Three women from the Bible in waiting

Elaine Storkey looks at Luke 1 and 2, where Elizabeth, Mary and Anna all had to wait for God’s plans and purposes to be outworked

Study passages: Luke 1:5-38; 2:36-38

Advent reminds us again that God’s plan for our lives usually involves waiting. A theme explored in both Old and New Testaments, it’s powerfully illustrated in the stories of three women at the beginning of the Gospel of Luke. As their lives interlink with one another, their waiting embodies three different dimensions of faith. Our first woman, Elizabeth, was elderly and childless, after waiting for years to conceive. Our second, Mary, was young and had no husband but was plunged into unexpected waiting after the shock news of pregnancy. Our third, widow Anna, had neither husband nor youth, but had waited through prayer and fasting for decades for God’s will to be revealed. In their different encounters with God and their experiences of waiting, each of these women shows us something of God’s timing and truth that challenges us.