The Promise-Keeper (Luke 1:54-55)

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Go ahead and grab your Bibles and turn to Luke chapter one. It’ll be page 831 if you’re using one of the black pew Bibles there in front of you or underneath. Maybe, if you do not have a Bible, that is our gift to us, we’d love for you to take that this morning. Well, we’ve probably all seen in a movie or a TV show, the following scenario play out. Maybe it even happened in your life. At one point, a dad hurriedly drives to his child’s game or performance, only to find out that everybody is leaving. Or maybe it’s a woman in a restaurant waiting for her husband to arrive, and an awkward amount of time passes as the server keeps coming back, and she finally says, I guess he’s not coming. And it’s in these moments that there’s a change in body language and expression of the people affected by this, because not so much that it happened, but because of the person who kind of didn’t follow through on their word. And so why is there disappointment? Why is there sadness in moments like this? It’s because of what the dad or the husband said. What did he say? I promise, I’ll be there. You can count on it. I promise. And it’s that those words, I promise that are weighty words, very few words besides that probably have more weight in our lives. Maybe I love you, I forgive you, but I promise is right there because they’re important words and not to be thrown around lightly. We don’t always trust that people will follow through. So then we get really serious, and we bring out the pinky I Pinky promise. Kids, you with me? Adults are like, yeah, we’re with you. Pinky promise, right? Because we’re gonna get really serious. And there’s a reason we do that, because we want to put weight on people’s words. We want to see them follow through. We want to believe them, but a lot of times in these situations, there is sadness, there is disappointment, there’s not a whole lot of shock, because we know we let people down, we break our promises, and so there’s this kind of expectation all the time of yeah, they might not follow through, and the more times these promises are broken, the expectation will grow in our life that I’m not really going to take their word seriously in the future. They’ve got to prove to me that they can actually follow through on what they say. So you see, our promises are a lot like this. So if I say to you, I promise, I am saying you can count on me, but then what happens? Life happens, right? I got stuck in traffic. The dog ate my homework. I had to stay late at work. I got sick. I forgot you see, this is what our promises are. Often like, something can come in, something seemingly small, and change everything, and now all of a sudden we have broken our promise. And the more times we do that, the harder it is to keep trust in the relationships that we have. In fact, a lot of people will have a hard time trusting anyone who keeps breaking their promise. Do you even care about this relationship? So here’s what I know is true of every single person in this room this morning, we want to take people at their word. We want to trust that people will do what they say in all areas of life. And not only do we want that from the relationships we have with others, the horizontal relationships we want that with God. Can I actually trust God and His Word? Will he fulfill and keep his promises, or will he break his promises? Now this morning, we’re going to imagine that these blocks here are God’s promises. Each one kids paying attention, right? Each one of these represents a promise of God that we find in Scripture. We’re going to talk about a number of these promises this morning, and we aren’t the only people that want to take God at His Word. That was true of Mary, too. So to Luke, chapter one, we go as we finish up this beautiful prayer that we’ve been looking at that Mary gives us here in the first chapter of Luke. Go ahead and look at verses 54 and 55 I’m going to read both of them, and then we’re going to go through and we’re going to see the character of God, that Mary is the God that she’s praying to His character, that he is a God of help, a God of mercy and a God of promise. But let’s read verses 54 and 55 He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever, just as He promised our ancestors. So first God is a God of help. Mary says that right right here in the verse 54 He has helped his servant Israel. In. If you know the history in the Old Testament, you know the history of the Israelite people. God has helped his people over and over again. Ever since he promised to Abraham that he would make him into a great nation. God has been helping his people. The most obvious rescue story, story of help in the Old Testament is in Exodus. As the people, the Israelite people, are oppressed by a foreign power. They’re oppressed by Egypt, a whole group of people enslaved for hundreds of years, and God sends a deliverer. He sends Moses to bring his people out of slavery. And so God actually tells Moses something in Exodus chapter six. This is what he tells him. Therefore, say to the Israelites, I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm with mighty acts of judgment. And so God uses