The Magnificat Luke 1.46-55 December 15, 2013 Rev. D2 Today we are continuing in our preaching series on the first Carols of Christmas. In our Gospel text from Luke, he gives us our most extensive telling of the Christmas Story! Luke tells us 4 times about the songs that people sang surrounding the Christmas Story. When you re happy and you know it, what do you do? Clap your hands! Or maybe you stomp your feet. When the Israelites where happy and they knew it, they sang. When they were sad and they knew it, they sang. When they were terrified and they knew it, they sang songs. Which is why throughout the entire Hebrew Bible, you ll find songs showing up in various narratives. And that s what s happening here. We find these songs in our Christmas narrative pointing us toward the meaning of the birth of Christ. So, today we re going to focus our attention on the most famous and best known of all the Christmas songs that Luke records for us. It s known as The Magnificat. It s Mary s Song of Praise! As I mentioned last week, Mary is probably around 12-13 years old and she has grown up in a village called Nazareth that is in essence the low income housing section of the greater Sepphoris area which was considered the Jewel of the Galilee region. Mary has met the Angel Gabriel who has announced to her that she is full of grace and the Lord is with her. And that she is going to have a child. Mary is terrified because she s not married. So, she goes and seeks counsel with Elizabeth her older cousin or maybe an older aunt who also has experienced some surprising and miraculous news of her own pregnancy even though she was beyond child-bearing years. And what Mary wants to know is: Am I going crazy? Did I make this up? Did this really happen? This doesn t make any sense. I could be put to death if people find out that I am pregnant by someone other than my engaged fiancé. Mary is terrified. She doesn t tell anybody; But, she makes the 10 day trek from Nazareth to a suburb of Jerusalem known as Ein Karem to see Elizabeth and her husband Zechariah.
2 Mary enters the home and before she has said a word to Elizabeth, Elizabeth becomes filled with the Holy Spirit and says: Child, you are blessed! And blessed is the fruit of your womb. Suddenly now, Mary knows she s not going crazy. She knows that what the Angel said was true. Mary feels like she doesn t have to be afraid anymore. And joy finally ceases her heart. And it s there in Elizabeth s presence that Mary announces The Magnificat. The song of praise. Now, there re a couple of things I want you to notice about The Magnificat. First, This song of praise actually first appears in the Old Testament on the lips of a woman named Hannah who was the mother of Samuel, the great prophet. Hannah was thought to be too old to have a child, but she becomes pregnant with Samuel and she dedicates him at an early age to God. Then, she breaks out in song that sounds very much like The Magnificat in Samuel 2. That Psalm/song was most likely learned by every Jewish girl as she grew up. So, that song was to Mary very much like the song, Amazing Grace, is to us. You can probably sing the whole song or at least the first couple of verses by heart because we have sung it so many times. So, Mary has this song in her heart from Hannah. She basically shrinks it a bit; Summarizes it; Adds a bit to it; And this song becomes Mary s Song of Praise to God. This song has become known as a beautiful Christmas song. And if you see it that way, then you haven t read it carefully enough. It s actually a dangerous song. In fact, prior to my mission work in Guatemala, there was one of the most repressive regimes in power then. It was illegal to read The Magnificat out loud during the 1980 s. The regime recognized that its words might lead people to revolt against the regime. When I was in Nicaragua during that same time period, the people were struggling so much that they would carry a copy of The Magnificat with them and they d read it regularly because of the promise it held for them. The words of The Magnificat are encouraging to any group of people who might still be living under repressive regimes today. The words of The Magificat speak to us about God s mercy for people who have been pushed down and made to feel small. It speaks to us about how God lifts up the lowly. It warns us that God humbles and tears down the proud.
