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The Songs of Luke's Gospel

Jesus: Song of Joy

TEXT: LUKE 1:46-55

There is word that when I hear it just rubs me the wrong way. There's something about it that violates my sense of what is right. When I hear it, it makes me bristle and set my jaw in defiance. I refuse to accept it. I muster all my emotional defenses against it. The word is - "impossible."

Does that word bother you? If someone tells you that something is impossible, do you immediately start looking for ways to prove them wrong? I don't know what it is. Maybe it's my tendency toward optimism or perhaps even some deep emotional scar that ought to be fixed, but my righteous indignation is never more stirred than when someone tells me - "it's impossible, it's can't be done."

Actually I think it all started when I was two years old. My parents were purchasing my Christmas gift and they were considering a toy that had all kinds of different parts. They knew me pretty well, of course, and they understood that my mission in life would be to take that toy apart piece by piece.

Well, they asked the toy man if a two year old could get the thing apart. Now he's an expert in these things, this toy man, and he said, "Impossible." That satisfied my parents so they brought the toy home and presented it to me on Christmas. Somehow I must have known that the word "impossible" had been spoken about that toy. In one hour, I had that toy scattered throughout the house.

Well, in a very similar way I am beginning to believe that God almost loves it when we come to a place in our life of saying, "That's impossible." He loves those times when we are tempted to throw up our hands and say, "This can never change. This relationship can never be different, this circumstance can never change, this person will never grow." I can imagine the laughter of God when we start talking like that.

Now I know that I'm attributing human emotion to God and I really don't mean any irreverence, but it just seems to me that over and over again in the Scriptures people come to that place of lost hope. They come to the place of saying, "Things can never really change, it's just impossible." And it seems like that's exactly when God says, in effect: "Oh yeah, watch this!"

The whole witness of scripture tells us that our God is not stagnant and predictable. He is active and creative, always bringing about new things. And one of the themes of Advent is surprise. Just when things are darkest and hope seems lost, that's when God surprises us with his redeeming work. It's his nature to bring new things where only old are expected - to bring life where only death is expected. That's why he delights in transforming impossible things into monuments of his grace and mercy.

You know something? Mary, the mother of Lord, came face to face with this God of new possibilities. Now she understood about impossible things. It all started when the angel Gabriel, who had just been to Zechariah six months earlier, came to visit Mary in her home town of Nazareth. God sent him with a specific message. The message was simple: "Greetings, you who are highly favored. The Lord is with you." Sounds pleasant enough. Sounds innocent. But the Bible says that Mary was troubled by it, it scared her. Why?

Perhaps Mary had enough intuitive wisdom to understand that being highly favored by God isn't necessarily a bed of roses. It isn't always a life of unbroken happiness. Being favored by God can be dangerous.

Mary would find that out soon enough. And we need to hear that message. We tend to think that when difficulty comes to life it means that God has turned his back on us. But Mary would soon discover that to be favored or blessed by God would not only produce joy, it would also bring her into contact with ridicule, loneliness, and pain.

By the way, whoever told you that a blessed life means constant happiness? Whoever told you that difficulty or suffering in life lie outside the providence of God? Mary seemed to know that being blessed by God can turn your life inside-out. Gabriel goes on to let her in on just what God's favor means for her (read Luke 1:30-35).

Now she understood all too well. She grew up in a Jewish family. She had been raised with the hope of the coming Messiah. She had heard those words before, but never imagined that they would have such a connection with her. And faced with the awesome reality of the angel's words, Mary asks the question that all of us ask when face to face with the impossible: "How? How can this be?" Do you know what the answer is? God will do it. (read Luke 1:35).

The message to Mary is, "You won't be responsible for the impossible task of bringing Messiah to your people, the God of impossible things will do it." And as evidence of God's ability to do impossible things, Gabriel tells her of Elizabeth who in her old age is bearing a son that will also be God's instrument in his majestic plan. Then he says, "For nothing is impossible with God!" (verse 37). Nothing is impossible with God!

Faced with that assurance, Mary's response is perhaps the most courageous, most faith-filled statement ever recorded: "May it be done to me according to your word." Wow! What faith! What trust! When confronted by the impossible, Mary understood that her obedient response was not to fight against it or try to overcome it, but to get out of the way and simply allow God to use her as an instrument to accomplish his purpose - to accomplish the impossible!

Mary goes immediately to see Elizabeth and in their joyous meeting God's blessing and favor upon Mary is wonderfully and unselfishly confirmed by Elizabeth. And then Mary unleashes this beautiful song of joy. We read this song in our Friday morning men's group and someone said, "How could a young girl put together words like this?" Well, when God moves on you, impossible things begin to happen. It's a beautiful song of joy, often called the Magnificat, in reference to the first word of the Latin translation.

It's a powerful song. The first two verses give praise to God as we might expect, but then the focus changes just a bit. Listen again to what it says: (read Luke 1:51-53). Do you realize how revolutionary those words are? It is said that William Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury, warned his missionaries to India never the read the Magnificat in public. Christians were already suspect in that country and so they were cautioned against reading verses so inflammatory.

What does the song really say? Through the Messiah, the mighty will be brought low; the humble will be exalted. God works through the unable. God brings his kingdom through the incapable. What God had done for Mary anticipates and models what he will do for the poor, the powerless, and the oppressed of the world. And that's why Mary's song is a song of joy. That why Jesus, the Messiah, is the Song of Joy. For when we come to the absolute end of ourselves, God is able. When we stare our inability in the face, God is able. When we face that part of our lives that is so painful and difficult to deal with that we finally throw up our hands and say, "It's impossible!" - even then, God is able. And there's the joy. The joy is that we don't have to be adequate. We don't have to be mighty or powerful or rich, for when we are empty God can fill us.

What is your impossible thing today? The impossibilities we face are heavy and sometimes very painful. We begin to feel like we're the only ones who have ever walked this road. Last week we talked about truly experiencing God's peace in the midst of an often hectic season. We talked about making some difficult choices about activity in order to experience that peace. But I know what happened this week. It happened to me, too. The pace got turned up a notch. The pressure increased.

Perhaps we come to worship today projecting all the right things outside, but inside we are saying, "Peace? Impossible! Joy? Impossible! Not in this life. Not at my house."

Are you feeling incapable of really experiencing Christmas? Are you feeling unable, powerless to really change the things in your life that need changing? Good. God can work with that. That's the whole point of this song. When you're feeling incapable and powerless, God can begin to create in you the answers to the impossibilities.

How does it happen? By choosing the attitude of trust and openness to God that Mary demonstrated here. She expressed absolute confidence in God that he would meet her at the place of impossible.

By the way, did you notice in the song that when Mary speaks of what God will accomplish she speaks in the past tense? (cite the verses). She was so sure that God would fulfill his promise that she speaks of it as if it already has happened. I believe that we can approach our impossibilities with that kind of confidence. It's more than exercising positive mental attitude. It's more than psyching ourselves up. Because this kind of confidence, this kind of hope is not based in our ability to change. It's not based in the probability that circumstances will change.

It's based in a God who has committed himself in Jesus, the Song of Joy, to redeem the impossible things in our lives.