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The Magnificat - Part 2 (Luke 1:51-55) · Reformed Thinking

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Imagine having absolute certainty that the greatest
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empires on earth were going to collapse and singing about it in
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the past tense before it even happened.
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Yeah, it is a staggering thought.
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Welcome to Reformed Thinking. Today's deep dive takes us into
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an ancient song of revolution. We are looking at the
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second-half of Mary's Magnificat.
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Right, which is found in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 1,
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verses 51 through 55. And the goal today is to examine
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the massive world altering reversals that this text
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predicts. To frame this I want to use a
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quick visual I. Love a good visual.
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So usually when you stand on the shoreline and look at the ocean,
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your perspective is, well, it is incredibly localized.
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You just see the water crashing right at your own feet.
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Yeah, exactly. I mean, spot on.
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Your entire understanding of the ocean in that moment is limited
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to what is happening right in front of you.
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And that localized view is how we naturally operate.
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We experience immediate sensations, the daily turbulence
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of our own lives. For sure we like things to be
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immediate and relatable, but you know, that keeps our vision
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quite narrow. But then imagine you board a
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ship and that ship starts riding U the massive face of a swelling
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ocean wave. OK, I am picturing it.
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You start down in this dark, through right, surrounded by
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walls of water, but as the wave swells, the ship is lifted
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upward. So your vantage point changes
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completely. Yes.
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Suddenly as you reach the bright Crest of that wave, you are not
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just looking at the water hitting the hall anymore.
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You look out across the entire ocean.
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You can see the distant landfall.
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You see the weather patterns rolling in from miles away.
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Right. Your perspective shifts from the
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immediate splash to a sweeping global horizon, and that is
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precisely what happens in the text we are looking at today.
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It really is. In the first half of her song,
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Mary is down in that through she says my soul magnifies the Lord
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is about her personal praise. But right here at verse 51, she
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hits the Crest of the wave. Yeah, the progression of her
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thought is just striking. She moves from the personal
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reasons for praising God to the prophetic historical reasons.
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And there is a core theological premise here that links the 2
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right? Absolutely.
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The principles by which God deals with individual souls are
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the very same principles that guide His dealings with the
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entire world. That is amazing.
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Massive concept. It is, Mary saw in the microcosm
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of her own life how God had dealt and would deal with the
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world in macrocosm. So the small scale reflects the
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global scale. Precisely, she realized that the
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grace and justice applied to her own humble estate are the the
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exact mechanisms that will topple empires and reorder human
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society. Which brings us to why the
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listener should care about this ancient poetry.
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It is highly relevant. From the Crest of that wave,
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Mary predicts 3 specific monumental reversals that
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directly impact how you view your own status, your own sense
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of security, and, well, your own spiritual appetite right now.
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We are going to see a moral reversal, a social reversal and
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a reversal of material and spiritual conditions.
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But before we get to the specific predictions, I am kind
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of stuck on the grammar here. Grammar is always a good place
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to start. To understand the predictions,
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we really have to look at the bizarre way she speaks about the
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future. Yeah, this is where grammar
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becomes theology, as Mary looks toward the horizon and
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prophecies about the future work of the Messiah.
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Who hasn't even been born yet, I might add.
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Right, who is still in the womb? She speaks entirely in the past
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tense. Which feels completely backward.
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In the original Greek text, she uses the Aoris tense.
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She says he has shown strength, He has scattered the proud.
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He has brought down the mighty. So she describes the future as
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if it is finished history. Spot on.
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Wait. I need to pause on that.
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She uses past tense verbs for events that are decades or even
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centuries away from happening. How does that make sense
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logically? It is a fair question.
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Why not just say he will scatter the proud?
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To grasp this, we have to understand that Greek tenses,
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particularly the aorist, operate a bit differently than English
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denses. OK, break that down for me.
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In English we are obsessed with time, right past, present,
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future. The Greek verbs system is highly
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concerned with aspect. Aspect meaning what exactly?
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Meaning what in this context? Meaning the kind of action.
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The Aoris tense often presents an action as a complete whole
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event. Regardless of when it happens on
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the timeline. Yes, and when used in a
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prophetic context, it is a rhetorical device called the
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prophetic past tense. We see this heavily utilized by
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the Old Testament prophets. Give me an example of that from
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the Old Testament. I think that will help clarify
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it. Look at the prophet Isaiah.
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When he foretold the captivity of Babylon, he spoke of it as an
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accomplished fact. Even though it hadn't happened
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yet. Long before the Babylonian
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Empire had even reached its peak.
