Jesus wasn't really born at this time of year most likely. He was probably born in the springtime. But this date was adopted primarily because of the winter solstice, which was a Roman pagan celebration. And so the church began to produce then Christmas songs to replace the pagan songs at this particular time of year. As time passed, those songs being written in Latin fell out of favor of people because the Byzantine period came and they spoke Greek and not Latin.
Latin was a dead language and I think everybody who studies it is dead too, don't you? But anyway, it's another story. So Christmas songs came out of favor for a period of time and during the Middle Ages hardly anybody sang them at all. That changed in about the 13th century though with Saint Francis of Assisi. He began to produce some plays, dramas, and incorporated into that canticles or songs that were based upon biblical themes including the Christmas story.
But those never really caught on that much in that period of time. In the Elizabethan period of time carols kind of evolved into songs that were based on the Christmas theme but not about Christmas itself. How many of you have heard of the carol, I saw three ships come sailing in on Christmas day on Christmas day? Well, that's not really a Christmas carol. It's from the Elizabethan period and it's based upon the idea of Christmas but it incorporates other ideas with it.
During the Puritan time and Oliver Cromwell and all of that stuff, Christmas was squashed. The Puritans did not believe in celebrating Christmas at all and they forbid the singing of Christmas carols. However, that began to resurge, Christmas carols began to resurge during the Victorian era. And the songs that we sing today including the ones we sang this morning are primarily from the last 150 to 200 years only of the church.
We sing Christmas carols that are European or British, English in their origin. So the church has not always even celebrated Christmas. Isn't that interesting? Nor sung Christmas carols that we so very much enjoy. So I was thinking about all these things this week. I was in my heart preparing a message regarding what I call the first Christmas carol.
The original Christmas carols I think are found in the Gospel of Luke and I invite you to turn there with me to Luke chapter one and to what I think is the first of the Christmas carols even though it may not have been called such in that day. It is the song of Mary and let me just set it up for you as Steve sort of did in the scripture reading this morning.
That is that the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary and announced to her that she was to be with child and she accepted that responsibility of bearing this one, this holy one who would be called the son of God. Three months later she went to visit her relative Elizabeth in the hill country of Judea.
When she entered into the house her relative Elizabeth who was bearing John the Baptist sensed that the child within her leaped and she made an exclamation regarding Mary and Mary in turn came out with this amazing song that Luke records for us. Now he had to have had the source of Mary herself for this.
Perhaps these are words that she was thinking about before this but she undoubtedly is the one that told Luke that she first gave this Christmas carol, this song on this occasion and notice what she said. My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed for the mighty one has done great things for me. Holy is his name.
His mercy extends to those who fear him from generation to generation. He has performed mighty deeds with his arm. He has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever as he said to our fathers.
So here we have what is termed the Magnificat. That is often the title to this particular song. It comes from the Latin Vulgate, the Latin translation of these Greek words written by Luke. It's the very first word in that particular translation, the word glorified or my soul doth magnify the Lord, the Magnificat. It means the song of worship, the song of praise. So I title this Mary's Song of Worship. You have to marvel at the depth of her understanding and the beauty of the words that she used.
It's comparable perhaps to what Hannah said in the book of 1 Samuel. You remember that Hannah also was going to give birth to a child by the miracle of God, a different kind of miracle for this is a virgin birth. But nonetheless she also spoke an utterance by the Spirit of God and glorified the Lord. Mary is a remarkable example to me of one who is a true worshiper because she surrendered by faith to God's plan for her life. What did she say when the angel announced to her God's plan?
She said, I am the Lord's servant. May it be done to me as you have said. Do you see the surrender in the heart of Mary? You see the heart of worship is surrender. The heart of worship is not where you worship. The heart of worship is not who leads worship. The heart of worship is not the style of worship. The heart of worship is not the language that is used. The heart of worship is the heart of the worshiper. And that is to be an attitude of surrender.
Surrender to God as Mary shows us gives you three vital perspectives. I hope you'll pull your outline out and follow along with me as we talk about them this morning. First of all, as you surrender in worship to God, you see yourself for who you are. You see yourself for who you are. I want you to notice Mary's perspective about how she saw herself. She begins by saying that her soul magnifies the Lord and her spirit rejoices in God, her Savior.
