DEC 17 2017

Sea Change Church · Elliott Stearns · December 17, 2017
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

Who's talking here? It's Mary. Yes. Right. And guess what happened? She just came to her cousin Elizabeth, right? Yeah. All right. Elizabeth was and Elizabeth, Mary greeted her. And then Elizabeth said, when you came, Mary, the baby in my womb, John the Baptist, leaped. Right. Joy. All right. Yeah. And and then and then Elizabeth says, I can't believe this. This is a paraphrase.

I can't believe this, but but but yeah, but God is in my womb. The Messiah that the Jews have been waiting for hundreds of years is here right with me. The Son of God is what I'm going to be bringing forth. He's going to bring redemption to the world. All right. And I just want you to think, how would you if and then the Holy Spirit comes upon Mary and she says, what?

My soul magnifies the Lord. I guess I guess I guess my spirit better rejoice. It must be the coffee. I haven't had enough coffee. OK, OK. Well, you know, I think one coffee yet. So, OK, I think it'd be better. In fact, let's why don't why don't we read if you have your sermon notes there. Turn it over. You'll see the message translation of what Mary does there.

Why don't we all read it together? The whole congregation, you think? Is that OK? Am I asking too much? Would you mind grabbing your cane and standing up here? And then we'll read the message translation together as a congregation. Is that that's in your notes? Can everybody stand, please, for that? And I want you. With with my brother here.

I love you, too. I want you to think of yourself as Mary. You had the it's come again, this revelation. I've got God himself in my womb. I'm going to be bringing forth the Son of God for the redemption of the world. And and and let's just say this together. It says I'm bursting with you see that there on the second side there. Let's just say it together. And Lord Jesus, I pray that just a measure of the spirit that was upon Mary would be in this congregation right now.

Amen. Ready? I'm bursting with God. I'm dancing the song of the Savior God. God took one good look at me and look what happened. I'm the most fortunate woman on earth. What God has loaned me will never be forgotten. The God whose very name is holy, set apart from all others. His mercy flows in wave after wave on those who are in awe before him. He bared his arm and showed his strength, scattered the bluffing braggarts.

He knocked tyrants off their high horses, pulled victims out of the mud. The starving poor sat down to a banquet. The callous rich were left out in the cold. He embraced his chosen child, Israel. He remembered and pulled on the mercies. Piled them high is exactly what he promised, beginning with Abraham and right up to now. Amen. You may be seated.

Thank you so much. And thank you. I really do love you. That sounds much better. Yeah. OK, thank you. I just want to make sure that nobody goes home tonight and writes in their diary. I think Elliot's the rudest man I've ever heard. OK, that really was put on put on there. You'll notice also on the second side, there's another translation from a song.

Magnificat. You can see hear this on YouTube there. Her, this writer's verse 46, 47. All that I am sings of the God who brings new life to birth in me. My spirit soars on the wings of my Lord. That's really what Mary was feeling there. And there's another translation that's come out recently called the Passion Version of the Bible. Anybody heard of that?

It, he starts out, and Mary sang this song, my soul is ecstatic, overflowing with praises to God. My spirit bursts with joy over my life-giving God. This is really what, what we're talking about here. By the way, I want you to notice, Mary was ecstatic as she realized that I was given that notice again. And something, something you may not have noticed is that starting about verse 51, she says everything past tense, as if it's already been done.

And really, I think it was sort of like John the Revelator when he was, when he was in the spirit on the Lord's day. It's like Mary went into the future and saw the work of her son that was, her son was going to accomplish. He said, it's all as good as done. And so we can say, when we think, when we read this, we can make it in present progressive tense.

He shows his strength with his arm. He scatters the proud and the thoughts of their heart. He brings down the mighty from their thrones, exalts those of humble estate. He fills the hungry with good things, and the rich he sends away. But she saw it. She was filled with the spirit. She said, this is what's going to happen, and it's as good as done because of the Lord's blessing upon me.

This is the third Sunday of Advent. It's a real special Sunday. All the Sundays are special, but this one is especially great. And in fact, we lit this candle up here, this one that's facing you right here. It's called the gadate, gadete candle. Gadete is a Latin term that means rejoice. And we called it the candle of joy. So it's appropriate here.

