Luke 1:26-33

Luke chapter 1, verses 26 to 33. And in the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was 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, and the virgin’s name was Mary. Mary. And the angel came in unto her and said, Hail thou art highly favored. Hail thou that art highly favored. The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women. And when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be. And the angel said under her, Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found her. favor with God. And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb and bring forth a son. Thou shall call his name Jesus. He 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. May God bless to us his sacred and holy word this morning. Robert Stevenson, who was born in 1772, was a famous Scottish engineer. And he was the grandfather of the well-known writer, Robert Lewis Stevenson, who gave us Treasure Island and many other famous. stories. 100 years after Robert Stevenson’s death, there was a parade held in his honor in Newcastle. And there was this huge procession with all sorts of banners of honoring the distinguished engineer. Now, in this parade, there were a group of peasants that showed up, and they had a banner, and they marched in the parade too. they were from the tiny village and rich Robert Stevenson was born. And their sign said, he was one of us. And so they had come to honor him. And they were especially honoring him as a great man from their group, from their people. All through the New Testament, the people of God are waiting for the coming of the prince, the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ. as Daniel 9 calls him, Messiah the Prince. It gives us the timetable in Daniel chapter 9, the 70 weeks of prophecy. He is the one whom God would call my king, who would rule the nations with the rod of iron. Psalm 2 tells us about that. Zechariah 9 says, rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion, shout, O daughter Jerusalem, behold thy king, cometh unto thee. He is just having self. salvation. Here we have the announcement of the Son of God is about to come. He is going to come through a virgin named Mary, and it would be a miraculous birth. The long, promised son of David, the everlasting king of Israel is about the to arrive. The son of God becomes man. We have the incarnation right before our eyes. I want to talk about the coming king here from our text of scripture this morning. Now you’ll notice the lowly manner in which your king comes into this world in verses 26 and 27 here. The mother of the king is said to be Mary. And verse 26 tells us that, you know, after in the sixth month, meaning in the sixth month of the Liz’s, of us pregnancy, we see an announcement is made to Mary by the angel Gabriel. Now, Mary was a real popular name among the Jews, for it was identical to the name Miriam. If you take the Old Testament Hebrew and you put it into the Greek, it’s Mary, the sister of Moses and Aaron. So you can imagine a popular name. have Mary of Bethany, you have Mary the mother of John and Mark, you have the mother of Joe’s and James that was Mary. You have Mary Magdalene. I mean, there’s a lot of Mary’s. She was a virgin. She never knew a man sexually up to this point, but was espoused here. She was engaged to be married to Joseph, we’re told. Verse 34 makes it very clear that she doesn’t see how it’s possible. for her to have a son when she’s never had sexual intercourse. So we know that that, again, emphasizes the virgin aspect of her situation. But you’ll notice that the scripture emphasizes here in verse 27 twice. It says that she’s a virgin. And so the emphasis is on this fact here. This was in accordance, of course, with Issafeited. Isaiah’s prophecy, therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Emmanuel. God with us. I like Matthew’s genealogy. He opens his book with the genealogy. If you read it carefully, the whole first part of it, this person begat this person, this person, this person began this person, this person, this person all the way through it. And then you get to Joseph. And here’s what it says. Jacob begat Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ. It doesn’t say that Joseph begat Jesus. Mary gave birth to Christ. So you can see how carefully this virgin birth of Christ is preserved for us. This conception is unique. It had never occurred again, and it never will occur. again. Jesus was not born by ordinary generation, but miraculously. Now, this was necessary to avoid the corruption associated with Adam’s fault. Jesus would have a human nature, but it would not be a depraved human nature. The rest of us are born in trespasses and sins, but Jesus was not. In notice verse 35, carefully where he says that holy thing, which shall be born of thee. Holy. No taint. No corruption associated with Jesus Christ. The mother of the king here