Tarek El Mahaba August Magazine | Page 45

St. Mary, the Mother of God Saint Mary is an exemplar for every person – Christian and even non- believer. She is mentioned throughout the Divine Liturgy, the prayers in the Coptic Books of Hours (Agbeya), and through many other services in the Orthodox Church. But the question lies – why is Saint Mary a great role model in our faith? I will highlight three main points that reveal how amazingly she served and placed others before herself. Firstly, Saint Mary began serving her life to God praying in the temple at the age of 12. This is the first stage which we know of where serves the Lord. The next service she helped with was when she immediately visited Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, and helped her give birth to John. This shows us how helping others is a type of service. Lastly, she helped during the wedding of Cana when there was no more wine at the celebration. She interceded to Christ and he performed the first miracle as is recorded in the Gospel according to St. John. Saint Mary had a great amount of faith and belief that Jesus, being the Son of God, will fulfil this miracle. Service must be done with faith and belief in God. From these three main events, we can learn a 45 variety of things which brings to mind a sermon I heard by about joy - funnily enough, joy can be used as an acrostic poem J-Jesus O- Others Y- yourself Therefore, serving others brings joy within a person and everyone can become much happier when they serve.