The third Sunday is different from the other two. The other two candles, I think, last week was hope. I can't remember what the first week was. I don't remember. But this one is called rejoicing. And in the Catholic and the Anglican communions is a special Advent day. And it celebrates, or we remember the need to rejoice just as Mary did at this time.

If you're in the Catholic communion, decades ago, the priest would come down the aisle. They'd be holding up the scriptures and so on. And he would be proclaiming in loud Latin or singing, gadete ad homino semper iterum dico gadete, which is Philippians 4, verse 4, which says what? Rejoice in the Lord. How often? Always. Again, I say what? Rejoice.

You know, and this is that special Sunday of rejoicing. And it's the Sunday that we remember the rejoicing. So it's a day in which we want to remember, and I think especially with the Magnificat of Mary. The word Magnificat comes from the Latin. Again, that's the first word of the prayer there, or the prophecy of Mary when she was proclaiming that, I will, my soul doth magnify the Lord.

So let's look at some of the verses that are in chapters 1 and 2 of Luke in terms of the spirit that should permeate the whole Christmas season, but especially to remember this day. So I think we might be missing some of the scriptures that were to be projected, so you'll have to listen to my voice projected here. Luke 1, 13, 15 in the message version again says, The angel comes to Gabriel, excuse me, to Zachariah.

Don't fear, Zachariah. Your prayer has been heard, Elizabeth. Your wife will bear a son by you. You are to name him John. You're going to leap like a gazelle for joy. And not only you, many will delight in his birth. He'll achieve great stature with God. Okay, so first of all, you're going to leap like a gazelle, Zachariah. Chapter 1, verses 41 through 44.

Again, Elizabeth comes to Mary. Elizabeth speaks to Mary. Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting. The baby in her womb leaped. She was filled with the Holy Spirit and sang out exuberantly. You're so blessed among women, and the babe in your womb also blessed. And why am I so blessed? That the mother of my Lord visits me. The moment the sound of your greeting entered my ears, the babe in my womb skipped like a lamb for sheer joy.

You know, the Magnificat again starts with, My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit doth rejoice in God my Savior. That word, you know, if you want to magnify something by your soul, you just want to shout it out. You just want to exuberantly speak. And that word for exult or rejoice, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, the root of that word in the original Greek there means to leap or to leap about.

Mary's excited. I'm sort of wondering whether I should say this or not because I might, I don't know. But how many movies have been made of Mary singing the Magnificat? You know, dozens, right? And they usually show Mary's head slightly raised. My soul doth magnify the Lord. My spirit doth rejoice in God my Savior. You know, I don't think it was like that.

I think it was, she was as excited as those words were when we were reading there. She, you know, maybe it was quiet outside, but fervent inside, and I'm sure, but the point is she was really excited by what God, the revelation, the joy that possessed her there. Chris Peterson, about six years ago, I can't remember what was going on in the church, but she told a joke about an Italian.

He said, what do you call an Italian with no arm, one arm missing, or with an arm and a sling or something? You know, he's got a speech impediment. And again, that's, that's, no, Italians aren't Jews, and Jews aren't, I know that. But they're both demonstrative, right? They're both really, when they get excited, you know it, okay? And you know it with all the gestures and everything else.

Mary was excited by what the angel had told her there. What, why? Well, when the angel came to Mary, he said, the Spirit of the Lord shall come upon you, and the power of God shall overshadow you. And because we're so familiar, we say, yeah, the Spirit's going to come upon her and she's going to conceive. No, he's stressing the coming upon, and he's stressing the overshadowing there.

That word coming upon is the same word that's used in Acts 1.8, when Jesus tells the disciples, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And that word overshadow is the same word that's used in the Transfiguration, when Peter and John were with Jesus, says the glory of the Lord overshadowed them. Peter also, in Acts 5, it says that he could walk down the streets of Jerusalem, and when his shadow just crossed over somebody, they were healed.

