Rethinking the place of Mary

Luke 1:26-56; 2:1-7; Jn 19:25-27

Last week I referred to a famous painting of the crucifixion, by fifteenth-century artist Matthias Gr ¼newald, and I drew your attention to the strange man Gr ¼newald has standing to the left of Jesus as he hung from the cross – the figure of John the Baptist, pointing to Jesus.

If you glanced to Jesus’ right in the painting, you would notice three other figures – all recorded in the Gospels as present at the crucifixion. There is Mary Magdalene, weeping and wringing her hands at his feet. There is John the apostle, and in his arms is Mary, the mother of Jesus.

Ideas about Mary

Mary is an enigmatic figure. In the New Testament, she is present at the defining moments of salvation history: at the conception of Jesus, at his birth, at the cross, and among the disciples when the Holy Spirit is poured out at Pentecost.

In later church history, however, Mary was sometimes depicted in rather non-biblical or unbiblical ways, and this persists today. For example, many Roman Catholics affirm Mary’s perpetual virginity – the belief that she had no children after Jesus and remained a virgin until her death. Many also believe in her immaculate conception – the idea that she was somehow born without the stain of original sin. It is also believed that when Mary died, she ascended “body and soul” into heaven without experiencing corruption. And, associated with these beliefs is the notion that Mary is the Mother of God or the Queen of Heaven, raised to an exalted place in heaven, perhaps even a higher place than her son.

It is no wonder that many biblically literate Christians have for centuries reacted strongly to such views. And it is no wonder that in reaction, as Timothy George observed recently in an article in Christianity Today, “evangelicals often say less about Mary than the New Testament does.”

The New Testament witness

What does the New Testament say about Mary? Most of us know the Christmas story well: God reveals through an angel Gabriel that Mary (a virgin) will have a child, conceived through the Holy Spirit. She is betrothed to Joseph, a descendant of David, and the child will be called Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins. Luke tells us that Gabriel spoke of Mary as “favoured one” (Lk 1:28). She had “found favour with God” (v 30). Mary is a good person, with a humble disposition, expressing the obedience of faith that brings joy to God’s heart.

In a way, Mary was the first disciple of Jesus (see Lk 1:38, 42-45). As Timothy George notes, “had she not believed, she would not have conceived.”

But it is important to understand that Mary is not a source of grace but a recipient of God’s grace. Martin Luther, writing a commentary on Mary’s song in the sixteenth century, acknowledged that she was the embodiment of God’s unmerited grace, but has Mary say, “I am only the workshop in which God operates.”

Which brings us to Mary’s song (Lk 1:46-55), often called the Magnificat. It is indeed a magnificent poem, almost a comprehensive sermon on God and his ways, demonstrating that Mary was not only a faithful believer, but that she knew the content of her faith well.

In verses 46-47, Mary proclaims the greatness of God, and confesses God as her Saviour. In verses 48-50, she gives reasons for her praise: God has noticed her humble situation, and has lavished on her his power and mercy. She is a recipient of his unmerited favour, and she is grateful. In verses 51-53, Mary extols God’s awesome acts of salvation, especially in redeeming Israel. Finally, in verses 54-55, Mary reminds us that in every generation God’s mercy is available, and that God has spoken words of promise to Abraham and his offspring, including the baby she is carrying – who is in fact the fulfilment of the Old Testament prophecies of which she has been singing.

I want you to notice something else about Mary’s song. On one hand, her God is the great and powerful warrior king who brings deliverance. He accomplishes great things, demonstrates his strength, scatters the proud, brings down the powerful, and sends the rich away empty. On the other hand, her God is the gracious and merciful covenant-maker, looking with favour, lifting up the lowly, extending mercy to those who fear him, satisfying the hungry, and helping Israel.

This is the God of Mary’s faith and experience, and she celebrates him. But Mary is about to discover another glorious perspective on God and his ways: her son Jesus is born, and Mary becomes, to paraphrase T.S. Eliot, “the place of impossible union where past and future are conquered and reconciled in incarnation.”

