We are pleased that you're here today.
We welcome you in Christ's name.
Let's open our Bibles together as we study God's Word in the first chapter of the Gospel
of Luke entering into our Christmas series, a series that will focus on the songs of Christmas.
Yesterday, my wife and I were invited to a dress rehearsal actually for Black Nativity.
How many of you have ever gone to Black Nativity in St. Paul?
A few of you, only a few of you.
If you want to put a little bit of excitement in your Christmas season, buy a ticket to
the Black Nativity.
It is worth going to see.
It is the perspective of Africans on the birth of Jesus.
And they tell the story several times from different African cultures as well as from
the Afro-American perspective.
And it will set your feet at dancing as it did, as the announcement did to Mary as we're
going to see this morning.
It's a wonderful occasion and it introduced us to the songs of Christmas as we've been
hearing also in the radio these days.
We're going to talk about the songs of Christmas in our Sunday morning series.
Today, the song of Mary, Mary's song of adoration.
We're going to begin reading in the 46th verse of Luke chapter 1.
And Mary said, My soul exalts the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior.
For he has had regard for the humble state of his bond-slave.
For behold, from this time on all generations will count me blessed.
For the mighty one has done great things for me, and holy is his name.
And his mercy is upon generation after generation toward those who fear him.
He has done mighty deeds with his arm.
He has scattered those who were proud in the thoughts of their heart.
He has brought down rulers from their thrones and has exalted those who were humble.
He has filled the hungry with good things and sent away the rich empty-handed.
He has given help to Israel his servant in remembrance of his mercy, as he spoke to our
fathers, to Abraham and his offspring forever.
Mary spoke these words, usually called a song because they're in the form of a poem.
When she visited Elizabeth, her relative, Mary had already received the news from God
that she was the chosen vessel to be the one who would bring the Savior into the world
through a virgin birth.
She accepted that role from God, as we're going to see today.
And then a few months later went to visit Elizabeth and her husband.
Elizabeth was also with child.
And Elizabeth made an exclamation as Mary came into her presence.
She says in verse 42, blessed among women are you, and blessed is the fruit of your
womb.
And how has it happened to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
For behold, when the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby leaped in my womb
for joy.
And blessed is she who has believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken
to her by the Lord.
Those are the words of Elizabeth upon Mary's greeting and entrance into the room.
And then Mary is the one who exclaims the words that we have read further regarding
her faith in the Lord.
Mary is a remarkable example of one who surrendered by faith to God's plan for her life.
We see this in her response in verse 38 when Mary said to the angel, behold the bond slave
of the Lord, be it done to me according to your word.
You see, she accepted the role that God gave to her.
And this was by faith that she did so.
As Elizabeth points out in verse 45, blessed is she who believed.
Mary is a remarkable example of a godly woman who surrendered by faith to God's plan for
her life.
That is the call of God to each one of us this morning.
That each one of us would come to understand God's plan for our lives.
And that we would then by faith surrender to the good, acceptable, and perfect will
of God for us.
Mary's faith gave her three vital perspectives that made her the woman of God that she was.
I want you to notice how her faith caused her to gain different perspectives.
First of all, how she saw herself, how she saw her God, and then finally how she saw
her times.
But let's think first about how Mary saw herself.
This is in verses 46 through the first part of verse 48.
How did Mary see herself because of her faith?
First of all, she saw herself as a sinner, a sinner.
She calls the Lord God, my Savior.
Now the implication there is very clear.
That Mary recognized that she needed a Savior from her personal sin.
Now I recognize that there are those who believe that Mary was born without sin, herself.
And only in that way they reason, could Mary then have been the mother of the sinless Son
of God.
However, that idea flies in the face of what the Word of God clearly teaches, which is
that Mary knew that she was a sinner and that God was her Savior.
Because God had saved her, she magnifies the Lord.
That word exalts means to magnify the Lord.
That is, God had become large in her life.
God was not distant and far away from Mary, but God was very real to her.
She says, my soul magnifies the Lord.
And she says further that her spirit rejoices in God her Savior.
That word rejoice means to leap.
In fact, it means to leap very much.
The idea is to dance.
Mary is saying here, God has set my feet to dancing because of what He has done in my
life.
God had saved her and the joy of the Lord filled Mary's heart because of that.
Because God had saved her, nothing that He could ask of her would be too much.
