And Mary said,

And Mary remained with her about three months and returned to her home.—Luke 1:46–56 

Introduction

Two weeks ago, we began our Advent series by recounting the whole story of how Mary received the good news and responded to it in four stages: She starts out skeptical, saying how can these things be? Then she receives what the angel says with submission, saying “May it be to me according to your word.” Then she receives confirmation as Elizabeth speaks by the Spirit. Then she bursts into celebration with a song of praise that we now call the “Magnificat.”

Last week, we looked at verse 47 in order to understand what worship is. We looked at the subject (soul/spirit), action (magnify/rejoice), and object (Lord, God my Savior). These next two sermons examine the reasons for worship in more detail.

I want you to see the overall structure of Mary’s poem of praise first. 

And Mary said,

Verses 48–55 gives the reasons for the rejoicing.

... for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
    For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
    and holy is his name.”

The second point about structure is an observation about the overall structure. The poem has two parts: vv. 46–50 and vv. 51–55.

1) Luke 1:46–50: Praise for the Personal Work

And Mary said,

It is so vital to see that God is the subject of all the verbs: He has looked on the humble state of his servant; he who is mighty has done great things for me; his mercy is for those who fear him. He looked, he has done, his mercy has come.

This is the way it always is with God and especially so in the gospel. It is the record of what God has done. Later, Zechariah will say the same thing: “He has visited and redeemed his people (Luke 1:68). Mary is rejoicing in what God does to save.

The Christmas message is not first and foremost a call for us to do something, but a call to receive what God has done. It is a travesty of the highest order when people hear that the Christmas season is all about being at your best and most generous and taking part in being a more thankful people and a giving people and to help others. That puts us at the subject of the Christmas message—about what we do.

But the whole Bible is a record of the activity of God. God creates the world, God pursues Adam & Eve after they sin and makes promises to redeem them and bring blessing to a world filled with the curse. 

B. The Recipient of God’s Action: The Humble

What does the mighty God do? He works for those who cannot work. He lifts up those who cannot lift themselves up. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that God helps those who help themselves. The gospel is all about the God who acts for those who cannot help themselves. The humble are those who know they can’t.

The humble cannot do great things for themselves. The nobodies are not the movers and shakers of this world who have lifted themselves up or exalted themselves. They are the ones that God lifts up with the power of his might. The Lord “has done great things for me,” in contrast to the proud who say, “I have done great things for me.”

Both parts of the poem end with the word mercy, and so we will unpack the meaning of that word when we get to the end of the second half of the poem.

2) Luke 1:51–55: Praise for the Pattern at Work

“He has shown strength with his arm;
    he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
    and exalted those of humble estate;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
    and the rich he has sent away empty.
He has helped his servant Israel,
    in remembrance of his mercy,
as he spoke to our fathers,
    to Abraham and to his offspring forever.”

In the first part of the poem, the Mighty God has done something for the humble woman. In the second part, the Mighty God has also done something for the humble and entire social strata are involved: He scattered the proud and cast down the mighty from their thrones, while the humble are raised up, the hungry are filled, and the rich are sent away empty-handed.

This week, we go right to the heart of why Mary is rejoicing in God her Savior. Remember that rejoicing in God means she is enjoying God. What is she enjoying? She is rejoicing in reversal. She is rejoicing that in the Messiah God is doing a work of sovereign subversion. In other words, Mary takes her experience (“he looked on the humble state of his servant”) and sees that it serves as a pattern. This pattern reveals God’s plan. God is going to turn the world upside down.

Main Point: Mary rejoices in the reversals God brings with the birth of the Messiah as a work of sovereign subversion.

God has overturned all that the world prizes as the somebodies: status, power, wealth, intellect. He has torn all those things down. And he has lifted up the humble and the poor and hungry—the nobodies.

Verse 52: The proud are torn down …. The humble are lifted up

Verse 53: The hungry are filled …. The rich are empty                  

This is the way of Christmas. It is amazing gift of grace that Mary sees this—she is a teenager after all. But she sees it right away. Why did he choose me? Because I am great and virtuous? No. I am not a somebody in the world’s eyes, and I did not make myself a moral somebody with my religious performance. I am not a likely candidate because of my social status and position. I am a nobody. Why come to me? He came to me because I am a nobody. He chose that!

I wish I had more time to tell you how the books of Luke and Samuel fit together. Mary’s song resembles Hannah’s song in 1 Samuel. Hannah sang about the reversals that God was going to bring. Then the rest of the book narrated those reversals. The priesthood of Eli was cast down and young Samuel was brought up. Mighty king Saul was torn down and young David (the youngest of his brothers) was raised up as king in his place. When this reversal theme sounds, the high and mighty better beware. Their time at the top will be short.

