Sermon Tone Analysis

Announcements

Join us for Bible Study & Prayer this Wednesday at 7pm in the Auditorium.

We’re currently working through the book of Psalms during our Wednesday evening services, I think it’s been a blessing to those that have been able to join us both in-person and online.

If you join us in-person, feel free to come at 6pm to join us for dinner as well.

Please note that this is our last Wednesday service until the new year.

Occasionally, I like to offer suggestions for outreach and this is something that anyone who spends any amount of time on social media can help us with:

Our church operates a Facebook page to help get information out to the community as well as to share information concerning sermons and upcoming events.

Many of you already like our Facebook page, but let me encourage you to do so if you haven’t yet.

In addition, let me encourage you to do two things on Facebook beyond simply liking the page.

Leave a review for the church—Facebook periodically reminds me that pages with reviews look better for people who are looking for businesses and since we are a new church plant, any opportunity we have to tell people about the church is vital.

In addition to that, don’t just like posts and videos by the church page, share it—I know that many people think that if you like something on Facebook, everyone can see that.

That’s how Facebook used to work, but now it doesn’t.

So, if you like something on Facebook, the only person that sees that is you and the person that you liked.

To be able to spread the word about the church, the only thing you can really do is share posts and videos, which is why you see Natalie and I sharing almost everything the church posts.

In addition, tag yourself in church events, posts, and photos.

It is an easy way for those of you that are already on Facebook to utilize your social media presence to help do outreach.

In addition, let me encourage you to go to Google, review the church there as well.

Like Facebook, Google periodically reminds me that websites and businesses with reviews tend to show up more in their algorithm, which means more people will be able to find information about us.

And again, since church plants rely on word of mouth for growth, it is five minutes out of your day that can help the get the name of the church out there.

I mentioned that this coming Wednesday is our last Wednesday service of the year.

The reason for that is that the last two Wednesday services are cancelled so that we could hold some special events instead:

On Christmas Eve, join us for Carols & Lessons at 7pm here in the Auditorium; followed by a dessert social in the Activity Room.

On New Year’s Eve, join us from 7pm-12am for our annual New Year’s Even Celebration.

Quarterly Business Meeting January 2nd after Sunday AM Worship

Prayer of Repentance and Adoration

Call to Worship (Psalm 37:12-26)

Our Call to Worship this morning is Psalm 37:12-26.

We started Psalm 37 last week, but because of its length, we’re splitting it between three weeks.

This psalm is a psalm of David in which he encourages those who are righteous to not be disturbed or troubled over the prosperity of the wicked, because God is just and he will act in justice.

This morning’s section, though a little longer, compares and contrasts the wicked and the righteous with it being clear that God opposes the wicked but loves the righteous.

Please stand and read Psalm 37:12-26 responsively—I’ll read the even-numbered verses, please join me in reading the odd-numbered verses.

Congregational Singing

Angels We Have Heard on High

Joy Has Dawned

Come Thou Long Expected Jesus

Scripture Reading (Luke 1:57-80)

I’ve asked Tara to read Scripture this morning and since we’re continuing in the Christmas account in Luke 1:57-80, I don’t have much to say beyond just pointing out that this is the passage in which we see John the Baptist born of Elizabeth and his father Zechariah being filled of the Holy Spirit and prophesying.

This passage brings us right up to the birth of Jesus, which we’ll read next week.

Tara can you read Luke 1:57-80?

Sermon (Luke 1:39-56)

Introduction

Over the past few weeks we’ve been working on our Christmas at Grace & Peace series focused in on the topic of hope.

Because we’re utilizing the whole series to discuss hope, we’ve been able to take a more in-depth study of hope as it pertains to us as Christians and as it pertains to Christmas.

Thus, the first few weeks of our series served as a sort of introductory material for this week and next week.

Just to get everything caught up to where we are in the series, let me just to a brief synopsis before we jump into this week’s message.

We started this series in the book of Ephesians, with Ephesians 2:11-22 being our text.

I explained that in that message, we were essentially just dipping our toes in the water.

That said, in order to get a proper understanding of Ephesians 2:11-22, we spent part of that sermon discussing the Old Testament temple and what the purpose of the Old Testament temple was.

After we understood the purpose of the Old Testament temple, we focused in on Ephesians 2, with Paul’s statement that those who have been saved by faith now belong to a spiritual temple that God dwells in.

I explained that we typically call that spiritual temple, which is made of all who believe past, present, and future the universal church.

Or put another way, the universal church is the new spiritual temple that God dwells in.

Which that idea of God dwelling with his people is so important for us to understand, because it is God’s desire to dwell with his people that provides us the first instance of hope in Scripture.

Because God wants to dwell with his people, he sent his son to be born in a little town in Israel.

Because God wants to dwell with his people, that son lived a perfect, sinless life and then died on the cross for your sins.

Because God wants to dwell with his people, Jesus was resurrected and now sits at the right hand of the Father.

Because God wants to be amongst his people, you can have hope.

