God’s Way vs Man’s Way

‘You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus. Mary asked the angel, “But how can this happen? I am a virgin.” Luke 1:31 & 34

In those days when a woman has been betrothed and is about to get married, culturally everybody knows who her husband would be and there are plans to get married in a short while. Now imagine you are this woman and God sends an angel to you. God said through the angel “you are going to conceive and have a son and name Him Jesus”. What will come to your mind immediately? You will figure out the how. You will relay the experience to Joseph and urge him to speed up the wedding plans and even move the date closer because “God has already given me the name of our baby”. So you will work very hard to get married quickly so that you can give birth to the great child right? That is the logical thing to think about. But not Mary, Mary said “But how can this happen?” When I read this, my thoughts were common Mary you are about to get married, what do you mean how? Just get married and have this child. If Mary had done that, would that be how God had wanted to bring about the Messiah? No! So the fact that God has given a word and it is God, His how’s are different from the how you and I will think of. In fact God says, “My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord. “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts’ Isa.55:8-9.

God said to Abraham “you will have a child” but Sarah came up with a plan, a strategy. In other words, what Sarah was saying, “God has said you will have a child so lets figure out the how. After all God can use anybody [have you heard this before?]. So take my house-girl, after all she belongs to me, any child she gives birth to is mine”. The Bible did not say Abraham resisted, not once. But was that what God had in mind? Do not jump ahead of God. There are so many examples in Scripture of the huge difference between man’s how and God’s how. God has told you what; you need to find out how from Him. It is not our responsibility to figure out how. God can choose to go with the how you have figured out but in my experience He usually never works like that.

Prayer: Holy Spirit, help me form the habit of enquiring of You Lord at every step, in Jesus Name.