TEXT: Luke 1: 39-56
BURSTING FORTH IN SONG
While I’m not much a fan of musicals, I can say there are a few I like. Godspell, Jesus Christ Superstar, Music Man, South Pacific: that’s about it. In high school, I performed in both Music Man and South Pacific, which is probably why they made the list at all.
It’s not that I’m anti-musicals, it’s just my own problem. I grew up in a family that shunned all things corny or cornball. If I were watching a movie and suddenly heard that cue—the background music beginning to swell, and the main actor sweeping forward, taking a deep breath—I would roll my eyes and curl up in my theater chair with my hands over my head. Either that or quickly change the channel, as in Quickly! Change the channel right now! I think I would sooner volunteer to change diapers at a state retirement facility than sit through either Rent or Chicago again.
I don’t consider this as something wrong with musicals, but something in myself. It’s my own shortcoming that I don’t appreciate them. So it is a bit of an irony how important that musical moment is to understanding our text today.
Bursting forth in song is exactly what happens when the Holy Spirit strikes people in Luke’s gospel.
Two women who ought not to be pregnant—Elizabeth and Mary—Elizabeth because she is old and Mary because she’s still a virgin—these two are today’s performers. Mary enters Elizabeth’s house, and the Holy Spirit—who was promised to be in John even while within Elizabeth’s womb—moves her up front and center while the other lights dim and the music swells from beneath:
Blessed, Blessed, Blessed!
Blessed are you among women,
Blessed is the fruit of your womb.
And why should this happen to me,
that the mother of my Lord comes to me?
From the moment I heard the sound of your greeting,
the child in my womb leaped for joy.
Blessed, Blessed, Blessed!
Blessed is she who knew, knew, knew
That the Lord would surely come through, through, through.
Yes, this is a song—at least, it is exalted speech. When the Holy Spirit descends, the result is something like song, something like a Shakespearean sonnet, something extraordinary, marvelous, true, and good.
But this is not an aria but a duet, for Mary steps into the spotlight and responds:
My soul magnifies the Lord,
My spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
He looks with love on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, surely, surely,
All generations, from now to eternity
will call me blessed, blessed, blessed!
To God be the glory, great things he has done
Holy, holy, holy—holy is his name.
From generation to generation, from age to age
God’s mercies are shown to all who revere his name.
He has answered our humble prayers
He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the greedy and raised up the lowly;
He has filled the hungry children with warmth and good food, and left the worldly materialists to wallow in wealth—
Full-bellied but empty and never satisfied.
He has lifted his servant Israel from years of anguish,
For God keeps his promises and always comes
Through, through, through.
These are songs, exalted utterances that burst forth as the Holy Spirit touches them.
TONGUES REDEFINED?
But to call these songs makes light of them, for they are more than songs; they are prophecy every bit as much as the utterances of Isaiah, Ezekiel, or Daniel. The Holy Spirit spoke through the prophets in just this same way.
Fifty times in the book of Ezekiel, we read:
“The word of the Lord came to me.”
Luke shows us the end of the Old Testament prophecy as the Holy Spirit speaks through Elizabeth, Mary, Zechariah (next week), and finally through John the Baptist. John the Baptist will be the final prophet. Why final? Because even though we are reading the New Testament, we are still in Old Testament mode—we are still Before Christ—and after Christ comes, everything changes.
All prophecy points toward Christ. There is no prophecy that matters that doesn’t point to Jesus. With the appearance of Christ, all prophecy is fulfilled and completed, so instead of prophecy, the New Testament church takes on a new task—proclaiming Jesus.
The gift of prophecy and the work of the Holy Spirit are one and the same: pointing all things and everyone toward Christ. That’s it. Prophecy is not about predicting the future, except to say that Jesus Christ is there.
Remember, this Luke is the same Luke who tells us about Pentecost—the birth of the Church—and he writes in our text today about how the Holy Spirit prompts people to speak. Question: What if Luke is showing us what tongues really looks like? What if the gift of speaking in tongues is not sacred gibberish(as in pagan Corinth and for which Paul issued many corrections) but rather this exalted, elegant speech?
Perhaps speaking in tongues is not a mysterious, nonsensical language, but a mysterious song-like utterance? Ordinary people like Mary from Nazareth and several Galilean fisherman go from being tongue-tied and hesitant to remarkably bold and articulate?
