Mary's Magnificat (Luke 1:46–56) — The Songs of Advent

Now, in a weekend in which we hopefully have spent much of our time giving thanks to God for the good things in our lives,

I think it only fitting to acknowledge that same goodness of God to this community in this, our first church service.

The Lord has cared for us well over these past seven months as we've progressed towards and prepared for this day. And I'm incredibly thankful for that.

In every way, really, this is not, this is only just the beginning of what we hope God will do for this community.

And so to give thanks, you can almost feel a little presumptuous or premature, and yet I think it is good, and I'm glad to do that today to give thanks to God for how he has brought us here and shepherded us here to this moment.

I think we err when we don't properly appreciate our current moment. Sadly, I think this is kind of endemic in our culture, to not appreciate our current times and seasons and places because we're so caught up in where we want to be, and so conditioned to always be thinking about the future, that we forsake the present.

I think this starts early in us. I think it's inculcated in us from a very young age. We don't appreciate childhood because we just want to grow up, or the dating or courtship period, or the engagement period because we just want to be married, or the newlywed period because we just want to start having children, or the early years of our children because we just want them to grow up and stop behaving the ways that they do.

And so finally, we don't appreciate our adult children, right, because we wish they were young again. In this cycle, it just repeats generation after generation until we've all essentially wished our lives away, hoping for a tomorrow that forgets to live and enjoy today for what it is.

It's good to have goals, and it's good to think about the future and to build for that future, but it's not good to forget to enjoy where you are today because you're so caught up in where you hope to be later on.

The Lord's mercies are new to us every morning, and so we mustn't spurn what we've been given today while we have them.

So it's good for us to acknowledge where we are today, this new day of small beginnings that the

Lord has given to us here, and to enjoy it as much as we are able in thanksgiving to God.

And so I thank you again, each of you, for being a part of this day. Now, interestingly,

I find the Advent season to be another good example of this. Unless you're Ebenezer Scrooge or the

Grinch, everyone loves Christmas, right? Everyone can't wait for that. Once you pass Thanksgiving, we're all kind of ready to start celebrating the season.

We're ready for the trees, the shopping, the songs, and I'm sure I actually know this for a fact that if some were honest here, they've been listening to Christmas songs for a while.

But, and I'd say that is because Christmas really is the most wonderful time of the year.

I truly believe that. But yet, it hasn't actually started yet, right?

Not in the liturgical sense, at least. Advent, despite what they want you to believe, is not early

Christmas, right? It's the ascent, it's not the peak. It's the anticipation, not the culmination.

It's a time to look forward to the celebration and to build up to it, but it's not the celebration itself.

And so we must take care, I think, to appreciate what it is we have in view in this Advent season and meditate on those things while it's appropriate, not just skipping ahead to the things that we want more.

In many ways, Advent is the church's way of learning to stand on tiptoe. We live in a world of instant everything, where two -day shipping feels like a fast, where waiting through a commercial break is considered long -suffering.

But the Bible is not written in the key of instant. It's written in the key of promise, of delay, of long winters and green shoots.

Advent is a season where the church deliberately steps into that ancient, holy waiting room and remembers what it feels like to ache for her

Christ. From Genesis onward, Scripture is one long Advent.

The first gospel word is not in Matthew's opening lines, but in the ruins of Eden. The promise of the seed of the woman would crush the serpent's head.

Centuries pass, empires rise and fall, and prophets thunder and then fall silent. Israel is given promises, covenants, types, and shadows.

The tabernacle glows with symbolic light. The temple resounds with sacrifice and song.

Every festival, every genealogical list that you skim past, every odd law about lambs and blood and priests, all of it is

God teaching his people to wait for someone. When we come to the

New Testament, we're not turning a page from law to grace, as though God tried one plan and saw it falter and then pivoted.

We're stepping into the moment when the long -promised seed finally arrives.