Moses, but he uses Moses as a faithful messenger. Because what we see throughout the story is that God is the one helping his people. God is the one who brings the plagues. God is the one who leads them out of Egypt. God is the one who parts the sea so they can walk across. God is the one who closes the sea on the Egyptians when they’re following behind them. It’s God’s work, and when the people cross over the Red Sea, when they see what God has done, how he has accomplished their salvation. For them in that moment, this is what they sing in Exodus, 15 they sing, I will sing to the Lord, for He is highly exalted, both horse and driver. He has hurled into the sea. The Lord is my strength and my defense. He has become my salvation. He is my God. And I will praise him, my father’s God, and I will exalt Him. God follows through on his promise. He says he would save them, and he does. And so this song and this story of God’s deliverance for the people out of slavery, plus many more times that he helped them, over and over again and generation after generation after generation. Hears these stories. Here’s how God has helped his people, all the way to a little Jewish girl hears it herself, a girl by the name of Mary, and she knows that history. She knows it. She knows how God has saved his people. And these are the things that come to her mind when Gabriel is saying, God is going to continue to help his people, and it’s going to come through you and what God is going to give you. So in her mind, in her heart, she has this whole new understanding of what it means for God to help his servant Israel. Because the words that Mary uses here aren’t just talking about the past. The words that she’s using carry with it that God is doing this in the present and he will do it in the future. This isn’t just a passing he’s doing something now, and it’s culminating in the One in whom she is carrying. God saves his people from slavery, and he saves his people from the Philistines, and we see other people groups that come and go, and come and go, and God continues to save them, continues to help them, but his greatest concern is not the foreign powers that overtake them. His greatest concern knowing our greatest need is not physical slavery to a foreign power, but spiritual slavery to sin. And for the wages of sin is death. And so he knows this is our great enemy, and he wants to destroy it. He wants to save us from it. And so when the Bible talks about sin, it’s referring to our rejection of and disobedience of God and His words, choosing our own way over his. So the problem of the Israelite people throughout their history is they keep turning away from God, and yet God keeps showing up. God keeps helping. He keeps saving them, reminding them, come back to me. He’s a God of help, and he has preserved them for this moment when the true deliverer, the Messiah, the better Moses, the help that they need is coming into the world. Look at what Paul says in Romans 616 when he talks about this idea of being slaves to sin and the change that can happen when we know Jesus, he says, Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey, whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death or to obedience which leads to righteousness. We got ourselves into this mess, choosing to disobey, choosing to go our own way, deciding against God and deciding for ourselves. And so we’ve made ourselves slaves to death, to sin, and we will never experience true freedom if we keep giving ourselves over to sin when we keep rejecting God, and His word, the God we’ve rejected, is a God of help, and so at just the right time, he sends Gabriel to visit Mary and to visit Joseph to tell them that help is coming, and this help would come through a promise. Shall. We just heard the kids sing it, because the greatest news in the history of the world was all wrapped up in one name. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins at just the right time. He sent the greatest help in the moment that we needed it, because his name means God saves when we put our trust in Him, when we believe that this is true. Here’s what Paul continues to say in Romans, chapter six, verse 22 but now that you have been set free from sin and become slaves of God. The benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. When you say no to the master of sin, you say yes to the master of God, all of a sudden we reap the benefits. We grow holy, we become more and more like Jesus, and the result of that is not death, the result is eternal life. And so if you’re here this morning, and we’re in this Advent season, and you’re wondering, what can Jesus do for me, this is what he does. This is how he helps. He can do the impossible, because we cannot save ourselves. The Israelites could not get out of slavery, so God had to come and help them. And he comes and he helps us, because we can’t do anything on our own to save ourselves from our sin, we need the help of Messiah, the One who proved himself over and over again. So God is a God of help. But why does he help us? Well, that’s our second point there? Because God is a merciful God. He is a God of mercy. Look at what Mary says right after he has helped to serve in Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever. Now, what does it mean that God remembers? Okay, that’s important. When we think about that word. But it’s not that God forgot, and later on, thought, oh, wow, I was supposed to do that. That’s not what it means when it says God remembers. When God remembers, it means he acts on what he has said. It means this is the time, this is the fulfillment. This is the time that I’m going to he always promised the Messiah. He didn’t forget. There was just waiting for the time. And so when he remembers, it means that he is acting the time has come. It has been fulfilled. Here is the moment I act. So we could say it this way, Mary is basically saying, Here, God, be who you have always been and do what you always do. Because he is a God of mercy, and he always acts as a God of mercy to his people because of his promises. That’s who he is. He is a compassionate and merciful God. Now, the thing here about God’s mercy is that it’s his active compassion. So it’s not like God just feels sorry for us. If God just felt compassion and just felt sorry for us. That’s not actually going to help us. That’s you guys all know that we’ve all experienced those times where we feel bad for someone and we do nothing. If God just looks at us, they say, Oh, poor people, and doesn’t do anything. How is that going to help us? It’s not so. In his mercy, his active compassion, he moves, he does something, and in order for God’s promises to be fulfilled, he acted compassionately, going all the way back to what Mary says here to Abraham and his descendants forever, because God promised Abraham some things, one of those being a son who we know is Isaac, The son of promise, who would be a partial fulfillment of a much larger promise that God gave Abraham back in Genesis, 12, verse two, you’ll see that on the screen. What does he say to him, I will make you into a great nation. This is a promise. I will make you into great nation, and I will bless you. I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. Abraham is old when he gets this promise. He’s got a wife who is well past childbearing years. So how is God going to fulfill this promise? Only through his mercy. And Mary knows this story. She knows how God provided for Abraham and Sarah when it looked like there was no possible way. And then she looks at Elizabeth, who she’s with her cousin, and she realized, Wait, Elizabeth was barren, too. And the messenger came and said she would be pregnant, and she’s pregnant, and here she is as a virgin, carrying the Son of God, all miraculous works of God, all acts of compassion, God’s mercy to his people. And so Abraham and Sarah see the promise fulfilled. They see it fulfilled in their son, Isaac, he enters into the world as this promised child, only to have God. Say to Abraham in Genesis, 22 now take your son to the mountain and offer him as a sacrifice. But God, what about the promise? What about the promise? How can the promise be fulfilled when you’re asking him to do this. But God has proven himself to Abraham over and over again in Abraham’s life, calling him from his place, keeping him safe, bringing him the place that he wants him to go. And so Abraham trusts him. God is testing Abraham to see if he will take him at his word. Do you trust my promises? Because at that time, many nations around Abraham were serving false fake gods, idols, and they would sacrifice their children to them. That is the most wicked thing you can think of, and they were doing it to fake God. So God says Abraham, in order to test whether or not you actually believe and trust in me, I’m going to ask you to do the same thing. Would you go to those same lengths to show that you are committed to me, that you believe in me. What would we do? Here’s what Abraham does. He takes his son to the mountain, and as they’re walking, Isaac asks him, where is the lamb for the sacrifice? And Abraham replies to him, God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering. My son and the two of them went on together what was going through Abraham’s mind in that moment, we get a glimpse, get a glimpse of what he might have been thinking in Hebrews chapter 11. It’s not on the screen, so I’m just going to read it for us. Here’s what it says in Hebrews 11 by faith, Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice, he who had embraced the promises, was about to sacrifice his one and only Son, even though God had said to him, it is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned. Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so, in a manner of speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death. This was a test of Abraham’s faith. Would he trust the promises of God? And he did, and he proved faithful. Because just as Abraham raises that knife and he is going to come down on his son, the angel of the Lord stops him, tells him, do not harm him. Don’t do it. Stop. God is seeing your faith. He says not withholding your own son from God. And God remembers his promise again. He didn’t forget. He’s just going to act now. And what does he do? He provides the sacrifice. Look at Genesis. 