Tis the season for songs. I just returned from The Netherlands where I was visiting with my wife’s family. We were watching soccer, as you do, and there was this heartwarming commercial about a hamster not being left behind as its family goes on vacation (the Dutch love hamsters…don’t ask).
As the hamster was imagining scenes of familial joy together, Wham!’s “Last Christmas” set the soundtrack. I swear, I haven’t been able to get it out of my head ever since. “Last Christmas” is the song of the season for me. Though, every time I hear it I think of hamsters. Go figure.
But there is another song of the season that the Gospel writer Luke records in the first chapter of his book. We’ve lost the tune, so maybe it doesn’t stick in our heads as easily, yet the words are far and away more beautiful and profound than “Last Christmas.” It’s Mary’s Song in Luke 1:46–55, often called the Magnificat.
In it, Mary, the mother of Jesus, sings, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior; for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed.”
Powerful words, especially given the reality of Mary’s situation. She is an unmarried pregnant woman who would undoubtedly have to endure mockery and shame from her whole community.
I don’t imagine that many of her neighbors had the categories to understand impregnation by the Holy Spirit, so Mary would be highly misunderstood, highly scrutinized, and highly shamed, maybe even excluded from her religious fellowship. Yet she does not let that sway her from proclaiming God’s favor and blessing. She is confident of God’s presence and work in her life.
She goes on: “[God] has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.”
Even as Mary sings these words, there are still powerful men sitting on thrones, still lowly who endure hardship, still those who hunger, still the rich who are anything but empty. Yet her faith declares the future hope of God’s people as if it were a memory of the past. In beautiful verse, Mary imagines the world as it is, not as it merely seems.
This Christmas season, I want to sing a better song than “Last Christmas.” I want to sing confidently along with Mary that God is with us, even when it doesn’t feel like it; even when the noise of the world clamors that He’s not. I want to have Mary’s faith, which speaks God’s promises of hope and life as if they’ve come to pass, because I know what Mary knew, that “His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation.”
Next Christmas, I want to sing that last Christmas was the Christmas I sang a more beautiful song.
Joshua Gorenflo and his wife, Kya, are ministers at Kenai Fellowship, Mile 8.5 on the Kenai Spur Highway. Worship is 11 a.m. on Sundays. Streamed live at kenaifellowship.com.