is Mary. Now, notice the great degraded state of the royal family at this point. Mary as well as Joseph, we see, was of the house of David. Verse 27 tells us this, that Jesus is going to be from the house of David. Now, this is significant. In Luke chapter 3, we will have the genealogy of Mary going all way back to Adam. Believe it or not, goes all the way back to Adam. It gives us every person in Mary’s line. If you look at Matthew’s Gospel, he gives us everybody in Joseph’s line. So you can follow both of them back. only he starts with Abraham and goes through David and so forth, getting us to Christ. Well, Mary was a descendant of the royal family of David, to whom God promised in the Davidic covenant to send the Messiah. A messianic descendant, the son of David, was going to be born through that line. And now it’s coming to pass, just as God said. Sakarias and his song later on in this chapter is going to make mention of that. Joseph was a poor carpenter. Mary was a poor virgin. But look at the low condition that David’s royal line was in at this time. None of his descendants occupied the throne. We already saw from verse 6 that Herod the Great was on the throne. He was the king of Judea. So there was no life of luxury for Christ. No royal bank. no special honor bestowed upon Mary or Joseph by the people and where will the king of the king of the king of kings be living as he grew into manhood? Well, that’s not in Rome. Well, you think it with a worldwide king as he is going to be that that would be the place to be born the capital of the Roman Empire. It’s not going to be in Jerusalem. The royal city will the temple is where the the kings of Judah reigned where David reigned, but we find he’s going to be in Nazareth. He’ll be raised in Nazareth. He’ll be born as we’ll see in Bethlehem, but he’ll be raised in Nazareth. A little town lightly esteemed. So we see the low condition of things. Quite a humble beginning for the great king. You know, the minor prophets speak about the tabernacle of David being fallen down. and how it’s going to be rebuilt, restored. Well, here, the time of the Davidic throne and so forth has fallen down. But now under Christ, it’s going to be built back up. It’s going to be restored. But it’s a degraded state that we see in at this point. The situation, the royal family. Now, let me say this by way of practical observations. Two things. You should admire the wonderful condescension and love. of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. Martin Luther, the great reformer, once said that he observed a picture hanging in one of the Roman Catholic churches that he had gone to. And the painting depicted the Pope and the cardinals and the bishops and the priests and the monks and the friars. And they were all in this great ship. But the common people were out there in the sea, the raging sea, and they were drowned. But the religious leadership were not very concerned about helping them. They were indifferent to the common people. None of them were willing to dive into the bolsterous sea to save the perishing. How much different is our Lord Jesus Christ? Who doesn’t sit aloof somewhere in heaven? Takes upon himself a human nature, the form of a man, and dives in. to the mass of humanity, this corruption and mess of this world to save us from our sins. He so loved us that he would not let us perish in our fallen state. The heir of all things willingly took upon himself the form of a servant here. That’s how lowly he became. In order to bring about your salvation, he came to earth, and he came to earth as a poor man. living in a remote place in Israel, despised of men, and he came prepared to die and to suffer. Let Christ’s love and condescension move you to live for him and be devoted to his kingdom. Let his example remind you, as the scripture says in Romans 1216, mind not high things, but condescend to men of lowest state. Be content with the common and lowly things of life. Do not despise the poor, the ignorant, or the weak in the faith. Bear with their infirmities. Seek to do them good. That’s what the Savior did. You should admire the wonderful love and condescension of the Lord Jesus Christ. The second thought is this. You should realize with God nothing is impossible. One of the important Christian doctrines that we have is the doctrine of the Virgin birth. That Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of Mary, without the sexual intercourse of a man. Many mock at such a belief, but they’re missing the bigger picture, that God is omnipotent. With men, this is impossible, but with God, all things are possible. Matthew 1926. Friends, we have to clearly grasp. the kind of God that we worship and serve. Our God is not a weak God. Our God is not a God who frets and worries about the future or what’s going to happen. If it’s all out of control, out of his control, he is in charge. He can do things that