Here are types of risks we take annually and their respective odds. Your Odds are:

one in 12 that you will have an accident
one in 2,900 that you will die in a auto accident
one in 80,000 that you will die from complications in surgery
one in 250,000 that you will die in a plane crash
one in 1,000,000 that you will die in your bath tub

There was also an article in the newspaper, which spoke to the things that people fear, in light of their probability of occurring. According to this article, one of the fears that people had, was dying in a plane crash, and yet statistically, we are more likely to be kicked to death by a horse than to be killed in a plane crash. How many of you have ever been afraid of being kicked to death by a horse?

Another fear people have is that of being murdered by someone they don't know like a drive by shooting. Did you realize that you are 8 times more likely to be killed playing a sport than to be killed by a drive by shooting? And yet how many people worry about dying when they go out to play a sport?

People also worry about surgery and dying while on the operating table, and yet we are more likely to be killed in the car ride to the hospital. When we step out of the car at the hospital door, our chances of dying just decreased from 1 in 2,900 to 1 in 80,000. The point here is that there are risks in everything that we do. That is also truth with the issue of faithfulness to God. However, when we think about the issue of faithfulness to God, one would think that Christians would feel more comfortable taking the kinds of risks that God asks us to take. Yet, how many of us would have been willing to have taken the kind of risks which Mary took when she said yes to becoming the mother of the foretold Messiah? Our text looks at the risks that Mary took.