This is what he is doing. He is lifting up people like me that the world regards as nobodies and tearing down all that is lifted up against him—all that the world calls somebodies. Mary delights in God’s wisdom to set up a way of salvation that demolishes all human pretensions and human pomp.

We would not do it this way if we were God. What makes the most sense to us is to make something big and obvious and grand. We are fond of dramatic propaganda, we want to do things in a big way with a crescendo and pomp and blowing of trumpets. Make it a big show and a big display. But God is in the demolition business. This gospel will tear down all the things that people take pride in.

Those who are proud of their learning, or proud of their status and power, or proud of their religious achievements, or proud of their money and riches will all be scattered—forcefully sent away. What a powerful word: In the imaginations of their hearts. In other words, they have taken leave of their senses. They are not really living in reality. They think they are something. They think they have attained. They think they are righteous and don’t need to repent. They think they are wise and can find God with their own reason on their own terms. They think they can achieve success and buy the good life.

In the new world order the proud, lofty people and institutions of the world will be torn down. The humble and outcast people and institutions are about to be raised up. The poor will be filled and the rich will be left empty-handed.

This is the message of salvation. God is going to reverse everything. He will turn the world upside down, or actually—because of the Fall—it is already upside down, and it now needs to be turned right side up. 

The smug, the proud, the self-satisfied, those who wrongly think that they can trust in themselves and look to who they are or because of what they have done must be brought down. They have turned the message of salvation on its head, and so God will turn them right side up. Instead of them being wise, Christ must be their wisdom. Instead of them trusting in their righteousness, they must see the Lord is their righteousness. Instead of their feeble earthly riches, they must see that they need the riches of Christ, who though he was rich, yet for their sake became poor so that through his poverty they may become rich.

Let’s look at the examples in the first two chapters of Luke’s Gospel. 

A) Luke 1: Jesus’ Mother 

The woman selected was a poor, teenage unknown nobody. That is not the way we would have done it. The Son of God should be born to a somebody, someone regal and impressive and powerful, like a queen.

B) Luke 2: Earth’s King and Heaven’s King

We can see it already in the contrast between the world conquering power of the Roman Empire and the little town of Bethlehem (smallest of the towns of Judah). Look at the contrast in more detail between the Caesar’s palace and Christ’s stable.

1. The King’s Decree: God’s ‘Hidden’ Control

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when n was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town.—Luke 2:1–3

A pagan ruler unknowingly is fulfilling God’s plan (vv. 1–3). He thinks he is taking a census to count the strength of his empire and to increase the empire’s wealth (a census to sign up for paying taxes). In the end, this census allows David’s son to be born in David’s city in fulfillment of prophecy. 

Here we see the hidden “weakness” of God’s control. It looks like the king of the earth is the big shot calling the shots. But God is in control. His decrees are decisive and they are sometimes hidden. God is always in control even when no one on earth sees it yet. 

The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; he turns it wherever he will.—Proverbs 21:1

2. Rome vs. the ‘Little’ Town of Bethlehem (vv. 4–5)

And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child.—Luke 2:4–5 

The prophecy of Micah 5:2 makes explicit that Bethlehem is a small place—it is the least in the clans of Judah. But from that very “little town” the ruler of all the universe will be born.

But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah,
     who are too little to be among the clans of Judah,
from you shall come forth for me
     one who is to be ruler in Israel,
whose coming forth is from of old,
     from ancient days.

3. The King’s Palace Compared to the Meekness of the Manger (vv. 6–7)

And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.—Luke 2:6–7 

If a little child is unimpressive, imagine a little child in a stable, born in a feeding trough. Don’t glamorize this. Have you ever smelled a barn?

Seek not in courts, nor palaces,
Nor royal curtains draw;
But search the stable, see your God,
Extended on the straw.*

He did not receive a royal welcome—he was not welcomed or received at all—there was no room.

4. Caesar’s Reception vs. the King’s Reception: No Room (Luke 2:7b)

“Because there was no place for them in the inn.”

Jesus did not receive a king’s welcome from the people of Bethlehem. No fanfare. This is so unimpressive that no one else noticed. Jesus was born in a little backwoods town surrounded by lowly shepherds not even in a house or an inn, but with the animals in a feeding trough. We would have had him born to a royal family in an extravagant palace in a place that is the capital or the center of power. 

It is a narrative picture of a principle that the apostle John stated at the beginning of his gospel in John 1:10–11.

He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 

He was certainly not welcomed by earthly authorities. King Herod tried to murder him and ended up murdering the children of Bethlehem. When the Holy Family relocated, they went to Nazareth—about as far from the center of earthly power as possible (Matthew 2:22–23). Why Nazareth? One gets a feel for how low it was to be a Nazarene when Nathaniel learns Jesus was from there: “Nazareth? Can anything good come from there?” (John 1:46).

