Advent: The Songs of Christmas

The lesson? Our experience of Christ and our understanding of His Word bring simple rejoicing and worship. Mary magnified God in her soul, she rejoiced in God as her Savior. That is worship. This Advent, more important than all the ornaments and presents and even the warm feelings of Christmas should be a deep-down soul-stirring response to what God has done for you.

“Go Tell it on the Mountain” is a simple song, but it belies a great truth. The line of that American Negro spiritual reveals its force:

Down in a lowly manger our humble Christ was born,

And God sent us salvation that blessed Christmas morn.

A Sweet Song

Mary’s Song was a Praise Song and in verses 48 and 49, we might also call it a “Sweet Song.” It is sweet because Mary moves from honest praise and worship to humble gratitude and thanksgiving. In other words, these two verses, the second movement in this Scripture, tell us that she is praising God. She is praising God because He has “regarded the lowly state of His maidservant.”

In other words, God saves sinners.

This is the first sweet chord struck in the passage. Mary was humbled because God had chosen a sinner to bring forth a Savior. Now that might sound heretical. Even those who aren’t part of the Roman Catholic Church, who do not hold to the immaculate conception of Mary, or that Mary lived a sinless life and ascended into heaven, nevertheless hold her in such high regard that to hear that she was a sinner sounds wrong. But, it is not. Mary was praising God; she was rejoicing that the Lord would come to earth through the instrument of a lowly maiden. Mary needed a Savior just like we need a Savior. Here is Mary’s repentance. She was the first to believe in Jesus as Messiah. She heard the Good News, she believed, and it caused her to say, “O Lord, I am lowly, I have nothing to offer You. I am a sinner.”

This is the Good News of this season: God has loved us while we were yet sinners. God came down to be born of a woman, entering a world of sin and a world at war with God in our very flesh. But when you stop to consider how amazing that is, how great is the love of God for us, is causes you to thank God. He came to save His people from their sins.

Another reason for this sweet song of thanksgiving may also be observed: God changes things.

Mary praised God with a sweet song of thanks because, as she said, “Henceforth, all generations will call me blessed. For He who is mighty has done great things for me.”

Mary burst forth in gratitude because the Lord was going to change human history through this little girl from the hick country of Nazareth. She confessed that He who was mighty had used His power to arrange and order events in the universe so as to bless her and bless the world through her.

This is the core message of hope and wonder in Christianity. It is the romance of our faith, if you will: that God can save a sinner and so change him or her that future generations are shaped and molded by God’s grace to one person.