-welcome everyone, the Sunday before Christmas (yay).
-this week for Advent our Scripture is a little different than last week. Where last week was more about repentance and preparing for Christ, this week, all joy. The song should be right. This should be the most wonderful time of the year! The ability to pray directly to God, the knowledge that He is always with us, the infilling of the Holy Spirit in our souls, our Comforter, the knowledge that we have the ability to be forgiven by God, that all starts here! Merry Christmas!!
-so this week we rejoice with some people about the coming of the Messiah.
**Luke 1:39-45 -> 39-40A few days later Mary hurried to the highlands of Judea to the town where Zacharias lived, to visit Elizabeth. 41At the sound of Mary’s greeting, Elizabeth’s child leaped within her and she was filled with the Holy Spirit. 42She gave a glad cry and exclaimed to Mary, “You are favored by God above all other women, and your child is destined for God’s mightiest praise. 43What an honor this is, that the mother of my Lord should visit me! 44When you came in and greeted me, the instant I heard your voice, my baby moved in me for joy! 45You believed that God would do what He said; that is why He has given you this wonderful blessing.” (LB)
-awesome. There are some people here who are full of joy over Christ’s coming.
1. ELIZABETH’S JOY
-first we have Lizzie. Elizabeth is Mary’s cousin, although she is much older. Her husband is a priest who has not been able to speak since she first became pregnant. She’s probably full of joy!
-but for Elizabeth’s story, she was old and barren and thought she would never have a child. And in Jewish culture, joy comes from having lots of children.
**Ps. 127:3-5a -> 3Children are a gift from God; they are His reward. 4Children born to a young man are like sharp arrows to defend him. 5Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them. (LB)
-for those who aren’t archers, a quiver is the pouch that archers wear on their back or on their side that holds their arrows.
-but that’s how big children are to God. They are a gift of God, a reward.
-so you have Elizabeth here who is now old and has no children. In a sense, in her culture, she is shamed. She is not as blessed by God as her friends who have kids.
-so for her to find out, here in this passage, she has a child. She is going to finally after all these years have a child, she is full of joy. The angel who told her husband this even said they would be full of joy.
**Luke 1:13-15a -> 13But the angel said, “Don’t be afraid, Zechariah! God has heard your prayer. Your wife, Elizabeth, will give you a son, and you are to name him John.14You will have great joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, 15for he will be great in the eyes of the Lord. (NLT)
-this child will bring her joy. And he does, even before he’s born. Elizabeth finds even more joy when she learns she’s not just having a child, she is having a son. Someone to carry on the family name, the family heritage.
-but even more than that, this son will be great in the eyes of the Lord. Could you imagine hearing that about your life or your child’s life? In the Sanctuary of the temple an angel appears and tells your husband that you will bear a child that will do great things for God. How would you feel if that happened to you today here at church?
-incredible joy. All the patience, all the time watching her friends play with their kids while she gets to be the babysitter, now she will finally have a child.
-and add on top of this, her husband. Zechariah was told all this by an angel, but he started to argue saying he and his wife were too old. This should sound vaguely familiar (Abraham and Sarah). So the angel tells Zechariah he won’t speak until the baby is born. So not only is Elizabeth having a baby, but throughout her entire pregnancy her husband can’t complain or talk back to anything she asks? Hallelujah! I bet she’s full of joy!
-you know it’s true. When I was little you know what we gave my mom for Mother’s Day? We played outside. All Momma wants is peace and quite!
-but seriously, this was huge for Elizabeth. She was finally a mother, and a mother to someone who would do great things for God. Can there be a greater joy than to know that your child’s life has a destiny chosen by God?
-so she is full of joy. But there’s someone else full of joy.
2. JOHN’S JOY
-it’s not too often that you hear of unborn children being excited. Yes, they kick and what not, but look at our passage:
**Luke 1:41 -> 41At the sound of Mary’s greeting, Elizabeth’s child leaped within her and she was filled with the Holy Spirit. (LB)
-baby John leaped within Elizabeth. Now I know that we’ve all heard of babies moving, but leaping? To give you an idea of what we’re talking about here, the word Luke wrote is eskirteuse (I’m sure I’m butchering the pronunciation), but it’s a word meaning something extraordinary, a huge jump. It’s used in Genesis when talking about Jacob and Esau fighting in the womb, or also here:
**Ps. 114:4 -> 4The mountains skipped like rams, the hills like lambs! (NLT)
-the word for John leaping in the womb is the same as mountains skipping or in other translations, mountains dancing!
-this kid is excited! He knows that Jesus is near. Back in Luke 1 when the angel speaks to Zechariah they tell him that John will be full of the Holy Spirit even before he is born. [SHOW LUKE 1:15b NLT] Here he shows it. He jumps for joy because the Holy Spirit inside of him lets him know that the Savior of the world, the Son of God is standing next to him. He is so excited and so full of the Holy Spirit over this that when he leaps in Elizabeth’s womb, Scripture says she becomes full of the Holy Spirit [SHOW LUKE 1:41 LB].
-think about it, just the sound of the voice of the mother of the Messiah causes an unborn child to do cartwheels. This baby who will one day be the person preparing the way for the Messiah, announcing His coming, He is already living out what God wants him to do in the womb! This baby is excited.
-Elizabeth is full of joy and her unborn son is full of joy. But there is another person in this story who is also full of joy.
