======================================================================== (LUKE) 04 - UNBELIEF-FAITH OF MARY by Ed Miller ======================================================================== Summary: The main theme of Luke chapter 1 is the contrast between unbelief and faith, as seen in the stories of Zacharias and Mary, and the importance of faith and trust in our relationship with God. Duration: 52:58 Topics: "Childlike Faith", "Marys Surrender" Scripture References: Matthew 6:33, Luke 1:3-4 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ DESCRIPTION ------------------------------------------------------------------------ In this sermon, the preacher focuses on the book of Luke, specifically chapter 1, verses 3 and 4. The purpose of Luke's writing is to provide assurance and certainty to the readers. The sermon highlights the contrast between the unbelief of Zacharias and the faith of Mary. Zacharias questions how he will know the prophecy will come true, while Mary simply asks how it will happen. The preacher emphasizes the importance of childlike faith and surrender, using Mary as a model for the Church. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CONTENT ------------------------------------------------------------------------ of gathering in this place and thank you for all that have come. And we just ask you now to meet the needs of our heart, unveil for us in a quickening way our Lord Jesus. We thank you that you'll guide our devotions and our meditation and we just pray because we've gathered we'll say that it was good that we met together around the word of God trusting the Holy Spirit. So we give our time to you with thanksgiving and and we just thank you in advance for meeting us and showing us Christ. We pray in Jesus name. Amen. All right if you'll open please to Luke chapter one. We're in the gospel of Luke. We have outlines here. I think most of you have them but let me just handle so those who don't have them can receive them and I think back there. Welcome. Just a little outline that we're going to be following. Actually it's for your own. We probably in fact we will not even refer to it this morning but that's something you can tuck away. We're in the gospel of Luke and the message of Luke's gospel. Thank you. The message of Luke's gospel is the presentation of our Lord Jesus as the son of all mankind. The son of all mankind. We're using as a key text chapter 19 and verse 10. Luke 19 10 says for the son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. I pointed out in our two introduction lessons that Luke was not a Jew. He was a Gentile and that makes him the only Gentile writer of any book in the New Testament. He's the only one that was not a Jew that wrote any scripture and as a Gentile writer he presents the gospel from the standpoint of the Gentiles and it's to all mankind and so this title son of all mankind is unique and belongs to this presentation of our of Luke of our Lord Jesus. For the past couple of weeks we've been introducing this wonderful gospel to your heart. I'm going to ask you to look please at chapter 1 verse 3 and 4. It says it seems fitting for me as well having investigated everything carefully from the beginning to write it out for you in consecutive order most excellent Theopolis so that you might know the exact truth about the things that you have been taught. In verse 4 so that you might know the exact truth about the things that you've been taught. Luke tells us why he's writing that you might know the exact truth. It's a book of assurance. It's a book of certainty. It's a book to give you confidence. I hope you're trusting the Lord before we start this study. I know as you go through Luke you'll trust him more at the end of the study than you do at the beginning because the book is designed to give you confidence and the more you study Luke the more you're going to know these things and be fully assured of them. I told you last week that in verse 3 this Theopolis who is he writing to this fellow named Theopolis well nobody knows and so what we're doing is just taking the meaning of his name Theopolis means lover of God so whoever he was if he was some nobleman or some slave owner or whoever he was doesn't matter his name means lover of God and God has put this in the bible God has given us the gospel of Luke so that those who love God might be fully persuaded. That's the point of the whole gospel and all the way through as we go through it I'm going to call attention on the things that bring certainty to the heart. We'll just underscore those all the way through. Now last time we had begun an overview of chapter one. If you just glance at the chapter you'll see it's a big one. There's 80 verses in chapter one. That's one thing about Luke. He's very not only prolific in that he's written more than any other writer in the new testament even more than the apostle Paul but he's also prolific. In every book he just can't find the end of a sentence. There's only one person who wrote a longer sentence than Luke and that's Paul. Ephesians chapter one contains the longest sentence in the bible and he just didn't know what a period was. One time Lillian has a habit of not ending sentences so one Christmas we gave her a bag of punctuation so she could end her sentences. That tells especially when she's on the telephone. When everybody's ready to leave she says well and then it starts all over again. I'm dead when I leave here. Anyway Luke chapter one has two stories in it basically. Number one the story of Zacharias and Elizabeth when they received news that they were going to parent John the baptizer and then the announcement by Gabriel the angel to Mary that she was going to be the mother of the son of all mankind. The story of Elizabeth and Zacharias actually takes two parts. The chapter