we don’t even imagine. He can do above all that we ask or think. Friends, we come to worship. Let us realize, as the scripture says in Jeremiah 2317, Behold thou hast made the heaven and the earth by thy great power and stretched outstretched arm, and there is nothing too hard for thee. Look at the heavens. Look at the earth. If God could create those things, there’s nothing that he cannot do. Now, friends, there are various things we might despair of. We go through this life if it were not for the omnipotence of our God. You see people all around you. They’re so wedded to their sins, so prone to evil, so adverse that all that is holy, so blind to the way of salvation. Is there any hope for the salvation of your unconverted neighbor and friend who are dead in trespasses and sin? Yes, because we have an omnipid God. That’s why. Who can raise the spiritually dead? That’s a miracle. Never forget that. person who is regenerated is a miracle from God. When you pray for someone’s salvation, you’re asking for God to do a miracle. The impossible. For what is impossible for you and I to do is to give them spiritual life God can do with all the suffering and the hardship and the difficulties in this life, with all the dangerous temptations, the deceitfulness of riches, the snares of achieving a position of power and authority of this life, the weakness of the flesh, the weakness of the flesh, What hope is there that your faith is going to survive? You think your salvation depends upon you? My friends, if it depended on us, where we would be? God calls us to persevere, but he also tells us he’ll enable us to do so, because we can’t do it on her own. I tell you, it’s a miracle. It is a miracle that our faith is preserved, and it’s because God keeps the flames going. That’s the God we have. Let us always keep that in mind. But we see the lowly manner in which your king comes into the world. Secondly, the kingdom of your king is founded upon grace. Now let’s look at the verses 28 to 30 here. And the angel came in under her and said, hail thou art, excuse me, hail thou, that art highly favored. The Lord is with a blessed art thou among women. And when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be. Now, we see the favor of God. Thou art highly favored. Verse 28 and also verse 30, where he says, Thou hast found favor with God. The angel come, greets Mary with a hail here, rejoice. is it conveys piece. The Greek word for favor here is caris. Grace. For favor. You’ll notice that this word is in the passive, which indicates to us that it is God who granted her grace. Greeks, Green’s inner literary Bible has, hail, one receiving grace. That captures the thought here. Cheritou, the passive of Carus, indicates one finding divine grace or favor in God’s sight is verse 30, for thou hast found favor with God. Both are passive here. So Mary was a recipient of God’s grace as every believer is. Like Noah, she found grace in the eyes of the Lord. For Christ’s kingdom is a kingdom of grace, isn’t it? Ephesians 2.5, by grace are you saved? Acts 1827, them which believed through grace. Romans 324 being justified freely by his grace. Now, God’s elect people not only receive initial grace at salvation, but we receive grace upon grace as we go through this life. Christ the king being full of grace, John 114, bestows a continuous supply of it to his people. Mary was specially granted grace as the one chosen by God to be the mother of the Savior Jesus Christ. So the favor of God is seen here. Notice the presence of God. Verse 28, the Lord is with thee. The Lord was watching. over her, protecting her, prospering Mary. There is never a reason to despair if God is with you. You can perform any task or work, for God will enable you to do it. It’s a guarantee of success. Remember Moses when he was going to go up to the Promised Land, if you won’t go with us, we don’t want to go. If God is with you, who can be against you? You can perform any task or work and have success. No divine favor will be held from you. You’ll obtain everything you need, whether it be physical strength or spiritual empowerment, if the Lord is with you. No enemy can successfully stand against you. The presence of the Lord is with her. Notice the blessing of God is upon her. Blessed art thou among women. Verse 28C, third part of that verse. The word blessed here and blessing here is used in the sense of the beatitudes. Happy is the one. Joyful is the one. It conveys the idea of personal peace and satisfaction. Paul often prays for believers that we’d have grace. And then what? Does he add? Peace. If you have that, you really have everything. Now, it’s true that others would recognize God’s blessing upon her, that she, deed was blessed. But I think the important thing here is to see that she personally is blessed by the Lord. Doesn’t the scripture declare in thy presence is fullness of joy? So if the Lord is with