Advent Guide: You BelongSample

Share in the Cost, Share in the Joy

Have you stopped to really look at a nativity scene recently? Nativity scenes are a staple of holiday decorations, and you might have several in your own home complete with a star, animals, shepherds, and wise men. But stop and notice what's not there.

This is the birth of Mary's first child, and one might expect to see parents, sisters, brothers, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. However, unlike the relatives and neighbors who share in Elizabeth's joy (Luke 1:58), none are mentioned in the story about Mary. They're conspicuously missing.

The angel tells Mary she is highly favored (Luke 1:28), but there's a tension between the message of the angel and the reality of what it will mean for Mary.

On one hand, this is the greatest blessing the world would ever know – that God would wrap himself in flesh and enter history. But on the other hand, for Mary, this blessing God wanted to give the world carried potential shame, scandal, and even estrangement from her family.

Her life would no longer be what she had planned.

As it was with Mary, so it is with us: to accept the invitation into God's work of blessing the world often means great sacrifice. When God desires to bring about some great blessing through us, it's rarely without cost. Many of you know God's great desire to bless children and families in crisis.

This work of blessing requires people and families who are willing to say, "God, I see your desire to bless, count me in. I see the cost. "I wonder how many blessings of God have never come about, because God could find no one like Mary who was willing to be interrupted.

And yet, the joy of the blessings far outweighs the sacrifices involved.

We find Mary bursting into song, filled with rejoicing at what God is doing. The story is not about the burdens Mary must shoulder in the process. Because in the end, it's never the sacrifice we remember. It's the joy of having a part in the sacred circle of blessing.

God invites us to be a part of his circle of blessing, not because he wants something from us, but because he wants something for us. And to share in the cost is to share in the joy.

Collin Bullard has served as senior pastor at First Baptist Church of Longview for five years. Collin and his wife, Candice, have been married for 21 years and have four wonderful children. They enjoy traveling, hiking, making music, and playing board games as a family.