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Wow. Or look at Isaiah 53, the famous
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prophecy about the suffering servant, Isaiah Thayer wrote.
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He was despised and rejected by men.
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Past tense. Yes, he used the past tense to
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describe the crucifixion of the Messiah, writing those words 700
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years before Christ was even born.
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That is incredible. The.
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Prophetic past tense views the future work of God as so
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certain, so guaranteed, that it is presented as a closed book.
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So Mary casts her eye back to what God has done in the past,
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and she projects those guaranteed principles into the
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future. Yes, as the assured result of
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the son she is carrying. I'm trying to think of a way to
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relate this to our everyday experience.
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It is kind of like watching a recorded sports broadcast.
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OK, I am tracking with you. Like a game where you already
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know the final score. Yeah, you have your team's
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championship T-shirt on. You know they won by 20 points,
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right? So even while you are watching
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the first quarter and maybe your team is currently losing, you
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can talk about the victory as an accomplished fact.
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You already know the outcome. Yeah, you say we won this game
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even as you watch the early struggles because the outcome is
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totally secured. That analogy highlights the
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certainty for sure, but we need to elevate it to the divine
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level. Fair enough.
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In a recorded game, you are just a spectator who happens to know
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the outcome. When we apply this to theology,
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this grammatical choice demands a completely sovereign view of
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history. It tells the listener that God's
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will is so absolute and his decrees are so certain, that the
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future could be confidently proclaimed as history.
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Human beings guess at the future based on trends and
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probabilities. We look at polls, We look at
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markets. But God declares the end from
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the beginning. Because he is outside of time
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entirely. That makes a lot of sense.
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When God decrees an outcome, no human agency, no political
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coalition, no military might can prevent it.
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So the future is incredibly secure.
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It is so secure in the hands of God that a young, humble woman
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in the 1st country could sing about the overthrow of global
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empires as if she were reading yesterday's news.
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Her confidence rests entirely on the sovereign authority of the
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one making the promise. Absolutely.
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That is a staggering level of confidence, and with that
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absolute certainty established, let's look at the first of the
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three mighty reversals Mary predicts from her vantage point.
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The moral reversal. Right.
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She begins with the moral reversal.
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She says he has shown strength with his arm.
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He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
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A very specific phrase. When she says the proud, who is
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she actually talking about? Because, I mean, we all have
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moments of pride. The original language describes
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those showing themselves preeminent.
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OK, these are the strutting, arrogant individuals who possess
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an imagined sense of moral superiority.
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The people who think they're just better than everyone else.
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Yes, they genuinely believe their good fortune, their high
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status or their wealth is due to some innate excellence within
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themselves. And notice that Mary specifies
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this arrogance begins inwardly. In the thoughts of their hearts.
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So it is an internal disease before it ever becomes an
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external symptom. Yes, very much so.
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Before pride manifests as a boastful word or a cruel action,
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it is a silent internal plotting.
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Like talking to yourself about how great you are.
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It is the inward scheming where individuals congratulate
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themselves themselves on their own brilliance, completely
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ignoring the grace of God. They build internal monuments to
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their own capability. That is a great way to put it.
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That brings us to one of the most vivid historical examples
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of this specific type of internal arrogance.
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Let's look at Nebuchadnezzar from the book of Daniel chapter
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4. Ah yes, a classic example.
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This is a man who practically invented strutting while sitting
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down. He really did.
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He was the ruler of Babylon, the greatest empire of his day, and
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he was imperially proud in his inmost thoughts.
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We need to set the scene for what he was actually looking at
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when his mind broke. Definitely Nebuchadnezzar is the
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prime historical example. He had actually been warned by
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God in a dream, which the prophet Daniel interpreted for
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him. A very clear warning.
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He was warned about a coming personal fall if he did not
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renounce his sins and his massive ego, but well, he could
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not control himself. The text tells us that 12 months
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later, he was walking on the roof of his royal palace in
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Babylon. And from that roof, the view
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would have been unbelievable. Babylon was the jewel of the
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ancient world. He is looking at the Ishtar
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Gate, covered in brilliant blue glazed bricks with alternating
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Dragons and bulls. He is looking at the massive
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ziggurats piercing the sky. He is likely looking at the
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Hanging Gardens, one of the wonders of the ancient world,
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which he built specifically because his wife missed the
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mountains of her homeland. Just flexing his architectural
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muscle, he is looking at a fortress city that seemed
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invincible. Surrounded by all that
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architectural majesty, he answered his own internal
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thoughts. Out loud, yes.