begins with that story and then the chapter ends with that story. In other words from verses 5 to 23 Zacharias and Elizabeth and then beginning at verse 57 to the end of the chapter Zacharias and Elizabeth and in between that is the story of Mary and the annunciation how God announced to her through the angel. Now there's overlapping you know because Mary spent at least three months or about three months with Elizabeth so there's some overlapping. The heart of the message of chapter one can be summarized in these three words certainty through faith. That's the point of chapter one and you can see how the Lord outlines this chapter. It's a contrast between unbelief and faith. The unbelief of the old priest Zacharias and the faith of the young maiden of Mary and there's this contrast. A glance if you would at verse 18. And Zacharias said to the angel how shall I know this for certain for I'm an old man my wife is advanced in years. Zacharias said how will I know and then in verse 34 we see Mary and Mary said to the angel how can this be since I am a virgin. Now they both ask the question and on the surface it almost looks like the same question. Zacharias said how can this happen my wife is old. Mary said how can this be I'm a virgin except Zacharias gets blasted for unbelief and Mary gets credit for faith and so we know there's a difference in the way that they ask the question and we were trying to illustrate that. See Zacharias was really saying prove it this is impossible and when Mary asked the question she wasn't saying prove it she said how how are you going to do this wonderful thing. She didn't doubt it she just wanted to know the mold she wanted to know the process by which God would do it whereas Zacharias said are you kidding me have you seen my wife do you know how old I am this is not possible give me a sign and so one was unbelief and one was faith and sometime unbelief and faith on the outside can sound the same. We better not judge one another someone might ask a question say why that unbeliever asking that question. You don't know if it's a questioning question or an inquisitive question. I don't know if it's questioning or inquisitive God loves inquisitive questions. He has never refused no matter how honest it is if there's a desire to know God will meet an inquisitive question because it's rooted in faith. The questioning question is rooted in doubt and God hates it and it's illustrated here. The simple outline for chapter one is this unbelief the first 25 verses faith first 26 to 55 and then the chapter ends unbelief turned to faith at the end Zacharias comes to have this tremendous faith. So you see the outline very logically unbelief faith unbelief is turned to faith and that's what this is all about to illustrate certainty through faith. Now before we look at our new material let me just mention I won't develop it if you missed last week's lesson and would like it you see Lillian we have the tapes we tape it every week and we'll give those out to anybody who wants them. There's no cost we just hope we pray that you have a hungry heart and desire to see these things. But let me just mention the observation first of all from verse 13 if you'll glance at verse 13 the angel said to him do not be afraid Zacharias your petition has been heard. We call attention to the fact that this was an old prayer don't forget Zacharias and his wife are very elderly now and the angel shows up and says your petition has been heard your wife's going to have a baby and probably in his heart he says where have you been I made that request 50 years ago and you're just getting around to answering it now and so this idea that God might delay an answer to prayer but he will never forget your prayer. He might delay it but he'll not forget it. Sometimes God answers and you've long forgotten that you even pray and God comes through with an answer. Sometimes God answers and by that time you don't want that answer. Now when you pray you want one thing but later on when God answers and so we see this point illustrated that God never forgets prayer. The second observation from verse 20 and we developed it last time because he didn't believe it says you shall be silent and unable to speak until the day these things take place because you did not believe and I showed you last time I won't go through it again but that he was made both deaf and mute they had to speak to him inside he couldn't hear he couldn't speak the illustration in verse 20 is this until the day these things take place the point being this you and I very often are going to be tempted to unbelieve do not think that my unbelief will stop God's will don't think your unbelief will stop God's will he didn't believe but his wife still got pregnant and John still came and they God's will was still done who gets hurt by unbelief not God not his purpose not his plan you see Zacharias was supposed to come out as the high priest quote number six the Lord bless thee and keep thee and make his face shine upon thee be gracious unto thee he was supposed to give the high priestly benediction but he couldn't do it and you see that illustrated in verse 21 and 22 the people were waiting for Zacharias were wondering at his delay in the temple when he came out he was unable to speak to them they realized he had seen a vision in the temple he kept making signs to them and remained mute God's will will not be stopped by unbelief and the only thing that's hurt is me if I don't believe God I'm hurt and I will not be able to bless others and that's wonderfully illustrated there the third observation was from verse six it says they were both righteous in the sight of God walking in all the commandments of the Lord blamelessly and all the requirements of the law call attention to this because Zacharias is accused of unbelief