The main purpose of the affirmation credibly in church history of Mary's being the mother of God

was motivated by the church's desire to say something more about Jesus than they were about Mary,

to make clear their assertion and confession of the deity of this one who was born of Mary.

To bring up Mary among Protestants can easily stir up suspicion, questions, and controversy.

In reaction to the errors of the Roman Catholic

Church, we often prefer not to speak of Mary at all, that is, unless it's Christmas. Hi, I'm Nathan

W. Bingham, and you're listening to the Tuesday edition of Renewing Your Mind. Perhaps more often than any other time of the year, during Christmas, the Advent season,

we hear sermons and maybe even sing songs that mention Mary, but outside of Christmas,

she's generally avoided.

So as we approach the Advent season, let's consider the controversy surrounding Mary and ask the question, do we lose anything if we ignore a study of Mary?

Today's message is from a series with R.C. Sproles simply titled Mary.

And you can learn how to request complete access to this series when you visit Renewing

Your Mind.org.

Well, here's Dr. Sprawl to introduce us to the topic of Mary and to address whether it's

ever appropriate to refer to her as the Mother of God.

When I was a boy, I used to work in a shoe shine shop with a very dear friend whose name

was Ned Barberich, and all the boys referred to Ned as Uncle Ned because he had such a wonderful

influence on looking out for us in our youth.

And Ned belonged to the local Roman Catholic Church, and every evening, when I was shining shoes in his shop, he would have the radio on next to my shoe shine stand.

And devoutly and religiously, it was Ned's custom to listen to the broadcast of the

rosary. And so I would shine shoes, actually, in tempo with the recitation of the rosary,

which as a Protestant I didn't know before I had this job, and I would listen to this every night

...