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Yeah, he said. Is not this great Babylon which
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I have built by my mighty strength as a royal residence
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and for the glory of my majesty? He gave himself total credit, no
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acknowledgement of Providence, no humility, just pure
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unadulterated self worship. And the punishment for the
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specific act of hubris is utterly terrifying, both
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theologically and medically. The moment those words leave his
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mouth, a voice from heaven pronounces his judgement and his
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mind simply snaps. The sheer degradation of his
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condition is striking. The mighty Emperor descended to
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all fours. Like an animal.
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He began snorting and bullying his way among his courtiers.
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He cast off his royal robes, preferring to wander naked in
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the palace gardens. That is horrifying.
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His only interest became foraging for vegetation.
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And the historical and medical records point to a specific
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mental disease here it is called bone to pee right?
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The term comes from 2 words, Bose meaning cow or bull and
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anthropose meaning man. It is a rare psychiatric
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syndrome where a human being genuinely believes they are a
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bovine. Animal and the physical effects
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on Nebuchadnezzar were just grotesque.
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The text notes that his hair and beard grew long and matted until
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they looked like eagle's feathers.
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Because he was constantly grubbing in the dirt for grass
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and roots, his nails toughened and grew thick.
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Like bird talons, the ruler of the known world was essentially
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reduced to a wild beast grazing on the lawn.
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Have doctors weighed in on what might have caused this
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physically? Some medical historians have
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suggested he may have suffered from a severe form of porphyria.
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That is the same disease that supposedly caused the madness of
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King George the Third, right? Spot on.
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Others suggest perhaps advanced neurosyphilis, but regardless of
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the secondary medical cause, the primary cause was divine
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judgement against arrogance. And the psychological terror of
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this condition is what really haunts me.
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Well, the symptoms of bontrapy involved pronounced antisocial
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tendencies and a diet of water and grass.
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But typically, a person suffering from this kind of
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delusion can drift in and out of reality.
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Meaning he might have had moments of clarity.
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Yes, this raises A horrifying prospect.
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Nebuchadnezzar likely wandered in and out of his animal like
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state. Imagine the recurring moments of
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lucidity. That would be torment.
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He would wake up trapped in a helpless Netherland of
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humiliation, fully aware of his absurdity.
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He would be staring at his Talon like hands.
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Tasting dirt in his mouth, knowing he is the king of
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Babylon, but completely unable to regain his right mind or
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stand up on 2 feet. The psychological torment of
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knowing you are a king, yet being compelled to eat grass
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like a cow. It is a staggering demonstration
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of God opposing the proud. It is the absolute peak of human
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arrogance met with the absolute depth of animalistic
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humiliation. But the narrative does not end
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in the dirt, thankfully. No, after 7 long years, his
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reason returned. And his immediate response is
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critical. He did not complain.
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He prays the Most High. He officially recorded his own
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humiliation for all of history. Which takes a lot of humility.
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Acknowledging that God's dominion is everlasting and he
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concluded with this massive realization.
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Those who walk in pride, He is able to humble.
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That historical retrospect really sharpens the force of
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Mary's prophecy. Gives it teeth.
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When she sings, He has scattered the proud and the thoughts of
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their hearts. She is pulling from a historical
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reality where God literally shattered the mind of the most
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powerful man on earth. And this moral reversal
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continues to echo through the subsequent annals of history.
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We see it over and over again. It is a consistent historical
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pattern. We can trace this prophetic
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fulfillment right through the centuries.
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Give us another example. Look at Herod Agrippa in the
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12th chapter of Acts. He stands before an admiring
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crowd in his splendid Royal Silver Rd.
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Then the crowds go wild. The historian Josephus actually
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records that the the sun reflected off the silver tissue
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of his garments, making him look radiant.
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So he is literally shining. He soaks in their blasphemous
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praise as they shout the voice of a God, and not of a man.
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And then what happens? Immediately an Angel of the Lord
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strikes him down, he is eaten by worms, and he breathes his last.
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Or move forward in time. Look at Napoleon.
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A great modern example. He had his proud, triumphant
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victory at Austerlitz. He believed his military genius
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was completely unstoppable. But then came the freezing
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devastation of the Russian winter, right?
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The loss of his Grand Army and the final crushing defeat at
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Waterloo. We're looking at Hitler boasting
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of his rapid expansion with the anchless in the fall of France.
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Claiming the Third Reich would last 1000 years.
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Only to face total ruin and shoot himself in a bunker a few
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years later. And today, you know you can
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travel to certain parts of Eastern Europe and find the
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grand sculpture heads of Lenin and Stalin resting in literal
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junk yards. Covered in weeds and graffiti.