don't think unbelief only finds its way into the heart of the callous and rebellious this was a godly man the choicest servant of God in the best time sometime fall victim to doubt and to unbelief and that also is illustrated here and then finally look at verse 18 and Zacharias said to the angel how shall I know this for certain don't forget why Luke's right he's writing this gospel that you might be certain it's for certainty and here's Zacharias saying I want to know for sure you would think that Luke would applaud that and give him an attaboy but instead he accuses him of unbelief and he's only saying how can I know for sure and Luke's point is this the way to know for sure is not to get a sign we know for sure to believe God certainty comes through the simplicity of childlike faith and so he was illustrating this we developed all of that last time all right that brings us to our new material I want to continue this discussion on doubt versus faith doubt illustrated by Zacharias and faith by the Virgin Mary but before I do that I'm going to ask you to bear with me for a little donkey work because sometimes to get the background helps you to enter into this I want you to get the big picture I'm going to come back to Zacharias and Mary and the contrast between doubt and faith and the point of the certainty of faith but let me get the big picture before you I laid stress for three weeks in a row and I even mentioned it this week that Luke was a Gentile writing to Gentile he was not a Jew if ever there is a non-Jewish book in your Bible it is Luke Luke is a non-Jewish book having said that there are no more Jewish chapters in the Bible than Luke chapter one and two any of the most Jewish chapters in the most non-Jewish book in the whole New Testament it opens up in the holy city of Jerusalem that's Jewish the first scenes are in the holy temple that's Jewish the characters in the first two chapters are the priests Zacharias and Simeon in chapter two that's very Jewish chapter one verse 10 they were all gathered at the hour of prayer that's Jewish the appearance in verse 11 of Gabriel in the holy place before the veil and at the altar of incense that's very Jewish Luke opens almost on the edge of two dispensations I told you Luke not Matthew is the connection between the old and the New Testament that God had been silent for 400 years what did he say the first time he spoke Matthew doesn't tell you the first time he spoke Luke is who tells you that in Revelation chapter 10 there's a great angel pictured with one foot on the land and one foot on the sea I'm not sure I know what that means but it pictures to me of Luke I know it doesn't mean Luke but I just picture him one foot in the Old Testament one foot in the New Testament and sort of standing in between them both and bringing both together he's bringing the old and the new together so this Gentile book starts off Jewish and then after chapter two you'll not find anything more Gentile than the gospel of Luke Zacharias and Mary not only picture unbelief and faith but it's bigger than that the first picture of the church in the New Testament is Mary Mary is God's picture of the church the first one now later on he's going to give you seven other pictures of the church but Mary is the first picture of the church and I have an idea in that same regard that Zacharias the father of John the baptizer sort of represents the whole priesthood the old system the whole Jewish form and the Jewish unbelief and so you've got Zacharias representing the old and their unbelief and then Mary representing the new the church and their faith and Luke sort of brings the old and the new together and he represents the whole priesthood in fact I have an idea that the judgment that was put on Zacharias his deafness and his muteness for his unbelief and then finally at the end his unbelief was turned to faith God said he's going to do the same thing to Israel and they have been struck the same way with unbelief but the last chapter hasn't been written and Israel has a future and they're going to come back and all of that's in another place but I think Zacharias pictures all that as Mary pictures the church now let me illustrate this strong Jewish emphasis by showing you the connection between the old and the New Testament at 400 years God had not spoke there was silence no word from God no vision no prophecy no oracle God said nothing that's between Malachi and Matthew in between there God never said a word now let me describe when God first speak we sort of read this la la la but oh my if you can get into what was happening here then you could see what a powerful thing took place in chapter 1 verse 5 in the days of Herod king of Judea there was a certain priest named Zacharias of the division of Abijah he had a wife from the daughters of Aaron her name was Elizabeth it's one thing to be able to trace your lineage especially if you were priest back to the priestly families but Elizabeth traced hers to the high priestly family to the house of Aaron that's an amazing thing in fact exodus chapter 6 verse 23 tells us the name of Aaron's wife Aaron the high priest the first high priest anybody know the name of his wife Elizabeth was Elizabeth and probably because she was in that family Elizabeth now we're in the tribe of Aaron so we're going to name our baby Elizabeth and that's probably how she got her name anyway on this special day a tremendous privilege was given to this priest who married the daughter in the family of the high priest verse 8 and 9 it came about while he was performing his priestly service before God in the appointed order of his division according to the custom of the priestly office he was chosen by lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense what's that all about of course you've got to be like the