3 Let s take a look at this dangerous song and listen to what God would say to us through it today. It can easily be separated into two parts. So, listen once more to these words: And Mary said, My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. This girl who once was afraid is now filled with exuberance. My soul magnifies the Lord. The Latin word magnificat is where we get our word Magnify. And if you put a magnify glass up to something, what does it do? It makes something bigger. Now, Mary is not making God bigger, but she s remembering and declaring how great God is in her heart. Mary says my spirit rejoices in God my Savior. And that word rejoice in Greek means: To Jump High. So, in essence, she s leaping for joy. And why is she leaping for joy? Why is her heart filled with such joy at this moment? Most of the time we think she s singing because she s having a baby. Look, if you were trying to have a baby and you got news that you were pregnant, you re going to leap for joy. You re going to call all your family and friends and say: Guess what? But, if you weren t expecting a baby; And you re not yet married; And you have no idea what your fiancé s going to say when he finds out; And you have no idea what your parents are going to do or if they re going to disown you; Then, you re not leaping for joy because you re pregnant. So, why is Mary leaping for joy? She goes on to say: God has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. She s declaring that even though she s a nobody from nowheresville, it s God who has chosen her for this task of bringing forth the long awaited Messianic King. Mary is marveling at the fact that God does what God consistently does in the Bible. And that is that God chooses the least expected to be his instruments. This is God s nature.
4 You will recall that God chose Abraham and Sarah who couldn t have children to go to a land that they had never been to before and I will bless you with children and you will be the father of many nations. God chooses Moses who was a stutterer to set the Israelites free. God chooses David who is the most unlikely sons of Jesse to be the great hero and king. This is what God does. God chooses the least expected. This is what Mary is celebrating. The word lowliness in Greek means powerless, unimportant, insignificant or as close to the ground as you can get. Mary is saying: God saw my powerlessness, my insignificance and the fact that my social status is as close to the ground as you can get and God has chosen me. Then Mary says: God has done great things for me. The word great things comes from the Greek word magnaluno which is where we get our words like magnify or mega which means to enlarge or big. So, Mary is saying: My soul magnifies the Lord because the Lord has magnified me. This is what she s praising God for. This theme that God chooses those who are pushed down, bullied, or oppressed is captured by the Greek word Eleos which appears twice in The Magnificat. It means mercy. Last week I said that Mary was full of grace and we are meant to be graceful or gracefilled. This week, our story is telling us that the God we serve is full of mercy. God is merci-ful. And God chooses to use people and exalts people and blesses people who are also merciful. So, I will be asking you this question 3 times this morning: Are you merciful? Are you growing in mercy? Are you more full of mercy today than you were last year? And even if you re not, are you committed to be more full of mercy next year than you are this year? Because you are never more like God than when you are full of mercy. So, mercy or Eleos in Greek means:
5 Compassion, concern and care for people who are pushed down, bullied and made to feel small, oppressed, weak, or the least of these as Jesus describes them. Now, this same word in the Hebrew Bible is a word that I have taught you before. It s the word: Hesed. It s a word that includes the concept of covenant love, kindness, compassion, pity, mercy in the Hebrew Bible. You know this word because it s in a familiar passage of scripture from Micah where the prophet says: What does the Lord require of thee? And the answer is: To do justice, and (to love Hesed, to love Eleos, to love mercy,) to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God. (Micah 6.8) So, Micah says that this is a requirement. This is what God thinks it means to be human. It s to imitate or model the attribute of mercy that we see in God. We are to be merciful and to look out for the needs of others. This reminds me of 5 business guys that a colleague of mine was telling me about. It was Friday afternoon and they had been in business meetings all morning and they were running through O Hare Airport trying to catch a flight that would get them home by dinner time. They re each running with their laptops slung over their shoulders and pulling their carryon roller-bags behind them. If you ve ever been in a hurry trying to catch a flight with a roller-bag, you know that they swing all around sometimes. As they were running down the terminal, they ran pass a fruit kiosk. And one of the bags swung over and bumped into the fruit stand and knocked all the apples off the apple cart. As the guys keep running, they realize what they ve done and they yell back to the lady: We re so sorry, we re so sorry. We didn t mean to knock your apples over. We re running late. We re going to miss our flight. We re sorry, we wish we could help. And they keep running through the airport. Now, after a moment, one of the guys became uncomfortable with what had just happened. And he turned around and saw this girl on the floor trying to pick up her apples. He hollers to his friends: Hey guys, go on ahead. I ve got something to do.
