Some secrets are too big to keep. Some news is too great to keep to yourself. Even so, even the best of news spoken in the wrong place at the wrong time can lead to the wrong results. Where could Mary go and who could she tell her great good news?

Gabriel had made a connection for her when he said, “And consider your relative Elizabeth—even she has conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month for her who was called childless. For nothing will be impossible with God,” (verses 36, 37). 

Mary knew Elizabeth’s long-denied desire to have a child. Hearing of her miraculous conception illuminated the path she quickly set out upon. Notice the word “hurried.” Mary and her relative Elizabeth had much to celebrate, more even than Mary then knew.

When Mary arrived, “Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. Then she exclaimed with a loud cry, ‘Blessed are you among women, and your child will be blessed!’” (verses 41, 42). The Message says Elizabeth “sang out exuberantly.”

Let’s pause for a moment and reflect on all the singing going on in the Christmas story. Elizabeth sings (verses 42-45). Mary sings (verses 46-55). Zechariah, who had not spoken a word in nine months, sings (verses 68-79). Angels sing (2:13, 14). 

Luke inserts a note in 2:19 which leads at least one reader to imagine that Mary softly and tenderly sang again on that silent night after the noise of the birth, the arrival of the shepherds, and the report of the angels. 

When Mary arrived and greeted Elizabeth, “the baby leaped inside her.” John the Baptist immersed inside his mother made his first announcement of the Messiah’s presence. Yes, it is true, that baby God was forming in Elizabeth’s womb had a destiny, a purpose. And that embryonic Messiah, Immanuel, God with Us, did as well. 

From conception to birth, from birth to maturity, from maturity to natural death, our Father in heaven has a plan for every life (Ephesians 2:10). Mark Twain and William Barclay, along with others, have been credited with saying, “There are two great days in a person’s life — the day we are born and the day we discover why.” 

These two babies-to-be were as real as you and I when they were announced before they were conceived. Each had a mission as big as, and even bigger than, the whole wide world. No wonder “Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart,” (2:19 NIV). 

There is so much more to notice and to consider in Luke 1. Today is a good day to read each section prayerfully, to see with new eyes, to hear with new ears, to receive with our hearts the new life God gives so graciously, so lovingly, so perfectly.

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