Bereans and check these things out to see if they're so don't take my word for it but I'm asking you to trust me at least through the bible study so we don't have to go looking up chronicles and all of this I'll tell you the story and then you can check it on your own Aaron the high priest had four sons two of those sons were judged because of sin now dabbing a bible God sent lightning wiped them out that's a story in itself of the other two sons those two sons turned into 24 families well that's a lot of priests and you only have one temple and so they had a problem what are you going to do with all these priests from 24 families we had before grandpa died you all remember grandpa dear man 106 years old we gathered one time for a family picture and we could hardly fit in so many people and so families grow well these priestly families grew too and so here's the plan that was devised out of the 24 families this happened in the days of David and it's recorded in chronicles David decided to divide the priesthood up into 24 courses and so each family had a call there's approximately 50 weeks in a year 24 courses so what they decided was every family could get to serve two weeks in the temple and that's how they would do it but just because your course was chosen didn't mean you were chosen because every course had a lot of priests and so what they would do is when it came your family's turn they would cast lots now i'm not going to go into all the controversy how did they cast lots for our discussion they just grew strong uh the point is they had to decide who was going to uh get to serve and notice verse 7 it says they were both advanced in age how old we don't know how old the bible doesn't tell us numbers chapter 8 said if they were just levites they'd have to retire at age 50 so we know these weren't levites these were high priestly families so they got to serve past 50 in fact they were probably way up in age so here's a man waiting for the lot to fall on him josephus the church historian tells us that some priests never got to serve in all their life they never got to serve in the temple and they waited for the privilege of the lot to fall on them now there are many duties and different priests had different duties but there was one duty that was singled out above all if your lot fell that you could serve or minister the incense in the holy place that was a once in a lifetime opportunity let's say you got lucky i speak as a fool let's say your lot came up twice let's say uh when you're 40 years old you get the privilege to go into the temple and minister incense in the holy place and then 50 years later you're now 90 years old and the lot falls again for a second time you get to serve incense you got to turn it down you had your turn you were only allowed to do this one time you could you could serve other things you could uh deal with the the table of show bread or the seven pronged candlestick or the labor or the altar you could do other things but you could only minister the incense one time in your life see we just sort of read this la la la it fell on zacharias the lot fell and he had a once in a lifetime opportunity he didn't know god was going to break the silence after 400 years and talk to him he didn't know that an angel was going to show up gabriel the angel and and talk to him at his side all he knew is i've got the privilege of a lifetime i've waited a long time i'm an old man now and god praise god has given me the opportunity to go in the holy place and to minister this incense uh josephus tells us that at that time in jerusalem in jerusalem alone there were more than 24 000 priests waiting for their turn most commentators make it around 18 to 20 000 he says 24 000 the point is uh you didn't often get this tremendous privilege but verse five the lot fell to the division of abijah that's his family and then in verse nine it falls to him to burn that incense to the lord and so this old priest robed in white barefoot with a holy censer in his hand goes to stand before the sacred altar of god uh many at that time were sort of plain priests and uh can i help you okay that's fine we're real real good we're real informal here now many at that time were playing at the priesthood but we know zacharias wasn't playing he he was righteous and he took this privilege uh very very seriously verse six said he was righteous blameless before god then verse 11 an amazing thing happened an angel of the lord appeared to him standing to the right of the altar of incense we just sort of read this again la la la according to verse 19 the angel answered and said i'm gabriel who stands in the presence of god i've been sent to speak to you to bring you this good news uh according to the bible the name gabriel just means the hero of god this angel of god gabriel is the messenger of mercy michael sort of has the ministry of wrath michael the archangel gabriel hadn't been around now on the earth last time he showed up was 500 years before this he went to daniel and he spoke to daniel now suddenly here's this priest this barefoot priest and gabriel the angel appears to him and says god's about to break the siren he's about to connect the old with the new and what does this angel say of course verse 12 it says zacharias was trouble when he saw him and fear gripped him the english by the way does not do those greek words justice uh the the greek word there is so powerful uh when it says fear gripped him it had the greek word is an outward tremor now that man starts shaking in his he was barefoot i was going to say in his skin uh he was frightened and you can imagine why now what message did the angel bring how did he break the silence of god we won't read it because we're going to pick that up that's the first thing god said when he broke the silence jesus is coming