you, what is going to, you’re blessed. You’re going to have joy and peace and comfort and so forth. The blessing of the Lord. The consolation of the Lord. It’s mentioned also in verse 29 and 30. Where he says, fear not. to her. Fear not, Mary. She was surprised. She was taken back by an angel’s appearance and pronouncement. She reasoned with herself, trying to understand the meaning of all this. It seemed bewildering to her that such wonderful things would be pronounced concerning her. The angel has to calm her spirit. There’s nothing to fear. The Lord’s favor is with you. God knows our frame, does he not? He’s fully aware of how frightening things may become when we have dealings with God, and he calms our spirits. God helps us overcome our fear, assures us of his favor. Now, let me make a practical observation here. You should realize how preposterous the Roman Catholic Church’s interpretation of this passage is. It is well-known fact that the Roman Catholics have elevated Mary’s status to that equal with Christ himself. Roman Catholic theologians teach that thou art highly favored in verse 28 means that Mary is full of grace. I’m not a Catholic, but I think when you say your Hail Mary full of grace that they’re drawing on they’re trying to draw from this idea. Like Christ who is full of grace. It is declared that Mary, you see then, can bestow grace upon people. who pray to her. This is a total failure to recognize the passive phrasing here. Hail one receiving grace. One finding it from God. She found favor, grace in God’s sight, as verse 30, clearly indicates to us. Recognize that Mary’s happiness, her righteousness, her eternal life flow from this undeserved grace of God. If all her virtues and excellence flow from God’s unmerited favor, that it’s absurd to tell people to seek grace for Mary when she needed it herself. Also, one should keep in mind that many things said here about Mary have been said about other saints as well. Did Mary find favor or grace with God? So did no. No. Noah in Genesis 6 and verse 8. So did David in Acts chapter 7, verses 45 and 46. Was Mary said to be blessed among women in verse 28? So was J.L. the slayer of Cicera and Judges 524 Blessed among women shall J.L. The wife of Heber that cannot be. Was God with Mary? Well, the same is said regarding Gideon and Jeremiah and Paul and many others. there is not the slightest warrant in Scripture of making Mary an object of worship here. It is a twisting of these verses of scriptures do that. So the kingdom of your king is founded upon grace. The third thing here, we have description of your king in his kingdom, verses 31 to 33. And behold, thou shall conceive in thy womb and bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, it 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. Christ is the Savior of men. You see that, behold, it begins this section. Behold! Indicating how extraordinary, how wonderful Christ’s birth would be. These words, of course, are from Isaiah chapter 7, verse 14. As we mentioned before, about the virgin giving birth. He’s going to be called Jesus. Now, why is his name called Jesus? Well, Matthew’s Gospel tells us, thou shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. It means Savior. so Christ’s name contains a promise and points out the purpose for which he was sent by the Father into the world, for Jesus Christ came into the world. to save sinners. He is most able and willing to save to the uttermost all who come unto God by Him. Nor is there salvation in any other. Christ is the Savior man. Christ shall be great, the Bible says in verse 32. He’s going to be great in his person because he is the God man. There is none like him in all the human race where have God and man, joined in one person. He is after all the son of the highest, is he not. He’s the son of God. He is the eternal son of God. The second person of the Holy Trinity co-equal with the Father. Isn’t the Father the voice from heaven that said, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased? Didn’t Peter say we believe in that thou art to Christ, and are sure, that thou art the Christ, the son of the living God. Then even the demon say, what have I to do with thee, Jesus thou son of the most high God? The centurion upon his death on the cross said truly, this was the son of God. Christ is great in his person. Christ is great in his offices. Look at his prophetic office. He was the great prophet. that Moses said would become, who would be mighty, and word and deed. And we see that in Christ, and his preaching, and his miracle work. Look at his priestly office. Not only is he the great high priest, but he exceeds that of the Levitical priesthood and all the high priesthood and all the high priest that were before him. For he is of the order of Melchizedek. And this indicates to us that his priesthood is an eternal priesthood. He never dies. His priesthood never