Every part of the world has its Jerusalem and its Nazareth. People in Minnesota may talk about coming from the State capitol, not the Iron Range. In our country, we may talk about coming from New York City, not Mississippi. In my home state, it would be like saying I come from Sioux Falls, not the Flandreau Indian reservation. Credentials matter—an Ivy League degree versus a high school diploma. 

5. The Mighty God Came as a Baby

How does the mighty God come to save humanity? The mighty God appears as a helpless babe. The mighty God needs a diaper. The Incarnate Word cannot talk and has to learn language.

God wars against all earthy estimates of what looks powerful and noble and impressive. So God chose for the high King of heaven to be born as a helpless baby in a little town (“no-ville”) in a cattle stall to a nobody teenager, and then he grew up as a nobody from nowhere called Nazareth. (“Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”) But this is nothing new. This is the way God always does it. He picks the childless, barren mothers like Hannah. He chooses not the oldest, but the youngest. God chooses Nazareth, not Jerusalem.

In Hidden Christmas, Tim Keller reflects upon this and makes the following observation (pp. 76–77):

Why? Is it just that God likes the underdogs? No. He is telling us something about salvation itself. Every other religion and moral philosophy tells you to summon up all of your strength and live as you ought. Therefore, they appeal to the strong, to the people who can pull it together, the people who can “summon up the blood.” Only Jesus says, “I have come for the weak. I have come for those who admit they are weak. I will save them not by what they do but through what I do.”

That is exactly right. And it takes us to the word that gets the last word in each part of the poem: mercy.

Gospel Mercy

What is mercy? Perhaps the clearest distinction we can make is to compare and contrast mercy with grace. Grace is God’s love and kindness to those who do not deserve it because they are guilty. They need a Savior. Mercy is something intimately related to grace. Mercy is God’s love and kindness to those who are not only guilty but in misery because of their guilt. God looks down and sees people in their misery, agony, and pain as they struggle with the effects of living and participating in a fallen world.

How often in the Old Testament do we hear that God heard the groaning of his people and he looked down upon them and then visited them with mercy? The gospel is not good advice for those who need a little guidance, but good news for those who have completely lost their way. They don’t just need a little help. They are a mess and can’t fix it.

Doesn’t Jesus’ genealogy make the same point? Judah and Tamar? Genesis 38 is not a Christmas text that you sit by the fireside and read it. Tamar tricked her father-in-law, Judah, into sleeping with her. Jesus came out of that dysfunctional family because he came to save dysfunctional families. Rahab? She was not just a Canaanite, but a prostitute. David and Bathsheba is also an embarrassing account.

Jesus’ genealogy is filled with cultural and racial outsiders, moral failures, racial outsiders. Christmas means race, pedigree, wealth, and status do not ultimately matter. We will not be biased against the poor and we will not be biased against or for the wealthy. We cannot be smug about moral performance and we cannot be snobbish about pedigree and social status. In Matthew’s genealogy, prostitute and king, male and female, Jew and Gentile, one race and another race, moral and immoral all sit down as equals. Equally lost and equally loved. We are not people who look down on those snobs with so much education or look down on those ignorant ones with no education.

Christmas says to the notables of society, “Do not confuse earthly status with heavenly status.” Having money, possessions, and position here, may actually make it harder for you to realize your true spiritual condition before God: poor and powerless—a spiritual beggar (deserving nothing except demerit).

Mary’s song is not only a celebration of God with us, but God at war (with the world). He builds his kingdom by tearing down all the pretensions of rival worldly counterfeit kingdoms.

If you see the pattern, then you will rejoice that you are at the bottom. People there are nearer to salvation than anyone else. It will take a disruptive demolition for the rich and the strong and the wise to come into the kingdom because before they can come through the low door they have to be brought low first. I want to show you seven quick examples of this pattern in Luke’s Gospel so that you see the Magnificat is like the opening of a great piece of classical music that contains the opening notes that will be repeated and developed throughout the symphony.

1. Luke 6

Mary’s song celebrated God’s reign turning the world upside down. Jesus later preached the same thing three four chapters later in Luke 6:20–26. 

And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said:

“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

“Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied.

“Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.

“Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man! Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets.

“But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.

“Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry.

“Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.

“Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets.”

2. Luke 10:20–21

In that same hour he rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, or who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”

Jesus rejoiced in God’s sovereignty in salvation. He hides things from the wise and understanding and reveals them to little children, like the disciples (Luke 10:23). The Son also takes part in this sovereign process because no one knows who the Father is “except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” The miracle of faith and salvation is the miracle that both Jesus and his disciples celebrate.

