24 ‘Y’varekh’kha Adonai v’yishmerekha.
[May Adonai bless you and keep you.]
25 Ya’er Adonai panav eleikha vichunekka.
[May Adonai make his face shine on you and show you his favor.]
26 Yissa Adonai panav eleikha v’yasem l’kha shalom.
[May Adonai lift up his face toward you and give you peace.]’
27 “In this way they are to put my name on the people of Isra’el, so that I will bless them.”
Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of GodThe Octave Day of the Nativity of the Lord
The Lord bless you and keep you!(Numbers 6:24)
How many New Year’s resolutions have you come up with? How many do you think you’ll forget by the end of January? Every new year is filled with great promise, but it also has a fair bit of uncertainty. Who knows what the future holds? As Mary prepared to have her baby circumcised, she probably felt a similar mixture of anticipation and apprehension. “The angel didn’t give me too much detail. What will our future be like? Will my child be accepted? Or rejected?”
But Mary answered her fears in the best way possible: she recalled God’s faithfulness in the past and held onto the promise that God had made his own “resolution” to bless and keep his people.
She recalled how God reassured Joseph that she had not been unfaithful. She recounted the way God had opened doors for her in Bethlehem so that she had a safe place to give birth. She remembered the shepherds and their stories of angelic visitors. God had protected her from shame; blessed her with a loving, faithful husband; and sent visitors at just the right time to remind her of his love and care. At every step of the way, God had blessed her and kept her, just as he had done for her people over the centuries. Why would he abandon her now?
What was last year like for you? It might have been just another year with the usual ups and downs. Or like Mary’s, it might have been a year of significant changes and challenges. Either way, take some time to recall one or two memorable situations. Try to see how the Lord has blessed you and kept you through them. Look for the ways he has proved his faithfulness to you. Let this “inspired remembering” fill you with hope for the year to come. Let it remind you that God, your heavenly Father, has resolved to love you and care for you all year long.
“Father, help me remember how you have blessed and kept me. Give me faith to entrust this new year to you.” Amen!
Psalm 67:2 (1) God, be gracious to us, and bless us.
May he make his face shine toward us, (Selah)
3 (2) so that your way may be known on earth,
your salvation among all nations.
5 (4) Let the nations be glad and shout for joy,
for you will judge the peoples fairly
and guide the nations on earth. (Selah)
6 (5) Let the peoples give thanks to you, God;
let the peoples give thanks to you, all of them.
8 (7) May God continue to bless us,
so that all the ends of the earth will fear him.
Galatians 4:4 but when the appointed time arrived, God sent forth his Son. He was born from a woman, born into a culture in which legalistic perversion of the Torah was the norm, 5 so that he might redeem those in subjection to this legalism and thus enable us to be made God’s sons. 6 Now because you are sons, God has sent forth into our hearts the Spirit of his Son, the Spirit who cries out, “Abba!” (that is, “Dear Father!”). 7 So through God you are no longer a slave but a son, and if you are a son you are also an heir.Luke 2:16 Hurrying off, they came and found Miryam and Yosef, and the baby lying in the feeding trough. 17 Upon seeing this, they made known what they had been told about this child; 18 and all who heard were amazed by what the shepherds said to them. 19 Miryam treasured all these things and kept mulling them over in her heart. 20 Meanwhile, the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for everything they had heard and seen; it had been just as they had been told.
21 On the eighth day, when it was time for his b’rit-milah, he was given the name Yeshua, which is what the angel had called him before his conception.
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