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Series:
Four People and One Person
Part 3 –
The Grace of Redemptive Entry
by Jack W. Hayford
Text: Read Luke 1:26-38; Ephesians 1:6
When we speak of the grace of God, we generally
define it as the unmerited favor of God. But the
word grace is not only descriptive of favor received that
is undeserved, as used in the NT, it also describes a dynamic.
There is an operational power of God that exceeds ours
– the grace that embraces us is also a grace
that enables us.
The entry of God’s Redeemer through the human agency of Mary
is not only a story we celebrate at Christmas, but it depicts how
all of God’s works penetrate our world. Mary
heard from the messenger of God about His purpose for her life;
she opened to that possibility, and the world has been forever changed.
Mary offers us a life principle of how God, by His grace,
moves into every human circumstance.
Redemptive entry describes the penetration
of God into our world to turn it around. It is what the
Lord does through His people, through the Church.
Each of us has personal significance in God’s design for us.
God has not only chosen to confer His redemption and forgiveness
upon us, but He enfranchises us with power to serve His
purpose in our time, in the place we’ve been given,
by His grace.
God did not have to use Mary. He could have simply announced, "I
will become flesh" and, in the Person of His Son, appeared
somewhere on a hillside in Galilee. He could have come into the
Earth scene by any means of His creative design, but He came through
the avenue of lowly birth, not only marking His humility,
but His full identification with us as well. With it, He indicated
the way and the means by which He flows grace into
the world – through ordinary people.
In the Greek text, the specific form of the word spoken to Mary,
"You are highly favored…" occurs
only one other place in the NT, translated in Ephesians 1:6 as:
"He has made us accepted in the Beloved."
It is God’s will to shower grace, not only in undeserved kindness
that forgives us and gives us the hope of heaven, but to grant us
grace to make each of us distinct avenues by which redemptive
entry occurs.
God is in the business of manifesting His kingdom through people
(vv. 31-33). This is the very thing you will find Jesus saying over
and over in His teaching in the Gospels ("The kingdom of God
is within you.") He isn’t simply offering high hopes
for the future. He isn’t posing some kind of human capacity
to save itself. He’s saying that God is putting grace
to work in you, that He who has made you an object of His
grace unto salvation, is wanting to make you an avenue of
His grace unto redemptive entry in circumstances you will
encounter from day to day in your life.
Mary carried within herself the King who, with His kingdom, was
avenued through her body. The promise of kingdom
grace came to her, grew in her, was delivered through
her, and the power of that kingdom grace
changed the world around her. God wants His promise
to be received by each of us, that He might use us as agents of
His redemptive grace to others.
Mary is a picture of the pathway of discipleship
– God happening in a frail, human vessel. She follows what
God says, learning slowly the real meaning of what is happening
in the Person of her son, submitting to it all the way to the Cross.
Later, in the Upper Room, waiting for the Holy Spirit’s coming,
she received power with the others to launch being what God wanted
them to be – the living Church in this world.
Just as Mary’s body physically stretched
to accommodate the growth of the King within her,
it’s not always comfortable to become an instrument of kingdom
grace happening through you. And it’s even less comfortable
when you come to the time of actual delivery.All of us come to moments
in which the Lord calls us to duty. He calls us to a time and a
place when grace is to be delivered through us. It will always cost
us something of personal sacrifice. We are not adding to redemption
by any struggle we go through, but there is something in our struggle
that completes the redemptive purpose.
Mary recognizes the resource that made it possible: "How can
this be?" she asks. The purpose we are called to always transcends
our own capacities. But just as He did in Mary, God will send His
Holy Spirit to enable you beyond yourself.
The grace that has been given to us avenued itself through
a human agent – Mary. It travels through us the same
way. Go in the grace of God with great anticipation, serving the
place He’s given you, at this hour.
Suggested resource: The
Christmas Miracle
Next: Part 4 – The Hope
for the Broken
Copyright © 2003 Jack
W. Hayford, Jack Hayford Ministries, Van Nuys, CA 91405
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Jack
Hayford Ministries
14800 Sherman Way, Van Nuys, CA 91405-2233