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The days of arrogant men echo amid the crash of falling
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Thrones. The higher the arrogant elevate
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themselves, the more severe the scattering.
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It is an unavoidable law of divine justice.
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Wait, hold on, I have a real problem with this, or at least I
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know people listening might struggle with this concept.
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Let's hear it. When we look at these historical
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figures, dictators and tyrants meeting miserable ends, are we
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supposed to cheer for that? Is it OK for us to enjoy their
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downfall? Because that feels incredibly
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vindictive. I see what you mean.
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How is this not just a cosmic form of divine karma where we
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get to sit back and applaud when bad things happen to arrogant
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people? That is a highly perceptive
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distinction to make and we have to examine our own hearts here.
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OK, No, it is not about taking joy in the suffering of others
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or cheering for a concept like. Karma, because karma is
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impersonal. Right.
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Exactly. Precisely.
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Karma implies an impersonal force balancing the scales of
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the universe based on human actions.
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What Mary is singing about is a very personal theological
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reality. So it is relational.
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The New Testament states it categorically in the book of
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James. God opposes the proud but gives
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grace to the humble. Opposes is a strong word there.
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The word opposes. There is actually a military
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term. It means God actively sets
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himself in battle array against the arrogant.
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So it is active resistance, not just passive consequence.
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Yes, we do not rejoice in the misery itself.
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Rather, we recognize and Revere the absolute justice of God.
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It should keep us grounded. This should not make us gleeful.
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It should make us introspective. It is a sobering warning.
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For all of us. If we secretly cherish thoughts
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of our own moral excellence, if we arrogantly imagine that our
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good fortune, our education, our comfortable lifestyle, or our
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status is somehow due to our own innate superiority, we are
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placing ourselves in the crosshairs of that moral
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reversal. We make ourselves a target.
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If we strut inwardly, God will scatter us.
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The arm of God's justice will be loosed against that pride.
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It is a call to genuine humility, recognizing that
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everything we have is a gift of grace.
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Without a doubt. And if that internal arrogance
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is left unchecked, it naturally manifests an external authority.
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Pride always looks for a throne. Right.
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If you believe you are superior in your heart, you will
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eventually try to build a throne for yourself to force others to
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acknowledge it. Which brings us to Mary's next
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point. Yes, that brings us to the
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second mighty reversal. Mary sings about the social
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reversal. She says He has brought down the
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mighty from their Thrones and exalted those of lowly estate.
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We move from the internal moral landscape to the external social
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and political landscape. And once again, history provides
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A spectacular precedent that lays the groundwork for Mary's
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prophetic language. If Nebuchadnezzar is the prime
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example of internal arrogance, his descendant Belshazzar
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provides the ultimate example of external hubris.
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Let's set the scene for Belshazzar's feast in Daniel
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chapter 5, because this is a master class in human
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foolishness. It really is.
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Belshazzar is throwing a massive debauched festival in Babylon,
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and there are three specific acts of hubris happening all at
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the same time in this one banquet hall.
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The first one is military overconfidence.
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Yes, 1st the armies of the Medes and the Persians, led by Cyrus
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the Great, have literally devoured the civilized world.
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They have already defeated the Babylonian army in the field at
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the Battle of Opus. And now they are currently
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camped right outside the gates of Babylon.
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But Belshazzar decides to throw a party for 1000 of his Lords.
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His first act of hubris is a supreme overconfidence in human
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engineering. He feels safe behind his walls.
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He feels entirely secure in his man made fortress, and to be
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fair to his perspective, the walls of Babylon were
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staggering. Just massive structures.
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Ancient historians like Herodotus claim the walls were
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so thick that four horse Chariots could race along the
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top of them. Wow.
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The city had stored up enough food to last for 20 years.
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A river ran directly through the city, providing an endless water
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supply. So from a purely human military
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perspective, Bill Shazar had every reason to believe he could
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outlast any siege. He's engaging in this arrogant
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royal thumbing of the nose at his enemies.
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But his second act of hubris moves from foolishness to direct
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ritual blasphemy. This is where things get really
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dark. During this drink and feast, he
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orders his servants to bring out the sacred gold and silver
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vessels. The ones that had been looted
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from the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem decades earlier by
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Nebuchad. Right.
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He and his Lords, his wives, his concubines, drink wine from
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these sacred vessels. And they use them to toast their
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false Babylonian gods of gold, silver, bronze, ironwood and
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stone. It is a deliberate, calculated
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insult to the God of Israel. He is taking the vessels
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dedicated to the worship of the one true God and using them to
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praise idols. And the third act of hubris is
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perhaps the most condemning of all.
