Consider: Mary’s song is very similar to the song of an Old Testament mother who was given the gift of a son. Who is that mother?
Learn: Read 1 Samuel 1:1-20, 2:1-10.
If you guessed Hannah, then you were correct. Mary’s song is very similar to Hannah’s, especially in the opening phrase. “And Hannah prayed and said, ‘My heart exults in the Lord; my horn is exalted in the Lord.’” (1 Samuel 2:1) Mary must have spent the months after the angel came to her considering the promise of the Messiah that God had given her.
Mary quotes or alludes to no less than 12 different Old Testament books in her song. She points to Genesis, Exodus, Judges, 1 Chronicles, 1 Samuel, Psalms, Isaiah, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Job, Micah, Deuteronomy, and Leviticus. In particular she thinks of Hannah and her song in 1 Samuel 2, who wept and cried out to the Lord for a son that she promised would be given over to the Lord. Like Hannah, Mary’s son was not just given over to the Lord, he was and is the Lord.
Hannah was Mary’s model of a woman, a mother, who cried out to God in prayer and trusted God to answer. Hannah then entrusted that child, Samuel, to God to do with him what God desired and planned. Mary was called to do the same thing, to give Jesus over to God for God to do with him what he had planned. God be praised for the example of Hannah to Mary and to us as one who trusted God and rejoiced in his fulfilled promises. “And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord.” (Luke 1:45)
Apply: What do you need to trust God for today?
I Commend Joy! 