Automatic Transcript Generated:
Speaker 1
So this question is, should we pray to Mary, Mother of God?
Speaker 2
I actually have my own Bible study I put together, and as I read Bible verses, keep adding to it.
Speaker 3
So I can actually answer this one on the spot. I think the first the most spot on verse on this is Luke eleven, verses 27 to 28.
Speaker 2
1St, I’m about in general, the veneration of Mary.
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And so here it writes, and it.
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Came to pass as he spoke, referring.
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To Jesus, these things, a certain woman of the company lifted up her voice and said to him, blessed is the womb that bore you and the breast that nursed you. And then verse 28, Jesus replies back, yeah, he said more than that.
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Blessed are those who hear the word.
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Of God and keep it. So a woman’s trying to praise Mary.
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And Jesus redirect and says, actually, blessed.
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Are the people who listen to me and do as I say, those are the people that deserve some commendation. There not that Mary was a bad.
Speaker 2
Person or anything like that, right?
Speaker 3
The Bible speaks very highly of her.
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But doesn’t put her on this totally.
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Different pedestal that some denominations do.
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And also this notion of a Holy Family with the Holy Mother traces back.
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To paganism, where you almost have like.
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This special trinity where you have the.
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Holy Mother as part of it.
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In fact, God even spoke against the.
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Worship of the Queen of Heaven in the Old Testament. If you look at Jeremiah seven, starting at verse 18, god says, the children.
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Gather wood and the fathers kindle the fire and the women need their dough to make cakes to the Queen of Heaven and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods. I mean, here God’s just listing a laundry list of all the things that the Israelites are doing wrong. And one of them is, as you.
Speaker 3
See there, making cakes to the Queen of Heaven. This is straight out of paganism, a veneration of like a Queen of Heaven. Now, I’ve heard I’ve been in a.
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Catholic cathedral and heard someone outright explain we venerate Mary because of this verse, Luke 128. And it reads, and the angel and I’m reading from the King James version, by the way, because what version you.
Speaker 3
Read can make a difference. In the KJV it says, and the.
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Angel came in unto her and said.
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Hail thou art, hail thou that art.
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Highly favored, the Lord is with thee.
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Blessed art thou among women. So he says, look, see, the angel.
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Hailed Mary, hail Mary, and said, therefore.
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Now we need to Veterate Mary. But that word hail used there in the Greek doesn’t mean worship. It means to rejoice, be glad, to.
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Rejoice exceedingly, to be well, to thrive.
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And in salutations, just like hail, it’s.
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Used like at the beginning of letters to give one greeting, like just a salute. So even people just casually can be.
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Doing it to each other. So if you look at James eleven, it says James a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus to the.
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Twelve tribes which are scattered abroad.
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Greetings. We see there that word greeting.
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There was the same word Hale said to Mary.
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So there’s nothing here to suggest that Mary should be exalted in a very unique, special way.
Speaker 2
Then we come to some Catholics also say that the woman prophesied in Genesis.
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315 is referring to Mary.
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And if we could put that up.
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Genesis 315.
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They mistranslated as saying that Mary crushes the head of the serpent rather than the seed of the woman.
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Which would be Christ. So if we read here the verse.
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It says, and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and between.
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Thy seed and her seed. So seed enmity is between her seed and the serpent seed. It shall bruise thy head, the serpent’s head. The seed shall bruise the serpent’s head and thou shalt bruise his heel. Look there.
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So here it’s clear the battle is.
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Really between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent and the serpent itself. But they try to translate it a.
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Little bit differently and put Mary in there. And Mary is the one that defeats.
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Satan, which is a bit tragic because it’s taking Christ out of the formula and putting inserting a human there.
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Again, a wonderful human.
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Not speaking bad about Mary, but it’s Christ substitution that we’re seeing going on. And then when it comes to praying to Mary, well, where is Mary right now? Is she in heaven? Can she hear us? We don’t have time to go into.
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A deep dive on this. But really, if you study the Bible out this concept of disembodied spirit that floats up to heaven and then people are there looking down and you could.
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Pray to them, is not biblical. It is absolutely not biblical. She’s in the grave like almost all.
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The other people, except for those who.