that was his message and for after 400 years and he said he's going to come in the power and the spirit of elijah now how did the old testament end you familiar with the last verse in the old testament the last verse in the old testament says i'm going to send you elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the lord he'll restore the hearts of the fathers to their children the hearts of their children to their fathers lest i come and smite the land with the curse the old testament end i'm going to send elijah 400 years past god says through to get through gabriel elijah's coming your son is going to come in the spirit of elijah now the question comes uh is does john the baptizer fulfill that prophecy uh the answer is partially you say well how do you know it's partial it says he's going to come in the spirit of elijah jesus said in matthew 11 14 if you accept it he himself speaking of john he himself is elijah which wants to come so jesus said he fulfills the prophet then john got beheaded john got later on they were questioned what about the second coming what about your return what's it going to be like matthew 17 11 he said elijah must come first and restore all things so it's not fulfilled because after he died jesus still said elijah is still coming so there's this partial fulfillment he came in the spirit of elijah anyway back to the point the message linked the old with the new and zachariah pictures the old and the unbelief that goes with it and now mary let's introduce her in faith and then next time we can develop it a little more mary is the first picture of the church in the new testament now let me first give it to you generally and then we'll home in on the record and i'll give it to you specifically and then next time as the lord gives us grace we'll apply it a little bit uh first generally no one can read the bible honestly no one who has a heart and loves the lord can read the bible and not see the high privilege that mary was given to become the mother of our lord nobody can ignore that now it's true some have gone too far with that but sadly some to balance the veneration that's been given to mary have swung to the opposite extreme and they neglect the privilege that was given to mary i think in fairness every earnest student of the bible has to admit that no woman on the planet earth was ever given a higher privilege than mary was given to become the mother of messiah you see only one person could have that of all the millions of women that ever lived on the earth only one person could have that tremendous privilege and that was mary so let me show you how mary was selected to be god's illustration of the church uh first in a general way what was mary's chief contribution to the history of redemption and i think beyond any doubt irrefragably her contribution was she gave jesus to the world well we all agree on that that's the main thing about mary she gave jesus to the world what's the great mission of the church and the answer is to give jesus to the world how'd she do it listen carefully the holy spirit by a miracle formed christ in her without the help of man and in the fullness of time she gave christ to the world how's the church supposed to give christ to the world listen carefully the holy spirit by a miracle formed christ in her without the help of man and in the fullness of time she gives christ to the world mary is god's great picture of the church the very first one and of course she took a beating for it too and so the women but it's exactly god's picture and the way she did it is the way we're to do it now let me home in a little closer to mary in her personal life and just for the sake of analysis give you three principles illustrated from the text how is mary a perfect model of the church let me give you three principles first of all she is one of the clearest pictures of childlike faith all the simplicity of her faith will take your breath away of course in one sense she wasn't child you know she was only about 14 years old they say at the most 18 years old i've had teenage at 16 ages how i would have longed to see faith like this in my teenage i didn't even come to know the savior till i was 16 years old and i just can't imagine somebody the age of mary having the faith that she expresses here she's believing without precedent and notice verse 34 mary said to the angel how can this be since i'm a virgin and the angel answered and said to her the holy spirit will come upon you and the power of the most high will overshadow you for that reason the holy offspring shall be called the son of god zacharias had a lot of precedence when he disbelieved god sarah was barren rachel was barren rebecca was barren hannah was barren many illustrations god opened barren womb mary had no precedence never before had god used the virgin she had to trust god for something he had never done before and she did it so easily this childlike faith this simplicity is so beautiful when she arrived at elizabeth's house in verse 45 elizabeth greeted her with these words blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what had been spoken to her by the lord of course you know elizabeth for six months she was living in the house with an unbeliever and every time she tried to talk to him she was reminded of his unbelief every time he tried to communicate with her they were reminded of unbelief and here comes mary and elizabeth said all blessed is she that believed what simplicity in faith in verse 30 the angel said to her do not be afraid mary you have found favor with god some translation said you're highly favored this doesn't mean that mary is the dispenser of favor it means she's the recipient of favor she received favor this beautiful child simply believed that god would do an unprecedented thing and work that miracle in her