A "Mary Moment" with the Lord.

Are you expressing that you love or loathe the Lord?
When reading the Christmas story I couldn’t help but recognize the attention to detail when the love that Mary had for her newborn was described for us.  

• To Love
  • Luke 2:7 (NKJV) And she brought forth her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.
    • The imagery is sweet. What a moment she shared with her newborn. The peace, the stillness, the caress, the recognition of how delicate He was. This young lady is having a precious moment with her son. She took the time and effort to carefully wrap Jesus, and lay Him down. 
    • In John MacArthur’s study Bible we read in the footnotes on p. 1514 about “swaddling cloths. Strips of cloth used to bind a baby tightly…This is still the custom in some Eastern cultures. The absence of swaddling cloths was a sign of poverty or lack of parental care.” 
    • Lack of parental care, or what it looks like to loathe a newborn child is described for us in this next passage from the OT. 
• To Loathe
  • Ezekiel 16:1-5 (NKJV) Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying, 2 “Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations, 3 and say, ‘Thus says the Lord God to Jerusalem: “Your birth and your nativity are from the land of Canaan; your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite. 4 As for your nativity, on the day you were born your navel cord was not cut, nor were you washed in water to cleanse you; you were not rubbed with salt nor wrapped in swaddling cloths. 5 No eye pitied you, to do any of these things for you, to have compassion on you; but you were thrown out into the open field, when you yourself were loathed on the day you were born.
    • In John MacArthur’s study Bible we read in the footnotes on p. 1169 that “Israel, in the day of its birth, was unwanted and uncared for.” 
    • The Merriam-Webster Dictionary shares with us that to loathe someone is, “to dislike greatly and often with disgust or intolerance : DETEST.”
• I’m thankful that we get to read about this moment that Mary had with her newborn. What we have recorded for us in no way reveals that she loathed Him. 
• Let me ask you, what is your treatment of the Lord? 
  • Are you careful in your study of His word? 
  • Are you careful in the way in which you share Him with others? 
  • Or do you throw His words and reputation around flippantly as though they don’t mean anything? 
  • Do you loathe/detest Him and His ways? Are you disgusted with Him because of how certain circumstances have turned out in your life? Is He really the one to blame? You say you love Him, but you live quite the opposite of that…you don’t spend time with Him in His word or in prayer…you don’t attend Church…you don’t spend time with His people. What is it about either Him, His Word, or His people that you can’t tolerate? 
• In what ways have you proven that you love and care for Him? What does it look like for you to metaphorically wrap Him in swaddling clothes, or to lay Him down? 
• In what ways might it have come across as though you loathe Him, or that you’re disgusted by Him or His people, or that you want nothing to do with Him or His people?
• I pray that you’ll have a Mary moment with Him this Christmas season and for the rest of your life…treat Him as tenderly as His mother did. 

Practicing His Presence,
Nate