Characters at the Cradle: Mary’s Magnificat, An Introduction

by David Chadwick

The Christmas season is truly upon us! As a church, we are going through the book of Luke, studying the many characters at the cradle who surrounded the birth of Jesus.

Luke 1:46-55 is one of the most beautiful passages in all of the Bible. Known as Mary’s Magnificat, which means “magnifies” in the Latin Vulgate translation, these verses reveal Mary’s song of praise to the Lord after being given the news that she was pregnant with the Savior of the world. We now see Mary as a songwriter. A psalmist. A hymn writer!

In this chapter, Mary was visiting Elizabeth, her cousin, who was also pregnant. At the point of her visit, John the Baptist had been growing in Elizabeth’s womb for six months. If you remember from last week, Mary was carrying the miraculously conceived Son of God in her womb by the power of the Holy Spirit.

As Mary and Elizabeth greeted one another, John the Baptist leaped for joy in the womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. The worship of Jesus was displayed, and the recognition of his coming kingdom was detected, even from the womb!

In verse 45, Elizabeth blessed Mary’s great faith for believing Gabriel’s prophecy. The Magnificat was Mary’s response to all that was taking place, and it was an eruption of praise.

Like David’s psalms of thanksgiving, which always began by thanking God for what he had done, this song of praise does the same.

Today, let’s look specifically at verses 46 and 47. Mary started off by saying, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.” Praise was her weapon. Much like in Psalm 103:1, all that was within her was praising her God and his holy name. Her cry out to God as her Savior showed that she was fully aware before Jesus ever arrived of her great need for a Savior.

Notice also that God is a personal Savior. He is loving, good, and kind. Surely Mary’s beautiful relationship with God and her deep, abiding faith were important in God choosing her to carry and give birth to the second person of the Godhead. Mary truly was a beautiful human in so many ways.

During this Christmas season, I pray that we will all develop a personal faith in God that is as special as the one Mary had!

And that we all will sing the Christmas hymns with a renewed passion for the power of praise.

Characters at the Cradle: Mary and Elizabeth, Pondering with Wonder

by David Chadwick

This week, we have looked at Mary and Elizabeth, two characters at the cradle who loved one another deeply and who both played a significant role in ushering in the birth of Jesus to this world.

These two women were full of faith and chose to play their part in God’s redeeming story with the utmost humility. They are both to be admired and respected. Especially Mary, as the mother of Jesus, the Savior of the world.

Today, I would like to wrap up our week by focusing on one more specific insight to Elizabeth and Mary’s relationship.

Imagine for a moment what it must have been like for Mary and Elizabeth to share their stories about the angelic visitation. Elizabeth waited for years, even decades, for the promise of a child to come true. She had been hoping for a child. But for Mary, she was a virgin, so her news was startling. It came out of nowhere. She had to fully hear and accept what had been said to her by Gabriel.

Knowing the role that Gabriel played in Old Testament prophecies to foreshadow the coming of the Messiah, it could be that Mary and Elizabeth were both pondering the significance and greatness of Gabriel’s appearance to each of them.

I bet they chatted back and forth with questions like, “Why me? Why us? Why cousins? What does the future hold? And for the nation of Israel?” Neither one of them knew all the answers, but both women gladly accepted what God had chosen to do. They embodied lives of full surrender.

And don’t forget Zechariah. Surely, he was there as the two cousins chatted. While unable to speak up, I am sure he listened to Mary’s story with his own sense of wonder. With a heart of worship. With utter fascination. Full of humility. Fascinated once again by grace and more aware than ever of the salvation that was about to come through this child soon to be born.

With every passing word, Zechariah probably thought about the first words he would speak when his son and Mary’s child were eventually born. It would now only be a few more months.

May we, too, ponder with wonder of our awesome God! May we cherish the power of the gospel once again. Oh, how great is our God!

Characters at the Cradle: Mary and Elizabeth, God’s Promises are True

by David Chadwick

Elizabeth’s next words to Mary are amazing. Follow along with me as we look at Luke 1:45.

Elizabeth said, “And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord.”

Did you catch what Elizabeth blessed in this verse? She blessed Mary’s faith. Mary heard from the mighty angel Gabriel and she believed that every word that he had said to her was true.

We all need examples of faith. It doesn’t matter if we are old or young, we all need the gift of faith. We must fight to believe that all of God’s promises are true. We must train our minds to believe that faith can cause mountains, the seemingly impossible situations of life, to move from here to there (Matthew 17:20). We must believe that what God has promised to us is received even when we can’t see it (Hebrews 11:1).

We can find many examples of people who modeled this kind of faith both in the Bible and throughout history.

Historically, consider missionaries like Hudson Taylor who went to China with little resources to claim it for God’s glory. Or Jim Elliott who endured tremendous hardship to reach the unreached in Ecuador, ultimately losing his life. How about David Livingston? He spent decades evangelizing in Africa. There are countless more examples.

Or biblically speaking, take a look at Abraham. He waited 25 years for Isaac, the child God had promised him. Or what about Joshua? Even though the Promised Land was within reach, he had to wait 40 years before entering it. Or King David, who was faithful in the pasture before he was ever entrusted with the palace. How about Paul? He spent years in prison for the sake of the Gospel where he had to wait on the Lord. Yet in prison was where he wrote most of the New Testament.

Then, there’s Mary. Perhaps she should be at the top of the list! As a virgin, she believed the child in her womb truly was the fulfillment of biblical prophecy. That this Jesus whom she bore was the Savior of the world. And that all of God’s promises really are true!

This is the kind of faith we must seek to emulate!