ends. He’s greater in his sacrifice that he could offer. He’s greater in the intercession that he offers. And of course he’s great in his kingly office because he’s the king of kings and the Lord of Lords. Greater than Solomon in all his glory stands before you. Christ shall be great. Christ shall be given the throne of His father David. Verse 32, the last part in verse 33, we read here, God shall give unto him the throne of his father, David, he shall reign over his house of Jacob forever and of his kingdom there shall be no end. As I said before, both Mary and Joseph are a house of David. Therefore, Christ here certainly, without question, is of the line of David. Christ is represented as the successor here to David’s throne. the seed that was promised the throne, the one who would reign forever. Christ’s kingdom would be a spiritual kingdom. It would extend to the uttermost parts of the earth. God would admit into the family of Israel or the family of Jacob, Gentiles, as well as Jews. They would become sons of Abraham. They would be grafted into the true Israel of God. In Christ’s kingdom, is never going to be destroyed. He shall reign as long as the sun and moon endure through all generations as Psalm 72.5 tells us. So he shall be given the throne of David. A couple practical observations. And the first is this. God is a great king, and you’re under obligation to submit to his kingdom. Christ’s reign consists in your actual submission to him, in obedience to his will. He reigns over you. Christ demands that you humbly bow before his will. For Christ will crush all those who oppose him. If you refuse to recognize Christ as king, if you live your life indifferent to his commands, then you’re going to be treated as an enemy. You will be treated as an enemy, and you will fall under his judgment. Why would you oppose him? Why would you oppose him? the king. Repend of your sins. Seek his mercy because that’s your only hope. It can’t end well for those who oppose the king of kings and the Lord of Lord’s. Notice also, you should rejoice in Christ’s perpetual reign. Friends, there have been many attempts to destroy Christ’s kingdom down through history. But you know what? Every one of them has proved to be in vain. The learning of philosophy, the sneer of scorners, the power of governments, the terrors of persecution have repeatedly assaulted the kingdom of God. There’s a lot of bloodshed down through the history of the church. Many have predicted the eradication of Christianity from the earth. Their predictions have failed to come to pass. You have a kingdom. The Bible says which cannot be moved. It cannot be moved. It cannot be moved. shaken. Christianity continues to flourish over the graves of all its enemies. Christ will always protect and defend and avenge his church on this earth so that the gates of hell cannot prevail against it. Rejoice for Christ reigns. And my friends, all his enemies eventually will fall before him. The victory of your king is, is assured. When we sing the Psalms, and we often do this, and we sing about the destruction of our enemies, we’re singing about Christ and what he’s going to do. We’re not talking about us being victorious. We’re only victorious through Christ. We’re singing about Christ’s triumph over our enemies. And so this is why one of the reasons we should sing the Psalms. It’s always talking about victory. It’s always talking about our king giving us the victory. It’s an encouragement to the people of God. You say, I don’t like all that heavy duty stuff that’s found in the Psalms about judgment, retribution of all that. Is it true or not? And if it’s true and God has given us to sing, that we should sing it. Let us realize he’s the king. He reigns now. Judgment falls even now. He’s a God who judges in this earth even now. But the greater judgment is to come. Well, Robert Stevenson, the famous Scottish engineer had a great parade in his honor, but the people from his tiny home village wanted to bring the banner that said, he’s one of us. The son of God is one of us. And as we’re going to see, he took upon the nature of a man, and he did it in all stages of life for us. From very child, from infanthood, all the way up to adulthood. He knows all those aspects. because he lived them. And we’ll talk about that in the future. We have a great king. He had a humble beginning, but he has a glorious future and end. As we see, he reigns right now. And he’s in the process of bringing all enemies under his feet. But is this kingdom that Christ has is found on grace. Grace begins the kingdom. Grace sustains the kingdom. Grace is the end of it. Grace is the end of it. the kingdom. So let us realize his kingdom has no ultimate end. It just continues on and on and on. And the kingdom of glory takes up where the kingdom of grace will leave off as far as this earth is concerned. Let us keep that all in on. Let us close with prayer.