I Am The Lords Servant - Mother's Day

I Am The Lord’s Servant! Luke 1:26-38

Introduction

My three year old Sebastian is often a little mimic. Christina and I have to be careful what we say to or in front of him because he will quickly adopt it as his own. Of late I have been trying, with marginal success, to teach Sebastian a little bit of Marine Corps Discipline. I have been teaching him to say “yes sir” when I tell him to do something that he needs to do. It usually goes something like this, “Sebastian clean up your toys.” To which he normally replies, “Umm, daddy, I don’t think so, I’m pretty busy.” Sebastian what do you say when I tell you what to do?” “Umm… I say, Yes Sir!” “Alright then Sebastian,” I reply, “Clean up your toys.” Usually the reply at this point is something on the order of, “No daddy, you do it!” After few tries he usually will comply, at least to some extent!

I’ve also been trying to teach Sebastian and Ephram a sense of urgency. I have begun telling them to do something right now, because now is the time to do it. “Ok boys, let put on our shoes so we can go to the store.” The reply from the eldest of the dynamic duo, “Umm… I don’t think so daddy, we busy!” “No, you guys come right now.” Well Sebastian has begun to use this technique on us.

Sebastian is going to see his grandma at the end of the month in Florida. The other day he packed up his suitcase and said that he was heading to his grandmother’s house on his bike. I suppose he had grown weary of his parents. I said, “Sebastian you are going to grandma’s house in a couple of weeks.” To this his stiffened up pointed at me just as I have a habit of doing when I tell him to do something right now, and said, “Daddy I’m going to grandma’s house right now!”

I wish I had never tried to initiate daddy boot camp because rather than teaching Sebastian and Ephram the “instant willingness obedience to orders” which was instilled in me as a young Marine, I have managed to create a 36 inch drill instructor who tells me when it is time to do something, right now!

Transition

This morning we will examine the life of Mary as it is recorded in the Bible. We will focus on applying that same present tense – active faith in our lives. She was a woman with a present-tense trust in God. When confronted with God’s will for her life, she answered simply, “I am the Lord’s servant.”

At least two great presidents paid tribute to their mothers. John Quincy Adams said, “All that I am, my mother made me.” Abraham Lincoln said, “No man is poor who had a godly mother.” Today is Mother’s Day. It is the day when we celebrate our own mother’s influence in our lives. It is the day when we celebrate our wives and daughters, friends, and all of the moms in our lives. As such it is entirely fitting to take a look at the one who bore Christ in her womb to learn from perhaps the most virtuous mother in the Bible; Mary, the mother of Jesus.

Her trust in God was not theoretical, it was not hypothetical; it was right here, right now. If you send me, Lord I will go. If you call me, Lord I will answer. If this is your will for me right now today God, then I am your servant. We will do this by looking at her having learned from the past, longed for the promised, and lived in the present.

Exposition (Based on “Present-Tense Christianity” Sermon outlines for growing Christians)

Learn from the Past. Hebrews 3:7-8 says, “So, as the Holy Spirit says: “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion, during the time of testing in the desert.” (NIV) All of us, came to Christ out of a “past.”

1. A past is a hard thing to shake. It is something you are always trying to live up to or to live down.

2. Some of us are proud of our pasts, but many of us are prisoners to them. The only proper way to deal with the past is to learn from it.

1. You can try to live in the past or you can try to run from the past; but you can never truly forget the past.

2. Since we cannot leave the past behind, perhaps at least we can learn from it. This is exactly what the author tells us to do. “You are your fathers’ sons,” he says, “but you do not need to repeat your fathers’ sins.”