Praise the Lord for this Holy Season. We are almost there to celebrate the Christ event of Christmas. The Lord blessed us with a soul full weekend. Some of us attended the Friday evening presentation of "Handel's Messiah" by the Downtown Singers of Binghamton. It was splendid. It was a treat. We had the Living Nativity at Center Court of the Oakdale Mall Saturday from 5 to 7 PM. The Lord blessed us and provided for this presentation. He provided the best site in the in the busiest of the shopping days before Christmas day. He provided with two young families with babies to be the "Holy Family". The babies took turns to be the baby Jesus. They were very quiet all through the presentation. Yancey Moore played all the Christmas carols at the Grand Piano. So many musicians came to sing the "Hallelujah Chorus" at 6:30 PM. It was a " Holy Roar". Praise the Lord for so many who stopped by... so many who participated. We praise the Lord. It was spectacular. It was splendid indeed.
The Lord blessed us with his presence in His house yesterday. The choir presented special songs for worship. It was such a blessing. After the worship there was a church-wide Christmas banquet including lasagna, ham, and Indian curry as part of the menu, which also included all home made desserts. I preached from Luke on Mary's magnificata. The Lord chose an unlike person to accomplish His great work. He Turned The World Upside Down and right-side up again. We read in Luke 1verses 51-55, —"He has performed, He has scattered, He has brought down, he has filled.”
“He has performed mighty deeds with his
arm; he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.”
(51) The coming of Christ means the end of all human boasting. It’s the end
of vanity and outrageous ambition. His coming means an end to insatiable
greed and uncontrolled lust for power. The mighty are brought down by the
strong arm of the Lord.
So it has happened across the
centuries. Proud and daring men lift their heads to challenge the Almighty,
but he swats them down like flies. What happened to Saddam Hussein? What
happened to Hitler? What about Idi Amin? What about Vladimir Lenin?
The coming of
Jesus Christ means that God has set a moral revolution at work in the world, a
revolution in which the workers of iniquity are eventually brought to
justice. The story of the “Tower of Babel.”
tells us how God works. He lets the proud gather together and
in their grandiose schemes, they plan to rise up to heaven. God watches for
awhile, he waits, he seems even to ignore, and in their temporary success they
congratulate each other on their cleverness. But God scatters the proud, and he
does so suddenly.
Proud men expect to take it all with them,
but God crosses them up. He breaks their bows. He blasts their projects. He
brings them low. He does it by the very counsels with which they thought to
advance themselves. “He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has
lifted up the humble.” (52) Some talk about a “reversal of fortune.” That’s
what Mary is talking about as the coming of Christ brings about the greatest
reversal of fortune mankind has ever known. The proud are brought low and the
humble are lifted up.
What men call luck, Mary called the work
of God. When someone loses it all, we talk about bad luck. When someone hits
the jackpot, we say he had good luck. This was not Mary's response. She
understood that behind a faceless mystery that many call luck stands God
himself. That which He lifts up no one can bring down. That which He brings
down no one can lift up again.
John Calvin said, the princes of the world
don’t understand this. They grow insolent, fat and lazy and greedy. They
indulge in luxury, swell with pride and grow intoxicated with power. They soon
forget that all they have comes from God. To quote Calvin precisely, “If the
Lord cannot tolerate such ingratitude, we should not be
surprised.”
“He has filled the hungry with good things but
has sent the rich away empty.” (53) This is the most revolutionary part of
Mary’s song. Not only does the coming of Christ upset the proud of this world,
not only does it lift up the humble, but it actually means that the hungry are
fed and the rich go away empty.
When gospel principles are
followed, the hungry are filled and the rich are sent away
hungry. What we have in
America today has come about because of our Christian heritage. It is the
spillover from the Puritans and others who taught gospel principles of hard
work, thrift, saving and investment. It is the residue of an educational system
that taught children to read by using the stories from the Bible. It is the
result of generations of believers who founded hospitals, sanitariums,
libraries, colleges and universities. In large part, the liberties we enjoy and
the economic standing that is ours have come about because of the gospel of
Jesus Christ. Atheism, agnosticism and humanism could never produce what we
have today. The gospel is the
only hope for mankind—not only for his soul but also for his body, not only for
the church but also for the world, not only for the individual but also for
society. When the gospel makes headway in society, there you will find peace,
harmony, tranquility .
Mary’s heart was filled with praise,
because she knew the world would be a different place because Christ had come.
He pulls down the proud and lifts up the humble. He fills the hungry and the
rich are sent away empty. Verses 54-55 bring us to the end of Mary’s song. She
concludes by praising God that in sending Jesus Christ into the world, God is
keeping his ancient promises to Abraham. Jesus was born that way in order to send us a
message about how God does business. God is at home with the humble, the tired,
the weak, and the lowly of this world. He does business with those who fear his
name.
In Christ,
Brown
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