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He is doing all of this while completely ignoring the direct
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written testimony of his own grandfather, Nebuchadnezzar.
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He has the historical record. He knows about the bone.
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Therapy. He knows about the seven years
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in the fields eating grass. He knows that God humbles those
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who walk in pride. He has the case study right in
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his family tree. Yes, but he ignores it
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completely. He is conceited, overconfident
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and blind to his own impending doom.
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You can imagine the scene inside that banquet hall.
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It is chaotic and debauched. The sacred vessels clattering
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onto the tables, the wine spilling.
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The roar of drunken laughter as idol after idol is praised.
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But then the revelry gives way to a deadly, suffocating
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silence. The shift in the room must have
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been completely terrifying. Suddenly, the fingers of a human
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hand appear out of nowhere. Just a disembodied hand.
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And they begin writing solemn words of judgment on the plaster
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of the wall right near the lampstand, where the king can
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see it clearly in the light. The biblical text uses
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incredibly visceral language to describe the King's physical
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reaction to this terror. It notes that the King's color
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changed. His thoughts alarmed him.
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His limbs gave way and his knees knocked together.
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The literal translation of the Aramaic is even more
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descriptive, isn't it? Yeah, something about the joints
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of his loins. Yes, the literal phrases.
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The joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one
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against another. That paints quite a picture.
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This is a physiological description of sheer panic.
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It implies either that his hips completely gave out and he
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collapsed into a heap, or quite literally, that he lost complete
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control of his bodily functions in his terror.
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One minute he is leading defiant, blasphemous cheers.
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And the next he is a wobbling, fainting coward, physically
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collapsing under the weight of divine judgement.
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And this terror is heightened because none of his Babylonian
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wise men can read the terrifying inscription.
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Not a single one of them. Finally, Daniel, a humble Jewish
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captive who has served his grandfather, is summoned, and
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Daniel fearlessly translates the message.
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The words written were many, many tickle Parson.
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Daniel breaks down the translation.
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Men A means God has numbered the days of your Kingdom and brought
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it to an end. Very straightforward.
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Tickle means you've been weighed in the balances and found
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wanting. And the last word.
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Parson means your Kingdom is divided and given to the Medes
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and Persians. But what makes this narrative so
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compelling is the external military strategy happening at
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the exact same moment. Right outside the walls.
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While Daniel is translating this message of doom inside the
22:08
impenetrable fortress, Cyrus the Great is executing A tactical
22:12
masterpiece outside. Let's look at how the Persian
22:15
army actually bypassed walls that were 80 feet thick.
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Ancient historians like Xenophon and Herodotus fill in the
22:21
specific details of that night. Cyrus knew he could not batter
22:25
down the walls. They were just too massive.
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And he knew a 20 year siege would be impossible to sustain
22:31
for his own troops. So he used a brilliant covert
22:34
tactic. He positioned his troops where
22:37
the Euphrates River entered the city and where it exited.
22:40
Then he took a large portion of his army upstream.
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They spent the siege working at night to dig massive trenches,
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diverting the mighty Euphrates River into a nearby swamp or
22:51
lake. On the very night of this
22:54
profligate banquet, historians dated precisely to the night of
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October 11th or 12th, 539 BC. The water level dropped.
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It dropped low enough that the invading Persian troops simply
23:06
waded into the city through the riverbed.
23:08
The water came up only to the middle of their thighs.
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And because the Babylonians were engaged in this massive
23:13
festival, they had carelessly left the internal brass gates
23:16
along the riverbanks unlocked. The invading army marched right
23:20
up from the riverbed into the heart of the city without a
23:22
single single major battle. According to Xenophon, the
23:25
troops rushed to the palace and killed Belshazzar in the very
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hall where the condemning handwriting had appeared.
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The mighty king was brought down from his throne permanently.
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In a single night, the greatest empire on earth changed hands
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because of a diverted river and a drunken party.
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And the second-half of Mary's prophecy is fulfilled in the
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same breath. Belshazzar is brought down.
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But who is exalted? Daniel.
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Daniel, the humble captive who spoke the truth without fear
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that very night. Darius Thamid takes over, but he
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retains Daniel. Elevating him to be one of the
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top three rulers in the entire Kingdom.
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The lowly estate is exalted to the highest levels of
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government. We see this pattern elsewhere in
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the Old Testament too. Think of Joseph rising from a
24:08
prison cell to rule Egypt. Or humble Mordecai overcoming
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the arrogant Haman in the Book of Esther.
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God routinely dismantles human structures of authority to
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elevate those whom society has marginalized or ignored.