In Acts 2, what does Luke tell us about how the Holy Spirit speaks? For one, the Disciples spoke in languages that were clearly intelligible in the worldly sense. Secondly, I would encourage you re-read Peter’s first sermon, which seems to burst forth from him like a song. It is the first Christian sermon and it is magnificent, just like Elizabeth and Mary’s utterances.
What if this is tongues? What if the Church was born and spread not with dry, academic prose, but this whole fresh-utterance-in-the-Spirit thing? I highly expect this is what Luke is demonstrating to us—that tongues, at least in Jerusalem, consisted of the Holy Spirit giving people words and expressions they had no worldly reason to utter.
THE RIGHT WORDS
Haven’t we had moments when we actually had the right words?
Because we’re modest, we don’t talk much about these moments; we’re more inclined to tell stories of times we didn’t know what to say—our moments of being struck mute or dumbfounded—or the times we wish we had a real zinger but couldn’t think of one until a few days later. We all have those stories.
But haven’t you had those moments when you were put right into the thick of things—a critical moment for yourself or someone you love—when you spoke truth from the heart and it changed everything?
—A time when you found confidence and heart to say unfailingly, unflinchingly, what really and truly needed to be said? Perhaps at that moment you had no idea that what you were saying mattered or would have any significance in the long run, but it later turned out to be a soul-saver, either for someone else or for even for yourself?
I think it may be a misnomer for us to say things like “I found the words” or “I centered myself” and truer for us to say, “the words just came to me,” or “it came to me,” for that is exactly how the Holy Spirit works. He comes to us. He speaks through us just as he spoke through the prophets. He just gives us the words in the moment we need them when we trust in him.
Jesus tells us:
When they bring you before the synagogues, the rulers, and the authorities, do not worry about how you are to defend yourselves or what you are to say; 12 for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that very hour what you ought to say. —Luke 12: 11-12
We need to trust in the Holy Spirit who can and will give us what we need to say.
We need to work out of our hearts with all integrity, truth, and confidence in him.
Such resistance to sharing faith because we are so afraid of being dumbstruck in a key moment. We feel so untrained, unprofessional, incomplete, or unworthy of the task. We remember all those moments when we didn’t know what to say and think that is what will happen and we’ll let down not ourselves, but God! Who would risk such a thing?
I’ve had people say, “Noel, I wish I had your education and knowledge of the Bible for those moments!” but I tell you that all of my experience and theological study add up to nearly nothing when it come to those moments. I, like you, worry about being dumbstruck, not having the right words, and/or running the risk of shaming the faith, but I also know that the Spirit always comes through. The Holy Spirit not only wants to make us better Christians, but God want to reach others through us. He won’t let that work fail, though we might. He is at work through us and we have to trust that he is there whenever needed. Just trust.
This is why we don’t “pitch” Jesus as though we were selling soap. We don’t memorize proposals or gospel approaches. We don’t follow carefully-written prescriptions for soul-saving. We can, do, and ought to memorize Scripture, but that’s not the same thing. When we reduce other people to “lost souls to be found with our help” we insult the Spirit. When we memorize gospel pitches or think we need to force-feed them along the Roman Road, we communicate something dangerous; namely, that we don’t trust the Spirit to follow through on his promise to give us the words!
We want security. We want comfort. We want to know that we will have the right words, so we memorize someone else’s words and hope it works. Wrong! We can do better and must to better. Let us agree that the best evangelism we can possibly enact is that kind wherein we honestly acknowledge our unworthiness of the gospel and our feelings of utter ineptitude before the task.
Unlike Zechariah, we do not count on our training to equip us for the encounter. Like Elizabeth and Mary, we are humble and lowly before the Lord. We too wait on the Spirit for fulfillment. We, like them, can expect the unexpected. When it comes, we may wonder at it, but our response should be as Mary says:
“Lord, let it be with me according to your word.”
PROPHETS OF THE SEASON
Perhaps you have family coming home for Christmas. Maybe you’re estranged from certain parts of your family. You may have children, grandchildren, cousins, or siblings who think the whole God thing is a crock. I imagine you may feel stress over coming confrontations.
People will say things that can make you uncomfortable—to make you feel like a phony or a self-righteous saint.
Don’t sweat it. Your Lord says, “Fear not, for I am with you. Worry not, for I will give you the words.”
Relax. Preoccupy yourself with love. The right words will come; just trust. †