Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Join the Song!

Every Sunday countless Christians sing songs of worship in their churches.  Each of these songs were written by someone trying to express their deepest feelings and emotions in response to what God had done for them.  As we sing along with these songs we, in essence, join them in their song.  Their words and thoughts about God become our words and thoughts about God.  In joining their song we are, in effect, saying "Yes, this is also my song, these are also my feelings, this is the same praise I want to offer to God."

In the Nativity story we read a beautiful song written by a young Jewish teenager about something God had done in her life that was so powerful, so amazing, so incomprehensible that she just had to express her praise.  We don't know if she ever put it to song, but others down through the ages certainly have.  It is called "The Magnificat," the song of Mary, the mother of Jesus (Luke 1: 45-56).

This Magnificat of Mary's was--at the time that she wrote it--the most wonderful secret in the history of the world.  Besides heaven, only Joseph knew about it until Elizabeth was told.  Down through the ages, powerful, intelligent, and influential men and women have pontificated on Mary's Magnificat, but they are discussing the thoughts and emotions of a Jewish teenage girl of lowly station in life.  Up until that moment Gabriel appeared to Mary, there was absolutely nothing for which history would remember her.

Mary's secret, however, was not to last long.  Soon wise men would show up with expensive gifts and an amazing tale of following a star, followed by excited shepherds talking about angels appearing and lighting up the Judean sky with light and singing -- and the sign of a baby born in a manger.  But not yet.  Not yet.  For now, this amazing secret was literally Mary's alone.  These words, though they speak to many, and of many, are intensely personal.  This is her articulation of the miracle unfolding within and around her, and her emotional response to it all.

So she wrote a song.  It was Mary's secret song.  If you study it carefully, you will find it has five wonderful parts.  It is the song of those who believe (Luke 1:45), the song of the lowly touched by grace (v.46-48), the song of the grateful (v.49-50), the song of the humble and humbled (v.51-53) and finally the song of fulfilled promises (v.54-56).

It is Mary's song, but each of us also has a song.  God has done great things for us as He has done great things for Mary.  If you are a Christian, the Creator of everything that exists has called you and taken up residence within your life.  He has adopted you into His family, given you His name, filled  your need for meaning and purpose, forgiven you of your sins, and promised you an eternal home forever, and one day a new heart without sin.  So the only questions is: what is your song, and how will you sing it?

In words?  In poetry?  With music?  In conversation, in service?  How will you exalt the Lord for what He has done to you?

And if Jesus is not yet your Savior--you have no song yet to sing.  As long as your song is only about you and what you have done, you have no song worth singing.  As long as the only thing your soul can exalt is yourself, you have yet to enter the Great Song.  But if you will invite Christ to be the Lord and Savior of your life, you will have your own Magnificat, and you will know precisely why we exalt the Lord and not ourselves.

Mary had her song.  I have mine.  What is your song?

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