As things turned out, neither of those two extremes actually played out during her lifetime- although she has been widely and rightly revered for many centuries.
What she did, on the day when she was surprised by that heavenly news, was simply to say “Yes” to whatever God might send.
“Then Mary said ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord, let it be with me according to your word’ ”(Luke 1 38)
And she became the physical bearer of God’s good news into a broken world.
Today, as we are confronted by the unexpected, and the potentially frightening, let us also say “Yes” to whatever God might send. Like Mary, we have no “road map” for the days ahead. Things probably won’t turn out the way we expect them to. We probably can’t imagine how they will turn out. But let us be unafraid- because we know that God is love, and that God’s love and life flows through each one of us, always. And let us, like Mary, be the physical bearers of God’s good news to a frightened world, rejoicing, like here, in the greatness of the one who calls us:
“My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God, my Saviour” (Luke 1.47)