2213 and 14. Abraham looked up, and there, in a thicket, he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrifices his burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called that place the Lord will provide. And to this day, it is said on the mountain of the Lord, it will be provided we see the better and final fulfillment of the promised child, the one Isaac was pointing to in Jesus, who is wrapped in swaddling cloths and placed in a manger, the true promised child. So we have another promise fulfilled by God. So the Lord has provided for all of us through this promised child, because his mercy was on display in a manger, and about 30 some years later, his mercy was displayed on a cross. From the manger to the cross, the mercy of God was on display in the cries of a baby in a manger, all the way to the cries of agony and pain and suffering on a cross, God kept Abraham’s hand from coming down on Isaac, instead providing a sacrifice in his place. In God’s hand, his punishment for our sins was held back from us. It did fall, but it fell on his son, who was the sacrifice in our place, taking the judgment that we deserve so on the cross, on the cross, the Lord provided fulfilling his promise that all the nations would be blessed through Abraham’s offspring, through this promised child from manger to cross. And we are part of that blessing. We’re part of it because listen what Galatians three says. So also Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness. Understand, then that those who have faith are children of Abraham. Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith and announce the gospel in advance to Abraham, all nations will be blessed through you. So those who rely on faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. We are spiritual children of Abraham, grafted into this family, the redemption accomplished through Jesus was for all of us, and it was always meant to be, because it goes all the way back to Genesis 12 and the promises. God gave Abraham that all the nations would be blessed through him. So we have another promise of God fulfilled. So why does God keep showing mercy to his people? Why does he keep helping? Lastly, because he is a God of promise. He’s a God of promise. If he says it, he will do it. And so God gives us promises. So God will say things to us, and he’ll say, I promise to do this. When God speaks, it’s going to happen. This is who he is. So this last section here, God of promise, look at what Mary says. I’m going to read it all again. He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever, just as He promised our ancestors. So we started off this morning talking about promises and how disappointed we are when others break their promise, and we’re disappointed because we know we’ve broken promises to other people too, because we’re sinners. We’re imperfect people. We’re not totally in control, and so we will break our promises. We will fail others. But here’s the thing, when I made a promise before with this, this is dry erase marker, all of you knew what was going to happen when I erased it. It was going to come off, because that’s the character of the marker. It’s meant to right? It’s meant to come off. But when we look at God’s promises, and we say God’s promises are sure, God’s promises will always happen, because he is faithful and true, nothing can change it, because this is a permanent marker. It’s its character. It’s supposed to last. It’s who God is. He is permanent His promises. He’s the promise maker, and he’s the promise keeper, which means, when he gives a promise, no sin can can stop it, no foreign enemy can do anything to erase God’s promises. Nothing I say, Nothing I do can ever stop God’s promises from coming true. Not even death itself can do it. It’s sure God’s promises. We can count on him. We can count on his word, kids, I need you to hear that, because when you open this book and you read it, there are 1000s of promises of God to you, if you are in Christ, Jesus, and nothing we do will stop his promises from coming true. He will remember, he will act on his promises. So earlier, I said, we all want it. We all want to trust people’s word. We all want to trust God’s word. And that’s the question, can we trust him? Can we trust him? So let’s look at this tower here of Legos. If this is the promises of God, each one of these representing one of the promises of God in Scripture, and they’re fulfilled, then he just keeps saying, yes, yes. He keeps remembering, he keeps acting in mercy, this tower is going to grow and we’re going to be more and more confident in who God is and what God says, and that he’s actually going to do it. Mary doesn’t doubt God’s words. She doesn’t doubt the message that Gabriel brings her, even though it seems impossible, because Gabriel says in Luke 137 for no word from God will ever fail. Mary’s trust of God is being built up because all of these stories she’s heard growing up all the way she’s seen God help his people, Israel. And so at the very end of that message that she receives from Gabriel, she says this in verse 38 you can just kind of look back a little bit. She says, I’m the Lord’s servant. May your word to me be fulfilled, she trusts it. And then Mary’s trust of God is strong, because she continues to see him fulfilling promises. Her trust is on full display, because