So Mary tells us that as she sees herself, she sees a sinner in need of a Savior. If you're not a sinner, you don't need a Savior. Mary saw herself as a sinner. Now sadly, that is not the case with all who are within Christendom these days. In fact, the Roman Catholic Church has a dogma that Mary was born without sin. Now this is not an ancient dogma.
It actually began to be adopted about 500 years ago and only in 1854 did the Pope finally declare it was an absolute belief and dogma of the Church. I grew up in a little town where the Church's name was, the Catholic Church was called the Church of the Immaculate Conception. As much as I understood that as a young man, I thought it was talking about the Immaculate Conception, the virgin birth of Jesus. But I came to a shock later to discover that in fact that's not what it means.
It's also called St. Mary's Church, the Church of the Immaculate Conception. And the reason is they're talking about the Immaculate or the pure or sinless conception of Mary. And they come to this point by reasoning it this way, the Son of God must be born without sin. Would you agree with that? Of course. God cannot join himself with sin. Therefore, his mother, his human mother must have also been without sin. And so they've declared that Mary was born without a sinful nature.
Now if you think about that, it doesn't really resolve the problem. It only pushes the problem back one generation. How then was Mary born without sin? I've never heard that answer. One lady told me last night that she asked her priest that when she was much younger and the priest didn't answer but just scolded her for asking the question. It's supposed to be a matter of faith. You see, Mary was not born without sin.
She would be the most shocked of all if she knew that there were people in the world who said she was born without sin because she saw herself as a sinner in need of a Savior. But we ask the question, how then was it that Jesus was not a sinner too if his mother had sin? And of course, the answer is the virgin birth in part because you see the legal responsibility and guilt of sin has passed through the Father's seed. But Jesus had no earthly father.
He was conceived without a male seed within the womb of Mary. Ah, but we still have the practical problem and that is that Mary was a sinner. So how could she give birth to the human body and nature of Jesus without it being tainted by sin? That's the other part of the story. Certainly was there a miraculous conception but there was a miraculous protection of the human body and nature of Jesus so that he was shielded from the sin of Mary and could be born as the sinless Son of God.
Now Mary made this confession and the results were very happy for her. You notice what she says, there are two results and by the way, same thing happens to us when we acknowledge that we're sinners. She says, my soul magnifies the Lord. It glorifies the Lord. In other words, it makes God real to you. It makes God real in your life when you acknowledge that you're a sinner. Mary surrendered to God acknowledging she was a sinner and when she did that she was worshiping the Lord.
You can't worship yourself and worship God at the same time. You can't do that. Mary did not worship herself. She worshiped God, acknowledged she was a sinner and she says, therefore my soul embraces God. Have you seen the moon the last several nights? Hasn't it been beautiful because of its closeness to the earth and its particular orbit right now? It's just magnified in its size somewhat but certainly in its light, some 30% brighter.
Friends, if you want to experience the reality of God in your life, it begins here by acknowledging that you're a sinner. Who needs to be saved as Mary did? It also brings a joyous freedom to your life when you can come to that point. If you're trying to cover up and excuse your sin and pretend somehow that you're not sinning, that you're not a sinner and need a forgiveness, it just enslaves you more. It just buries you under all of that pretense, all of the lie about that.
Mary says, my spirit rejoices. The real word there, my spirit dances. It leaps with a dance for joy. You see, when you acknowledge your sin it sets you free. Have you experienced that in your life? It begins by surrendering to God in the acknowledgement that you are a sinner in need of a Savior. Because of Mary's realization about herself, the fact that God had set her free and become real in her life, there was nothing that was too great for God to ask of Mary.
Many years ago now I was called over to a hotel room in Cincinnati, Ohio for a very brief appointment with Bill Bright. At that time the leader had been the founder of Campus Crusade. He was in the city organizing a particular emphasis and he wanted to meet with a number of pastors to convince us that we ought to be on board. So it was a sales job is what it was. So I think each of us were given 15 minutes with him.
So I walked into the room and he presented his thing and we were on board with it. But before we left I just tried to be a little more personal. I said, well Dr. Bright, you've sacrificed so much for Christ. Your influence has been so great in the world. How do you do that? How do you keep going? I'm not a young man. I want to understand him a little bit. You know what he said to me, he said, Galen, Jesus laid down his life for me. There's nothing too great that he could ask of me for him.
