HG006-7 Luke 1:39-56
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39 At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea, 40 where she entered Zechariah’s home and greeted Elizabeth. 41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. 42 In a loud voice she exclaimed: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! 43 But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? 44 As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. 45 Blessed is she who has believed that the Lord would fulfill his promises to her!”
46 And Mary said:
“My soul glorifies the Lord
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has been mindful
of the humble state of his servant.
From now on all generations will call me blessed,
49 for the Mighty One has done great things for me—
holy is his name.
50 His mercy extends to those who fear him,
from generation to generation.
51 He has performed mighty deeds with his arm;
he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.
52 He has brought down rulers from their thrones
but has lifted up the humble.
53 He has filled the hungry with good things
but has sent the rich away empty.
54 He has helped his servant Israel,
remembering to be merciful
55 to Abraham and his descendants forever,
just as he promised our ancestors.”
56 Mary stayed with Elizabeth for about three months and then returned home.
No sooner had Mary arrived at the house there was Holy Spirit mayhem! Mary had just travelled 80 or 100 miles, a three or four day journey, to see the prophecy fulfilled told her by the Angel Gabriel concerning Elizabeth. The baby that Elizabeth was carrying who had been filled with the Holy Spirit from before birth leaped for joy. And in doing so Elizabeth herself was filled with the Holy Spirit. Blessed is the fruit of your womb. My Lord’s mother has even visited me! And Zacharias, three months later, was also filled with the Holy Spirit and blessed the Lord God of Israel.
How wonderful all this is. And all very selfless. In both cases of being filled with the Holy Spirit God is immediately glorified. This is the sign of anyone filled with the Holy Spirit of God because He cannot help but glorify Jesus and the Father. Oh that we would truly be filled with His Spirit for we would not take thought for ourselves but like the disciples at Pentecost and thereafter they could not help speak of Jesus. But it seems to me that those who claim to be filled with the Holy Spirit are more concerned with themselves and what they can do rather than exalting and praising God. Such people are not filled with His Spirit as they suppose but are filled with ego instead. The Holy Spirit cannot help but glorify God the Father and God the Son: the real proof of being filled by Him. And this is how we can know how filled we are too. Let’s make sure we go back to the fountain of life regularly and be filled.
Following on from Elizabeth Mary then speaks one of the greatest hymns ever composed in vs 46-55 which is very similar to Hannah’s prayer. Let’s hear how that went, it is found in:
And Hannah prayed and said:
“My heart rejoices in the Lord;
My horn is exalted in the Lord.
I smile at my enemies,
Because I rejoice in Your salvation.
“No one is holy like the Lord,
For there is none besides You,
Nor is there any rock like our God.
“Talk no more so very proudly;
Let no arrogance come from your mouth,
For the Lord is the God of knowledge;
And by Him actions are weighed.
“The bows of the mighty men are broken,
And those who stumbled are girded with strength.
Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread,
And the hungry have ceased to hunger.
Even the barren has borne seven,
And she who has many children has become feeble.
“The Lord kills and makes alive;
He brings down to the grave and brings up.
The Lord makes poor and makes rich;
He brings low and lifts up.
He raises the poor from the dust
And lifts the beggar from the ash heap,
To set them among princes
And make them inherit the throne of glory.
“For the pillars of the earth are the Lord’s,
And He has set the world upon them.
He will guard the feet of His saints,
But the wicked shall be silent in darkness.
“For by strength no man shall prevail.
The adversaries of the Lord shall be broken in pieces;
From heaven He will thunder against them.
The Lord will judge the ends of the earth.
“He will give strength to His king,
And exalt the horn of His anointed.”
Hannah, herself had been barren but she gave birth to one of the greatest prophets, Samuel. If we went line by line we would see the similarities immediately. There’s rejoicing, humility, answer to prayer, the rich shamed but the poor and humble exalted. These are great songs for the powerless with trust in the Powerful God.
Let’s have a closer look at Mary’s Magnificat:
v46
My soul makes great the Lord. God cannot be any greater but He can be enlarged in our own lives and hearts. When we understand more and more about what God has done in and through Jesus then our hearts and minds magnify God all the more. All that I am magnifies the Lord. This is what these following verses are about:
But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”
We need to be like King David who was totally consumed in worship he didn’t care what others thought. His own wife despised him for his dancing before the Lord. We do now have space in front of a couple of the pews if anyone fancies!
v47
Is Mary our Saviour? No, but God is hers as well as ours and we rejoice with her.
v.49-50
It is the realisation of what God has done for us personally that starts off our praise. Hear Mary: “For He who is mighty has done great things for me”. For me. For me. Can’t get any more personal than that. How great God is! How small we are! How amazing it is that God humbles Himself to our level. And such was Mary feeling. God is so great that He does miracles, that He does the impossible and He is doing all that for someone like me! Mary speaks of God’s holiness and mercy too.