The manger in Bethlehem is the hinge of history, but the door it swings is mounted in the

Old Testament. Advent reminds us that you cannot understand the incarnation, God entering into the world as a man in the person of Jesus Christ, unless you feel the weight of the centuries that preceded it.

Jesus has not dropped into history like a surprise guest. He is the fulfillment of a story that God has been writing with painstaking patience.

Properly appreciating Advent is us acknowledging and entering into that patience and anticipation every year, reinvigorating our hope at the beginning of each liturgical year in the

Messiah promised of old, whose coming ushers in the kingdom of God on earth. And so we mustn't let each year that passes by numb us to the works of God, as it is so prone to do, and lead us to mindlessly drift through life, but rather we must recognize where we are and respond accordingly.

This is one of the beauties, again, I think of recognizing the church calendar and utilizing it for our worship.

One of those ways in which we respond in Advent in particular is to sing. James says in his letter in chapter five, verse 13, is any merry,

Merry Christmas? And is anybody merry? Well, let him sing songs. Have you ever wondered why this is really, this

Advent and Christmas season, it's really that one time of the year that the church introduces all these additional songs that we don't sing in any other season, or why other seasons don't seem to have that same effect, right, other seasons don't have their own particular songs, at least within the life of the church, quite like Advent and Christmas do.

And the reason is in the liturgical year, the Advent season is wholly unique for its purpose. It truly is a building up of anticipation that we on this side of the life of Christ in history do not understand unless we are diligent to dwell upon it and consider it in his word.

And so this is why over these four weeks of Advent that we have this year, we're gonna consider four of the songs of the first Advent, the final months before the birth of Jesus, as we aim to see the beauties of God's unfolding promises to his people.

We're gonna consider how the anticipation of Christ shapes our reading of the whole Bible, how the Old and New Testaments are one seamless garment of promise and fulfillment, and how

God intends his people not only to think these truths, but to sing them. The Christian life is not a mute ascent to doctrine, it's a choir of hearts tuned to the key of hope.

God did not give Israel a bare set of propositions to recite, he gave them a psalter. Their history is wrapped in melodies, their repentance, their lament, their joy, their longing, all of it is scored.

And so we'll see that even in these early pages of the New Testament in Luke chapters one and two, the same thing is at play.

And today in particular, we're gonna see this when Mary learns that she will bear the Messiah and shares the news with her cousin

Elizabeth. She doesn't merely nod and file the doctrine away, she sings it. The church's first great

Advent meditation comes to us not as an essay, but as the magnificent, a young woman's spirit -filled song tying together

Abraham, the covenants, the poor, the proud, and the coming child, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Advent trains us to wait as Israel waited, with candles lit, with scriptures open, and with mouths full of song, knowing that the

God who once kept his promises in Bethlehem will keep every last one still. And so let's open together to this song of Mary's, the magnificent, and read our text for this

Lord's Day in Luke chapter one, verses 46 through 55. As we conclude the reading of this,

I'm gonna say, thus ends the reading of God's holy word. May you write it on our hearts by faith and you all will respond, thanks be to God.

Luke chapter 146 through 55, hear the word of the Lord. And Mary said, my soul doth magnify the

Lord and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my savior, for he hath regarded the lowest state of his handmaiden.

For behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. For he that is mighty hath done to me great things and holy is his name, and his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation.

He hath showed strength with his arm. He hath scattered the proud and the imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seats and exalted them of low degree.

He hath filled the hungry with good things and the rich he hath sent away empty. He hath filled his servant

Israel in remembrance of his mercy, as he spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed forever.

Thus ends the reading of God's holy word. May you write it on our hearts by faith. Thanks be to God. Let's pray.

Father, we thank you for your word and we ask again that you would be with us as now this word would be preached to your people here.

We ask that you, by your spirit, would work faith and trust and rejoicing in us as we would sit under the teaching of your word.

Strengthen us and help us while we ask in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. In our readings today, we've received much of the context that this song is wrapped up here in Luke chapter one.