That was Mary's attitude. And that brought her to the second way she saw herself and that is a servant ready for service. She said, I'm a handmaid of the Lord. I'm a servant. Notice the way that she states it there in verse 48. He has been mindful of me, of the humble state of his servant. She had an attitude of humility. She said, God, whatever you want from me, whatever you want is yours. May it be done to me according to your word.
Now, friends, if you want to be a true worshiper of God, it begins with surrender. When you surrender, you first of all get this perspective about yourself and who you are. You have to see yourself first as a sinner in need of a savior. Once you understand then that God is real in your life because you've made that step of faith and repentance, then you see yourself as a servant who's prepared to serve the Lord in however he asks you to serve him. We can only admire Mary as the worshiper of God.
The second perspective you get is that you see God for who he is. Now Mary may have been young and poor and even uneducated. We don't really know, but most likely that was the case. But I'll tell you one thing about Mary. She knew God. You don't have to question that because you see the words that she uses in this text as she worships God. Mary knew God by his name. For example, she says, holy is his name, verse 49. And notice the names that she uses in this song, the names for God.
She calls him Lord. That is the one who is supreme and ultimately in control. She calls the Lord Savior, the one who delivers or rescues her or protects her. And she calls him the mighty one. I especially want to camp on that one for a moment. He's the one who is able, who's all powerful. It is the equivalent to the Old Testament Hebrew name for God, El Shaddai. Have you heard that one?
It's used a number of times in the Old Testament, but the first time it's used is in Genesis 17, 1, where it is used in the context of another miraculous birth. It is the name by which God identified himself to Abraham on that occasion when he said, Abraham, you and Sarah are going to have a son. And God said, I am El Shaddai, the mighty one. And that was the name for God that Mary brought into her own expression of how she understood God and how she saw him. Mary also knew God by his nature.
And I like to think of it this way. All of what she knew about God met her where she was. And may I say to you that all that you know about God will meet you also at your point of need. And the more you know about God and you know God, the more he'll be there able to meet your need. Mary knew that God is powerful. He is powerful. He has done great things for me. Literally, he has done mega things for me. Supersized, supernatural. He has done great things for me.
Perhaps she picked this idea up from what the angel had said to her, the power of the Most High will come upon you, overshadow you in the miraculous conception of Jesus. She also knew that God is holy. That's his nature. That is, God is incomparable. God is free from any imperfection. But more than that, God is entirely unique. He is not like us. We are created in his image, but he is not like us. He is holy. I've copied there in your notes a statement by R.C.
Sproul. He says that he, God, is so far above and beyond us that he seems almost totally foreign to us. To be holy is to be other. To be different in a special way. The angel had said to Mary that, holy one who shall be born of you will be called the Son of God. Mary knew God was holy, but also Mary knew that God is merciful. And what she says in verse 50 is sort of a loose paraphrase of Psalm 103 verse 17, written by her ancestor David. God is merciful. That is, God is tender.
God is compassionate. I was reminded of that this week in something that happened, something that our family is passing through right now, and a friend of mine had written to me to share their own experience, a similar experience. And he said, when I was going through this, a friend of mine, a man that I also had known, wrote to me and he gave me a verse, Zephaniah 3, 17. Now when was the last time you read Zephaniah? Here's what it says, the Lord your God is with you.
He will take great, excuse me, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you. He will quiet you with His love. He will rejoice over you with singing. And so Paul said, I ask our friend, what does that mean? And here's what he said, and Paul passed this on to me. He said, do you remember when as a child you were crying because you were hurt, something had happened, and your mother picked you up and put you in her lap and hugged you and began to sing over you?
He said, what you need to do right now is to get up in God's lap, let Him put His arms around you and sing over you to quiet your heart. What a beautiful picture of the mercy of God, His tender compassion for us. Mary knew this about God. She saw God for who He is. She knew God by His name, she knew God by His nature, and she also knew God by His deeds. In verses 51 through 53, she says some things that basically address oppression, issues that we would call social justice issues.
She says, He's performed mighty deeds, He's scattered those who are proud, He's brought down rulers from their thrones, lifted up the humble, He's filled the hungry, He sent the rich away empty. You see, she lived at a time when there was tremendous oppression of the Jewish people by the state of Rome. She uses language here that says, God is on our side. The point that she's making in this poetic language is that God can do what seems impossible.