3. Luke 7:40–48

Let’s look at some stories where this principle is found live and in living color. Look at Luke 7:40-48. The Pharisees are grumbling that Jesus would let a prostitute touch him and wash his feet with expensive perfume. So Jesus addresses the Pharisee. A moneylender forgave two different sized debts (500 denarii and 50 denarii). He asked who would love him more. The Pharisee answered rightly, “The one, I suppose, for whom he cancelled the larger debt.” Then he said, “Look at this woman. Do you even really see her like you think you do? When I entered your house, you gave me no water for my feet, but she washed my feet with her tears and her hair. You gave me no kiss, but she has not stopped kissing my feet. Her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little.”

4. Luke 12:13–21 (The Rich Fool)

Jesus warned people that they need to be on guard against coveting because life does not consist in the abundance of possessions. He told a success story. Someone’s crops did well. So well in fact that it exceeded his storage space. So he planned to acquire even more wealth: He built bigger barns and accumulated more wealth. He took the bigger is better approach to life and then he decided he would keep living that way: eat, drink, be merry. But he was so focused on living it up in this life that his soul was not prepared for the life to come. He was rich in the world’s eyes, but poor in terms of true eternal wealth towards God.

5. Luke 16:19–31  (The Rich Man and Lazarus)

The rich man has all the world’s goods and Lazarus was poor and destitute. But then there was a great reversal. Lazarus went to heaven, where he was comforted, and the rich man went to hell, where he was tormented.

6. Luke 18:9–14 (The Pharisee and the Tax Collector)

The Pharisees trusted in themselves that they were righteous and they treated others with contempt. The Pharisee boasted in his achievements and how he was better than others like the tax collector. The tax collector didn’t think he was better than anyone. He just pleaded with God for mercy: “Lord have mercy on me, the sinner” (v. 13). Then Jesus said this: “I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 18:14).

7. Luke 23:34–43

None of the chief priests or Pharisees standing around the cross were saved. They saw no reason for Jesus’ death. They thought they had won. They had eternally lost. But there was a dying thief whose eyes were opened and he said, “Remember me when you enter your kingdom.” Jesus said, “Today you will be with me in paradise.” And after his death, a Roman Gentile hailed Jesus as the Son of God.

So where are you today? Are you successful according to the world’s standards? What is your metric of success? The Christmas message is nothing less than a different metric. Beware of trusting in what you have or what you do or who you are. Don’t let earthly success or achievement blind you to your real need. You need to receive what God has done in Christ.

If you find yourself on the bottom of society, if you feel down and out and regard yourself at rock bottom, rejoice that Christ is the rock at the bottom. And you are in a position now to realize you can’t do anything to save yourself. You see your need. You know the pain and misery and need to cry out for mercy. Cry out! He will receive you. And your life will become a song of praise.

Conclusion: Christmas Is a Celebration of the World to Come

The great reversal will one day be complete. A whole new world order is coming. The kingdom of this world is become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ. And he shall reign forever and ever. The humble king will reign. We sing the Hallelujah chorus now in a world filled with the curse: cancer, abuse, broken bodies, broken marriages, broken homes. But he came to make his blessings flow far as the curse is found. The rest of the reversal is yet to come. But the future is so sure that by faith we are told to sing about it now.

Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.” And the twenty-four elders who sit on their thrones before God fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying,

“We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty,
     who is and who was,
for you have taken your great power
     and begun to reign.
The nations raged,
     but your wrath came,
     and the time for the dead to be judged,
and for rewarding your servants, the prophets and saints,
     and those who fear your name,
     both small and great,
and for destroying the destroyers of the earth.”—Revelation 11:15–18

________
* From “The Shepherd’s Carol” by William Billings

Sermon Discussion Questions

Main Point: Mary rejoices in how God lifts up Israel in remembering his promises.

Outline
Three Phrases of Luke 1:54–55:

1. “He has helped his servant Israel ...”
2. “... In remembrance of his mercy ...”
3. “... As he spoke to our fathers and to Abraham …”

Discussion Questions

• What is the main point of Luke 1:54–55?
• Can you summarize the four messages of Advent 2019? How do they fit together to help us understand Mary’s poem of praise?
• What does it mean that God has “helped” Israel? Why is this portrayed as “mercy”? What is the difference between mercy and grace?
• What particular promises are mentioned in Luke 1:55?
• How is Jesus the offspring of Abraham? How does he bring the Gentiles into the family of God as the offspring of Abraham?
• What is the connection between cell phone usage and the point of Advent, which is to look to Jesus and adore Jesus?

Application Questions

• Were you surprised by some of the statistics about cell phone use? How would you assess your own usage rates?
• How does this use impact your spiritual life and your ability to look to Jesus?
• What needs to change in order for Jesus to win the war for your attention? What practical/tangible changes can you make?
• What part of this sermon or passage do you need to share with others? Plan to share, and pray for who to share it with and when and how to share it.

Prayer Focus
Pray for a grace to rejoice in God’s faithfulness to his promises through Jesus, and pray for a grace to trust him for the guarantee of all of his promises.