John Donne poetically said:
Preaching the Word: Luke, Vol. 1—That You May Know the Truth Mary’s Divine Celebration (vv. 49–50)
“God’s mercy hath no relation to time, no limitation in time.… Whom God loves He loves to the end; and not only to their end, to their death, but to His end; and His end is, that He might love them still.”
As Mary’s heart is lifted up she sees God more clearly in the workings and history of humankind. When we set our hearts to magnify God then our spiritual eyes are opened up.
Mary, then, in the next few verses, speaks prophetically about the future in the past tense; that is, speaking of things to come as though they have already happened.
v51
We see that those who are proud in their inmost thoughts are going to be brought low. Throughout Scripture we find this so often to be the case. We know of Nebuchadnezzar, whom we read about in Daniel, become like an animal for seven years because he thought he had gained the whole kingdom by his own power. When he came to his senses he glorified God who has everyone in His hand. We know of King Herod who died of worms when people praised him as a god and did not refuse the worship to redirect it to the true God. God opposes the proud. Jesus Himself said:
And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.
It is important to know that God has the hearts of leaders in His hand and can lead them but if they are proud they will fall. It is not too political for me to say when Theresa May called the general election she thought that it would be a whitewash and there is something about pride in this for the election was very much about her and so it did not turn out according to her wishes. God raises people up and can just as easily take power away and give to someone else such as the DUP. This should inform our prayers, by the way. God is able to move a leader’s heart.
It is too easy to become proud as if we are or can be something by ourselves. Everything we are and have and can be is because of God giving us our lives, our intelligence, our abilities. Our lives are in His hands just like our leaders so fear and praise belongs to God alone.
Augustine, wrote:
“For those who would learn God’s ways, humility is the first thing, humility is the second, and humility is the third.”
We can see that also in verse 48 that Mary was not much in her own eyes. But God exalted her to be the one who, as Elizabeth said, was to be the mother of our Lord.
v52
He has pulled the mighty from their thrones and such were Belshazzar in Daniel and Heman in the Book of Esther but the lowly were exalted of such were Joseph and Esther. But the lowliest of them all is Jesus who came as a babe, who is King of kings and Lord of lords, and died, who did the job of slaves in washing feet, and who on a cross died in a shameful way in the eyes of the law. This Jesus…He is the one of which Scripture says:
Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Yes, He is exalted! He is to be praised!
v53
In Mary’s song she says: He fills those who hunger and sends the rich away poor for they trusted in riches to gain the Kingdom. Listen! God always hears the prayers of those who admit their needs and He is willing to be provider, healer, friend, and comforter.
It is those who think that they are rich who do not receive help:
Because you say, ‘I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing’—and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked—I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; and white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see.
Our spiritual senses are dulled by the material things of this world. We have everything. We know that this is the case at this time of year because it is nigh impossible to buy anything for anyone these days because they already have everything. All we have besides what we need can hinder our lives in Christ and compared to Christians elsewhere in the world we are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked in a spiritual sense.
If our love for Jesus is withered;
if we have no heart for the lost though we are told the fields are white for harvest;
if we do not love one another
then I put it that we have lost our passion that should be roaring hot for God and we need to repent.
Blessed are those who keep on being hungry for righteousness is a better translation. It is not that we will be hungry once but we should keep on being hungry for the things of God. And what is the promise? We will be filled. Our hunger, though, cannot be filled by anything or anyone other than God but if we try to be filled by our possessions; our entertainment; and our busyness then emptiness is the result.
God though, shows His hunger, His passion for us. Surely we know that God desires us, right? What is this time of year except a celebration of the greatest Christmas gift ever given? Why? So that we could be reconciled to Him.
When God says: Seek my face. Do we say: “I will, when I have time”? Or do we say with David whose heart was after God: Your face, O Lord, I will seek?
There is a song sung in some Churches that I don’t know has been sung here or not but the words are: ‘More love, more power, more of You in my life’. Without Him we can do nothing but with Him nothing is impossible.
vs54-55
In the last two verses of Mary’s song we find that God is the God of His Word. His promises to Israel and to Abraham were about to be fulfilled. God is utterly trustworthy. It is not enough that we simply believe but we must trust Him with our lives in health, in finances, with the lives of our relatives and friends, and to trust Him that He will fulfil His Word as we share the Gospel with others for it is the power of God for those who believe. And signs will follow as we follow Him.
Let us seek God, be filled again with His Holy Spirit and rejoice! We have to think about how great God is who has done great things for us and then with Mary celebrate and magnify the Lord and rejoice in God our Saviour.
Mary was there for the birth of John the Baptist, saw the promise fulfilled and knew that, in due time, the promise to her would be fulfilled too.
Friends the main lessons today are
keep oneself humble and
keep our ego in check,
be filled with the Holy Spirit
and trust the promises of God’s Word.