As we read in verses 26 and 27, this young Galilean woman, Mary, is engaged to be married to a man named

Joseph when she's visited by the angel sent from God named Gabriel. Luke doesn't introduce

Mary the way that we might've done it, right? There's no soft focus halo, no sentimental glow, no angelic choirs humming in the background.

Maybe we wouldn't have done that, but probably Roman Catholics would have done that. But he drops us quite deliberately into an out -of -the -way village with an unknown girl in an empire that does not care or know about her at all.

Nazareth, to the cultured mind of the first century, was a punchline. Can anything good come out of Nazareth?

Was not just Nathanael having a grumpy day. It was the received wisdom. If Rome was the center of the world and Jerusalem its theological capital,

Nazareth was a forgotten corner of the map. And it's here that the Lord of glory sends his herald.

Luke tells us in verses 26 and 27 that the angel Gabriel is sent from God unto a city of Galilee named

Nazareth to a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph of the house of David.

This is how scripture introduces Mary, not as a plaster saint, but as a young woman with a lineage and an address.

She's betrothed, which means that her life is already on rails. The trajectory is set.

Everyone knows what happens next. She's gonna marry Joseph. They'll set up a house. She'll bear children and she'll live and die as one more faithful daughter of Israel, whose name is forgotten by men, but remembered by God.

But this is the moment that the author of history chooses to step into his own story. The eternal word comes first as a word.

Before Mary carries the Christ in her womb, she carries a promise in her ears. Gabriel arrives not as a negotiator, but as an announcer.

In verse 28, we read, Hail thou that are highly favored. The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women.

The angel speaks as though heaven has been watching this girl for a long time. The world has not noticed her, but heaven has.

And we notice Mary's first response. She's troubled at his saying and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be.

The text takes pains to show us that Mary is not gullible. She's not carried away by religious feelings.

She thinks, she weighs, she ponders. When God interrupts her day, she does not collapse into a heap of vague spirituality.

She asks questions. How shall this be that I'm carrying this child seeing I know not a man?

In verse 34. The first thing that we learn about Mary is that she's both humble and intelligent.

She bows her head, but she does not turn off her mind. Gabriel's message, of course, is the central scandal and glory of the

Christian faith that this virgin will conceive and bear a son, and that son will be called the son of the highest.

The throne of David, the promises to Abraham, the entire scaffolding of the Old Testament is now being fastened to this girl in Nazareth.

God is not just dropping a miracle out of the sky. He is tying up centuries of covenant history, and he knots the rope in Mary's womb.

And Mary responds with the only sane sentence in the universe when God speaks like this. Behold the handmaid of the

Lord, be it unto me according to thy word. That's the heart of who she is.

Before she ever sings the Magnificat, before she is ever hailed or misused by later traditions, she stands before us as a model of faith.

She does not crown herself, she does not negotiate terms. She simply identifies herself as the

Lord's servant, and she throws open the door to his will with all the cost that will entail.

And we can't underestimate that cost. In Mary's world, a visibly pregnant virgin is not a theological curiosity, it's a scandal.

To receive this promise means embracing misunderstanding, whispered conversations in the marketplace, and the real possibility of being cast off by Joseph, her family, and her community.

And so when Mary says, be it unto me, she's not signing up for a Hallmark movie. She's climbing onto the altar.

The favor of God in her case comes wrapped in risk, reproach, and the sword that will later pierce her own soul.

After Gabriel departs, Mary doesn't float six inches above the ground. She arose in those days and went into the hill country with haste into a city of Judah and entered into the house of Zacharias and saluted

Elizabeth. The girl of Nazareth goes on a long walk to visit an old cousin who's also caught up in this great divine upheaval.

When she steps into Elizabeth's house, the child in Elizabeth's womb, John the Baptist, leaps, and Elizabeth, filled with the

Holy Spirit, blesses her. It says, blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb and blessed is she that believes, for there shall be a performance of those things which were told her from the

Lord. And that last line really is a spirit's commentary on Mary. She's blessed because she believed.