God can do what seems impossible even when you are oppressed and you're humble and you're hungry and you're poor. God's on your side. God will be with you. God is known by Mary by His deeds. She saw God for who He is. One who's able to do just exactly what He's promised, including a virgin birth. How many times did that happen before? Zilch. But she knew God was able to do that. She knew Him by His deeds. Well, question, how do you see God? How do you see God?
It's only those who see God for who He is who will worship Him and surrender to Him. Mary did. I want to be that kind of a worshiper, don't you? Who really knows God? Well there's a third perspective that Mary had and it's this. Same perspective we need. When you surrender to God in worship, you see your place for what it is. Mary saw the work of God in her generation and beyond that she saw now her place in it. But Mary, there are two things that you and I need to believe.
Number one, God is executing His plan and I am part of it. Do you believe that about yourself? That God is working His plan in the world, in your family, in this church, in your Bible study, in your group? That God is at work there and you have some divine part in that? Mary believed that. Notice her words here. God has helped His servant Israel remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever even as He said to our fathers. She's got the big picture in view.
God's doing something. This whole song is also saying, and I have a part in this. Do you see your place for what it is? How vital, how important, how strategic it is as far as God is concerned? Second thing that we need to believe as Mary did, God is keeping His promises and I have a part in them. She says God is remembering. God is doing even as He said to our fathers. She saw the events of her lifetime as the fulfillment of God's promises to Abraham and the fathers of the Jewish nation.
These were Messianic promises. She said God is doing something special in my time and I am a part of the promises of God. Dear friend, God never forgets His promises. He always remembers them. Mary knew this. She understood her part in it and that caused her to surrender to God in worship and to be able to say, Lord, may it be done to me according to Your word. That is what worship is about.
What we learn from Mary's Christmas carol is this, only those who surrender to God can worship Him from the heart because the heart of worship is surrender. You see, Mary made a critical choice and that was to surrender by faith to God's plan for her life. When she did that, she gave up and surrendered to God her reputation. You understand that? Nazareth was a small town in Galilee, a few hundred people at this time. They would know when she was pregnant.
She surrendered her reputation when she said, may it be done to me according to what you say. She surrendered a relationship with Joseph. She didn't know how he was going to respond. She was engaged to this man. She said, God, I surrender this relationship to You when she said, may it be done to me according to what you say. She also surrendered the right to her own body. She said, God, I'm willing from my body to be the vessel to bring that Holy One, to be called the Son of God, into the world.
Surrender. Because she did surrender, Mary has indeed been blessed by all generations since her time. It started with Elizabeth who said to her, you're blessed. And it is she who has believed what the Lord has said to her will be accomplished. And since that day, she has been called blessed. That is supernaturally favored by God. We might say that Mary has been graced by God. But it's not just Mary who can know this. It's all of us who will worship Him by surrendering to His plan for our lives.
What is God calling you to surrender? Is it the right to your opinion? Is it the right to live in a house instead of an apartment? Is it the right to live here in the valley? Is it the right to that job that you want? Is it your reputation? Is it a relationship? There is no worship without surrendering to God. When we come together like we do on the Lord's Day, unless we come with a heart of surrender, it makes no difference what happens on this platform or who's talking or anything else.
We have not worshiped. Because the heart of worship is the surrender of our hearts. God has planned for only one Mary, only one in all of history. But you know what? He's also planned for only one me and one you. We're special to God. And we can get in on the same grace and the same favor that Mary knew if we also in our generation will surrender ourselves to God. So I call upon you to surrender to God's plan for your life. And to do that is an act of faith.
Why don't you look up here for just a moment. When you and I grasp things and hold onto them, we cannot worship God. God can't pour His grace into our lives. When we are willing to release them and give them to God, then we worship. Then we know God. Then we understand what our part is in God's work in the world. Because this is the posture of worship. May it also express the attitude of my heart and your heart this morning. Let's pray.
Lord, thank you for Mary. We acknowledge to you that because there are some who wrongly even worship her, we evangelical Protestants tend to neglect her. We thank you for the wonderful example of a godly young woman that Mary was. And for what she teaches us about worship in this song. And we thank you Father that she bore and brought into the world that one who also surrendered his rights to be glorified as God and took upon himself our humanity.
Who left his throne of glory and came into this world that he might be our Savior. Father, how can we do any less than surrender ourselves? Amen. Amen.