Mary | Jerry Harris

Well good morning Crossing Church.

How are you doing today? Doing all right.

Awesome. It's good to see you.

I don't know about your house but my house is a mess this time

of year. It just kind of goes crazy.

All the Amazon boxes. I mean you know what do we do

with all the cardboard? It's just it's just nuts and and

and we get try to get prepared for it and it's just clean up on

aisle 7 all the time. But that's kind of what the

Christmas season is all about. It's all kind of a about this

whole messy thing that that we experience together and church

is a messy place. Have you ever noticed that?

I mean, we're a bunch of messy people and we're and we're in a

messy place, but God is is an incredible God when it comes to

messes. And Speaking of messes, I want

to welcome all of our locations joining us from all over this

region in three States and how God has been cleaning up messes

in our lives for all these years and he continues to do that.

And that's awesome. If you're inside or online, we

are thankful for each and every one of you and all the messes

that you bring, because God is bigger than all of our messes.

And that's the series we are in, in the middle of the mess and

we're looking at these different characters in the story of the

birth of Jesus Christ and what a mess it was and how God was

glorified incredibly in the midst of it.

So when we get into the Christmas season, we start

singing Christmas songs, right? We sang Joy to the World this

morning at all of our locations. You know, that song was written

in 1719. I mean it's all like a like a

300 year old song. And a lot of the songs of the

Christmas season are are very old songs and a lot of them, you

know, we originally sang them out of a hymn book, right,

Because they just go back and and they're not as easy to use

as worship songs than conventional worship songs.

You kind of, you kind of have to work them a little bit

different, different genre. And not only that, you know, the

shelf life of a worship song today is pretty short, right?

I mean, if we've been singing a song that's 10 years old, it's

like why are we still singing that song?

But it isn't that way with Christmas songs.

I mean they go back, don't they can go way, way back.

And so to become a a great Christmas song, you've you've

got to be put up against some pretty heavy hitters, not just

these more, you know, hundreds of year old songs like we read

in the hymnal. But even some of the more

contemporary songs, and I'll say they're contemporary Christian

songs, we call them contemporary and they're like almost 100

years old. And we still, we still like to

hear them. We still like to sing them.

Like Walking in a Winter Wonderland 1934.

What? Yeah, Little Drummer Boy 1941,

White Christmas 1942. The Christmas song Chestnuts

Roasting on an Open Fire, Right? 1946 Rudolph the Red Nosed

Reindeer 1949. A lot of those songs are a

little more secular in nature, and it's really rare that you'll

actually have a new song that sticks with people and at the

same time it communicates the actual meaning of Christmas.

That actually happened in 1991 with a new song that came out

that did. Both of those things captured

the essence of not just like the season of Christmas, but the

story of Christmas and the birth of Christ.

So the words were written by Mark Lowery in 1984.

Actually, he was putting together a musical, the musical

part of a living Christmas tree. And while he was doing that, he

had a conversation with his mother about one of the

characters in the Christmas story.

And it started all of this, you know, creativity inside him.

And he wrote poetry about it. He wrote that poetry in the form

of 18 questions. And he tried him.

He's a musician, so he tried to put music with the words and he

just wasn't able to capture the right music to connect with the

words that he'd written and and that went that way for seven

years. He wrote it in 1984, but it

wasn't until 1991 that he shared it with a friend of his who was

really good on the harmonica of all things.

And his name's Buddy Green. And Buddy Green looked at it and

he said, I I've come up with something called Mark Lowry on

the phone and said, let me just hum this to you.

Let, let me, let's let you hear it.

And Mark said, that's it, that's it.

In 1991, the words and the music came together.

Now, this song is so popular, it's been covered by Kenny

Rogers and Wynona Judd and Clay Aiken, Cee Lo Green, Pentatonix,

Jordan Smith, Carrie Underwood, Dolly Parton and most recently

by Maverick City Music. I know a bunch of you know what

song I'm talking about. What is it?

Just say it. Mary, did you know?

I want you to think about the words in these 18 questions that

Mark Lowery came up with in the discussion he had with his

mother? Mary, did you know that your

baby boy would one day walk on water?

Mary, did you know that your baby boy would save our sons and

daughters? Did you know that your baby boy

has come to make? You knew the child that you

delivered would soon deliver you?

Mary, did you know that your baby boy will give sight to a

blind man? Did you know that your baby boy

will calm the storm with his hand?

Did you know that your baby boy has walked where angels trod?

And when you kiss your little baby, you kiss the face of God?

The bridge of that song says, the blind will see, the death

will hear, the dead will live again, the lame will leap, the

dumb will speak the praises of the lamb.

And then back to those questions.

Mary, did you know your baby boy is the Lord of all creation?

Mary, did you know that your baby boy would one day rule the

nation's? Did you know that your baby boy

is heaven's perfect lamb? At the sleeping child you're

holding is the great I am. It's a haunting and beautiful

song. It's written in a minor key with

these magnificent rhetorical questions and what they do.

Even though I know that people, since it's a popular song,

they've used it for memes and all kinds of other things, it

leaves you to contemplate just how awesome the Christmas story,

the true Christmas story really is.

Each concept that these questions evoke from us, they're

so uplifting and they're so powerful and there's so much a

part of the story. But my question is, is that the

whole story we're in, the series called In the Middle of the

Mess, and Clayton shared last week about Joseph.

And when when this came down in Joseph's world and in his life,

it made an incredible mess of his life.

I would encourage you to listen to that if you haven't heard

that. It was incredible.

And that mess was down in Joseph's lower story.

