If you could choose when to be born and who your parents were: what would you choose? Certainly I would want midwives and doctors present with an excellent hospital near by. I would want to be born in an age of comfort, in a place of peace and prosperity.

So why on earth did God choose Palestine of 2,000 years ago?

Perhaps because his values are not our values. In this Advent Season let us take time to reflect on our lives. Are my priorities God’s priorities? So often we are selfish and self-centred whereas God calls us to be outward looking and considerate towards others. Mary didn’t consider herself when she answered the call of God to be the mother of Jesus. In todays terms Mary was a young girl probably aged between 14 and 16 and when presented with the challenge simply said yes.

She didn’t know the full picture but kept taking the small steps that God called her to, steps that would lead her eventually to the foot of the cross and to witness the barbaric death of Jesus, her son.

So what about us 2,000 years later. Do we make Mary so special and so important that we don’t need to follow in her footsteps? What is God calling you to do in your life? Remember Mary didn’t leap from the birth of Jesus to the cross, she made small steps trying to work out what God was calling her to do and be and not always getting it right. We must do the same, look at your life and ask yourself, ‘What can I change?’

Often the changes which are most dramatic appear at first sight to be small and insignificant. Who knows where God will take you in this new Church year.

Have a happy and blessed year, and celebrate the birth of the Christ Child with a promise to try to listen more and more to what God is calling you to do and to be.

May God bless us in this challenge.

Andrew SSL