6 I ll see you back in town. So, he runs back to where the girl was and says: I m so sorry. I m one of the dopes that knocked your apples off your cart. I just want to help you, are you okay? He gets down on his knees to help and she looks up at him and he see 2 things: He sees that there s tears in her eyes and that she s blind. So, he says: I m so sorry. Really, I m so sorry. We didn t know. We re just being stupid. We re in a hurry trying to catch a plane. Listen, I m going to help you. Are you okay? What more can I do? And he starts picking up the apples and she stands up. And he begins carefully stacking the apples back on the cart when he notices that many of the apples are now bruised because they had fallen to the ground. And he says: You know what? I really love apples and I m really hungry today. Can I buy the rest of your apples? Would that be okay with you? There s about 20 apples here. How much are they apiece? And she told him. And he says: Here s $40. That should be enough to pay for all the apples that you have left here. Again, I m really sorry for what I did here. I hope you have a good rest of the day. She looks at him and says: Can I ask you a question? He says: Sure. Are you Jesus? And he says: No, I m not Jesus. Jesus would ve never bumped your apple cart and kept running. I m really sorry. I m nothing like him, I wish I was! Why do you ask? And she says: Because when I was on the floor trying to find my apples, I was crying and I cried out: Jesus, please help me and He sent you!
7 My friends, that s what mercy looks like! And you re never more like Jesus than when you re showing mercy. I want to ask you a question: Are you merci-ful? Do you have compassion, pity, concern, care for those who are bullied and made to feel small; Or for those who have been hurt or wounded in some way; Or for those who are in need? Because, that s what Mary s teaching us in The Magnificat! And, secondly as we continue with our story, we begin to learn what God does on behalf of those who are in need and what God does to those who are merci-less. And this is where the song becomes a little bit dangerous. Mary goes on in the second half of The Magnificat and says: God has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. (Luke 1.51-53) This is the disturbing part of the song That God is actively engaged on behalf of those who need mercy; And that God is actively working against those who fail to show mercy. Mary uses the image of God having a strong arm that can do one of two things. It can help or it can destroy. And Mary mentions both of these things. She makes clear in the first warning that: God scatters the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. I began thinking this week What does it mean to have your thoughts scattered? Scattered thoughts, Scatterbrain! Yeh, I know what that s like. Especially at this time of the year. There are times when our thoughts become clouded when we don t see or think very clearly. And I think Mary is saying that this happens to the proud as they come to a place where they re not thinking clearly and that this becomes the cause of their downfall. This got me thinking this week about how some successful company s end up going through bankruptcy and how some businesses even cease to exist. Why is that?
8 Jim Collins, a Business consultant and author of such books as Good To Great, Built To Last and How the Mighty Fall, answers that question by saying: It s because of what he calls an undisciplined pursuit of more. When we lose our moral compass; When we place increased shareholder value and maximizing profits over ethics and moral integrity; When we become proud and successful and convince ourselves that we are above the law and it s all because of how smart we think we are; When we speak down to others; When we expect others to treat us special, We get confused in the thoughts of our hearts about what we really exist for and our downfall is inevitable. This is just as true for Churches and individuals as it is for businesses. You may recall the news story last December when a couple of radio disc-jockeys from Australia called the hospital where Princess Kate was a patient. They pretended to be the Queen of England. Even though they had a bad accent, they managed somehow to get all the way through to the nurse who revealed information to them that probably, she shouldn t have revealed, if she hadn t thought it was the Queen of England. Everybody began pointing the finger at the two DJ s, but how did it make its way to every morning news show and across every social media at the time? It did because people thought it was funny. Ha Ha! Can you imagine this nurse who thought it was actually the Queen of England? What a dopey nurse that must have been! Then about a week later we woke up to the news story to learn that she took her own life. Everybody was pointing their fingers at the disc-jockeys. And yes, the DJ s did a really stupid thing. You see When you get to a certain place where you re popular; You have a radio program and you have an audience; You sometimes forget what it feels like to be made fun of and picked on. And what do we call it when a whole bunch of people pick on somebody, make fun of them and laugh at them? We call it bullying, don t we? They obviously forgot. But, we had no business pointing our fingers at them because why did this make the news everywhere in the first place? It made the news because people thought it was funny Until it wasn t funny anymore. So, somewhere along the way, we forget what it feels like to be the person that other people are stepping on. Yes, to be that person who is really low to the ground. Of course we don t know everything that might have been going on in that woman s life. We don t know if she had been struggling with other issues in her life;