now what is this childlike faith see we just start saying mary's a picture of the church yeah we and we draw some parallels all that's pretty i've never seen that before listen to the reality of it do you believe that the virgin birth was a mighty miracle do you believe that do you realize that's the secret of the christian life it's as much a miracle for you to live the christian life as it was for mary to conceive the son of man in her womb and the simplicity of faith is saying that i will trust god to work the miracle in me to live a christian life you don't have to be a theologian you don't have to have a degree from a seminar to know that you can't turn the other cheek without a miracle that you can't go the second mile without a miracle that you can't love your wife as christ loves the church without a miracle that you can't count affliction joy without a miracle that you can't rejoice evermore without a miracle that you can't do anything without a miracle we don't think the christian life's a miracle we say i'm gonna try harder to live the christian life you can't try harder you've got to come like mary came and trust god to do an unprecedented thing in your life to work that kind of miracle and every time you do it right god has reenacted the virgin birth every time i do it right god has reenacted the virgin birth he's formed christ in you and that's what what it's all about and that's what the christian life is it isn't doing a bunch of things and trying to live right it's allowing god by the holy spirit to form christ in you in such a way that by and by it will be manifest and then that manifestation will turn into a birth and you will have the privilege of fulfilling the great commission and giving christ to the world it's a glorious thing and the way he's written it is absolutely uh wonderful now the second principle not only was simple childlike faith i trust god for the miracle but look at mary's surrender i don't think in all the scripture you're going to have a fuller more comprehensive expression of total surrender than verse 38 mary said behold the bond servant of the lord be it done to me according to your word and the angel departed from her you know one of the most amazing things about this whole story is that all of heaven was waiting for the permission of mary god never forces anybody he didn't force her to do this he presented it to her and he was waiting for her permission and she could say yes uh we sort of read this thing la la la you realize when she said be it done unto your handmate what she was saying she said yes to the reproach of christ never in four thousand years in human history had any virgin conceived and you know and i know we're all old enough to know there is no human explanation for that that's a mighty miracle and you try to explain that and blood's going to come to your cheek to try to explain well i was and i was right and i'm pregnant but you gotta understand it wasn't me and it wasn't another man it was there's no way you can't explain it and in that she pictures the church and don't you try to explain what god does in your life or you'll be hemming and hawing and not be able to explain it there's a reproach there mary conceived and then went away for three months uh and then was with elizabeth was pregnant already for six months and she went away for three months when she came back she was probably already beginning to show now matthew tells us about what poor joseph went through my heart goes out to that fellow just try to imagine that and god had to come in a special way and tell him what had taken place now one thing that's interesting mary never tried to explain to joseph she left god to do that there's no way she could explain it to joseph but when she said yes to god she said yes to the reproach of christ the angel came and explained it to joseph but the angel didn't come and explain it to the public and don't forget all through their life they had that uh stigma and later on when jesus was dealing with the pharisees they didn't you know how people call you names when they don't have any good argument and so jesus was dealing with the pharisees and in john chapter 8 verse 41 they answered him we're not born of fornication why'd they bring that up see that stuck with him because mary got pregnant out of wedlock and and that never went and she had to carry that and so she said when she said yes to god she said yes you can have my body she said yes you can have my reputation there's a good chance she's going to lose her husband to be too and she was willing to lay down that she said yes you can have my marriage and she said yes you can have my life because there was a possibility she'd get stoned for that this is an amazing surrender now usually when we say surrender we say okay lord i'll do it for you that's not what mary said okay lord i'll do it for you she said okay lord i'll let you do it for me that was her surrender blessed is she who believed that it would be performed to her the christian life is not me surrendering saying all right i'm going to surrender i'm going to give all i got for jesus real surrender lets god do it for you and you just say okay lord i give you permission you do it amen mary illustrates faith faith number one because in childlike simplicity she said i will trust god for the miracle of christian life for christian number two i give god permission here's your handmaiden do what you say i'm not going to try harder i'm just going to be available and allow you permission to work your thing in me that was her surrender that's what makes it so beautiful and makes her a picture and then finally mary and we'll close with this mary is a picture of humility oh when you read this song that she wrote what a humble song it is verse 46 mary said my soul exalts the lord my spirit rejoices