Luke 1:39-80

March 26  

Reading: Luke 1:39-80 

³⁹ In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a town in Judah, ⁴⁰ and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. ⁴¹ And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb.    

And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, ⁴² and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! ⁴³ And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? ⁴⁴ For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. ⁴⁵ And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord."    

⁴⁶ And Mary said,    
    "My soul magnifies the Lord,   
⁴⁷  and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,   
⁴⁸  for He has looked on the humble estate of his servant.    
     For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;   
⁴⁹  for He who is mighty has done great things for me,    
     and holy is His name.   
⁵⁰  And His mercy is for those who fear Him    
     from generation to generation.   
⁵¹  He has shown strength with his arm;    
     He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;   
⁵²  He has brought down the mighty from their thrones    
     and exalted those of humble estate;   
⁵³  He has filled the hungry with good things,    
     and the rich He has sent away empty.   
⁵⁴  He has helped His servant Israel,    
     in remembrance of His mercy,   
⁵⁵  as He spoke to our fathers,    
     to Abraham and to His offspring forever."    

⁵⁶ And Mary remained with her about three months and returned to her home.    

⁵⁷ Now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son. ⁵⁸ And her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her.    

⁵⁹ And on the eighth day they came to circumcise the child.    

And they would have called him Zechariah after his father, ⁶⁰ but his mother answered, "No; he shall be called John."    

⁶¹ And they said to her, "None of your relatives is called by this name."    

⁶² And they made signs to his father, inquiring what he wanted him to be called.    

⁶³ And he asked for a writing tablet and wrote, "His name is John."    

And they all wondered.    

⁶⁴ And immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue loosed, and he spoke, blessing God. ⁶⁵ And fear came on all their neighbors. And all these things were talked about through all the hill country of Judea, ⁶⁶ and all who heard them laid them up in their hearts, saying, "What then will this child be?" For the hand of the Lord was with him.    

⁶⁷ And his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, saying,   
⁶⁸ "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel,    
     for He has visited and redeemed his people   
⁶⁹  and has raised up a horn of salvation for us    
     in the house of His servant David,   
⁷⁰  as He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from of old,   
⁷¹  that we should be saved from our enemies    
     and from the hand of all who hate us;   
⁷²  to show the mercy promised to our fathers    
     and to remember His holy covenant,   
⁷³  the oath that He swore to our father Abraham, to grant us   
⁷⁴  that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies,    
     might serve Him without fear,   
⁷⁵  in holiness and righteousness before Him all our days.   
⁷⁶  And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High;    
     for you will go before the Lord to prepare His ways,   
⁷⁷  to give knowledge of salvation to His people    
     in the forgiveness of their sins,   
⁷⁸  because of the tender mercy of our God,    
     whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high   
⁷⁹  to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death,    
     to guide our feet into the way of peace."    

⁸⁰ And the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness until the day of his public appearance to Israel. 

In the first half of the first chapter of Luke, we were told of two different birth announcements. In this section of Luke we read two different songs (or psalms), the first sung by Mary after she is pregnant and meets Elisabeth, the second sung by Zacharias after his son John is born. 

After Elizabeth rejoices because of God’s fulfillment of His word in Mary we read the Magnificat, Mary’s psalm of praise to God because of her baby. It is an epic song of God’s faithfulness that moves from God’s goodness to herself to God’s goodness to all Israel. We discover that Mary is not only “favored” and “blessed” by God, but that she has a deep understanding of the Scriptures. Her song is filled with allusions to Genesis, Psalms, and Job and sounds much like Hannah’s song in 1 Samuel 2. 

Read through Mary’s song (vss. 46-55) and list everything she is teaching us about God and how He works. How are each of these things manifested in the birth of Jesus?