Before Mary is an icon for anyone, she's an example for everyone. She's not a co -redeemer, she's a believer.

She's not the source of grace, she's the recipient of it. Her greatness is not that she saves, but that she trusts the one who does.

The church's honor for Mary must run along the grain of scripture. We don't bow to her, we stand beside her as fellow servants, learning from her to receive the word of God with both trembling and joy.

So Luke, in these verses, he's giving us Mary not as a sentimental ornament on the edge of Christmas, but as the first disciple, in many ways, of Jesus Christ.

She is young, obscure, and very much in over her head, but she listens when God speaks.

She asks honest questions, she yields without reservation. She bears the reproach that comes with obedience, and then, having believed, she sings.

So that by the time we reach verse 46 and Mary opens her mouth in the Magnificent, we already know the kind of woman that's going to sing it.

Luke 1, 26 to 45 is not just background information as much as that's what we're using it for today, it's the

Spirit's way of introducing Mary to us as a model believer. When God turns the world upside down, this is where he starts, with the girl in Nazareth who says, behold, the handmaid of the

Lord. So now, as we look more closely at this Song of Mary's, we're gonna see that it breaks down into two main clauses that will guide the remainder of our time today.

First, in verses 46 to 49, we're gonna consider this solemn thanksgiving for that mercy of God which

Mary had experienced in her own life. And second, in verses 50 through 55, the Holy Virgin celebrates the covenant faithfulness of God and how his power, judgments, and mercy are coming to bear in history through the

Christ in her womb. So again, let's look at verses 46 through 49 to see her celebrating these personal kindnesses of God.

And Mary said, my soul doth magnify the Lord and my spirit hath rejoiced in God, my Savior, for he hath regarded the lowest state of his handmaiden, for behold, from henceforth, all generations shall call me blessed, for he that is mighty hath done to me great things, and holy is his name.

In our love for the doctrines and the context and so forth, and in our efforts to carefully exegete the scriptures, meaning we want our understanding of the

Bible to come from it, to be derived from it, as opposed to us placing our presuppositions and our experiences onto the

Bible and kind of forcing our beliefs, our understanding into it, eisegesis.

We wanna be exegetes. But often in our efforts to do this, I think that we often forget that it's okay to recognize the ways in which

God's kindnesses come to bear for us personally. It's good to celebrate those ways in which

God has dealt kindly with us, not only corporately, not only throughout history, but also individually.

And that's precisely what Mary does here at the beginning of her song. She sings, my soul doth magnify the

Lord. Magnificate, obviously the name of the song is from the Latin, this is the first word, magnify.

This is where the song gets its name. It testifies of her gratitude. And yet she's doing more than giving lip service here.

She's not a whitewashed tomb. God in his ways does not bring himself to the proud, but he meets the humble and adorns them with salvation.

God knows the heart and he knows those who might look the part and say the words, but who are inwardly strangers to him.

In Isaiah 29, 13 and 14, we read, wherefore the Lord said, for as much as this people drawn near me with their mouth and with their lips to honor me, but have removed their heart far from me.

And their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men. Therefore behold, I will proceed to do a marvelous work among this people, even a marvelous work and a wonder, for the wisdom of their wise men shall perish and the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid.

This is what we see here in Mary. The professional religious class would be bewildered by the idea that God would use a lowly virgin for such a marvelous work and wonder.

But this is the nature of God's work. He has no need for the learned, no need for the worldly wise, because they're not able to understand the things of God.

And more often than not, even these same men who know the words and say them with great pomp and praises of men have removed their heart far from him.

And their fear towards God is taught by the traditions of men, more than the knowledge of him,

Isaiah says. Later in the gospels, we see Jesus rebuking the Pharisees for this very sin. When he says in Matthew 23, 27 and 28, woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they're full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.

So you too outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

But this is not so with Mary. To pronounce the glories of God with tongue alone would do nothing more than profane his name, but Mary does not merely say the words unaccompanied by any affection of the heart.