9 Or whether she was just overwhelmed by having the world make fun of her and laugh at her; Or whether she thought she had humiliated her country; Or whatever it was, she decided that she couldn t take it anymore. I want to ask you: Are you merci-ful Or merci-less? Because mercy looks like standing with the people who are being made fun of and saying: I don t think that s really funny! And probably, a lot of us have forgotten that sometimes. So, Mary goes on to say in her Magnificat: He has brought down the powerful from their thrones. (Luke 1.52) This was a very dangerous thing to say. She was just on the out skirts of Jerusalem. And in Jerusalem, there was a king who s named was Herod. And Herod called himself, The Great! Can you imagine a person who calls themselves, the Great? I m David, the Great! Nobody would do that would they? But, there are some people who wouldn t say it, but they act like their the great. They expect other people to serve at their beckon call. So, Mary says: People like that are going to be pulled down from their thrones. The reason why it was dangerous to say this was that Herod was like many people who become full of themselves. He became paranoid. You eventually begin to worry that other people want to take over. King Herod even had his favorite wife and 3 of his sons killed because he was afraid they were plotting to take over the throne. What kind of man does that? And when the Wise men came to Herod after Jesus was born and said: We ve seen the star of the One who is born King of the Jews; Herod wanted to find out where he was born and when he found out, he sent his troops to Bethlehem and killed all the babies who were born around that time. That s King Herod! And what Mary says could have gotten her arrested and maybe even put to death. So, you better whisper these words: God brings down the mighty from their thrones. (Luke 1.52) This is what God has always done and what God will do.
10 Sometimes this happens by the hands of their people We saw this in the Arab spring with people who had had enough of being mistreated by their rulers. We see it throughout human history. There is no regime that is merci-less that goes on forever. Sometimes they fail due to natural causes. King Herod managed to hang on until he came down with a disease that killed him. But, even when you die from a natural death, one day you re going to stand before the One whose mighty arm is outstretched to save the least of these and who raises his hand against those who are merci-less. People celebrate when those who are merci-less get brought down. It doesn t matter whether you re the CEO of a company; Or the pastor of a church; Or a King of a country. So, Mary says this is what happens! Then she goes on to give a final warning word of warning by saying: God sent the rich away empty. (Luke 1.53) Now, this should disturb us just a bit. Because relative to the rest of the world even those of us who receive unemployment or who are on fixed incomes are rich. 1.5 billion people live on less than $650 a year. People who live in Haiti live on $300 a year. So, $650 is 12 times more than what 1.5 billion people live on every year. So, we recognize our relative wealth. And in our community, there are many who are in top income brackets in the United States. There was an article recently in Bloomberg s Business Report that stated that the gap between the top 20% and the bottom 20% of income levels in America is the largest it s been since 1967. If Mary was to sing this song in our churches today, she might receive nasty emails and be accused of being a Socialists: You know God sends the rich away empty and makes sure the hungry go away with good things. (Luke 1.53) That just doesn t sound very American! But, here s the deal. This is Mary, the mother of Jesus who is saying these things. We can debate about how we deal with the economic inequalities in our country, right? Some people think the government is the solution. And others think that the government is the problem;
11 Some people think that taxes should go up; And others think taxes should go down in order to spur on economic activity. In this room we re divided on these things. But here s the thing we can t debate. We can t debate that God cares about the people who don t have enough to eat. We can t debate the fact that God cares about the least of these. We can t debate the fact that if we re among those with the most, then we re responsible for our brothers and sisters. There s at least some obligation we have to be merci-ful. This is not open to debate if we read the New Testament. We ignore Mary s Magnificat to our own peril. Mary says: God lifts up the lowly and he fills the hungry with good things. (Luke 1.53) And the question is: How does God do that? What I ve learned is that if God does something in the world, it s because there re people who are listening to God s Spirit and they say: Here I am Lord, Send me! That s just how it works. The Church is called the Body of Christ. We are his physical presence in the world. If the lowly are going to be lifted up and if the hungry are going to be filled with good things, then it s going to because God s people said: Use me! And in the process of allowing God to use us, we find our own salvation. Don t misunderstand me, we are saved by grace, and grace alone. But, when we act upon God s call upon our lives, we find that we re no longer as prideful as we once were. We re no longer merci-less, but we re merci-ful when we actual do what God asks us to do. And in the process of that, we discover joy. We find joy ourselves by being used by God. So, if you re going to lift up the lowly and fill the hungry with good things, it s going to require selflessness, sacrifice, and conviction and sometimes courage. This isn t just about helping the poor. It s about finding the people who have been pushed down and helping to lift them up. It s about courage. I was thinking about courage and I recalled seeing the movie, Lincoln earlier this year. The film is about what happened at the end of the Civil War. The Civil War was about to come to a close and Lincoln is worried because he has used his sweeping wartime powers to emancipate all of the slaves.