She would, in her heart, demanded surrender of her life to whatever His purpose would
be.
May I say to you the same is true of us?
That if God has saved you, if God has given you new life in His Son, Jesus Christ, then
out of the joy that is in your heart, may you surrender completely to Him.
Nothing that He could ask of you would be too much, would it?
That He has redeemed you from the judgment of your sin.
That He has rescued you from the eternity apart from God and hell.
Mary's feet were dancing because of what God had done for her, a sinner.
He had saved her.
But secondly, Mary saw herself as a servant.
I really prefer what some translations say, the handmaid of the Lord.
She refers to her humble estate in verse 48.
That humble estate reflects the poverty in which she had been raised.
It reflects her sense of a lack of credentials for what God had called her to do.
She did not feel worthy of this.
She saw herself as a servant of the Lord.
That God had had regard for her.
God had looked upon her with favor and had chosen her actually because of her joyous
humility before God.
There's nothing like humility to attract God to you for His wonderful divine purpose.
God saw in this marvelous, godly teenage girl a humble person and He selected her to be
the mother of the Savior.
Peter reflects this very idea when he writes, humble yourselves therefore under the mighty
hand of God that He may exalt you in the proper time.
When you and I think ourselves worthy that somehow God is missing out if He doesn't
choose us, then we have disqualified ourselves really from being used.
But it is when there is a genuine humility and we sense ourselves unworthy of being used
by God that He joyously chooses us for marvelous purposes in life.
Mary was finding out what God's purpose was and by faith she had surrendered to that purpose.
And her faith had given her a right perspective on who she was.
She was a sinner who had now been saved and who was now called also by God to serve her
Lord in a very special way.
I hope that your faith has brought the same perspective to your life.
That God has saved you for a purpose.
That God has saved you that you might be His servant in some special way.
Well I noticed then a second perspective that came to Mary.
It was how Mary saw her Lord.
Not only how she saw herself, but her faith affected how she saw her Lord.
The last part of verse 48 up through verse 53.
I noticed first of all that she tells us the identity of her Lord.
She calls Him the Mighty One.
The Mighty One.
This One who was magnified in her life, this One who had become large, who had come near
to her was the Mighty One.
This name Mighty One is used elsewhere to describe God as able.
The One with whom all things are possible because He is the Mighty One.
It is a word that is also used to describe Jesus in Luke chapter 24 verse 19 when He
is called a prophet mighty in deed and word.
When I see this name Mighty One, I'm reminded of that Old Testament name for God, El Shaddai.
Which is God Almighty.
It is used the first time in Genesis chapter 17.
We saw that in our study of Genesis.
In the larger context of the word, that name being used for the first time is the story
of another miraculous birth where El Shaddai promises to Abraham and to Sarah a son.
Abraham was 99 years old, beyond the point of being able to physically father a son.
But God says to him, Abraham, I am El Shaddai.
I am God Almighty.
I will give you a son.
And here we see Mary.
Unmarried, engaged to Joseph, but unmarried, a pure and chaste young lady.
And God says to her, you're going to be with child.
Her response was, well how will this be?
And God says to her, the power of God will overshadow you.
The Holy Spirit will come upon you and that one that will be conceived in your womb will
be holy.
And she accepts that as from God.
And the name that she gives to God is the Mighty One.
I just wonder if she wasn't reflecting upon the promise that had been given to Sarah and
to Abraham, the Mighty One.
She identifies for us also His character as well as His name.
She describes her God as being powerful.
He says the Mighty One has done great things for me.
The word great there is the word mega.
That's one of the end terms these days.
The mega things, the mega mall, the mega this, the mega that, mega vitamins.
He says here God has done mega things for me.
Powerful things, big things.
So she sees God's character first of all as being one who is powerful.
God has done things for her that surpass in degree and intensity anything that she could
have possibly imagined.
The same word is used of Jesus in chapter 1 and verse 32 when the angel says to Mary,
He will be mega.
He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.
Secondly, Mary sees her God as holy.
For she goes on to say and holy is His name.
We see that word holy.
We think of God's moral perfections, that God is without any defilements.
And of course that is true, but the idea of holiness is bigger than that.
The idea of holiness is that God is entirely unique.
That God cannot be compared to anything that you and I know.
In all of creation there is nothing that can be compared to God.
He is holy.
He is above everything and all of us.
He is entirely different than we are.
R.C.