See, I think that experience, that conception, that begetting of Jesus within the womb of Mary, that was quite an experience. We don't have any description of it, but it must have been something. And so, think how excited she was by what she knew there. I think Mary became a Pentecostal before Pentecost. I mean, 34 years beforehand. Reading on there, Luke 1, when Elizabeth was in full term in her pregnancy, she bore a son.

Her neighbors and relatives, seeing that God had overwhelmed her with mercy, celebrated with her. Chapter 2, verse 10, the angel comes to the shepherds. He says, don't be afraid. I bring you, this is from the Living Bible, I bring you the most joyful news ever announced. And it is for everyone. And again, verse 20, like Luke 2, and the shepherds returned.

And when the shepherds returned, they let loose, glorifying and praising God for everything that they had heard and seen. I like that expression, they let loose. That means there's pressure building up, and suddenly it gives way. They just couldn't hold it in. So, we have expressions, leap like a gazelle, skip like a lamb, and so forth. This is the kind of spirit that should permeate our Christmas time.

Because our Christmas rejoicing prepares us for our Easter hallelujahs. Last Wednesday, there was a little time between sleeping and waking, you know. It's just something, it's sort of a fugue in the middle there. And I just heard this sentence come to my mind, and it said, the end of a thing can't be better than the beginning. And I woke up, and I said, that's wrong.

Because Ecclesiastes says the end of a thing is better than the beginning. But then I realized, I sort of thought about it before, and I realized there's another way of looking at it. Whatever tree comes from a seed depends upon what's in that seed at the beginning, the DNA in that seed. Whatever starts something is predictive of what's going to happen.

And Christmas is our seed for Easter. And if we can enter into the spirit of the rejoicing, this is a foretaste of the joy that God wants to bring to us. That end, the end of something is determined by what's there at the beginning. So when we look forward, we're going to come up to Easter here on April 1st, which I think is interesting. The joke's going to be on the world.

When we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and that is that time Christ the Lord is risen today. Hallelujah. Because we're seeing something of the fulfillment of the joy that we're now experiencing as we think about, as we celebrate the birth of Jesus. Joy characterizes this story in order that we might taste and see what the Lord has in store for us.

In John 15, 11, Jesus says, These things I have spoken unto you that my joy might be in you. And that you embracing that joy, your joy might be full. That's his desire. We know. Why did Jesus come to earth? Yes, he came to do the Father's will. Yes, he came to die and save us from our sins. But the purpose of all of that was to bring us into fellowship with the Father and the Son and the fullness of the kind of joy and relationship that he has, that Jesus has with the Father, and he invites us into.

That's why Jesus was so, you know, Pastor Jim has this Wednesday class. It's over now. We're comparing the scriptures in Matthew, looking at the scriptures in Matthew, where Matthew quotes Isaiah. And one of them, of course, you know, Jesus goes into the temple, and he casts out the money changers and those who sold doves, and he says, How dare you do this?

Paraphrase. For it's written that my house shall be a house of prayer, but you've turned it into a what? Den of thieves. Okay. But if you look back, take that scripture, and then go back to Isaiah 56, verse 7. Say, what was the context there? Here's the context. The Lord is speaking to those who have joined themselves. The Lord want to be his servants, and the promise is if you join yourself to me to serve me, to keep the Sabbath, all of that that's in that context, then I will make you joyful in my house of prayer.

See, that's his purpose. He's not just telling us, I want you to do these things and you'll be saved. He wants to save us, to bring us into the fullness of joy in relationship to God. C.S. Lewis wrote that joy is the serious business of heaven. Like that. What's that, right? And he also says, We are half-hearted creatures fooling around with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is being offered to us.

That's why we sing it this season, Joy to the world. We sing that we are joyful and triumphant. That's why we sing that the Lord wants to give us immortal gladness. Love that expression. That's why we have our children sing. I don't know, did the children here learn this song, Joy is the flag flown high from the castle of my heart? Anybody heard that song?

All right? You know how it goes? Joy is the flag flown high from the... We have to wave the hands. Joy is the flag flown high from the castle of my heart, right? And when the king is in residence there. Teach it. Okay. So again, what triggered this prophecy? I guess we're probably gone over that. And Mary just expressed it with that exuberant joy that just couldn't be held in, that just let loose, as we said there.

