Visitation 5-31-05

May 31, 2005 – The Visitation

A little-observed minor festival has major implications for the message of Lutherans For Life.

The Visitation commemorates the visit of Mary to Elizabeth in Luke 1:39-45. The Holy Spirit and the “power of the Most High” overshadowed Mary in Luke 1:35. The conception of Jesus takes place at this point. That is what Luke is referring to in verse 39 when he writes, “At this time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea.” Mary left immediately after the conception and traveled quickly. The town in the “hill country of Judea” would have been near Jerusalem since Zechariah, Elizabeth’s husband, was a priest. The journey from Nazareth would have taken perhaps 6 or 7 days.

The quick journey by Mary is significant. Jesus may have still been in Mary’s fallopian tube or just beginning to implant in her uterus. It is Jesus the embryo that causes the unborn John to leap for joy (vs. 41 & 44). It is Jesus the embryo that Elizabeth calls “Lord.” “But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (vs. 43) In Luke 1 “Lord” is used as the counterpart for the Old Testament name of God. For example: “the temple of the Lord” (vs. 9) and “the angel of the Lord” (vs. 11). There is no reason to understand Elizabeth’s use of “Lord” any differently. The Holy Spirit enables her to understand that God, the Creator of the universe, is present in Mary’s womb (or fallopian tube) as an embryo!

Jesus was God and man as an embryo. This was necessary for our salvation. Since we are sinful from the moment of conception (Ps. 51:5), Jesus took our place from that moment. He passed through all the stages of human development, including development in the womb, as part of His great humiliation to redeem human kind. In His humiliation in becoming a human embryo, Jesus exalts the value of human embryos!

Mary’s visit to Elizabeth attests to the divinity of Jesus as an embryo. In so doing, it also attests to the humanity of all human life at the embryonic stage. These two points are worthy of reflection on this day of the Visitation—and in these days when embryo destruction is promoted with little thought to who is being destroyed.