Perfect - by Laura Duke

I've been thinking about two mothers in the Bible - Mary and Elizabeth. If you're unfamiliar with their stories, go ahead and read Luke 1 for some background.

Mary was a young woman filled with hope and with a future ahead of her. But in accepting God's plan for her life, opened herself up to experience the pain, rejection and disgrace her culture would have bestowed on her as an unmarried, pregnant woman. Passers by in the street would have warned their daughters not to be like her.

Elizabeth was once a young woman filled with the same hopes and dreams as Mary was. But as time passed on, those hopes and dreams faded. She wasn't able to fulfill her very purpose (as seen by the culture at the time) to bear children, thereby securing her and her husband's comfort in their old age. I imagine she may have felt forgotten or rejected by God. But the opposite was true, God had chosen her and was preparing her for her part in His plan.

What strikes me is the brokenness and imperfection that both of these women experienced as part of God's perfect plan to fulfill his promises and bring salvation to the world.

Their brokenness was actually integral to the part they played in God's plan.

Elizabeth was old and aware of her brokenness. She had maybe lost hope and felt useless. But not in God's eyes.

Mary was young and full of hope, but in participating in God's plan was called to experience brokenness, sorrow, pain and rejection.

How about us? We all experience brokenness and pain or will at some point in our lives. Be encouraged that it's not simply 'something we must endure', grit our teeth and bear, but rather that it is an essential part of God's plan for our lives. Like Elizabeth, maybe the pain of our past has been God forming us and preparing us for our part of his plan. Perhaps, like Mary, he is calling us to open ourselves up to the possibility of great pain, that we may also participate more fully in His plan for the salvation of others.

Lord, thank you that your plans are perfect and good and complete. We know that we can never fully understand, but by your Spirit strengthen us to trust you in the midst of our pain. And may we, like Mary, open ourselves up to the possibility of pain, having faith in your good plan.

Amen