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I usually think of something like a modern tech billionaires
24:23
doomsday bunker when I consider the social reversal.
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Oh, that is an interesting comparison.
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You have these individuals building massive self-sustaining
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fortresses underground in New Zealand or the American West.
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Preparing for the worst. And they are entirely convinced
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that their immense wealth and engineering can save them from
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any global collapse. They have their air filtration,
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their hydroponic gardens, their impenetrable steel doors.
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Exactly spot on, but all it takes is 1 overlooked flaw, a
24:54
ventilation shaft that floods or a security code that glitches.
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And the billions of dollars spent on self preservation
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become a highly engineered tomb. It is that same hubris, that
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same reliance on human capability right before reality
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proves how fragile we really are.
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That analogy captures the false security of wealth and
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engineering perfectly. But we must take this a step
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further and look at the supreme theological reality.
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Jesus Christ himself is the ultimate example of this social
25:22
reversal. Right when the Messiah arrived,
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he did not come as a conquering political king with an army to
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rival Rome. He descended into the ultimate
25:31
humiliation. He took the form of a servant.
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He suffered the agonizing, shameful death on a cross
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executed as a state criminal. But because of that willing
25:40
humiliation, God highly exalted him and bestowed on Him the name
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that is above every name. In God's economy, the directions
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are completely reversed. Down is up and up is down.
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The way up is down. Jesus said.
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The meek will inherit the earth. Not the aggressive.
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Not the socially dominant, not the ones who claw their way to
26:00
the top of the corporate ladder, but the meek.
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The world tells you to assert yourself, to build your own
26:05
prone to make sure everyone knows your accomplishments.
26:08
But the Gospel says that those who humble themselves under the
26:11
mighty hand of God will be exalted at the proper time.
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It is a complete inversion of human values.
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And this inversion brings us to the third and final reversal
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Mary predicts. Moving from Thrones to tables.
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We move from global rulers and geopolitical strategy down to
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everyday individuals looking at both literal and spiritual
26:31
appetites. Mary sings.
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He has filled the hungry with good things, and the affluent he
26:36
has sent away empty. This targets our daily lives
26:38
directly. Let's look at the historical
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connection Mary is drawing from the Old Testament.
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She is pulling from songs like The Song of Hannah and Psalm
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107. There is a strong link
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established here between physical need and spiritual
26:53
reality. While it is not an absolute
26:55
rule, the text suggests that those who are in physical or
26:59
material need are often much more likely to sense their
27:02
spiritual poverty. Yes, the Old Testament
27:04
consistently uses physical hunger and thirst as the primary
27:08
vocabulary for spiritual health. The Psalmist writes as a deer
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pants for flowing streams, So pants my soul for you, oh God.
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A deer panting for water is not casually looking for a drink.
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It is desperate. It is a matter of life and
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death. The Old Testament constantly
27:24
prescribes this kind of desperate spiritual hunger as
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the absolute prerequisite for spiritual health.
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You must recognize your emptiness before you can be
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filled. And the tragedy is that
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self-sufficiency kills that hunger entirely.
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It suffocates it. Let's look at the letter to
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Laodicean Church in Revelation chapter 3.
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This is a chilling diagnosis. To understand why it is so
27:44
chilling, we need to understand the socio economic reality of
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Laodicea in the 1st century. Set the stage for us.
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Laodicea was incredibly wealthy. It was a major banking center in
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the Roman Empire. So they had plenty of cash
27:57
flowing through. The Roman order Cicero actually
28:00
cashed his letters of credit there.
28:02
Wow. It was famous for producing a
28:04
specific breed of sheep that yielded a highly sought after
28:08
soft black wool. Which made the city a Center for
28:11
luxury clothing. And it housed a famous medical
28:13
school that produced Phrygian powder, a widely exported cell
28:17
for eye diseases. They had banking, luxury fashion
28:20
and big pharma all in one city. Precisely.
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And they were so wealthy that when a massive earthquake
28:26
destroyed the city around AD 60, the Roman historian Tacitus
28:30
records an amazing detail. What did they do?
28:32
Lay to see a refused imperial disaster relief from Rome.
28:35
They turned down free money. Paid to rebuild the city
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entirely out of their own pockets, they literally told the
28:42
Roman Empire we don't need your help.
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That historical context makes the letter in Revelation
28:48
devastating. The Spirit tells them, you say I
28:50
am wealthy, I have prospered and I need nothing.
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They carry that civic pride right into their spiritual
28:56
lives. They were completely oblivious
28:59
to their true condition. The spirit follows up by
29:01
attacking their specific industries, right?
29:04
Yes, he tells them. They are actually wretched,
29:08
pitiable, poor attacking their banking.
29:11
Blind attacking their eyesalve industry.
29:13
And naked attacking their luxury wool industry.
29:15
They had full bank accounts, but they were spiritually bankrupt
29:19
and completely unaware of. It their material abundance had
29:22
created a fatal, false sense of spiritual security.
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This is the danger of. Fullness When all your physical
29:28
needs are met, when you can buy whatever you want, and when you
29:31
can rebuild your own city after an earthquake, it is incredibly
29:35
easy to believe that you are self-sufficient in every area of
29:39
life. Including your relationship with
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God. Exactly.
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Absolutely. I need to ask a practical
29:44
question here on behalf of anyone listening who might be
29:47
feeling a big guilty right now. Let's hear it.
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Does this mean that having a full pantry or having a well
29:52
funded 4-O1K or living in a comfortable home is inherently a
29:57
sin? That is a critical distinction
30:00
to make. Does God only favor the
30:02
literally destitute? No.
30:04
Material abundance is not inherently sinful.
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The text of Scripture is full of individuals whom God blessed
30:10
with massive material wealth. Like Abraham?
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Or Job or King David. The issue Mary is highlighting
30:17
is not the presence of wealth, but the illusion of
30:19
self-sufficiency it creates. The danger is that material
30:22
abundance can quickly dull A budding spiritual appetite.
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When you have everything you physically need, you stop
30:28
feeling desperate for God. You stop panting like a deer for
30:31
water. And you start casually sipping
30:33
from the streams of comfort. That brings to mind the story of
30:36
the affluent young ruler who approached Jesus.
30:39
A perfect example. He had kept the law externally,
30:42
he was highly moral and he was very wealthy.
30:45
But when Jesus told him to sell his possessions and follow him,
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the young man walked away sorrowful.
30:50
He missed Christ entirely. And he missed Christ, not
30:54
necessarily because wealth itself is evil, but because his
30:57
wealth had filled him up so much that he wasn't hungry enough for
31:01
the Savior. His desire to keep his material
31:03
possessions dulled his spiritual appetite.
31:06
And so, exactly as Mary predicted.
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Well, precisely as Mary predicted, the affluent man was
31:11
sent away empty. Contrast him with the
31:13
individuals in the gospel narratives who are desperately
31:16
hungry. Like who?
31:18
Think of young Mary, herself, a peasant girl in a backwater.
31:21
Town. Or think of the aged Simeon and
31:23
Anna waiting decades in the Temple for the consolation of
31:26
Israel. Think of the rough fishermen who
31:28
dropped their Nets at a single command, or the despised tax
31:32
gatherers who knew they were social outcasts.
31:35
These were people who knew they were empty.
31:37
They possessed a desperate spiritual hunger, and because
31:40
they came empty, they went away eternally full.
31:43
Jesus later codified this in this Sermon on the Mount.
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Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for
31:49
they shall be satisfied. There is a striking paradox in
31:52
this satisfaction. I want to bring in a quote from
31:54
a 12th century monk, Bernard of Clervau, because he captured
31:57
this dynamic beautifully. What did he say?
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He wrote a hymn that says, We taste the O thou living bread,
32:04
and long to feast upon thee, still we drink of thee The
32:08
Fountainhead, and thirst our souls from thee to fill the.
32:11
Cyclical nature of this spiritual reality defies normal
32:14
physical rules. Physically, when you eat a
32:17
massive meal, you are full and you don't want to think about
32:20
food for hours. Your hunger is gone.
32:23
Right, you just want to take a nap.
32:24
But in the spiritual realm it works differently.
32:26
We hunger and God fills us. And that filling brings a
32:30
substantial deep. But rather than ending our
32:33
appetite, that satisfaction actually creates an expanded
32:37
capacity for a deeper hunger. Which is then followed by an
32:40
even greater feeling. It is an ever expanding cycle of
32:43
desiring God, being satisfied by Him, and thereby growing to
32:48
desire Him even more. It is a beautiful cycle, but
32:52
let's bring the relevance directly to the listener today.
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Why do so many people miss this grace?
32:56
Why do so many people walk away empty today?
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And they miss it because they simply have no hunger.
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Our modern world is a master class and distraction.
33:05
We are constantly busy. We are the most entertaining,
33:08
overstimulated, well fed society in human history.
33:12
People are constantly filling themselves with trivialities.
33:15
We gorge ourselves on the junk food of modern entertainment.