And it's the same thing for us. She had God himself in her womb. But you also have God in your innermost being. Scripture says we're born again not of corruptible seed, but of the incorruptible seed, even the living word of God. So you have that in that same exuberant joy that Mary expressed. We can. And let loose with that expression that she had.

And I think it's interesting. You'll see notes there. Mary means what? Mary's name, interestingly, means bitter. Why should the mother of God be named something that means bitter? She's a picture of you and me. She's a picture of all of us who have been lost in sin, who have done wrong, who need to be saved. You shall call his name Jesus, for he shall do what?

He shall save his people from their sins. And so it's perfectly appropriate. Jesus comes to save. And so he takes, and that's why she celebrates in the Magnificat here, so much about the poor. Go back to the front of your sheet there. Again, what's it say? He scatters the proud, and he brings down the mighty, but he exalts those of humble estate. He fills the hungry with good things.

Those are the poor. The rich he sends empty away. He helps his servant Israel in remembrance of his mercy. So she's, again, she's a perfect picture of you and me. She needs Jesus to be planted within. She needs salvation. She needs redemption. And God gives it to her, and he gives it to all who call upon his name. And think of all the Marys that are in this story.

Zachariah, old and tired and with no offspring. Elizabeth, old and tired and barren and ashamed. She had no children. And the shepherds. Ah, the shepherds. Ah, the shepherds. Shepherds with bathrobes on holding little lambs. Okay. How we love the shepherds. Let me tell you about the shepherds. Pardon me if I read a little here, though. The Mishnah is a very holy book in Judaism, a written record of the oral law.

It describes the shepherds. It generally describes them as incompetent. It said, believe it or not, it says, no one should ever feel obligated to rescue a shepherd who has fallen into a pit. They're dirty and smelly and are probably getting what they deserve. Shepherds were deprived of all civil rights. They could not fulfill judicial offices or be admitted in court as witnesses.

Shepherds worked on the Sabbath. Violated the law. They permitted their flocks to graze on land belonging to others. And because they cared for animals belonging to others, the owners feared that the shepherds might kill one of their animals and share its meat with their immediate family. Shepherds were not permitted to give evidence in a court of law.

They were not even permitted to enter the Jerusalem temple. Shepherds in Jesus' time were considered by the general populace generally untrustworthy. Even worse, their work made them ceremonially unclean because they had daily contact with carcasses of animals and came into contact with all sorts of unclean animals. So to whom did the angel come?

When the angelic announcement arrives, it comes first to the social outcasts of Jesus' day. No one is too lowly to receive God's salvation. God reached out to the absolute rejects of society first in order to demonstrate that no one would ever be excluded. God sent the message to the humblest. The shepherds were humbled by their low social standing.

They had no place, no status, and very little value to their society. Similarly, God's message only comes to those humble enough to hear it. That's why the proud get sent to see it empty away. They don't want to hear it. The humble and the poor and the shepherds of this society need to hear it. Speaking of lowliness here, it leads us to something.

There's a lowly little word in Mary's Magnificat. I just wanted to share a background here. Pastor Adam back in October gave a sermon called Putting Things in Place. It was about the dedication of Solomon's temple. And as he was studying this dedicatory section of the scripture and the dedication of Solomon's temple, he kept seeing this word place there.

Place. And he said, that's really important. Because that shows that God isn't just talking. He's actually establishing he's going to put his name in a place. He has a purpose in it. Joshua says, to Joshua he says, every place that you put your foot I'm going to give to you. And so on. It's, that was an important word even though the word place is so common and ordinary.

Every day we don't even think about it. But once it was seen in the context there, it was very important. And he spent some time on that. Even citing that there was 1154 uses of it in scripture. Here, same thing happened to me on two weeks ago or so. I'm starting to prepare for this message. And I'm reading the Magnificat. And just out of the blue, a very lowly word in this Magnificat leaps up before me and says, that's the theme.