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Have been resurrected and taken with Christ when he returned. The rest of us are going to be waiting for him when he comes back and Mary is going to be with that group so he can’t hear us. Even if she was in heaven, we.
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Wouldn’T be praying to her. Just like we shouldn’t pray to Moses.
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Shouldn’T pray to Elijah. We pray straight to the Father because isn’t that even better? Tina, what?
Speaker 2
What are your thoughts? Sorry, I spoke a lot.
Speaker 4
Yeah, no, 100%. Like we do need to pray because Jesus says very clearly in John, chapter 14, verse six, I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me Jesus. That’s it. We only have access to the Father through Jesus Christ. And that’s very plain. And Jesus himself. Mary was not infallible Mary as much as she was a very good woman. I have 100% respect when I go to god willing, I go to heaven and I get to meet her. I’ll be like, I don’t know how you did what you did. I have the most respect for you. However, was she perfect? No. And Jesus actually had to call her out at one point in his ministry. You see that in Matthew chapter twelve, verse 46 and 47 and 48 as well. And so again, Matthew 1246, it says, while he, Jesus was still talking with the multitudes, behold, his mother and his brothers stood outside seeking to speak with him. They were like, hey, come here, what are you doing? And then one said to him, look, your mother and your brothers are standing outside seeking to speak with you.
Speaker 4
And so this was Mary and his brethren. I’m not sure if these were from Joseph or whatnot, but Jesus had brothers. And verse 48 he says, but he answered and said to the one who told him, who is my mother and who are my brothers? And in verse 49, he stretched out his hand toward his disciples and said, here are my mother and my brothers. And verse 50 is key, for whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother, sister and mother. And so he, at this point in time doesn’t even acknowledge Mary as his mother. He acknowledges his followers and those who do the will of the Father as more of his family than she and his brothers here on earth. And so you have to be very, very to me, it doesn’t get any more clear that she was a sinner. She’s not infallible, she’s not somebody we pray to. She’s somebody we give, we think back to as a woman of respect, sure, she did amazing work that I think I can’t even imagine having that responsibility that she had. But she was definitely a fellow sinner who needed Jesus as her savior.
Speaker 4
And the angel even tells her that this is the one who’s going to save you, in essence. So, yeah. Do we pray to Mary? No, we don’t.
Speaker 2
Why do we want to put any more distance between us and God?
Speaker 4
Yeah, well, the thing is, I have family who’s Catholic. And here’s the thing that I hear from a lot of and I’ve had a lot of friends who are Catholic is like the depiction of Mary is that she is so sweet and so kind and she smells like roses and I get all these different descriptions of her, whereas God is very harsh and kind of scary. But she prays to Jesus that he’ll have mercy on these people. And it breaks my heart because I’m like, but if you read the God of the Bible, the God of the Bible is very merciful. He’s the Lord. The Lord God. Merciful. That’s his name. Then he declares his name. He says I’m the Lord. The Lord God merciful. It’s a first description of who God is. We don’t need to go through Mary. Mary does not soften up God to us. God already loved us. John 316 god so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. God already loved you. God already had mercy towards you by sending his son Jesus, he did not need Mary to soften him up towards you.
Speaker 4
And that’s the truth. That’s the Bible. I hope that makes it very clear and I hope you get an understanding of God’s character a little bit better that way.
Speaker 1
And I think that’s really important to point out because I’ve heard similarly from many people that they pray to Mary because of this character of Mary and they have this idea in their head about a character of God that is not correct. And so the real challenge there then is addressing that incorrect understanding about that character of God. It’s often based on their experience with a father figure in their life rather than based on the actual God of the Bible. And so coming to know God the Father directly and his character through Christ is going to do us far greater good than praying to another human being.
Speaker 4
Definitely, yeah. And even a lot of people in their churches, god is depicted as scary and vengeful and that sort of thing. And then of course, if it gets reiterated at home in the family, it’s even more impressed in someone’s mind. But praise God. When you study the Bible, you see a God of love and God of compassion and mercy and kindness who loves you. And Jesus is the only intercessor you need between you and the Father because he died for you. And God the Father was one that sent Him to die for you because he loves you so much.
Speaker 1
Amen.
Speaker 4
Have to answer that question.
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In His Service
BibleAsk Team