when Elizabeth sees Mary and John, who is in Elizabeth’s womb, leaps when Mary arrives, because he knows what she is carrying at the time. This is what Elizabeth says in verse 45 Blessed is he as she who has believed that the Lord would fulfill his promises to her, Mary believes because she’s seen it. Why would she doubt? Why would she doubt the promises when this is her foundation, when she’s seeing God fulfill his promises over and over again, and the Christmas story tells us we can trust God completely, completely. So here’s the big idea this morning. It is to take God at His Word, take God at His Word, and trust in the promise of the Second Advent. Take God at His Word and trust in the promise of the Second Advent. You’re thinking, Wait, the second advent. That might be a typo. I haven’t talked about this at all this morning, though, we have alluded to it a few different times already. Yes, we are talking about the second advent. We need to trust. And those promises, the promises to come, because the first advent of Jesus already happened. He already came. That’s what we’re celebrating. That’s what we remember this week. So we’re not waiting for that to be fulfilled. We are celebrating the past promises of God, all of these things being fulfilled in Jesus. And so what we are doing on this side of Christmas, on this side of the cross, on this side of the empty tomb, is we are looking forward to the return of Jesus. We’re looking forward to the second advent, the second coming. And in that first advent, when Jesus came, when he was in a manger and he went to the cross, we have to remember what happened. How did he come? Well, he told us he came as a servant and as a savior. That’s what happened the first advent, doing everything necessary to help us, doing everything necessary to put God’s mercy on display. So here’s what he did that first time, he lived a perfect life. He showed us what it means to honor our parents. He loved others, even the worst of the worst. He did everything God the father wanted him to do. He testified to the truth. He brought the kingdom of God to Earth. He was a light shining in the darkness. He died as a sacrifice on the cross in our place. He rose victoriously from the dead, crushing evil, death, sin and the devil. And then what did he do? We don’t often talk about this part. He ascended back to heaven. He did alive, back to his father, alive, and reigning at the Father’s right hand, and he’s doing that today. And I would love to have been there in Acts chapter one, when the disciples are looking up and Jesus is gone, because they’re probably thinking, what just happened? All the stuff we’ve seen Jesus do, right? And now he’s gone, and they’re just staring it says, up into the sky. And what happens? Messengers come again. Of course. Messengers Look at Acts. One verse 11, says Men of Galilee, they said, Why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven. At those words, the disciples must have gone back just weeks earlier to the upper room when Jesus is eating his last meal with them, just weeks earlier and in John 14. Listen to what Jesus tells them. Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God. Believe also in me. My Father’s house as many rooms if that, if that were not so what I have told you that I’m going there to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back. I will come back and take you to be with me, that you also may be where I am. I will come back. So as we celebrate the first advent of Jesus, as we celebrate the Christmas season, we thank God for the promises fulfilled all the things he said he would do that he did, and we then cling to the promises yet to come because of what he’s done there, we can stand confident today that he will do what he said he will Do, and we have to put our full weight on it. And I know this is hard to understand. How do I trust God? So kids, maybe this can be helpful for adults too. I have a weight here, and if I had something up here that I didn’t really trust, I wouldn’t put this weight on there. Okay? I wouldn’t do it. But because I trust that what is here is strong. It is a solid foundation. It is God’s promises, then I have no problem putting this here and leaving it that’s what it means to trust, to put your full weight, your entire life, on Jesus. Well, God’s Word says that he has fulfilled all these promises. And so when there’s more promises, you say, of course, I’m going to lean on him. Of course, I’m going to put my full weight, my whole life, into him, because he has proven himself over and over again to be faithful and to fulfill his promises. So take God at His Word. Trust Him. Cling to His promises of His return. And so here’s some things you might need to cling to today. If today you are longing for his presence and you’re in Christ, know that His Holy Spirit is with you. Now He dwells with you, and one day He will dwell among us again in a very unique way when he says, We will be his people, and he will be our God. If today you are mourning the loss of someone, one day that mourning will cease. If today you have tears because of a broken relationship, God will wipe away every tear from your eyes. If today you are in pain, chronic pain, the. Acute pain, mental, emotional, physical. If you are in pain, remember, one day there will be no more pain. If today you believe, you believe in Jesus, but you continue to struggle with sin, you continue to struggle with doubt, you continue to struggle each day, just to keep going, one day, you will see Jesus face to face, and it will not be hard anymore. There will be no struggle, because he will look at you and say, Behold, I am making all things new. Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true, because I said I would do it, and I have, and I’ve shown you over and over again, culminating in Jesus. So if God has fulfilled all of these promises, why wouldn’t we believe these other promises that He gives us in His Word? All of those promises, they sound good. Yeah, all of those are just from Revelation. So come back in January, when we’re going to go through revelation, we’re going to see the promises of God, of things that are still to come. There’s 1000s of other ones in Scripture. And if you’re here this morning, and you’re just kind of checking it out, because, you know, Jesus is the reason for the season, and you’re kind of like, what does that mean? Like, why are we celebrating this whole thing, checking out see if it’s true? Then I want you to hear these words of the Second Coming of Jesus, you need them too, because this next time he’s going to come as King and judge, that’s what he’s coming back as he already did everything necessary for us to be saved. It’s our choice now, whether we believe it or not, he will come back as judge, and He will separate those who believe from those who do not. And you can count on him because he’s fulfilled all these other promises that He promises that He will return. You’re thinking, is he slow? Is he ever going to come actually listen to Second Peter 39 the Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead, he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. You see that he is patient with you. He wants you to repent and to turn back to him, just like he had been doing with Israel for their history. Keep welcoming them back, calling them back to him. So repent of trying to free yourself from slavery to sin and find the freedom that we have in Jesus. Believe in Him. Believe in Him, repent of your sin, and maybe this would be the first Advent season that you could celebrate as a child of God, and rest in all those promises that are already been fulfilled, and praise Him for that, and start to cling to the promises that he is offering in the future and the things that we can cling to now, because if you put your full weight on him, he will not disappoint. He will not disappoint. So I want to close by reading from Luke two, because there was a man who received a promise from God that he would not die until he had seen the Lord’s Messiah. His name was Simeon, and when Mary and Joseph brought Jesus to the temple, Simeon was moved to go towards them. And Simeon takes Jesus in his arms. And I believe what he says in this moment wraps up everything we’ve been talking about this morning. This is what he says about this baby. He’s holding Sovereign Lord, as you have promised. You may now dismiss your servant in peace, for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all nations, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and the glory of your people. Israel, God will keep his promises. Let’s put our full weight on him this Advent season. Let’s pray.
Lord, we are grateful, grateful to join together to hear the beautiful words the kids were singing this morning, because those words are directly from you in your word with your messenger saying, She will bear a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins, Lord, that is our greatest need to be saved from our rejection and our disobedience of you. I pray that each one of us this season spend some time confessing those sins to you, so that as we celebrate this Christmas season, we can be filled with joy, the joy to the world that came that the angels announced, because we know what you came to do. You came to reconcile us to yourself. You came to reconcile that relationship so that we could say that is my God. And when God looks at us, those are my people. And so Lord, we thank you for sending your son, Jesus. Jesus. We. Thank you for going to the cross for us, for experiencing what we should have experienced on that cross, for displaying your love to us. We thank you for sending the Holy Spirit to dwell with us now, so that when we doubt or we struggle through these promises that we have in Scripture, the Holy Spirit will strengthen us to believe, to give us the strength we need each and every day to pray for us when we don’t know what to pray for. I pray for each one of us here, Lord, this season that the Christmas story is not just a story. It’s not just something nice we do, but we understand it was you fulfilling your promises, that all the nations on the earth would be blessed through your Son, and that we would see true life transformation in our own hearts, in our community and around the world, as people hear the name of Jesus and come to believe that it’s only through him that they can be saved. Jesus, we love you and we pray this in Your name. Amen.