She says that she praises God from an inward feeling of the soul and spirit. She worships with her mind and her affections, and these two feed one another.

People will discourage you for your love of doctrine as too wooden of a faith, and so others will discourage you for a faith driven by affections as too emotional.

I say heed not the counsel of foolish men in this regard. Let your love for doctrine drive you to increased affections, and your affections for God drive you to know him more fully.

The soul and the spirit are to feed, not withhold from one another in the life of the Christian, just as they do for Mary here.

And so she magnifies her Lord and rejoices in God, her Savior. And here it's worth noting, but only quickly, that Mary looks to God as her

Savior and Redeemer. She doesn't view herself as any form of co -redemptrix as has been bestowed upon her by the traditions of Rome.

Again, she magnifies her Lord and rejoices in God, her Savior. And this is important in the context of her song and ours, because you will not sing as Mary does with words and inward love, apart from knowing

God as Savior. Until Jesus Christ has been recognized as a Savior, the minds of men are not free to indulge in true and full joy but will remain in doubt and anxiety.

It's God's fatherly kindness alone and the salvation flowing from it that fill the soul with joy.

And in a word, the first thing necessary for believers is to be able to rejoice that they have their salvation in God.

And the next follows, that having experienced God to be a kind father, they may offer to him thanksgiving.

So rejoicing in our salvation in Christ and thanksgiving forevermore is only possible, of course, for the

Christian. And why? Why is she so thankful, right? And celebrating God's kindnesses to her?

You know, when we consider that this is such a calamitous thing that's happening to her, the Lord has given her, this is a hard and difficult providence.

A young woman betrothed in marriage to become pregnant. It's just not a trivial thing, not something that she was praying for,

I'm sure. So what is it? How can she be so thankful in this situation?

Again, I think we learn from the character of this young woman when we pay close enough attention. Married is in doubt or scoff, she trusts.

We'll consider this more next week, but it's a stark contrast from even the reaction of Zacharias earlier in Luke chapter one.

And even a contrast from Sarai in the Old Testament, the wife of Abraham, when the Lord promises them a natural son in their old age.

Married is in doubt or scoff. She receives by faith in her God and trusts that he means good for her.

Again, she knows this, doesn't have to doubt it, because she believes God is her savior. She isn't prone to the emotional swing because she knows what she believes and she actually believes it in her heart.

Instead of fear, she sings, again, verse 48. For he hath regarded the lowest state of his handmaiden.

God has regarded her. He has seen her and he has dealt kindly with her.

The world didn't see her, but God did. Even in their lowest state, according to earthly measures,

God sees his people and he deals kindly with us according to his measure. We're not forgotten and we're not an afterthought.

We're not merely an idea in the mind of God. We are his people and he sees us and he delights to give us good gifts, even if they may seem difficult to us in the moment.

And he does so so that we can join Mary in singing. For behold, from henceforth, all generations shall call me blessed.

For he that is mighty hath done to me great things and holy is his name. Mary delights in the personal care that the holy

God has shown to her. And may we, as Christians, learn to join her in singing that refrain, that we will be called blessed because he that is mighty has done great things to us and holy is his name.

Now, from the personal, Mary pivots to the more general, but an acknowledgement of the covenant faithfulness of God in a celebration of the ways in which his awesome character is being put on display for his people through this child, that she's now carrying.

Again, verses 50 through 55, she sings. And his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation.

He has showed strength with his arm. He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He has put down the mighty from their seats and exalted them of low degree.

He has filled the hungry with good things and the rich he has sent empty away. He has helped in his servant

Israel in remembrance of his mercy, as he spake to our fathers to Abraham and to his seed forever.

Now, the second clause is structured a little bit like a sandwich. In that in verses 50, 54 and 55, we see that Mary highlights her covenantal understanding of all that's happening as bookends to this passage.

While in verses 51 through 53, she points out the wonderful nature of God on display within it.

And so we're gonna start it there. We're gonna start with that meat in the middle and save that covenantal bread for a second.