3. MARY’S JOY
-this is a part of the story that’s a little overlooked. Yes, we know Mary’s happy. Yes, she sings a song of joy over her son being born just like other women in the Bible have done before her. But here with Elizabeth she is truly full of joy.
-first, it’s because she just got some sense of validation. Let me explain.
-you’re Mary. Imagine for a second. An angel comes to you and tells you that you will be pregnant with God on earth. What’s your reaction? I would love to say I have the faith that can move mountains, but there would be that part of me thinking, “Okay, was that really God? Did God really say that?”
-and I don’t know how it works for you, but if I think God is doing something or telling me something, my first reaction is to get some sort of sign to know I’m on the right track. Someone to come and tell me I’m doing the right thing. A sign from God. The sun and moon stand still. I don’t know, just something to let me know I was not imagining God speaking to me.
-hearing that God wants me to do something is big. Hearing that I will be responsible for the birth and bringing up of God as a child?! I think my head would explode. I need to know this is true.
-when Mary sees Elizabeth, what’s the first thing Elizabeth says to her? Not how are you, not even hi. “God has blessed you above all women and your child is blessed. Why am I so lucky that the mother of my Lord would visit me?”
-in an instant all Mary’s questions are gone. How could Elizabeth know? She hadn’t told her. The angel had only visited her a few days before, I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t look pregnant. But Elizabeth knew. The child in her womb knew and through the Holy Spirit Elizabeth now knew, she knew that Mary was the mother of God.
-can you imagine the weight that would lift off Mary’s shoulders at that point? I think that’s part of why in his message to Mary Gabriel mentions that Elizabeth is pregnant [SHOW LUKE 1:36-37 NLT], she can be a comfort to Mary.
-and I think that’s the other reason Mary is full of joy. She’s not only with someone who believes her, she’s with someone who understands! Elizabeth is pregnant thanks to God at a time that’s really unlikely for her to be, kinda like Mary is here.
-I mean, really, who was Mary going to talk to about this whole experience and learn from? Get with her teenage girlfriends in Nazareth and have teenie-bopper girl talk about how cool it will be to have a baby out of wedlock?
-I’m sure Mary is full of joy right now because she has someone to talk to, someone who understands what’s going on.
-and now for a few months she can spend some time with her cousin, family, someone she trusts, away from home, away from al the other problems and distractions of life and take a bit of time to work through this all.
-a little plug but this is part of the reason we push retreats and mission trips for adults as well as students, to get away for a little bit and be with people who all have the same goal and same reason for being there, to just take a bit of time to straighten things out.
-I think with this passage, with this piece of the Christmas story, Mary is full of joy because she now has someone who believes her and she can openly and honestly and safely talk with her about everything going on in her head and her heart.
-and Elizabeth confirms Mary’s feeling with a great message. “You have been given a wonderful blessing because you believed God would do what He said.”
-and that can be:
4. OUR JOY
-this Christmas season, this whole idea of Jesus coming to earth, it was a blessing to God’s people because finally, after what seemed like forever, God was fulfilling His promise of a Messiah. The people who followed Christ and were full of joy at His coming were those who believed that God was doing what He said He would.
-[HOLD UP BIBLE] This book is full of promises from God to us. Things He said He would do in our lives. How much happier do you think we would be if we believed God would do what he said? How much more do you think we’d be able to see God working if we believed it was God doing what He said He would do?
-think about Jesus’ ministry, all the healings He did. What was one line He said over and over? The woman who knew she could touch Jesus’ robe and be healed, what did He say to her?
**Mark 5:34 -> 34Jesus said to her, “Dear woman, you are made well because you believed. Go in peace; be healed of your disease.” (NCV)
-you are made well because of your belief. Your faith has made you well. We find joy in actually believing that God will do what He says He will do.-so for Advent, here’s a challenge for you. Go online or ask pastor Mike or someone here can get you a list, but look for a list of all the promises of God in the Bible. Promises that can apply to your life. Look them all up, every one. Then start thinking, what if I believed God would actually do this one, and this one? What if God did every promise I’m reading?
-how much happier would you be to know that God will do what He says? How would your life be different if it was living trusting and believing God is doing what He says he will do?
-the key is we have to start living like we believe. It’s not much faith if you’re not putting something on the line. We need to be living like we believe.
-one last story. There was a man named Hudson Taylor, he was one of the first missionaries to go to China. There’s a story of him sailing around China. All around the shore there were little islands, and some of the sailors knew had cannibals there. One day while they were sailing the wind died and the ship started to drift towards one of the islands with cannibals. So the captain came to Mr. Taylor and asked him to pray for a breeze so they could steer the ship away from what was probably certain death. Hudson Taylor said he would pray, but only on one condition, the captain let out the sails to catch the breeze. The captain said he didn’t want to, he didn’t want to embarrass himself in front of the crew but unfurling the sails with no wind, so Taylor told him, no sails, no prayer.
-that’s where we need to get to, the faith, the believing that God will do what he says. By the way, the story goes that the captain agreed and Hudson Taylor went below to a quiet room to pray. A few minutes later [KNOCK ON PULPIT], it was the captain coming to ask Taylor to stop praying because they had too much wind now.
-this is a season of faith. A season that asks us to believe the impossible. But if we believe God did the impossible, we can believe that God will still do the impossible and that will bring more joy to this Christmas season than any present you can unwrap.
