Immediately following today’s Gospel is
the Magnificat – which I printed on the sheet that contains the “O
Antiphons.” I thought it would be
helpful for you to briefly explore Mary’s wonderful song of praise, located in
the first chapter of the Gospel of Luke, verses 1:46-55. This great worship
hymn is called the “Magnificat” because in the Latin Bible it begins with the
words "Magnificat Anima Mea Dominum," which mean "My soul glorifies
the Lord."
When you open the Gospel of Luke, you
notice that it is filled with music –
especially the first two chapters. There you find five hymns: the hymn of
Elizabeth (Luke 1:42-45); the hymn of Mary (Luke 1:46-55); the hymn of
Zechariah (Luke 1:68-79); the hymn of the angels, "Glory to God in the
highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests," (Luke 2:14);
and the hymn of Simeon (Luke 2:29-32), which he prayed when he saw the infant
Jesus Christ and realized that God’s promise to him had just been fulfilled and
that he would not die until he saw God’s salvation.
The Christmas season is a time of
singing and rejoicing because of the divine announcement of good news of great
joy to all the people of the world. We need a divine Savior, and the message of
Christmas is that God has given us such a competent Savior in his Son, our Lord
Jesus Christ, who became man for our salvation. After the annunciation, the
archangel Gabriel left and Mary got up quickly and traveled to Judea to visit
her cousin Elizabeth, who was six months pregnant. When Elizabeth saw Mary, an
amazing thing happened: through the Spirit of the living God, she recognized
Mary, this unmarried teenage girl, as "the mother of my Lord," and
began to prophesy.
When that happened, Mary also began to
sing in the Spirit, exalting and worshiping God. It is this song that is
recorded as the Magnificat, and at this point I want to note something:
Although Mary was just a poor peasant girl she had been brought up in a godly
home and for that reason she was thoroughly versed in the Holy Scriptures. Like
Zechariah, Simeon, Anna, and others, Mary was looking forward to God’s
redemption of Israel. So when she heard Elizabeth’s greeting, she was filled
with the Holy Spirit and Scripture came pouring out of her heart.
Listen, then, to Mary’s acknowledgement of God’s greatness as she
magnifies the Lord. Psalm 103:1 tells us, "Praise the Lord, O my soul; all
my inmost being, praise his holy name," and elsewhere we are told that out
of the abundance of our heart, our mouths will speak. Mary was filled with God
and his grace; thus, she sang about God and his attributes. There are seven
attributes of God that Mary speaks about in her song, the Magnificat:
God Is Mighty…The first attribute Mary speaks of is
the might and power of God. He is the mighty God, ho dunatos, and in
Luke 1:49 she sings, "For the Mighty One has done great things for
me." Mary’s God was the Almighty God, the Creator of the ends of the
earth. There is no god mightier than her God. He alone is able to do all things
and with him alone nothing is impossible.
God Is Holy…The second attribute Mary speaks about is God’s holiness. In verse 49 Mary
declares, "Holy is his name." Throughout the Scriptures God tells us,
"Be ye holy, for I am holy." God is light, and in him there is no
darkness at all. He is the One separate from us – that what it means sacred,
holy! – the One without sin.
God Is a Judge…The third attribute of God that Mary
speaks about in her hymn is that God is a judge. In the latter part of Luke
1:51 she says, "He [God] has scattered those who are proud in their
innermost thoughts." Additionally, in verse 52 we find, "He has
brought down the mighty rulers from their thrones," and in verse 53,
"He has sent the rich away empty."
God Is Merciful…The fourth attribute Mary speaks of is
that God is merciful. The word "mercy" appears five times in Luke
1—in verses 50, 54, 58, 72 and 78. Mary reveled in the knowledge of this great
attribute of God.
God Is a Covenant God…The fifth attribute
of God that Mary speaks of is that God is a covenant God. We must realize that
God does not have to enter into a covenant with sinful man. There is nothing in
his being necessitating that he stoop down and promise salvation to anybody.
But the truth is, God did just that. He entered into a covenant with Abraham,
promising to show mercy to him and his descendants by granting them salvation.
God Is Faithful to His Covenant…If God promises through a covenant, he will fulfill it, because he is the
God of the covenant. The sixth attribute of God Mary speaks of in this passage
is the faithfulness of God to his covenant.
Mary realized that what was happening
in her womb was the fulfillment of the age-old promise to Abraham, that God was
finally sending the divine Messiah, Jesus the Savior, the eternal God
incarnate. So she sang, "He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to
be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever, even as he said to our
fathers."
God Is the Savior…The final attribute of God that Mary describes here is that God is her
Savior. "My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices. . . ." In
what is Mary rejoicing? ". . . in God my Savior." …and so we pray
together:
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit
of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us
sinners now, and at the hour of our death.
Amen
Before we reach
Christ's birth in Luke's gospel we are already well aware of how special Mary
is. The angel Gabriel calls her "most highly favored" and her cousin
Elizabeth exclaims how she is "most blessed". She is the one in whom
the blessings spoken of by God to Moses are to be fulfilled. Yet she has no
claims to greatness. She is a maiden betrothed to a man named Joseph in an
insignificant village in the unimportant region of Galilee. Luke traces the
genealogy of Jesus through his foster-father, Joseph. Mary herself, in her
great hymn of praise on her visit to Elizabeth, will speak of her own lowliness
and marvel at how God has chosen the weak and poor to confound the rich and
powerful.