But all the while, understand that God's covenant and his work are intrinsically connected not only in this passage, but in reality.

And that intrinsic connection is made clear to us through the word made flesh, Jesus Christ.

He's not merely a God of theory and a God of or in a general commitment to an idea.

Our God is a God of action. So let us take heart as Mary does that God does what he says he is going to do.

May we even strive to be like him in that way and learn to do the same. So again, first in verse 51, she sings of God's power.

She says, he has showed strength with his arm. When we read these types of anthropomorphisms in scripture where God has said to have human characteristics like an arm, we should know immediately that what's being communicated here is a certain characteristic that we associate with that particular, in this case, body part because God doesn't have body parts, right?

So for example, if we read the heart of God, we know that his affection and love towards something is in view or the hand of God, we're dealing with his care and attention towards something for better or for worse.

It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of an angry God. But in this case, Mary makes it easy for us by telling us that God's arm, in this case of sending his son into the world through the virgin is showing his strength.

In this incarnation, God's strength and power are on full display. He has no need for any other aid.

He is satisfied with his own power in this work of redemption. He has no use for the machinations of the proud in accomplishing his plan.

In fact, as Mary sings, God in the execution of his condescension has scattered the proud from him such that they will not receive as the humble will receive.

And this should remind us as Mary sings of another condescension of God that we see in Genesis 11 at the

Tower of Babel. As the whole earth was of one language after the flood, we see them come together in their pride to build a great city that they may reach unto heaven and make a name for themselves.

As I read this in Genesis 11 verses four through nine, I want you to note the condescension of God and the usage of scattering in the passage.

Again, Genesis 11 verses four through nine. And they said, go to, let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.

And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the children of men builded. And the Lord said, behold, the people is one and they have all one language.

In this they begin to do, and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.

Go to, let us go down and there confound their language that they may not understand one another's speech.

And so the Lord scattered them abroad from hence upon the face of all the earth and they left off to build the city.

Therefore, as the name of it called Babel, because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth, and from hence did the

Lord scatter them abroad on the face of all the earth. In many respects, what

Mary is singing here is that the coming of Jesus Christ is the very scattering of the nations at Babel.

These people very humanistically thought they could come together on their own merit and strength to build their way to heaven, but the

Lord said, no. Instead, he scatters the proud because they will not find their way to him than by any other means than by Jesus Christ.

In Babel, God comes down to scatter them all over the earth and bring confusion so that in Christ, he comes down as the one who will bring all the earth back into unity with him.

The coming of Christ through the virgin's womb, Mary sings, is the power of God on full display to scatter the proud and then to bring them back in humility and submission to his son.

The strong arm of the Lord is coming, the son of his right hand, the Lord Jesus Christ in the virgin's womb.

And so we see God's power on display as Mary sings. Next in verse 52, we read of God's justice.

Mary sings, he hath put down the mighty from their seats and exalted them of low degree.

Many people will try to elevate some of the more revolutionary aspects of Christianity, particularly in the narratives of the

New Testament to extreme levels that justify essentially the overthrow of all hierarchical structures and institutions.

That somehow what God did throughout history was to be fully torn down with the incarnation because of verses like this.

And we need to make sure that we don't make that mistake. God isn't destroying all hierarchies through the incarnation.

God does work in the way of exalting the humble, the poor, the weak, and humbling the proud, the rich, the strong.

But this does not mean that this is what we are to do by default. By God, kings reign, they're his servants and we're to submit to them in righteousness.

We trust him and know that he'll bring justice as he sees fit, but we are not revolutionaries, right?

Because we know how our God works and that from time to time, he will work in ways of overthrow to humble the proud and bless his people.

And that's what Mary is singing of here, that she is celebrating that the world does not move and revolve by a blind impulse of fortune or chance, but that all the revolutions observed in it are brought by the providence of God.

And that those judgments which appear to us to disturb and overthrow the entire framework of society are regulated by God with unerring justice.