That's a theme here. This is really important. What was that word? It wasn't a noun, some solidity. It wasn't a verb of some dramatic action or something. It's just a lowly adverb. But it seemed to describe really what's important here. You'll find it, you'll find it in verse three. I mean the third verse there. For behold, from henceforth on all generation, all generations will call me blessed.

And I looked at that word and the word was henceforth. Just a lowly little adverb. But to me, it was all important. From henceforth. Henceforth means from this time on, everything's different. Regardless of what happened in the past. She says, no matter how poor and hungry, despised, whatever it was, no matter what happened in the past, from henceforth, everything's new.

Henceforth, we've been justified by faith and have peace with God. Henceforth, we always and forever have access by faith into the grace of God. Those from Romans 5. Henceforth, we live and boast of the hope of the glory to come. Henceforth, there is no condemnation for those who in Christ Jesus. Henceforth, he who raised Christ will give life to my mortal body.

Henceforth, I can call God Abba. And you could just take it and go. Christmas is the henceforth feast. Rejoice for the new thing that God is doing. So have yourself a merry, henceforth, everything is new and glorious in Christ Christmas. Okay. Last section of your notes there talks as it was at the beginning. I just wanted to say again that God is going to do in the future when he comes again, in a way, what he did back then.

And we'll take a lot of time with this. You can study some of the scriptures there. But one way, the shepherds were abiding in the fields, watching their flocks, how? By night. Today, there are shepherds like Pastor Adam, Pastor Jim. And they're watching their flocks. That's you. And it's night. What does night speak about? Darkness. Trouble. Tribulation.

Tension. Men's hearts failings for fear. Wondering what's going to be happening. But the promise is that the Lord will send an angel. And the glory of the Lord will shine around. And Paul says, the voice of the archangel and with the sound of the trumpet will come. In other words, we want to be, again, aware that as it was then, when all were in anticipation, so, well, the question is, are we in anticipation as well?

It's called the blessed hope. We want to see the Lord come. I'll add something. Well, I'll add something not in your notes there. Back in those days, Herod killed all the little children. Good thing we don't have any Herods, right? Herod means hero-like. And the heroic, quote-unquote, politicians and media eminentos here. They don't think anything's wrong with slaughtering the innocents, do they?

And the abortion that's going on. So let's recap and review. We have heard and hopefully tasted, I hope that something of the Spirit came about Mary's exaltation in the Spirit. And can we do the same? Do we seek that same kind of Spirit? You know, I often pray, I want to be Spirit-possessed. Oh, I knew it. I want to be possessed with the Spirit of Bartimaeus, who when everybody else was shuffling their feet, ran into the camp with a spear and took care of the evil.

I want to be filled with the Spirit of blind Bartimaeus, who when he needed healing, didn't let anything keep him from it. He would not be denied. I want to be filled with the Spirit of David when he approached Goliath, and he said, you come to me with sword and spear and shield, but I come to you, what? In the name of the Lord of armies, who is with me.

I want to be filled with the Spirit of the Shulamite, who Song of Solomon says was sick with love until she could join to her beloved. And I want to be filled with the Spirit of Mary, just filled with the exaltation and the joy of the knowledge that God was in her and with her, and he would fulfill all the promises made to Abraham and to the patriarchs.

Can we just ask the Lord, Lord, fill me with that kind of Spirit? Make me holy. I don't want to just be holy by doing, quote, the right things. I want to have her Spirit, her passion. Secondly, we've learned that the gospel has come to the poor in spirit, and that nobody of this world is out of reach of the gospel. And can we be convicted? I want to be the instrument, as Joe Brandy said, I want to be the hands and the feet of Jesus to the poor.

And thirdly, we've hopefully appreciated that as it was in the beginning, so it's going to be at his return. And can we be in equal expectancy there? We're standing at the cusp of a new year, 2018. I'll be up here in prayer from the prayer team after the service. Maybe you want to come up for prayer. Just ask for a fresh, like Mary, receive an overshadowing of the power of the Lord, a filling of the Holy Spirit.

Make this a year of jubilee in our souls. And say to the person praying with you, I want to have a henceforth Christmas and a new year. Amen. Thank you.