Luke 1:26-28 NASB95
Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth, [27] to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the descendants of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. [28] And coming in, he said to her, “Greetings, favored (graced) one! The Lord is with you.”
The angel Gabriel when addressing Mary, called her “favored, or graced” one. The grammar there indicates that God’s favor had been already and continued to be on Mary, and the phrase “The Lord is with you” almost always in Scripture speaks of God’s demonstrative presence and activity. Gabriel wasn’t just declaring that God’s favor and presence and power were going to be on her only in light of the fact that she was going to give birth to the Messiah. Gabriel was actually acknowledging that God’s favor and demonstrative presence had already been on her for some time. Mary wasn’t just an arbitrary choice that God made blindly. There was already something about her life that postured her for God’s enlarged purposes.
Gabriel’s announcement to Mary is not the first time we see him in chapter 1 of the gospel of Luke. Earlier, we have Gabriel announcing to Zacharias that even in her old age, Elizabeth was going to give birth to a child. Elizabeth was barren, and Mary was a virgin, and an Archangel came to John and to Mary to announce the miraculous. I’ve always been fascinated by the fact that even though John and Mary were stunned by what the angel said to them, neither of them was shocked that an angel, even an Archangel, would reveal himself to them and speak of the intentions of heaven for their lives. They acted like it was normal to have an angel visit people, and of course, in their biblical worldview, it was. God just splashes every page of the gospel narratives with some kind of supernatural, trans-rational event. God is a multitasker, and one of the reasons the miraculous is demonstrated so much in the pages of the gospels is so that we would adjust, as followers of Jesus, to what is normal from God’s perspective.
We are in the season of Advent, and Advent is all about expectation and anticipation. It is the first season of the Christian calendar, and I believe that it is first because the Holy Spirit wants us to have a foundation spiritually that always expects and anticipates the supernatural divine activity of God. Mary had postured herself to live under God’s favor and with God’s demonstrative presence, and therefore the miraculous was part of her worldview. For all who are in Christ is important to realize that Jesus Himself has postured us under God’s limitless favor and in union with His demonstrative presence. Remember the gospel; “Our inclusion in the life that Jesus lives, and the favor He lives under.” Because of what Jesus has done at the cross on our behalf, we should expect and anticipate the supernatural, including signs and wonders and the tangible activity of angels in our lives. You think that you don’t deserve that kind of lifestyle, but because you are in Christ, you get to experience what He deserves and what He has earned. Advent is such a great season because it reminds us that because of the incarnation and the finished work of Christ of the cross, we get to continually live with a holy expectation and anticipation of God’s version of “normal.”