And this is the important distinction because we don't have an unerring justice, which is why we trust

God to do that work. So again, we need to understand that she's not merely stating these theological facts, she's applying them to her situation.

In this Jesus, a baby growing in her womb, God is bringing and has brought, even as she says, he hath put down, right?

God has brought the type of justice that will topple oppressive governments like the one she and her people live under.

It will remember those of low estate. In Christ and in governments that properly submit to him, there will be no more forgetting of the people.

There'll be no end to his good justice to the righteous. Psalm 72, one through three,

David writes, "'Give the king thy judgment, "'so God and thy righteousness unto the king's son. "'He shall judge thy people with righteousness "'and thy poor with judgment.

"'The mountains shall bring peace to the people "'in the little hills by righteousness.'" And then of course, in Isaiah chapter nine, six and seven, we read, "'For unto us a child is born, "'unto us a son is given, "'and the government shall be upon his shoulder, "'and his name shall be called

Wonderful, Counselor, "'the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, "'the Prince of Peace. "'Of the increase of his government and peace, "'there shall be no end.

"'Upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom, "'to order it and to establish it with judgment "'and with justice from henceforth, even forever.

"'The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.'" The zeal of the

Lord of hosts will perform this. Mary sings, just as the angel told her, because this is being fulfilled in the child growing inside of her.

"'This Jesus,' Gabriel said, "'shall be great and shall be called "'the Son of the Highest, "'and the Lord God shall give unto him "'the throne of his father

David, "'and he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever. "'And of his kingdom, there shall be no end.'"

In this incarnational work, God is bringing justice to the nations through his son, and the zeal of the

Lord of hosts is doing it. And finally, in verse 53, we read of God's mercy on display in this coming

Christ. He hath filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he hath sent empty away.

God takes pleasure in this work of upheaval that he does, because he not only works justice by bringing the proud to nothing for their ingratitude, but he also works mercy to the humble for their faith.

The great and rich and powerful, lifted up by their abundance, ascribe all the praise to themselves and leave nothing to God.

But the meek and lowly, humbly trusting the promises of God by faith, believe that God means good for us, no matter how our circumstances may tell us otherwise.

And it's not to say that God doesn't prosper his people, or that the wicked are always rich, but it is to say that we must always be on our guard against being carried away by prosperity, lest God suddenly were to deprive us of what we enjoy so much.

We must always, even in poverty or famine, give thanks to God and lift our cry to him, being comforted by our hope in this, as Mary sang that he hath filled the hungry with good things.

And sending his son through the virgin, God has made the offensive attack on the kingdom of darkness, where oppression has reigned and kept the nations in bondage.

And why? Psalm 149 .4 answers for us. Why has God done this? For the Lord taketh pleasure in his people.

He will beautify the meek with salvation. God in his mercy adorns the humble with salvation.

He adorns them with Christ as a token of his mercy and a love for his people. Mary is singing that this coming

Christ is the fulfillment of that mercy that God has always shown his people. God's power on display to bring justice and mercy for the faithful.

And so now as we prepare to close this afternoon, we're gonna do so by returning to those bookends of this passage in verses 50 and 54 and 55.

And consider how Mary connects what's happening to her to the redemptive work of God in all of history.

Verse 50, and his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation. Then 54, he hath hope in his servant

Israel and remembrance of his mercy as he spake to our fathers, to Abraham and to his seed forever.

In the joy of her salvation, Mary does not see her joy as something new or disconnected from her past or the history of her people.

She is a part of the people of God throughout all time, past, present and future. She's not unique in the sense that she again is some co -redemptrix or queen of heaven, but she is one of us.

She's a God fearer who has been shown mercy. His mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation.

And this language is covenantal. Mary knows her Old Testament, how to understand its implications better than many modern

Christians do. Here, by leaning upon generations language and covenant obligations to fear

God, she is singing the word of God back to him in worship. For it is God who said to Abraham in Genesis 17, seven,

I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant to be a

God unto thee and to thy seed after thee. And in Deuteronomy 7, nine, know therefore that the

Lord thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that loves him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations.

