Sing: Hark the Herald Angels Sing
Luke 1:26-38
26 In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, 27 to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28 The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
29 Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. 30 But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. 31 You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus.32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, 33 and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”
34 “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”
35 The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. 36 Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. 37 For no word from God will ever fail.”
38 “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.
This text is foundational to Christmas. It is very familiar to all of us. I think most Christians would have no trouble reciting the basics of this story of the angel appearing to Mary and telling her she would have a baby who would be Jesus, the Son of God. This is what Christmas is all about. Maybe in popularity and familiarity it’s only second to the 2nd chapter of Luke when the angels appear to the shepherds and that’s probably only because Linus recites that in A Charlie Brown Christmas. We all know this text, but how often do we stop and really consider it. Has it become so familiar to us we just take it for granted that we know what it says?
Speaking for myself, when I studied this text for this sermon, I discovered information that I hadn’t realized was there. And I also noticed that I had superimposed some information into the text that is not there. For example, I have always had it in my mind that the text tells us that Mary was immediately at peace with what the angel Gabriel told her. Where did that idea come from?
After the angel spoke to her, what does the text say about Mary? Does it say, “and she was filled with peace” or something to that effect? No, it doesn’t. It says that when the angel appeared to her, she was greatly troubled, and the angel tells her not to be afraid. And after the angel tells her the news, she asks the angel, “How will this be?” The text doesn’t actually tell us anything about Mary being at peace.
Something else that I found interesting is that Gabriel, the same angel, had earlier appeared to Zechariah and told him that his wife, who was past the age of childbearing, would have a child. When Zechariah hears this, he asks the angel, “How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.”
19 The angel said to him, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. 20 And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their appointed time” (Luke 1:18-20).
The angel took Zechariah’s voice away because he didn’t believe him. Why didn’t Gabriel take Mary’s voice away? She, just like Zechariah, asked, “how this could happen?” What was the difference?
Is that why I have always assumed Mary immediately was at peace? Because the angel didn’t take Mary’s voice away?
What Mary says last might be the key to why she didn’t lose her voice like Zechariah did.
38 “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.
She accepted what the angel told her. She submitted to what God wanted to do, but did she have peace?
To start with, we should define peace. Is peace like a placid lake without any wind? Is it the same thing as calm? Is peace the absence of trouble?
Last week I said that hope only exists in the waiting.
I wonder, does peace only exist because of storms?
Philosophers would probably take exception to my pondering. You might want to argue this with me, but go with me for a minute.
What is peace? Let’s look at what it is not. Peace is not apathy. It is not the same thing as not caring. Peace is also not the same thing as friendship or love.
I think a lot of people would define peace as the absence of war. If you describe a nation as at peace, that means a war has ceased. The nation stopped fighting and reached peace. They laid down their weapons. But peace is different from rest. Think beyond the technical definition of peace as in an armistice. Think about emotional peace. You could have a lovely day off from work and be relaxing lazily by a fire, drinking hot cocoa, and be completely and utterly not at peace. Inside you could be worried, anxious or restless, which means you are not at peace. Or you could be in a hospital room, facing a complicated surgery and yet be perfectly at peace.
You know how you can’t have courage or bravery without fear? By definition of those words, a person has to be in a situation that is tough or generally scary for the action or attitude to be defined as courageous or brave. For example, it isn’t courageous or brave to rub the belly of a cat who loves belly rubs. It is only brave if you did that to a cat you thought might scratch or bite you. There has to be some element of fear or it isn’t bravery. Being brave or courageous means you face the fear and do the thing, regardless.
Is peace sort of like that? If peace is the absence of war, then if war never existed, would the word peace even exist? If we define a word based on it being the opposite of another word, if that word was never invented, then wouldn’t its inverse cease to exist too? Is it peace if there wasn’t a conflict to begin with? For example, if a lake’s surface never rippled and never was blown around by the wind, would we describe that water as peaceful when it was calm? Wouldn’t we instead say the water in that lake seems stagnant? It’s not moving at all. We might wonder if there is anything even alive in that water. Have all the fish died? I think we say a lake is peaceful because there is just enough wind to show us the contrast. It’s kind of like how a candle won’t give off any light in a bright room, but in a dark room, the candle really shows up. Is peace like that?
With Mary, why do we think she had peace? She concludes in verse 38, “I am the Lord’s servant […] may your word to me be fulfilled.” Maybe we interpret that as peace because we know she is in the middle of a personal crisis. Because otherwise, why would we think her response is one of peace? Instead, couldn’t we interpret her response as apathy, indifference, or boredom? We could even choose to interpret that response as a sort of dreadful resignation or depression. The point I want to make is that there is no adjective that tells us about her emotions in that statement. It doesn’t say, “Joyfully, Mary said, ‘I am the Lord’s servant.’” The last emotion the text tells us about her was that she was afraid. I think we rightfully infer that she is responding with peace only because we understand that her entire life has just been changed. An angel just appeared to her! And he told her that should would miraculously get pregnant! And her baby, “He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end” (Luke 1:32 &33).
Talk about monumental news! I think we recognize she is at peace because she isn’t freaking out and, by all logic, she has reason to panic. Happy or not, news of that magnitude can only be described as a storm. I think because there is this storm, we can perceive her peace.
If you go with my hypothesis, that peace only exists because of storms, then what are the implications of that statement.
In John 16:33, Jesus says, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
In this world there is trouble, there are storms, but take heart, in Jesus we can have peace.
When everything is in upheaval, big changes happen in our lives, we experience sorrow and pain or when everything that could go wrong seems to go wrong at the same moment, Jesus says we can have peace. We can have peace in Jesus because He has overcome the world.
As long as we live on this present earth, there will be trouble. There will always be storms. That means, if my reasoning is logical, then there is always the potential for peace. But peace, true peace, can only be found in Jesus.
In our society, people lack peace. More and more states have voted to legalize marijuana. I think that is because people are trying to find peace. They want to chill out and numb their emotions. Other people take prescription medications to accomplish the same thing. Still others use escapism, distractions, or chase experiences trying to find their peace. I understand. The world is full of changes, trouble and storms. That is why Jesus’ promise is so significant. He promises we can have peace in Him.
In Jesus, we find our peace because He has become our peace. The reason Jesus came to earth and was born as a baby, suffered and died was because our world is full of storms. If our world was perfect, if Adam and Eve never sinned and sin was never brought into this world, then why would Jesus have had to come to earth as a baby? Jesus our peace, exists as a human because of the sin, the turmoil, the storms of sin.
Now I know I’m teetering on a fine line of some pretty complicated theology, but don’t fall off. Jesus came to earth to be the Savior of the world because of sin. He was born as a baby so He could live the perfect life that we cannot live. He took our sin on the cross and because He triumphed over sin and death by rising from the dead, He has overcome the world and that is why, if we have faith in Him, we can have peace. That is what I mean by: He has become our peace.
Christmastime is the perfect opportunity to share this message of Jesus becoming our peace with the world. People, myself included, hang up Christmas word-art that says, “Peace.”
So many of the traditional Christmas Carols talk about peace. We sing “peace on earth and mercy mild” or “peace on earth goodwill toward men” for example. An often quoted Christmas scripture prophesying about Jesus says, “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace” (Isaiah 9:6).
We all seem to know that Jesus’ birth has ushered in peace. But simply hanging up the signs, singing the carols, lighting some candles, and sitting around a fire doesn’t bring us the kind of peace that Jesus is talking about. The peace that Jesus brings is eternal. It is sustaining during the storms. As Philippians 4:7 tells us, “… the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Mary did not understand how this could be, but she believed anyway and respond in agreement to what the angel said. She said, “May your word to me be fulfilled.”
I think another way we could say that is, “May your will be done.”
I have found in my own life that when I simply say to the Lord, “may your will be done,” then I too experience peace. The times that seem the least peaceful are when I try to assert my will in any given situation. When I go to the Lord in prayer and give Him the problem or worry, then He can fill me with His peace. It doesn’t mean I understand anything any better. But His peace supersedes the worry. I have also found that the greater the storm, the greater the peace I feel. I think that has something to do with this promise: The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit (Psalm 34:18).
I think Jesus, the Prince of Peace, draws closer to us when we are in the midst of storms. That has been my experience and I’ve read countless other testimonies of believers who say the same thing. Even to the point where people will say that they are glad they suffered such-and-such a storm because it brought them closer to the Lord and they would not trade that for anything. Peace shows up when there are storms.
Storms reveal to us what has been true all along, but we forget sometimes: we need Jesus. We need the Prince of Peace to guard our hearts and minds so that we can respond to Him like Mary did: May your word to me be fulfilled. When we do that, then we find peace.
Sing: As We’re Waiting and Waiting
Pray: Lord Jesus, our Prince of Peace, thank You for loving us so much that You would humble Yourself to come to earth and be born in a lowly manger. We love You and praise You for Your sacrificial love for us. This advent time as we look forward to celebrating Your birth, please fill us with peace. Help us to come before You and spend time with You each day. We need You to be our peace in the midst of every storm and every ordinary day. Help us, Holy Spirit, to say, may Your word to me be fulfilled, each and every moment. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.
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