May it be to me as you have said

Ezekiel 45, 46
Luke 1

SOAP - May it be to me as you have said

Scripture
Luke 1:38 "I am the Lord's servant," Mary answered. "May it be to me as you have said." Then the angel left her.

Observation
Mary believed the angel and accepted what he told her. She didn't object or doubt.

Application
Wow! I'm totally impressed by Mary. If I were her I would have been pretty mad... even though I was being told that I would be a part of something so wonderful and amazing. I'm sure a part of me would have been thinking, "yeah right, I'll have a kid that will reign over the house of Jacob forever?" I would have had a lot of doubt. And I would have also been thinking, "this is going to ruin everything!" I would have been worried about Joseph not wanting me if I was pregnant. I would have wanted to tell that angel to go away, no thank you angel, my life is just fine the way it is right now.
I wonder how many times I've passed up opportunities to do something great for God because I thought it would mess up my life at the moment. I'm sure there have been many. But, I can think of at least one where I (we... Hugh and I) said yes to the challenge in front of us, and it was a huge blessing. When they called him and asked him to come be the pastor at Bethel UMC for a while, I wanted to say "no" so badly. But we both felt like it was something we had to do. The timing was terrible. We were already busy. We were part of a new church we didn't want to leave. We were about to get married and feeling a little overwhelmed already. Going to Bethel felt like it would mess things up. Hah, not at all! Everything about it was great! I love how the Lord works. That whole experience was a great blessing. And we continue to be blessed by the people we have met at Bethel. Answering the Lord's call turned out GREAT even though I was afraid it would mess everything up.

Prayer
Dear Lord. I know there have been lots of times that I've said "no" to you. Actually, I kind of feel like I say "no" in LOTS of little ways everyday, probably thinking those little things don't really matter. I don't want to say "no". Lord I am going to try to make sure I notice when I'm turning away from what you've called me to do, and turn all those little (and the big ones too) "no's" into "yes's". Thank you Lord for your word, for this Bible study, and for all that I am learning. Please bless the study of Hugh, John, Zach and Rachel as well. Amen.

Some general thoughts on today's scripture:
1 - Kitchens?! In Ezekiel it mentions kitchens for cooking the offerings. Did they eat the offerings? I confess, I've always been bothered by the fact that all these offerings in the old testament seem wasteful. I guess I'm too much of a tree hugger, animal lover, whatever. It's giving back to God what is God's so I guess it's impossible for it to be wasteful, but still. I've always thought they just burned the offerings and did not eat them. But here it sounds almost like they are using them to feed the priests. That would be pretty cool. I like that idea. I looked in some study Bibles trying to find out if that is what's going on, but none of them addressed that topic. Bummer. Further research will follow... :-)

2 - This section of Ezekiel seems to contradict itself some, and have more footnotes about uncertain translations, etc. Wonder why that is? Weird.

3 - Zechariah and Mary both questioned the angel. Wonder why he got mad at Zechariah and not a Mary? I guess it sounds kinda like Zechariah doesn't believe the angel, but Mary believes and is just asking how it will work.