort?