Luke 1:46-49

Luke chapter 1, verses 46 through 49. 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 handmaid. For behold, from henceforth, all generation shall call me blessed. for he that is mighty have done to me great things and holy is his name. May God bless to us his sacred and holy word this morning. In Golifers travels, Jonathan Swift gives us his opinion about ingratitude. And he describes the laws of the Lilliputens. These are the little, tiny people that Gulliver encounters. And he states this, ingratitude is reckoned among them as a capital crime, for they reason thus that whoever makes ill return to his benefactors must need to be a common enemy to the rest of mankind. Such a man is not fit to live. His reasoning, while severe is certainly, I think, sound. Now, if you apply this with regard to God as man’s benefactor, and especially to the Christian, think about this. God is the giver of all good gifts to men, the sunshine, the rain, the crops, the family, all the provisions that we have and the wealth and so forth, all these good gifts God gives men. And yet we see. see in gratitude. But the Christian has even more reason to be thankful in that in Jesus Christ, we have all the gracious gifts given to us, all the spiritual things associated with the wonderful salvation that’s found in Christ. And thus the psalmist tells us that let everything that hath breath, praise the Lord, for all, oh, praise to the Lord God. After Elizabeth’s inspired address to Mary that we looked out last week. There follows what is commonly called here the song of Mary. She too, moved by the spirit, expresses praise to the Lord in a very sublime and beautiful manner. This song can be compared to Hannah’s song with regard to the birth of Samuel. There’s some. There’s some similarities between these two. that’s bestowed on all the people of God. And so the first part of this Song of Mary has to do with herself, verses 46 to 49. The second part has to do with the rest of the people of God, all of them, and verses 50 to 56. So I split the Psalm in two for that reason. There is much to be gleaned from Mary’s song, I think that would be beneficial to us today. I want to talk about true praise from this particular passage of scripture. And I’ll begin by saying this. The true praise proceeds from the joy of your inner person. You’ll notice here in verse 46 and 47, and Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God, my Savior. You ascribe greatness to God. That’s part of your praise. My Spirit. My Spirit. My soul doth magnify the Lord. God’s people speak highly and honorably of the Lord. Praise is something that is to be continually on the lips of the people of God. We have much to praise the Lord for. This is not the case with the ungodly. First Scripture says in the book of Job 21, 14, and 15. therefore they say unto God, depart from us, but we desire not the knowledge of thy ways. What is the almighty that we should serve him? Their thought is not to praise the Lord. It’s God’s work of grace within your heart, though, that makes you praise the psalmist. Psalm 40, verse 3, You have put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto the Lord. He put that song in your word. your mouth. Now here’s a key distinction between God’s people and the ungodly and the wicked, the righteous and the wicked. God’s people magnify the Lord. God has put it in their hearts, put it on their lips. Now, by magnify, it does not mean that somehow or other we make God greater. He can’t be made any greater than he already is. He’s already perfect. We don’t add anything to God. The idea is that you are declaring his greatness. You are praising all the perfections of his deity. You speak well of all the great acts that he does, that reveal his power, in his grace, in his goodness, and his mercy. When you are reading a text on your computer, you have that wonderful ability for us who have old age and difficult, seeing smaller print of enlarging the screen so that it gets bigger print on it. For example, when you’re reading the bank statement, you can magnify the bank statement. It comes in at 100%. You can raise up the 150 or even 200%. Maybe I could read it without my glasses. I get up to 400. I don’t know. But you can magnify it. You can enlarge it. Now, you’re not changing any words. You’re not changing any amounts. If I could change the amounts, it would be better, but I can’t change the amounts in the bank account. But I’m making it more prominent. So praise doesn’t add any greatness to God. It just magnifies it. It makes it stand out. It stresses it. Are you a person of praise? Do you desire to magnify him, for he is worthy of your worship? Is that how you feel? about it. That’s how Mary felt about it. You describe greatness to God. Now, you engage in heart-felt praise. Now, there are hypocrites who, God said, praise me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. But you’ll notice here in this passage of Scripture, we read about Mary’s soul and spirit, be involved in her worship. With the ungodly, it’s different. Calvin said this. They who pronounce his glory, not from the mind, but with the tongue alone, do nothing more than profane his holy name. The word soul and spirit are often used to mean the same thing. They speak of the inner being of a person. They speak of your heart. When soul and spirit are used together, like they are in this text of scripture, they speak of different aspects of man’s heart. The soul, many times will speak of the affections or the appetites or the desires of man. Well, the spirit will talk about the mind or understanding which directs a person. Together, the heart affects the worship. The spirit or mind leads and directs a person, the soul, the person. The soul, the person, the person, passions, the affections, motivates, stirs you to action. The excitement of the will of a person to praise God is preceded. We’re told by a rejoicing of the spirit. He says here, the scripture says here, my spirit hath rejoiced in God, my Savior. That’s why my soul does magnify the Lord. Okay? It’s the inner joy. that leads to the outer magnification here of God’s and the praise of his name. James tells us, is any Mary, let him sing Psalms. A merry heart should lead to praise. Now, sadness and anxiety sometimes lock up the soul. Restrain the tongue from praise. You know, you read some of these Psalms, and the first part of the Psalm is pretty dire. But by the middle of the Psalm, as you head toward the end, He’s starting, his spirit’s changing. He begins to rejoice in the things the Lord. The praise starts coming out. And so that’s what happens. When you praise God, it should be with joy. Not with a sorrowful and mournful heart. Why is it that some people can’t worship God without a long face? Without a depressed spirit. As if it’s a dreary exercise. Can we not rejoice? Along with Mary, the Greek word means rejoice greatly, to be exceedingly glad. She’s bursting with price. She’s like David leaping before the ark. She’s happy. She’s motivated. Are your mind and understanding and affections engaged in your praise of the Lord? Do you come to church like you’re attending a solemn funeral service? that it’s a dreadful occasion? Or do you engage your whole heart in the worship? For God deserves nothing less. Does not God command us to delight thyself also in the Lord? Psalm 374, we’re commanded to delight ourselves in God. Joy is a fruit of the Spirit. He alone can produce this inner joy that we have that leads to this praise if we’re lacking that inner joy we need to pray for the spirit that can help us and to move us to give us the joy we should pray for it if it’s lacking so true praise proceeds from the joy of your inner person you ascribe greatness of God and you engage in heartfelt praise secondly until Christ is embraced as your Savior true praise is impossible notice verse 47 she says here, my spirit hath rejoiced in what? In God, my Savior. Now Mary is going to give birth to the Messiah. He is the son of the highest. He is Emmanuel. He is God manifested in the flesh. He is her God just as much as Thomas saying my Lord and my God to Christ we must understand here that she is recognizing Christ as her God, her Savior. Remember the name that is supposed to be given to Jesus we studied last week is Jesus meaning Savior. and so when she speaks about God, her Savior, I believe she’s speaking about Christ, the Messiah, who’s coming forth through her, but he is the Savior of sinners. So she rejoices in Christ who saves her from sin and death and hell. Now, friends, unless they recognize Jesus Christ as our Savior, then how can your mind be free to praise God as you ought? You’re going to remain in doubt and anxiety. Unable to rejoice in spirit because you’re someone outside of Christ. You don’t have all those benefits of Christ. of the fruit of the Spirit. And like Isaiah, you are undone if you are outside of Christ. You’ll die in your sins and you’ll perish, but you have to look to Christ. Look to the Savior. By faith, you must grab hold of him. In the wilderness, you remember when the Israelites got bit by the fiery serpents and they were dying, Moses was commanded to make this pole and put a brass serpent on it. We still use it as a symbol of healing today. It’s on ambulances, if you ever notice. Some doctor’s offices still use it. And he puts up this brass pole and what were they to do? They were to look and they would live. Look and live. Jesus tells us in the New Testament just as the serpent was raised up on that pole in the wilderness for people to look on as a way of being spared and saved. So he, as the Son of God, would be lifted up upon the cross, and we were to look to him by faith, look to him by faith, and be saved. He alone can take away your sins, but a blood of the cross. You need a substitute to pay the curse of the law, and he is the substitute for sinners. He alone can grant you a perfect righteousness. Can you say, with Mary, Jesus Christ, is my Savior. Can you say with Paul, the Son of God loved me and gave himself for me. There was a sea captain that related how that he was sailing past the island of Cuba and they ran in some rough weather, some rough seas, and one of the men got swept overboard. And they heard the cry that a man was overboard. It was impossible to immediately stop the ship because it was being tossed by the storm and it was. and it was in pretty good speed mode at the time to retrieve the man. And so each second that passed would put a distance between the ship and the man overboard. So the captain had a rope thrown off the stern of the ship with the idea of, you know, telling the sailor, grab hold of it. We’ll pull you on. You know, grab hold of that rope. And we’ll save you. And the struggle. sailor grabbed hold of that lifeline and eventually he was pulled back to the ship and saved and rescued. However, he grasped that rope with such firmness, with such a death grip. It took hours before they were actually able to get his hand pried off of it. It seems that his hand, the strands of the rope, became embedded in his hands. And he just could not let go. My friend, God has provided a way of salvation in Jesus Christ. Grab hold of him with all your might. He is the way of salvation. Cling to Jesus Christ. Now, as an observation that I must add here, I want you to notice that Mary needed a Savior. Mary needed a Savior. At the Council of Trent, 1545 to 1563, Mary’s sinlessness and perpetual virginity were affirmed as a official dogma of the Roman Catholic Church, which means that every Roman Catholic is supposed to believe that. Later, Pope Pius X. 11th in 1923, declared the Virgin of Sorrows, shared the work of redemption with Jesus, and she was a co-redemptrix. However, in absolutely no sense. can Mary contribute to your salvation? For your notice that Mary herself needs salvation. Plainly Mary confesses her need a Savior. She sees Jesus as her Redeemer. Thus she must have been a sinner if she needed a Savior. She too is fallen in Adam. She too is conceived in sin. She too has personal transgressions of the law of God. She can’t contribute to her salvation. It’s an abominable lie that you’ve been told. A damnable lie. Scripture declares that Christ alone is the Savior sinners. Christ is the door of paradise, not Mary. Christ is the sinner’s advocate, not Mary. Christ is the only Savior. Mary can’t be a co-redemptor. deemer. Christ is the only hope of sinners, not Mary. So you need faith in Christ, the Savior. Now true praise then requires your faith, doesn’t it? Don’t overlook the fact that this song of Mary is a song of faith. It’s a song of someone who believes in the Savior, Jesus Christ, moved by the Spirit of God, and given the joy by the Spirit to do it. Now it’s interesting. At this point, no Savior is born. We don’t know that she has shown any signs, you know, of her belly getting larger or anything of this nature at this point. However, it seems from verse 42 that Jesus is certainly conceived, for Elizabeth tells us, moved by the spirit that her Savior has visited her in the belly of Mary. So Mary might naturally have suspended her song until she had more physical evidence. However, on the basis of the promise of God’s word and the word of the angel that she’s been, has communication with, Mary’s heart leaked with the light and her tongue glorified her Lord. The benediction of Elizabeth rightly confirms this. Blessed is her, she, that believed. Verse 45. Now, friends, you and I have not yet received every spiritual blessing and benefit promised to us in Jesus Christ, but can we not joyfully sing of that which is promised knowing that it’s going to come. How often do you sing a psalm? Were you rejoice in Christ who crushes all your enemies and all the enemies of his kingdom? Whether those enemies crushed you? yet? Why is it that we sing with such joy about the crushing of our enemies? Because it’s a sure thing. We do it by faith, right? You sing, thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and after receive me up to glory, Psalm 73, 24. You joyfully look to the Lord to take you to heaven. What are you counting on? You’re counting on what God has said by faith. You sing, he made a pit and digged it in his fault. Fallen into the ditch which he made, His mischief shall return upon his own pate or head in Psalm 7. About the wicked, that God’s going to cause them to fall into the own ditch that they’ve dug and so forth. You might not see this immediately. Though why do you sing this? Because you expect it to happen. Because you believe that this is the way God operates. You joyfully sing, staggering not at the promise of God through unbelief, but fully persuasive. it that what he has promised he is able to do until Christ is embraced as your Savior true praise is impossible. Thirdly, in true praise you delight in God’s grace. Versus 48 and 49, for he hath regarded the lowest state of his handmaid, for behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. For he that is mighty hath done great, done to me, great things and holy is his name. Holy is his name. Now, friends, true praise also includes the idea that we recognize our low estate. We confess it. It’s true that Mary was in a very low, earthly condition. She was a poor, common individual. However, the word regarded here implies the the Lord bestowing grace upon her, looking upon her with pity out of free grace. This explains the reason why she rejoices in the Lord or Savior. She renounces all personal merit and describes everything to the undeserved grace of God. She makes herself nothing. She is in low estate. Everything reaches forth to the Lord, her Savior. That’s where the praise belongs. She uses the language of one who has been taught by grace to feel her own sins. Friends, do you feel intensely to the propriety of your own natural circumstances? Have you been humbled and shamed by a sense of your own failings? Do you mourn the spiritual lethargy that sometimes plagues your soul? Perhaps you feel insignificant. Perhaps you feel utterly unworthy of the least of God’s mercies. You know the lowliness of your condition. It’s vivid before your eyes, and it saddens you. However, the less worthy you see yourself, the more sweetly you will sing. of God’s grace and the Savior. You may be the least significant of all God’s chosen, but it should make you praise the Savior all the more, because he saved you. Did not the Lord look upon you in your lowest state? Did he not pity you? Did he not regard you? Isn’t that the wonderful thing about God’s salvation, that grace is unmerited favor to the unworthy people, the most unworthy people? until you truly recognize this, you can’t sing the praise unto God with the joy of Mary. The famous Baptist minister, John Gill, was preaching on the total depravity and spiritual inability of man. Very humbling doctor. There was a gentleman who was attending his congregation. Became deeply offended and highly agitated by Gil’s preaching. So the man decided to call upon Gil and give him a peace of his Armenian mind. He told him, told Gil, you have degraded man. You’ve laid him too low. Gil said, pray, sir. How much do you think man can contribute to his own conversion in salvation? And he said, the man properly gave Gil a long list of all that man could do, devout, safe, God’s eternal salvation. Gil said, have you done all these things yourself? The man said, no, I can’t say, that I have. Gil looked at him with some surprise and said, if you really have all these things in your power and you have not done them for yourself, you deserve to be doubly damned. You are ill-qualified to stand for that imaginary free will, which, according your own confession, has done so little for you. However, after you have made yourself spiritually whole, if that ever occurs, be kind of to come and let me know how you went about it. For at the present, I no but one remedy for human depravity, namely the efficacious grace of him who worketh in men both the will and do of his own good pleasure. My friends, that’s what salvation is all about. God reaching out in grace. Not about man’s ability, not about man’s goodness. It’s about God’s grace. That ought to give you a joy of heart. You openly confess your lowest state. You rejoice in God’s grace to you. It was not only because Mary would give birth to the Messiah that she would rejoice and that she would be called blessed. But also on account of her interest in Christ as God, her Savior. She’s going to be blessed with all spiritual blessings in Christ. He that is mighty had done great things are done to me, great things. Yes, she would bear a son. He would be Emmanuel. But what about the great things that God has done for her? Personally. The salvation that Christ provides for her. The wonderful things that goes with union with Christ. Has not God blessed you who are once under the curse? But in Christ there is now no condemnation? Has not God through Christ done great things to you. he’s lifted you out of a horrible pit, has he not? he’s made you a child of God. he’s made you a recipient of a heavenly inheritance. Here’s what the psalmist said. Psalm 126.3. The Lord have done great things for us whereof we are glad. When we think about the great things God has done for us, it makes us rejoice. Were you not once spiritually dead? Jesus Christ made you alive. Were you once spiritually lame? Jesus Christ has made you leap with joy. Were you once not enslaved to sin and Satan? Jesus Christ set you free. You have reason to break forth then in song for all that God has done for you. Your constant song should be blessed be the Lord who daily loadeth us with benefits even the God of our salvation. Psalm 6819. The third thing, he says here under this section, is you delight in the fact that God’s grace and holiness coexist and salvation. Not only does she talk about the good things and the great things that God has done in looking upon her estate and showing her mercy and so forth, but she indicates here that he is holy. Holy is his name. Now she sings brightly of the holiness of God. Now, usually when you think about God’s holiness, that ought to make you shudder and fear. If you’re standing on Mount Sinai with Moses and seeing the holy God, like a present burning fire on top of the mountain, you may say with Moses, I do exceedingly quake in fear. You could see that. How can any sinner be comfortable in the presence of a thrice holy God. How can you look upon him who is, indeed a consuming fire without being destroyed yourself? My friends, the grace and holiness of God are found united together in the person and work of Jesus Christ. For your salvation did not involve a relaxing of God’s holiness. God doesn’t just forgive sins, willy-nilly and sweeps aside the punishment. due to his broken law. Stand at Calvary. Look on, I’ll take you to that mountain for a moment. Because on that mountain, you see the outpouring of God’s holy wrath upon the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, taking place. You see the full penalty of the law being extracted, fearfully observed what fury was poured out upon the substitute for sinners Jesus Christ. Now you can understand how God can be just, and at the same time, the justifier of those who believe in Jesus. God’s holiness doesn’t need to frighten you because your sins have been forgiven. Indeed, you are a partaker of God’s holiness through Jesus Christ. One day, you’re going to stand before the Lord perfectly holy without any blemish whatsoever. This is the end result of the salvation that God has provided, so the that we can rejoice in the holiness of God, for it is involved in our salvation. Well, in Gulliver’s travels, Jonathan Swift gave his opinions about ingratitude. The law of the Lilliputens indicates that it’s a capital offense to be ingratitude. The Christian has every reason to be grateful to God for the wonderful salvation he is provided in Jesus Christ. My friends, Mary lays out before us what God has done for her personally here and the grace that she’s enjoyed. It’s true of us what is true of Mary. And I pray that this morning you would see that. Now, Lord willing, we will look at the second part here of the grace to all the people of God that is included. The personal grace, she rejoices in and then the grace that God shows to all his people. If Jesus Christ is your Savior, rejoice. Rejoice. Let’s close.