God, Mary is recalling, is the one who has declared his intent for his people, and he will always keep his promises.

He will show them favor not only in their lives, but even after their death by loving their children and their children's children and all their posterity.

She knows that what is happening in her is the work of God to bring good to his people, just as he promised

Abraham in Genesis 17. He has in her womb remembered his mercy and helped his servant

Israel. He has remembered his promises to the fathers, to Abraham and his seed forever.

By these words, Mary shows that she knew her Bible and that the covenant which God had made with the fathers was a free race for she traces the salvation promised in it to the fountain of unmixed mercy in her womb.

This long anticipated arrival, the hope of God's people is now growing within her. All of history from the garden to the silent years has been building up in anticipation of these moments when the works of God are coming together and the world is being changed forever.

In the advent season, redemptive history is coming to a head, and that's what we are entering into. The Bible calls this the fullness of time.

The apostle Paul in Galatians chapter four, beginning in verse four writes, but when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his son made of a woman made under the law to redeem them that were under the law that we might receive the adoption of sons.

And because you are sons, God had sent forth the spirit of his son into your hearts, crying,

Abba, father, wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son, and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.

Mary is rejoicing that the promises God made to Abraham thousands of years ago are now being fully realized in her.

Where they had only seen in types and shadows of that free grace that God had promised to him was now here.

The fulfillment of this everlasting covenant to Abraham and his seed would be birthed from her womb, for he is the seed of Abraham.

Look again at Galatians, this time in chapter three, verse 16, now to Abraham and his seed with the promises made, he saith not into seeds as of many, but as of one into thy seed, which is

Christ. And then in verse 29, and if ye be Christ's, then ye are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise.

Galatians three and four are among probably my favorite passages in all of scripture. And in it,

Paul is really, as I studied for this this week, he's really just reiterating what this young Galilean woman saying so eloquently about these 10 verses.

All of these promises of God to his people, the ones that they looked forward to for so many centuries with hopeful longing are here.

The fullness of time has come and Jesus the Christ is to be born, a savior for his people.

The anticipation has an end in sight and the God who sees his people is coming to dwell with them.

So let us not forget the beauty of the Advent season. Let's join the saints of old in thanksgiving to God's faithfulness to his promises, his kindnesses to each of us and join them in longing to see

Christ come again in his glory as he fills the earth with his kingdom. So as we stand here at the headwaters of Advent, we really do have only two options.

We can either hurdle past it like everyone else, treating these weeks as pregame festivities for a vaguely spiritual

Christmas nostalgia, or we can do what Mary did. We can stop, listen and sing and rejoice and magnify the

Lord. The world is very happy for you to decorate your home with a sentimental halo so long as you do not bow your head to God who breaks proud empires and raises up obscure girls from Nazareth.

But the Magnificat is not a Christmas card. It's a war song. It's a song of a young woman who understands that when

God remembers his covenant, he does not merely pat his people on the head. He turns the world upside down.

Advent then is not a liturgical hobby for people who light candles in purple pyramids.

Advent is the church standing on tiptoe, learning to live in the same posture as Mary.

She heard the word, she believed the word, she received it and then magnified the Lord who had done great things for her.

That is what we are summoned to do in these weeks. Not to pretend that the world is less dark than it is, but to confess in the very teeth of that darkness that the true light has already dawned and that his mercies are in fact new every morning.

So do not waste these days of small beginnings. Now wish them away in a restless hurry for something flashier.

The God who saw Mary in Nazareth sees you and us in our Nazareth. He's not forgotten his promises.

He's not misplaced his covenant. In Christ, the seed has come. The kingdom has been inaugurated and the zeal of the

Lord of hosts has not grown tired. Therefore, like Mary, take up the song, magnify the

Lord, rejoice in God, your savior. And as you do, remember that the same God who once filled a virgin's womb with his word will not fail to fill the mouths of his people with praise.

Like Mary, ye are Christ, you're Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise.