Pastor Will Stoll Northwest Church
May 13, 2012; Mothers Day
Sermon: “I Am The Lord’s Servant”
Scripture Reference: Luke 1:25-56

Last week I was not here, so you heard a message from Paul (Mavrogeorge). Just to recap where we have been – and where we are not going to go today – we are not going to talk about Song of Solomon today. But, where we were – Song of Solomon, chapter 4, these two lovers get together; they are virgins; they have done everything right; everything is perfect in their lives; they get married and it’s wonderful! Then 90% of you out there are saying, “What about us?” What about the rest of us who have had problems in our lives? Maybe you are on your second marriage; maybe you have had problems in the marriage; maybe you were not perfect before I got married; what about us? Last week Paul came and preached on Blocked Intimacy – what are some things that can happen in your life that block intimacy? Probably most of us are saying, “That happened, that happened; oh, yeah, okay – now what do we do?” And he said, “Pray about it – and we’ll tell you next week.” And you are like, “Oh, thank you – pray about it! Sunday school answer!” No offense, Paul, wherever you are. So he said to come back next week, and that is now and this is Mothers Day, so what I am going to tell you is that we have all the answers for you from the Word of God, but you have to come back next week for that.

Next week we’ll be talking about the road back to intimacy. So if you have had some events in your life that have blocked intimacy in your marriage or whatever relationships you have had, we’ll talk about that next week and actually for the next four weeks in the book of Song of Solomon. So I hope you will join us for that.

But today it is Mothers Day. For most of us today, if you are a Mom, Mothers Day is kind of bittersweet. I have a bittersweet experience every single night. I put my kids to bed – Layla, Reilly in the front row here – they share a bed and I’m like, “Okay, girls, here’s your water, they’ve had their snack.” Then it’s “I need my pill for my allergies; I need my spray” – so we go through all of that. Then we have a story, then Layla prays, then Reilly prays, then I pray and, “You want to sing a song?” “No, I don’t want to sing a song tonight.” Finally, after this whole process, “Go to bed now. Stay in bed.” Then I go back to my room where Katie is with the baby and I sit down next to her and about five or ten minutes later, a little blonde head pokes around, “What, Reilly?” “I have to go to the bathroom.” Now what Dad is going to deny bathroom rights to his kid? It’s not that I haven’t tried – but it has disastrous results! Go to the bathroom, go back – then a few minutes later – “My stomach hurts.” Now, what Father is going to deny medical care to their kids? Right here! So it is bittersweet because it’s sweet in that I want to see my kids’ faces – they’re so cute! But I also want them to obey me, too. That’s how a lot of you feel on Mothers Day.

You are saying, “I love this day when Mothers are honored, but I come to church and hear a sermon and the sermon goes like this: ‘Don’t be like Jezebel, be more like the Proverbs 31 woman who cooks, cleans, shines her husband’s shoes, goes out and works, and does all this stuff with a good attitude.’” You are saying, “Okay, I’ve heard that message. Here’s the routine – I know how this goes.” Well, today we are not going to do that.

Today we are going to look at a very Godly woman, Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and we are going to look at a woman who was not Godly because she followed every rule and checked every box. She was Godly because she was placed in a situation that was really difficult. Insurmountable difficulty – and she completely relied on God. From her life, whether you are a man or a woman, a child, a mother – whoever you might be, you are going to get something out of this from God.

Turn to Luke, Chapter 1 and we’ll start with verse 26. If you can’t find Luke, look in the Table of Contents that God placed right in the front of your Bible. He put it there so you can find the Book of Luke.

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth,

Gabriel was a pretty special angel. The last time we saw Gabriel in the Bible was in Daniel – 600 years earlier – where God sent Gabriel to deliver a message to Daniel that a Messiah would come. Now God chooses the very same angel to go and tell Mary that when He delivered the Messiah, that she would be doing that task.

Here’s the point – God doesn’t allow anything in your life to happen by coincidence. The fact that you are sitting here today is not an accident. You might think, “I only came because so and so invited me and I had to do it; it’s one of those Mothers Day things; I only came because I saw the sign and decided to come in.” God has you here for a very particular reason. Nothing is coincidence. And if you just take a look at your life and think about all the circumstances going on, you are going to see a lot of “coincidence.” What you are really going to notice is that God is weaving together the fabric of your life in a pretty amazing way. And that is what He is doing with Mary.

Verse 27 says this:

to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin's name was Mary.

So they are betrothed – Joseph and Mary are betrothed, which is like a super engagement. If they guy you are betrothed dies, you are actually a widow! You cannot have any kind of sexual relations before the marriage, but it is binding. So she is in a very hemmed-in situation when she gets this news from Gabriel.

The first thing I want you to see, though is that Mothers are highly favored. Look at verse 28:

And he (the angel Gabriel) came to her and said, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!”

Two times in this passage, Mary is going to be called “a favored one.” Favor is God’s grace. Mary was given God’s grace. Now, a lot of people would look at Mary and say, “Well, the reason she was given God’s grace is because of her amazing character.” Now, you are going to see that she does have great character; she is an amazing young lady – actually, young woman, because betrothal would happen right after puberty, so she is 13 or 14 years old. But that is not how grace works. Grace is not bestowed because of your great character. In fact, the word grace means “unmerited favor.” God gave Mary favor she did not deserve. In fact, a few verses later we are going to see her say, “My soul rejoices in God, my Savior.” She is going to say, “I need a Savior because I am a sinner.” When the angel goes and talks to Joseph in Matthew 1:21, he said, “You need to call this Son’s name Jesus because He will save His people from their sin.” And what Mary is saying is, “I am in that number; I am someone who needs to be saved from my sins.”

So today we are not going to worship Mary; we are not going to pray to Mary; we are not going to enshrine her – God would never want us to do that. We wouldn’t want to do that with Titus or with Moses or any other person from the Bible. You wouldn’t want to do that with a person you have known who is not from the Bible. We wouldn’t want to enshrine or revere someone like Bufe Karraker. He worked in this church as the pastor for over 30 years. Or someone I got to know pretty well, Opa Williams. He would never want anything like that. He was a missionary in Indonesia for 60+ years and it is very tempting to enshrine people like these. In fact, even Peter got tempted to do this – one time he was on the mountain with Jesus and Jesus was transfigured before his eyes and he becomes light and glowing. Peter is like, “No way!” Then here comes Elijah and Moses! And Peter thinks this is so great to see all three and he says, “Jesus, why don’t we just build a tabernacle for each one of you? We could go in there and worship you – you guys are awesome!” Then God speaks and God said, “Peter, this is My Son!” It’s like, “That is my son (Jesus) – those are people (Elijah and Moses). Big difference.” And that is what God wants us to see about anybody – whether it is Mary or Paul or Peter or a person you know.

My favorite verse in the Bible is James 5:17 where James just says: “Elijah was a man like us!” Taking a prophet who was revered more than anyone else and saying he is “a man, just like us.” Elijah prayed that it would not rain and it didn’t – for over three years! So – we are just people. Today my goal is to honor motherhood as God honored motherhood. God honored motherhood through Mary because God could have allowed Jesus to come in many ways. It could have been a stork – Jesus could have been delivered by a stork. I don’t remember how Superman came, but I don’t think he was born, he was just delivered. But God said, “No, I am going to allow My Son to come through a woman,” and in doing that, He honored motherhood.

Jesus honored motherhood. From the cross, one of the last things He did was say, “John, behold your mother; take care of your mother now.” Mary, Jesus’ mother. Because God honored motherhood, He has given you special grace. There is a special grace for the billions of women across the globe who are single – whether you have chosen to be single or it is a special calling, you are not married. In that, you don’t have that relationship with a husband or children, but God has a special grace for you. There is a special grace for you single moms who are raising your children alone and that element of marriage is painfully missing in your life every single day. You are working hard, double or maybe even triple as hard as you would have to. God has a special grace for you. There is a special grace for you women who are married, whether it be that you physically cannot have children or your husband doesn’t want children, or some other reason that may be medical or not – that you don’t have children. There is a special grace that God has for you. There is a special grace that God has for you women who have children and working in the home, getting your home the way it needs to be. Maybe you have part-time or full-time employment outside the house and you are trying to weave this whole thing together and it is difficult. God has a special grace for you. God has a special grace for you “women of influence” – who maybe are not influencing your own children and maybe you have no children of your own, but there are other people in your life that you are “mothering.” And that’s a real thing. How many of you in this room were greatly influenced by a woman who may have been a teacher, coach, maybe a mother-in-law? Raise your hands. You are testimony to the fact that you women of influence are doing your job every day. Someone other than our moms was at work in our lives and God used them. There is a special grace for you.

I want to honor you women today because you are not going to get that honor from the secular world. You need to get it right here from the Word of God. So the Bible says that Mary found grace in God’s eyes; God’s favor. The neat thing about God’s grace is that God’s grace banishes two things: fear and judgment. When you get grace from God, you say, “I’m not getting His judgment and I’m not getting fear!” No – shame, judgment, fear – those things really mess with your emotions and cause all kinds of disfunction in your life and in the lives of people around you. The thing you need and I need more than anything else in this world is God’s grace. We need it and we need to give it, offer it.

Number two – Mothers are created for a special purpose. Look at verse 29:

But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”

Mothers are created for a special purpose. Now Mary was created to give birth to Jesus, the Son of God, the Messiah. That’s a pretty special purpose and a pretty special child. But all children are special. Whoever you have influence over, whoever you have given birth to or have adopted, those children are special. Elizabeth, in a few verses later, would say to Mary, “Blessed is the fruit of your womb.” What does the Bible say children are? A blessing. The Bible says they are a blessing! In Psalm 127:3, the Bible says:

Children are a heritage from the Lord and the fruit of the womb a reward.

Now the world says they are a curse – “You’re going to get fat; you’re going to get stretch marks; they’re going to burp and poop; they’re going to throw up; they’re going to keep you up at night; they’re going to be expensive; they are going to be an inconvenience.” No! The Bible says they are a blessing. You know, last week I was gone for one day, Saturday night and a little bit of Sunday. And when I came home, I got Layla and Reilly to run and greet me like I had been gone for two weeks! They throw their arms around me – as soon as I open the door, before I can see anything, I can hear, “Dada” from Abby, 16 months old and she’s waiting for me. She knows I’m gone, but I’ll be coming home! It is such a blessing to have that kind of love. Children are a blessing and, Mothers, you were created for those blessings.

Number three – look at verse 34 – Mothers have questions:

And Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?”

Now if Mary had been a man, the first thing said would have been, “How do I know you are an angel? How do I know you are telling the truth?” None of that with Mary – she had faith. Women – you have amazing faith! It’s sort of innate inside of you. Instead of, “I don’t trust you;” she asks, “How is this possible? I’m a virgin. How could I have a baby? I understand how all this works the last four or five thousand years – what’s going on now?” Moms have questions. Mothers, you are either going to ask or you are going to act. You are going to ask your questions or act like you know what you are doing – but we all have questions. There are a lot of things in your lives – maybe in your home or your family – where you say, “This just doesn’t feel right.” If something doesn’t feel right, something isn’t right! What do you do with those questions? Just bury them and act like things are fine? Or do you seek out the answers to those questions? Mary asked, “I have questions.” Ask your questions. Ask God your questions – then expect an answer. You can ask other people who are close to you; maybe you have a mentor in your life. We have a program in our church where we can help you get a mentor – whether you are a man or a woman. Maybe go to a Christian bookstore and find your answers from books. Go to a Christian website like Focus on the Family, but don’t bury those questions – get answers! That’s what Mary did.

In verse 35, she got the answer:

And the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; . . .

Most questions in life do have an answer: You need God! That is the answer.

. . . therefore the child to be born will be called holy— the Son of God.

Number four – Mothers need God. Six times in these two chapters you hear, “the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Holy spirit.” That’s Who Mary needed; that’s Who you need; that’s Who I need and I rely on – the Holy Spirit.

On Friday night last week, Ronnie (Welong) was in town – our missionary from Indonesia, and we went over to a neighbor of mine’s house. They live a block away from us, and we went over there because Blaine invited Ronnie to come over and witness to his sister-in-law, Xynon, who is a Muslim. So we sat down at the table and we talked and just had some small talk about Jesus and Christianity and Islam and that kind of thing and after about ten minutes, Ronnie said, “Look, Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, Confucianism, it doesn’t matter – it doesn’t matter what you are. We all have the same problem before God. All of us have sinned! We have all sinned before God – the same God.”

He said, “Xynon, have you sinned?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Have you already paid for your sins?”

“No, I haven’t.

He opened his Bible to Romans 5 where it says we are ungodly, an enemy of God, and when we were ungodly, Jesus died for us. He died for you when you were ungodly. He read from Chapter 10, verse 9, “If you confess Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart God was raised from the dead, you will be saved!”

And she said, “That is very convincing.”

And Ronnie said, “But you don’t have to go to church, or go here and do this – do you confess Jesus as your Lord?” And he just looked at her.

Then she said, “Jesus is my Lord.”

We were like, “Whoa!” And just like that, the scales fell off her eyes! Incredible! So then we said, “She’s going back to Singapore in a month. What to do? It’s all Muslim there, what do you do?”

Ronnie said, “No problem. You go back and be wise. Do not tell them you are a Christian unless they ask you. Just live for God and when the situation comes up, you do this (in his Asian English) – Depend to God!”

We got it. “Depend to God” – what does that mean? When the situation comes up and there is tension or a problem, you just say, “Lord, I need you; I’m going to trust in You for wisdom and for the strength for the answer. I’m going to depend on You.” That is relying on the power of the Holy Spirit. You don’t live in a Muslim country, but you need to “depend to God,” don’t you? If you are a Mom, if you are a Dad, if you are a child – all of us have situations in our lives that we cannot control and cannot handle. And that is when you depend on God! And the way you do that is to say, “Okay, in my own heart I am going to stop and say, ‘Lord, I need You. Help me to see what You see in this situation. Hear Your voice – what I need to do or not do in this situation.’” Depend on God.

And that is what Mary said – “I need God.” And the angel said, “He is there.”

Number five – Mothers need family. Verse 36:

And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.”

So, Mary’s cousin is six months pregnant and the angel said, “She’s pregnant, too, and this was said to be impossible. But nothing is impossible with God, so go to her.” Moms, you need some family in your life. Now, for some of you this is difficult, because there are issues in your family. For my family, we just live so far away – we live 3,000 miles away from our family. So, for us, what God has done is provide us with a small group, and we had been here a little less than a year and we were in our small group. To be very honest, a couple of years ago, at that point we were still a little lonely. Still a long way from family. And one day Katie got a text message from a lady in our small group that we had gotten close to her family – her name is Stephanie and she texted, “I’m pregnant. Are you?” No one was trying to have any babies. And Katie texted her back, “Just found out an hour ago – yes!” So God – in His own way – literally the same day, put us together. We had been in the same small group for six months or a year, but now it’s like – okay, we’re on this journey together; we’re in this life stage thing together – that we both understand. By the say, when we do our small groups we like people to be in a life stage together. If I have one of you in my small group and you are 20 years past having kids, we talk about being up late with the kids and you are like, “Oh, that’s nothing – my back hurts so bad!” You know – and I’ll say, “What do you mean? Your whole schedule is free! You don’t have to do anything . . .” So it’s good to be in the same life stage.

So – what you are going to see is Mary is going to visit Elizabeth, and when she gets there, they both have something in common! They are both pregnant. There is Elizabeth saying, “I’m six months pregnant; Mary, you won’t believe it, the other day I laughed so hard that . . .” And that’s where Joseph say, “Okay, I’m going to leave. I don’t think I put the parking brake on the mule. I have to make sure that’s done – I don’t want to hear any more pregnancy stories, I’ve heard enough!” But, you women get it. You need people around you – whether it’s a family member or someone who is kind of like family. Someone close in your life – and that’s what God gave to Mary.

Number six: Great mothers are humble servants. Look at verse 38:

And Mary said, “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.

So Mary hears this message, “You are going to have Jesus.” But she heard something else. She heard this, “Everything in your life as you know it is going to be turned upside down. You have had a great testimony; you have kept yourself pure; you come from a nice family and everything. Guess what? Everyone is going to think you are a tramp! And two thousand years later, there will be liberals writing commentaries about you and how you got with a Roman soldier and how this is an illegitimate child – and your name is going to be mud! Nobody is going to believe you!” And you know what she said? “I’m the servant of the Lord. I will do what You want me to do.” That’s huge.

There have been a lot of important tasks throughout history – Paul Revere in the 1775 had to ride through the streets of Boston saying, “The Redcoats are coming!” A lot of things could have gone wrong. The horse could have fallen; he could have gotten lost; he could have forgotten the message. Whatever! With Mary . . . Moms, you know how it is when you are pregnant, you worry about everything – “I hope the baby is getting enough nutrients; what if the baby’s heart stops breathing; what if I fall . . .” She’s thinking the same things – “What if I fall off a donkey and hurt God – or Jesus – or whatever this is inside of me – what happens?” Big job.

But you know what? Mary is not the only one with a big job. In the movie Madagascar, there was a zebra named Marty. He lived in the Central Park Zoo and he was the coolest zebra anywhere around – because he was the only zebra around! He could do stuff that no other zebra around could do and he knew it. He knew he was awesome – until these animals escaped to Africa. They get there and Marty comes to the realization that there are thousands of zebras here that can do everything I can do. In the same way, Mary is not alone. God is calling you to do exactly what He is calling Mary to do. And that is this – say one thing - whatever circumstances you find yourself in today, you say, “I am a servant of the Lord. But I am in a circumstance I didn’t choose and it should not have happened; I didn’t expect it to happen – but I will serve the Lord under these conditions.” Will you say that? That is what makes Mary so extraordinary. “I will do what You have called me to do.” God has not called anyone in here to give birth to the Son of God. But He is calling you to do what He is calling you to do – and that is this, “I will serve the Lord right now.”

The last thing we see here is Great mothers glorify God. Verse 46 and following is called “The Magnificant.” Mary says:

And Mary said,
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, . . .”
She sings a whole song about “God is my Savior; I am a sinner, this One is going to save me. My own Son will be the Messiah and I rejoice in Him.”
Now, we are in the throes of the NBA playoffs, the NFL draft just finished, Major League baseball is in full gear – great time to be a sports fan. I’m a big fan, I love football and these sports, and when my team scores a touchdown, nobody has to tell me what to do. I never had to make a conscious decision to do a fist pump, or a clap and a fist pump, a “Yeah!” maybe two “Yeahs!” It just comes out naturally and I don’t have to think about it. Something inside of you just lets you know what to do! When God comes through in your life, when God is there for you, the natural response is praise. And that is what Mary does. She says, “I’m not worthy. You are everything. You are so great, God!”
I hope that is your response today when you realize the Holy Spirit is there for you. You can “depend to God!” You can say, “I will serve You; I’m going to do what You have called me to do; I’m going to depend on You.” You can find God’s grace in that. You are going to find that God’s grace is there for you – you don’t deserve it – it is unmerited, but it is there for you in full supply! And it’s pretty awesome.
Okay, I have to share one more thing. Final thought: What is going to happen to you if you depend on God? Everything is going to be Hebrews, chapter 11. Once again, go to the Table of Contents, find the book of Hebrews, because this is worth seeing in your Bible. Underline this, highlight it – you don’t want to forget this one – this is a really good passage. Hebrews 11:30 and we’ll read a few more verses here. This is called the faith chapter of the Bible – the Hall of Faith. The Bible says here:
By faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encircled for seven days. 31 By faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient, because she had given a friendly welcome to the spies.
And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets— who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Women received back their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated— of whom the world was not worthy— wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.

Wait a minute – what is God saying? “When you depend on God, everything is going to be . . . .” I don’t know. And that’s how Mary was. How was it for Mary when she depended on God? Well, not everyone believed her – maybe Joseph. She had one believer. Then she got through that and Jesus becomes this great kid – “Oh, Mary, you have such a great kid (despite everything)!” “We love Jesus.” Then Jesus does some miracles, and they say, “Oh, you’re great!” Then He says something that ticks them all off and they say, “Mary, what is wrong? Talk to Jesus about this!” And then – Jesus is crucified. How does it all end up for Mary? Then He rises from the dead. “This is great – we believe! But we don’t believe over here.” Mary goes to her grave with this bittersweet experience of wondering how everything works out. In the same way, when you depend on God, He doesn’t say, “You will be one of the ones that when the fire goes out, you will be one of the ones cut in half.” But on the other side – oh, man! The world isn’t even worthy of you, the Bible says! The promises of God, He answers – on the other side. Our response is, “I am a servant of the Lord.”
I would like to ask all the Moms in here, all the women of influence, all the women in this room, to please stand up and we are going to pray for you right now. Men, remain seated and we are going to be praying for all the women right now. Would you join me?
Father, I want to thank You for these women here. The Moms, the women of influence, single women, single Moms, Moms with lots of plates spinning, women who are influencing people all around them. I thank You for their dedication; I thank You for the fact that You have given them grace to do what they are called to do. And I pray that each one of them would find everything then need in You as they depend on You. Thank You for the nights they spend working on homework, and calming children who are sad. Thank You for the love that when they go out of their way for someone they hardly even know, to show them love and that maternal instinct just kicks in. I pray they would be blessed today. That they would find in this service and in the people around them, but most of all through Your Holy Spirit, the blessing that You brought them here to experience. And we ask these things in Jesus’ Name. Amen.