12 And he realizes that it may have been a stretch of his powers to have done so. But, he did it anyways. And he knows that when he comes to a time of peace, he will no longer be a wartime president and the states can choose to re-instate slavery. This is what he is worried about. He says: This is not going to happen on my watch! We are not going to go back to having human beings enslaved anymore in this country. So, we have to pass the 13 th amendment to the Constitution before we have peace. And there were people in his cabinet who were saying: We can have peace now. And Lincoln says: No, we have no leverage. We ve got to do this in order to have peace. Now, is the time! Now is the time to stand up for these people! Now is the time to fight against slavery! Now, now, now! You can hear his courage in his conviction. When the film ended, I was sitting there in the darkness of the theater realizing once again that the 13 th amendment was passed before he died. He gave his life for a cause that was greater than himself. He showed us what it means to be human. He showed us what courage and conviction and mercy actually look like. In thinking about that movie again, I recall that Christ came to save us from ourselves. He laid down his life to redeem us and to show us the way. And I realize that I have the privilege of serving a church made up of people who can make a difference. And the question that keeps popping in my mind is this: How will we leave this world a better place together as a congregation? How will Archbold be more merci-ful because we were here? Sometimes there are big battles to fight. Sometimes there are epic places where people are being made to feel small. But, most of the time the battles are not epic or huge. They re often day to day and small. And I m reminded of what Mother Teresa said: It s small things done with great love that change the world. And that s the kind of stuff you do. We re meant to model for the people we influence what it looks like to be merciful.
13 We re meant to encourage the people who work for us and with us and alongside of us and our neighbors and our friends to be more merci-ful. I m reminded of what that looks like for us. Earlier this year we raised over $20,000 to help our missionary, Gaston Ntambo, buy a plane. And we turned it into a mobile hospital to serve our brothers and sisters in the Congo. We blessed and consecrated the plane before he flew it back to Africa. Here s some photos of that day: We helped our youth raise $16,000 so they could go build a medical clinic to bring health to a very remote village in Haiti. Here s some photos of that Mission Trip: This is what mercy looks like when the hungry are given good things and the lowly are lifted up. Show the next photos: These kids are rejoicing and they re giving a Magnificat. Because God has heard their cries for help! There is joy here. The children here are receiving the soap, the toothbrushes, the health kits and medicines that you provided and that our team took along with us. This was just one small thing we did together as a congregation. Imagine the potential and the possibilities of all of us seeking to live lives of mercy together. Imagine what it will look like the more externally focused we become? Let me ask this question one more time: Are you merci-ful? That s what God is hoping for from us. Let s pray:
14 O God, we thank you for the Magnificat and its powerful words that unnerve us, and call us, and comfort us. Help us to be merci-ful. Help us to have hearts of compassion for people who are bullied and use me to lift them up and to fill them with good things. Lord, as the Senior Pastor of this church, it is privilege to be in ministry together with this congregation. And I see your mercy in them so many times. I would pray that you would help us to be more merciful in the future than we have been in the past. To leave a mark on the community of Archbold and in our world. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done; on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.