Sproul puts it this way in his book, The Holiness of God.
He is so far above and beyond us that He seems almost totally foreign to us.
To be holy is to be other, to be different in a special way.
You see Mary had grasped this, that God was entirely different.
He is holy in all of His divine perfections.
And then she sees her God as being one who is merciful.
For she quotes from the Old Testament and in fact there are quotations and allusions
to at least fifteen different Old Testament passages here in Mary's song.
She was a woman who knew the Old Testament scriptures.
She knew her Bible and it was reflected in the song that she wrote, that she composed
out of this experience with God.
Here she quotes from Psalm 103 verse 17 very clearly and she says, His mercy is upon generation
after generation toward those who fear Him.
God is merciful.
That is her God.
She says the mighty one is powerful.
The mighty one is holy.
The mighty one is merciful.
God's mercy is God's tenderness.
James Dictionary says that God's mercy is the outward manifestation of pity.
See pity is something we feel in our hearts.
There is sympathy there.
It's probably what went out of you or what was expressed in you when you heard about
that terrible accident in the parade the other evening.
And the mother and an infant were killed and other children and adults injured.
And our hearts went out to that.
There was pity and we felt for them.
You see mercy is the outward demonstration of that.
It's not just the feeling, it's doing something to alleviate.
Vine goes on to say that mercy assumes the need on the part of Him who receives it and
the resources adequate to meet the need on the part of Him who shows it.
Mary says here that God is adequate for my needs.
God is all-sufficient for me.
He is merciful.
Now just think about those three attributes of God that she identifies as she describes
her Lord, the mighty one.
And notice how they fit Mary's situation.
In the first place she says the mighty one is powerful.
Mary had a situation on her hands that was made hers by the power of God in the first
place.
She was with child.
She had conceived by the power of God.
And what was it that was going to carry her through this experience?
Was it Joseph?
Well, Joseph would be there eventually.
So often husbands are there eventually.
But Joseph initially was mindful to put her away.
Now out of love, out of concern for her because he didn't want her to be mocked.
So he was going to put her away privately and they would disengage from their marriage,
which had been promised.
But then the angel appeared to Joseph and said, don't do that.
And the angel explained to Joseph what was going on and he got on board then.
So she had Joseph.
So just think of her situation in the Jewish society that she was in.
There was a lot to be afraid of.
There was the shunning and the mocking of many people.
But Mary says, my God is powerful.
The mighty one caused me to be with child and the mighty one will see me through this.
She also says the mighty one is holy.
There would be those who would say that she was unholy and that's why she was with child,
that she had been unfaithful to Joseph.
But she knew better.
She knew that her God was holy and that she was with child because of His holiness.
So God was sufficient for her.
And in her situation, she needed mercy.
She needed a mighty one who would come to her aid, who would not only feel and sympathize
but who would actively intervene on her behalf.
So that's why I'm saying that when she identifies her God and describes Him to us, what she's
telling us in this song is that by faith she saw that God was able to meet her every need
in her situation.
And thirdly, she saw by faith the deeds of this mighty one.
She describes them in terms that we must understand in light of her day.
She says in verse 51, He's done mighty deeds with His arm.
He's scattered those who were proud and thought.
He's brought down rulers from their thrones and exalted those who were humble.
He's filled the hungry and sent away the rich empty-handed.
She describes the deeds of the mighty one here in terms of social justice.
She uses language that really is revolutionary language.
By faith she grasps that what is happening to her and what will happen through her is
going to overthrow the unjust order of man.
That what is taking place here is more than personal salvation through her child.
But eventually her child is going to bring about the overthrow of the corrupt systems
of man that oppress the poor and exalt the arrogant and fill the rich and rob those who
are hungry.
Much of the hunger, ladies and gentlemen, in our world today is not caused because of
the lack of food but because of political corruption in countries.
Much of the aid that we give to foreign governments is absorbed into the pockets of corrupt politicians.
The food that we send, in fact I heard recently that there are warehouses in one particular
nation where we send food that is filled with sacks of grain from the United States.
But the people are still starving to death because that is for the political and military
benefit of the corrupt rulers of that country.
And if anybody gets the food it's the soldiers, it's the military.
You see Mary is saying here the mighty one through what is happening to me eventually
is going to overthrow the injustice of man's system of government.
The implication is he's going to rule.
Mary grasped this all by faith.