After the birth of Jesus, the New Testament does not mention Mary’s virginity. Paul merely speaks of Jesus as “descended from David,” and “born of a woman” (Rom 1:3; Gal 4:4). Mary’s glory was to bring the Messiah, the Son of God, into the world.

Mary appears several times in the Gospels as Jesus grows up, and as he pursues his public ministry. She and Joseph present the infant Jesus at the temple, and encounter Simeon and Anna (Lk 2:22-40). She takes Jesus to the temple at Jerusalem every year to celebrate the Feast of the Passover, and this is where he is separated from them (Lk 2:41-52). She appears again at the wedding at Cana in Galilee (Jn 2:1-11), and in a few other places.

And she is there at the site of the crucifixion of Jesus, watching in grief and horror, unable to do anything about it, as her first-born son dies a terrible, undeserved, unexpected death (Jn 19:25-27).

Referring to paintings like that of Gr ¼newald, Richard John Neuhaus writes,

Beginning in the Middle Ages, artists would depict a very tall cross, with Mary and the others far below at its foot. But historians believe that the cross was probably about seven feet tall. They were face to face. The sweat, the blood, the tearing tendons, the twitching, the wrenching, the bulging eyes – she would have seen it all quite clearly, as clearly as she saw him so long ago when she held him safely to her breast. When he was twelve years old they came to Jerusalem, and now she had accompanied him once more, to celebrate his last Passover there outside the walls of Jerusalem. But this time he is the Passover lamb. This time they would not be going home again.

The theological significance

Mary is a beautiful example to us of faithfulness, obedience, constancy and commitment to the cause. But she is also theologically significant, for at least three important reasons.

First, like John the Baptist, Mary represents a link between the old and new covenants. She points back to a long line of faithful mothers (Sarah, Rachel, Hannah, Tamar, Rahab, Ruth), and to the promises made to them, and to the God who made them.

But for the early church, Mary also pointed forward, as the Daughter of Zion, to the fulfilment of prophecy and the climax of salvation history. Reading passages such as Micah 4:10 and Jeremiah 4:31 typologically, the early church saw Mary as their fulfilment, which is understandable. Some went further, and saw Mary as the new Eve, whose obedience reversed the disobedience of the first Eve. But the Bible itself does not teach this. Mary cannot save us, or cleanse us, or answer our prayers. Mary too was a sinner who needed the salvation of God through Christ.

Second, in the twentieth century the doctrine of the virgin birth has often been used to defend the deity of Jesus. But for the early church, the virgin birth was a way of affirming that the Son of God was truly human. They were arguing against the heresy we call ‘docetism’:

an early Christian heresy that claimed that the humanity and sufferings of the earthly Christ were only apparent, not really real. That way of thinking was picked up by various Gnostics who claimed to have a secret knowledge of what was really going on behind the veil of the ordinariness, the everydayness, the thus and so-ness, of Mary and her child. For the Docetists and Gnostics a real incarnation, a real immersion of the Divine in the flesh and blood and tears of humanity, was not worthy of their lofty conception of God. Thinking to honor God, they denied the ways of God. Such Christians are still with us today.

Third, Mary is the one who gave birth to the One who is God. She was the “bearer of God.” At the ecumenical Council of Ephesus in 431, the doctrine of theotokos (that is, Mary as the bearer of God, not merely of a ‘Christ’ who was less than God), was established as Christian orthodoxy, to assert the unity of divinity and humanity in Jesus Christ. Jesus was indeed, as Paul had said, “manifested in the flesh” (1 Tim 3:16).

Mary’s relation to Jesus

Coming back to Gr ¼newald’s painting, there is something about the figure of John the Baptist that I did not mention last week. Above him, floating in red letters against a black sky, are the words of John 3:30, “He must increase, but I must decrease.”

The same sentiment could have come from Mary’s lips. As G.A. Studdert-Kennedy expressed it in his poem, “Good Friday falls on Lady Day,”

And has our Lady lost her place? Does her white star burn dim? Nay, she has lowly veiled her face Because of him.

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E147 Copyright (c) 2004 Rod Benson. Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2001). To talk with Rod about this message, email RodBenson[at]morling.edu.au