In the fullness of time, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph. He was a righteous man and a descendant of David, the greatest king of Israel. The virgin’s name was Mary, and I was that virgin.
That day started out just like any other, only I had a strange feeling that it was some how special. Perhaps I would have a visitor; or maybe I had forgotten an important date. Whatever the cause, I could not help the feeling that something was to interfere with the monotonous routine of every day. As the day passed the same as it always had, little did I know that something would happen that changed my life forever.
I had just finished weeding my vegetable garden. I was placing the pesky weed-flowers into a vase in hopes that they would germinate so I could plant them around the olive tree out front. Then they would cease to be weeds and just be pretty flowers, for a weed is sometimes just a flower blooming at the wrong time or place.
Suddenly, I felt a great light behind me as if someone had just lit twenty candles all at once. “How foolish,” I thought, “to have a candle on a bright sunshine-day.” But when I turned around to see where the light came from, that thought was completely forgotten.
Before me stood a man dressed head to toe in the purest white I ever saw, it was so vivid a white that the daisies I held barely seemed white compared to it. And as for the light, he was not carrying one. It was as if he had found the greatest source of love, joy, and peace and it just overflowed from his soul so that you could see it written all over his face and the rest of him for the entire world to see. He was glowing with the love of God that emanated from his very soul. I knew then that he was not a man; looking back I realize I was too shocked to know that he must have been the angel Gabriel that Daniel spoke of.
When the angel spoke, it sounded as clear as a bell with the boldness of a lion. “Greetings! Oh favoured one, the Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women!”
Somewhere in the distance, I heard the crash of pottery as the vase and flowers I held dropped to the floor. All I could do was stand there and blankly stare at him. I kept thinking over and over what he said. I could have been having a vision of some great calamity followed by a blessing. Or maybe I was getting an angel escort to heaven like Elijah. As what always happens when something good or bad happens, my mind was drifting to the worst possible solution. Yet since he said I was blessed none of these were truly as bad as they could have been.
Finally, I thought or possibly said aloud since it seemed that the man heard me. “If this man said I am truly blessed and the Lord is with me, then what can man, or death, or disaster do to me, for I shall be with my God in the end? I shall not be afraid, for the Lord is everlasting and will be with me and never leave me.”
Almost as if the angel heard my thought, he reassured me. “Fear not, Mary,” he said addressing me personally, “For you have found grace and benevolence with God. Hark! You will be with child and give birth to a Son, and you shall call Him Jesus.
“He will be great, and will be called Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will endow upon Him the throne of His forefather David. And He will reign over the house of Israel throughout the ages, and of His reign there will be no end.”
Now I was even more confused than ever. First, how could I be with child, and second, how did this man who did not appear to be a Jew (or Greek, Roman, Egyptian, or any other I recognized for that matter) know the Scriptures so well that he quoted Isaiah in Hebrew with perfect accuracy? Theoretically, it was impossible that I could be with child; yes, I am engaged to be married, but I could never have an affair with him or another man that I am not married to. I would bring shame to my family and Joseph, my husband-to-be since doing so was against the law of God as adultery (I would say fornication, but according to Jewish law, a proposal to marriage was just as binding as the actual marriage). It was not that I doubted the Lord could do it, I know God can transcend natural laws since he created them, but I wondered how he would perform the miraculous act.
Thus, I asked even more astonished than before, “How can this be, since I have no husband nor have I had intimacy with any man?”
The angel replied, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of The Most High will overpower you. Therefore, the holy, sinless One who is to be born of you will be called the Son of God.
“And indeed, Elizabeth your relative has also conceived a son, and this is now the sixth month of her who was labelled barren. For nothing is impossible with God, and no word from God shall be without power of fulfilment.”
This was news to me, for I had not heard from my mother’s sister Elizabeth for some time. If my aunt, who I was told would never have a child, was now in her sixth month, certainly the Lord could cause me to conceive as He willed.
Therefore, I replied with total confidence and submission, “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be done to me as you have said.”
Then the angel, as if to reassure me of the Lord's power or to apologize for startling me, knelt down, picked up the broken vase, and faster than I could blink, he fixed it. Smiling, he poured water into it, and then placed the flowers in it. Next, he carefully handed it back to me. I took my eyes off of him for the first time to examine the vase which had the scars of being broken as if he healed it so it was now whole. Before I could look up to thank him, he was gone. The light remained for a few moments after he left, and then it too was gone, and I was alone once more. I placed the vase on the table, and to my surprise, I saw on the inside of it carved exquisitely:
“You’re welcome,
Gabriel”.
Gabriel”.
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