Her faith enabled her to have this wonderful perspective on her God.
But finally her faith also helped Mary to see her times in the right way.
How did Mary see her times?
Well verses 54 and 55 she says, He has given help to Israel as servant in remembrance of
his mercy.
As he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and his offspring forever.
Mary saw what was happening to her as God working in her generation.
Obviously Mary didn't understand all the details of that, but she knew that her people,
the Jewish people were oppressed under Rome.
That her people were enslaved in a sense to Rome.
Now they had some freedoms, but certainly not political freedom, only limited religious
freedom.
She saw the people of Israel as in bondage, not unlike they were in bondage in Egypt.
And by faith she was able to see that God was at work in her times.
There were two things that she believed.
In the first place she believed that God was executing His plan.
That God has a plan and He's working it.
She didn't understand that plan fully, but she knew that God is sovereign, that God is
working.
He's given help to Israel in remembrance of His mercy.
God is intervening on behalf of Israel, she said, in what is taking place with me.
Secondly, she saw that God is keeping His promises.
Just as He spoke to our fathers, God spoke to Abraham, to Isaac and Jacob.
God gave a covenant to them.
He swore by an oath certain things to that people.
She says, God is keeping His promises in my day, in my time.
She saw all of this by faith.
It's amazing.
God does not forget.
God remembers, you see.
And God was working in Mary.
Now Mary accepted God's calling in her life by faith.
She surrendered by faith to God's plan for her.
And that gave her these right perspectives that made her the woman of God that she was.
She had a right perspective on herself, a right perspective on God, a right perspective
on the times in which she lived.
I want to say to you today in closing that God calls you also to surrender to His plan
for your life by faith.
Choose to surrender to God's plan.
That is an act of faith on your part, of course.
But choose to surrender by faith to God's plan for your life.
It's only reasonable you should do so, by the way, for He has purchased you.
He has bought you with His own blood.
But beyond that, doing so gladly and as an act of faith will glorify God.
It will glorify God and it will bring benefit to your life.
What will it do?
Well, first of all, it will give you right perspectives too.
It will help you to understand why you are in the world.
Do you understand that today?
Do you understand who you are, why God has made you?
You say, no, I don't really.
The only way to understand that is to by faith surrender to God's plan.
You say, well, if I just knew what God's plan was, I would.
No, no, it doesn't work that way.
You have to surrender by faith first and then God will show you His plan.
And when you surrender to God's plan for your life, then God can begin giving you a right
perspective on what He's made you to be, what your life is about in His plan.
Finally, your surrendering by faith to God's plan will do for you what it did for Mary.
It will set your feet to dancing.
It will fill your life with joy as you see that you too are the servant of the Lord.
In whatever circumstances He brings into your life, you're His servant.
He's working out that purpose, that plan for you.
But finally, let me say to you that surrendering by faith to God's plan for your life will
do this.
It will mark your life forever.
It did Mary's.
She says, from this time forward, all generations will call me blessed.
Her life is marked forever as a godly example to us.
And your life will be marked forever too if you will by faith surrender to God's plan.
It will make a difference a hundred years from now, a thousand years from now, that
you today surrender by faith to God's plan.
I hope that you will do that because it's the only way to live.
It's the only way to experience God.
And frankly, it's really what Christianity is all about.
And I say that because our Lord did the same thing.
He surrendered by faith to the Father's plan for His life.
His going to the cross was an act of faith on His part.
He believed that the Father was going to count His life being offered there as the propitiation,
the sacrifice, the satisfying sacrifice for our sins.
He believed that God would raise Him from the dead on the third day.
And even though in the garden He prayed, if it be possible, take this away from me.
You see also in His very next words, nevertheless, not what I will but what you will.
By faith He surrendered to God's plan for His life.
And our lives today are marked because of it.
As we come to the Lord's table today, may it be with that wonderful spirit of surrender
to God's plan.
Let's pray.
Will you make that choice this morning as we come to the Lord's table?
And may I ask you to outwardly show that you are surrendered to God's plan by faith, by
partaking of these elements.
And as you eat this bread and drink this cup, be saying to the Lord, Jesus, just as you
surrendered by faith to God's plan for my salvation, so I surrender by faith to your
plan for my life, whatever that means.
And Jesus, may it be with that sense of glad surrender in faith that we partake of this
bread.
We receive it with gratitude for its symbolism.
Amen.