Thus, Christmas is a celebration of one part of God’s plan of salvation through which we can have hope.

Last week, we were in Isaiah 7:10-25, which was again, another moment in which we sort of just dipped our toes into the water.

We read and studied about Isaiah speaking to King Ahaz, who was an evil king.

And in speaking to Ahaz, Isaiah presents to him two prophecies—a short-term prophecy and a long-term prophecy.

The short-term prophecy was to be utilized as validation for the longer-term prophecy.

The short-term prophecy was that the Kingdom of Judah would be destroyed by Egypt and Assyria; the longer-term prophecy was the virgin birth of a child that will be called Immanuel.

I explained that the reason for the prophecy being two-fold was so that the shorter prophecy would act as assurance for the longer prophecy—because God fulfilled the first prophecy, we know he’ll fulfill the second prophecy.

I then explained that we live in an era in which we celebrate the fulfillment of the second prophecy in Isaiah 7:10-25 as we celebrate Jesus’ birth, but we still live in a time period in which theologians call the already, but not yet—we’re already in God’s kingdom, but we don’t yet see the physical consummation of the kingdom; we’ve already been sanctified in one sense and yet, we’re still going through the process of sanctification; we’re still waiting for God to return to finish what he had initially started, but what Isaiah 7 along with its fulfillment in the New Testament shows us is that we can have hope even if it takes several hundred years for something to occur because God keeps his word.

And because Jesus keeps his word, even though its been 2,000 years since his birth, we know that he will come back, whether that’s tomorrow or another 100 years or another 1,000 years.

We know this because God has previously kept his word and he’ll continue to keep his word—when Jesus says that he will be back, he will truly return.

Thus, Christmas is a celebration of the birth of Jesus because it is the first step for God’s plan of redemption to bring you to reconciliation with him, so that you can dwell with him and it is proof that he will return to be with his people physically again.

This morning’s message is from Luke 1:39-56, which hopefully will be familiar to you because we read it as Scripture reading last week.

This message is unique from our previous messages in this series because this is our first message that is completely based in the biblical record of Jesus’ birth—we’ve gone from dipping our toes in the water to jumping right in.

And we’re actually jumping into the middle of an account that started at the beginning of chapter 1, which I’ll explain as we work through the passage, but before I get too far ahead of myself, let’s read the text.

Luke 1:39-56:

As we study this passage together, we’re going to break it into two parts, which I think you can see the clear separation of the sections in your Bibles.

(1) Vs. 39-45 tells us the setting of the text and tells us what exactly is going on.

This is Mary visiting Elizabeth and it describes a unique event that occurs as the result of Jesus in Mary’s womb being in the presence of John the Baptist in Elizabeth’s womb.

The response of John the Baptist in the womb of Elizabeth causes Elizabeth to cry a statement that we’ll look at in more detail.

(2) Vs.

46-56 is then Mary’s response to Elizabeth’s statement, which comes out in a beautiful song of praise that we typically refer to as her Magnificat.

It is a song of praise and worship of the LORD.

As we look at this text, we’ll see the result of hope on Elizabeth’s part and we’ll see continued hope in Mary’s words.

This should cause us to continue living in hope of what is to come and that hope should compel us to praise God the same way that Mary praises God.

Prayer for Illumination

Mary Visits Elizabeth (39-45)

In the first few verses, we’re told that Mary arose and went into the hill country to a town in Judah.

We aren’t entirely sure what compelled her to do this, however, remember that Mary had just been told by the angel Gabriel that she is to have a baby and as part of Gabriel’s message to Mary, he tells her that Elizabeth, her relative has also conceived a child.

So, Mary could very well be traveling to see Elizabeth simply to celebrate with Elizabeth—that Elizabeth was able to have a child despite her old age.

Or it could just be that Mary wanted to be with family during her own pregnancy.

Again, we aren’t particularly sure about the human reasons behind Mary’s traveling to Judah, but its clear that God utilizes this visit for his own purposes regardless of the human reasoning behind the visit.

Vs. 39, tells us that “Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a town in Judah, and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth.

And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb.”

There’s already a response being given in vs. 40 to the arrival of Mary in her family’s home.

Remember, that at this time Zechariah still can’t speak.

Vss.

20-23 tells us that because of his lack of belief in the angel’s words that told him of Elizabeth conceiving, he lost his voice and would continue not having that voice until the birth of his son.

However, Mary does greet Elizabeth and when Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb.

That in and of itself could have just been a coincidence.

Babies moving while still in the womb isn’t uncommon, but its the next phrase that keys us into the fact that God is doing something in this passage.

“And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.”

Now, remember that until Acts 2, the Spirit didn’t indwell every believer in the same manner that he does now.

After Acts 2, the Spirit permanently indwells all who believes, but prior to that point, the Spirit would fill believers for specific tasks and this is one of those specific tasks.

Elizabeth is filled by the Holy Spirit for a specific purpose in Vs. 41 and that purpose is seen in vss.