33:18
Streaming services, Endless social media feeds, Political
33:21
outrage. Career ambitions.
33:23
They are constantly snacking on digital content.
33:26
We feel full, but we are starving, and because we make no
33:30
serious effort to seek God, because we bring no hunger to
33:33
the table, we are sent away empty.
33:35
We are stuffed but not satisfied.
33:38
We have looked at these severe mighty reversals.
33:41
God shatters the arrogant mind. He topples the secure Thrones of
33:44
the mighty. He sends the self satisfied away
33:47
empty handed. After detailing A narrative that
33:49
turns the entire world upside down, how does this resolve
33:52
right? Where is the hope for the
33:54
listener who recognizes their own pride or their own lack of
33:57
hunger? Yeah.
33:58
How does Mary conclude this sweeping vision?
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She concludes by anchoring everything in the eternal
34:03
covenant. We look at verses 54 and 55.
34:06
Mary sings. He has helped His servant Israel
34:09
in remembrance of His mercy, as He spoke to our fathers, to
34:12
Abraham, and to His offspring forever.
34:15
After looking at the terrifying justice of God against the
34:18
proud, she lands firmly on His mercy.
34:21
And she traces this mercy all the way back to the book of
34:24
Genesis, chapter 12, verse 3. Where God made a covenant with
34:27
Abraham to bless all the families of the earth.
34:30
This is the finished work. This is the guarantee.
34:33
Mary recognizes that this entire plan of redemption is not a new
34:37
idea, It is the fulfillment of an ancient promise.
34:40
Then the New Testament makes it clear that this is not just a
34:42
promise for ethnic Israel. Precisely, the Apostle Paul
34:45
explains in Romans chapter 4 and Chapter 9 that through faith,
34:49
all believers are the spiritual descendants of Abraham.
34:53
We are the spiritual seed. This means that the covenant
34:55
mercy Mary is singing about extends to us forever.
34:59
The reversal she predicted are terrifying if you were standing
35:02
on the side of human pride. But they are incredibly
35:04
comforting if you rely on God's sovereign mercy.
35:07
His mercy is just as much a guaranteed reality as His
35:10
justice. What stands out to me in all of
35:12
this is the realization of total reliance.
35:15
We bring absolutely nothing to the table.
35:18
Mary recognized that she could do absolutely nothing to bring
35:22
about her own deliverance. She's a poor girl in a forgotten
35:25
village under the thumb of the Roman Empire.
35:27
She could not deliver herself, and she certainly could not
35:30
deliver the nation of Israel. Her entire hope, and our entire
35:33
hope rests completely on God's sovereign mercy.
35:36
He has to do the work. He has to bring down the mighty.
35:39
He has to fill the hungry. We simply bring our emptiness.
35:43
And that is the crux of the matter.
35:44
We bring nothing but our need. The principles God uses to deal
35:48
with the individual soul are the exact same principles he uses to
35:52
deal with the nation's. He humbles the proud and gives
35:55
grace to the humble. So let's summarize the
35:57
overarching theme of our deep dive today.
36:01
Through the lens of Mary's song, we see that Jesus Christ turns
36:04
the world completely on its head.
36:06
Morally, he scatters the proud and those who harbor arrogant
36:09
thoughts in their hearts, shattering minds that refuse to
36:12
bow. Socially, he brings down the
36:14
mighty rulers from their secure Thrones, bypassing their walls
36:18
and lifting up those of lowly, humble estate.
36:21
Spiritually, he fills the desperately hungry with good
36:24
things, but the self-sufficient, the affluent and the distracted,
36:29
he sends away completely empty. The way up is down.
36:32
Emptiness is the prerequisite for fullness.
36:35
It is a radical reordering of reality.
36:37
The through of the wave may feel low, but it is the safest place
36:41
to be when the justice of God sweeps across the ocean of human
36:45
history. I want to leave you with a final
36:47
thought to chew on as you go about your day.
36:49
Think about the areas in your life right now where you feel
36:52
the most defeated. A great question to ponder.
36:55
Think about the places where you feel the most lowly, the most
36:57
insignificant, or the most desperately hungry for answers
37:00
or relief. What if those exact areas of
37:03
perceived weakness are actually the precise locations where God
37:07
is preparing to administer His greatest spiritual satisfaction?
37:10
What if your current emptiness is simply the carving out of a
37:13
vessel meant to hold an eternal weight of mercy?
37:16
Keep seeking the truth, keep recognizing your need, and watch
37:20
how the Crest of the wave reveals a horizon you never
37:22
expected. Thanks for joining us today on
37:24
this deep dive and take care.