in god my savior she's not coming as one immaculately conceived she's coming in as one who needs a savior god my savior later on she offers the offering of purification she knew she needed an offer and she just came as a very humble individual and when you read the song we won't take time to do it because time's getting away but when you read the song it's all about him it's all about the lord if god did that for me i think i would talk about and sing about you know god chose me as an instrument to bear christ i'm going to bear the lord she doesn't mention one word in her song about her body being the channel of god's redemption i would now i would have been shouting that all over the place she was so humble she didn't have low thoughts of herself she had no thoughts of herself that's what humility really is it isn't low thought it's no thought you know after this remarkable song we hardly hear anything about mary only two times for the rest of her life did she ever speak far as the record goes we only have two things that she said after this only two occasions she just sang she's so humble and and she just she just sort of bows out of it she's not starstruck and dazzled at this great privilege that she's been given she's lost in god and she just so christened what is a real christian what's a someone who trusts god for the miracle to work christ in it someone who gives god permission to do his thing someone who's lost in god and just is so god-centered in all of it she didn't say oh i can't do this the calling's too high she didn't say i can't do this i'm a nobody she didn't say i can't do this it's going to cost too much she said all right lord you do it so humble she had no thoughts of herself if you want to do it you do it there's a difference between humble and humiliation jesus was so humble he could not be humiliated if you can still be humiliated you're not humble because you're still thinking about yourself jesus could hang naked on the cross without humiliation because he was humble he humbled himself by being obedient to death so that's how you'll know you're humble or not just ask yourself can i still be embarrassed can somebody still say or do something that will humiliate me if so you're not humble mary was just so humble now let me close with these two verses and then we'll actually pick it up here next time one's from mark three a multitude was sitting around him and they said behold your mother your brothers are outside and answering he said who are my mother and my brother looking around on those who were sitting around him he said behold my mother and my brother whoever does the will of god he's my brother my sister and my mother what a great thing say what a privilege mary had through the will of god you have that privilege too you are his mother and then listen to this one luke 11 27 came about while he said these things one of the women in the crowd raised their voice and said blessed is the womb that bore you and the breast at which you nursed and he said on the contrary blessed are those who hear the word of god and observe it we are married mary said mary what a privilege she had yes and what privilege you have dear saint dear christian dear church mary the picture of the church our mission give christ to the world how do we do it how'd she do it she gave god permission to allow the holy spirit to form christ in her without the help of man and in the fullness of time she gave christ to the world well we're not done with chapter one we need to come back and see unbelief turn the page and look at john the baptizer and so on but we'll close it for now comments or questions in first john and he uses the same word here it says his seed is planted in me paul in galatian to the galatians prayed he said i long that christ be formed in you and though it's true it comes he comes in all at once but there's also the process you got to grow in christ but christ has to grow in you and there's also this process of the lord growing as our vision of him increases uh he's manifest and pregnancy is just a picture do you think that because peter was rich in discipline perhaps he was always well but i don't think he was with sanctification and even later in his life he was still talking about in fact when he wrote the message of second peter that's his message peter so yeah they're the process comments other comments or questions well it could be but in the fullness of time he came and during that 400 we call it 400 silent years because god didn't speak but it's 400 noisy years in that he's working governments and creating the language and the greek language and so he's very busy getting ready but yeah there were many many stubborn people whether the offer was made to anybody yeah one one was uh on the uh where he made the water into wine the great thing she said so we ought to obey mary uh i can't remember the second time she spoke oh yeah we see her all the time but she's not speaking she's standing at the cross and she's in fact the last time we see her she's on her knees praying first well let's pray together father we thank you so much again not for what we think we know these things mean but for all you have designed and created them and inspired them for me will you work that in a heart thank you for mary as the glorious picture of the church and teach us lord to trust you for a miracle and to give you permission to do your thing in our life and then we pray that you would just allow us to be lost in god work it in us because jesus deserves it we ask in his name ======================================================================== Audio: https://sermonindex1.b-cdn.net/15/SID15104.mp3 Source: https://sermonindex.net/speakers/ed-miller/luke-04-unbelief-faith-of-mary/ ========================================================================