Luke 2:15-20: in context

After the angels depart, the shepherds hurry to Bethlehem and find Mary and Joseph and the baby lying in the manger, just as they were told. They spread the word of what they had seen and heard, and all who hear it wonder. The shepherds return, glorifying and praising God. But of Mary the text says something different from all this activity and amazement: Mary kept all these sayings, treasuring them and pondering them in her heart.

Amid all the movement of the scene, the shepherds hurrying and telling, the crowds wondering, Mary does something quieter and worth learning from: she treasures these things and ponders them in her heart. She does not merely react to the wonder and move on; she takes it in, keeps it, turns it over, reflects on it deeply, holding the words and events in her heart to consider what they mean. She is doing what we might call pondering, or meditation, the treasuring up of God's words and works and the deep reflection on them, rather than letting them pass in a rush of activity. There is a wisdom in Mary's way that our hurried lives badly need. Much passes through our lives, including much of God's word and work, that we never take time to ponder. We hear, we react, we move on; the wonder flickers and is gone, unreflected upon, unabsorbed. Mary shows another way: to treasure up what God says and does, to keep it, to turn it over in the heart, to reflect on it deeply until it yields its meaning and takes root in us. This is the practice of pondering, of meditation on God's word and works, and it is how what we hear becomes what we live by. The shepherds' telling was good, and the crowd's wonder was real; but it was Mary who kept these things and pondered them, and it is this treasuring and reflecting that lets God's word sink in and shape us. There is an invitation here to slow down and ponder, not to let God's words and works rush past unreflected upon, but to treasure them, to turn them over in the heart, to reflect deeply and let them take root. Mary kept these things and pondered them in her heart; and the same treasuring and pondering is how we, too, take in and are shaped by what God says and does, rather than letting it pass in the rush.

Do I let God's words and works rush past me in the hurry of activity, reacting and moving on without absorbing them, or can I learn from Mary to treasure and ponder them in my heart, taking time to reflect deeply on what God says and does, so that it sinks in and takes root and shapes how I live?