And I started thinking about what I was assigned the topic of

Mary. And immediately this song came

into my mind. And the questions that are posed

in that song made me wonder, how much did Mary actually know when

this story began to unfold in her life?

And I think that's an honest question and it and you can get

an honest answer from it just by reading.

So if we are going to Luke, chapter one and we start in

verse 26, we can read the beginning of the story.

It says in the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy.

Now Elizabeth is Mary's cousin, and she's six months pregnant

with John the Baptist. God sent an Angel, the Angel

Gabriel, to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to

be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David.

The virgin's name was Mary. The Angel went to her and said

greetings. You are highly favored.

The Lord is with you. Mary was greatly troubled at his

words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be.

But the Angel said to her, Do not be afraid, Mary.

You have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth

to a son, and you are to call him Jesus.

He'll be great and he'll be called the Son of the Most High

and the Lord God will give him the throne of his Father David

and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever.

His Kingdom will never end. How can this be?

Mary asked the Angel. Since I'm a virgin, the Angel

answered. The Holy Spirit will come on

you, and the power of the Most High will over shadow you.

So the Holy One to be born will be called the Son of God.

Even Elizabeth, your relative, is going to have a child in her

old age, and she was said to be unable to conceive as in her six

months. For no word from God will ever

fail. I am the Lord's servant, Mary

answered. May your word to me be

fulfilled. Then the Angel left her.

So what did she know? That's the question, right?

That we're looking to God's word for an answer.

She knew that God favored her. She knew that God was with her.

She knew that she was going to have a child, a son, and that

God was going to 'cause it, even with her being a virgin.

That his name would be Jesus, that he would be great, that he

would be called the Son of God, that he would reign on David,

the ancient King's throne, forever.

And she knew that the Holy Spirit would over shadow her to

conceive. She knew all of that.

We get all of that from Gabriel's words.

But my question is, what didn't she know?

She didn't know what Joseph's response would be.

She didn't know what her parents response would be.

She didn't know what her community's response would be.

She didn't know what all of that would cost her.

She didn't know that she would have to travel 90 miles on foot

in her 9th month of pregnancy. She didn't know that she would

deliver her first child without any help from her family save

Joseph, that there would be no one there to really help her.

She didn't know that she would have to run for her life and the

baby's life to Africa soon after he was born.

There was a lot that she didn't know, but I don't think for a

minute that that meant she was naive in the sense that she

didn't know that there would be hardships, there would be

trouble, there'd be challenges, and there would be pain.

A lot that she didn't know, but maybe an overarching

understanding that those things would be coming, as well as all

the good things she heard. And what was her response?

Well, it's recorded and it's recorded.

Her response is recorded a little bit of time afterward,

and I really appreciate that because she goes to visit her

cousin Elizabeth. Now, there's a number of

reasons. I believe she visited her cousin

Elizabeth because I believe that Mary was the type of a woman, if

she was highly favored by God, she was the type of a woman that

would be honest with Joseph and she would be honest with her

parents and imagine her having to say that to her parents.

I was visited by an Angel who told me this and how her parents

would respond to that. I think it's pretty obvious

because even though her parents also had to register in

Bethlehem, when she had to register in Bethlehem, they

weren't together, were they? Mary and Joseph were alone in

that stable in Bethlehem. No family there to support her,

So I don't think they took it very well.

We obviously know from last week's sermon that Joseph didn't

take it very well and he needed for an Angel to speak to him, to

get his head turned around, right?

It was a mess. It was a horrible mess.

And so when she goes to visit Elizabeth, we know that it's

somewhere in that first trimester of her pregnancy,

right? Because we know that John the

Baptist hasn't been born yet to Elizabeth.

And we know that when Gabriel came, she, Elizabeth was in her

6th month. So it was somewhere in that

first trimester and it would take you a little while to get

down all the way into Judea, that 90 mile trip.

So how did she feel about it? Because by that time she had had

some reflection time, and she'd already endured some of those

things that she probably didn't know just how deep they would go

with her parents and with Joseph and even with the community.

But we read about it in the 46th verse of Luke One, it says, And

Mary said, My soul glorifies the Lord, and my Spirit rejoices in

God my Savior. For he has been mindful of the

humble state of His servant. And from now on all generations

will call me blessed. For the Mighty One, listen, has

done great things for me. In the middle of the mess she

said those words. The Mighty One has done great

things for me. Holy is his name.

His mercy extends to those who fear him from generation to

generation. He has performed mighty deeds

with his arm. He has scattered those who are

proud in their inmost thoughts. He's brought down rulers from

their Thrones, lifted up the humble.

He's filled the hungry with good things.

He sent the rich away empty. And he has helped his servant

Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his

descendants forever, just as he promised our ancestors.

Mary's song is called the Magnificat, and the reason it

is, it's taken from the first line.

My soul magnifies the Lord, and it's pretty obvious.

Here she is, full, absolutely full of joy, overflowing with

joy, overwhelmed by joy. Think about that.

She tells you God's chosen me. He understands my humble

circumstance and he's exalted me.

She sees herself from an eternal upper story perspective, she

said. All generations will call me

blessed. All generations.

She's not just looking at her moment, she's looking at all

moments. She views her circumstance as a

great thing, and not just a great thing, but a great thing

for her. And then she presents this

flurry of praise for God, as evidenced by all the good things

that he's done that is amazing. Just amazing.

And then my first question for me and I, I would pose it to you

as well as how do we, you and I, interpret the circumstances of

our lives. So a lot of us, you know, when

we're asked the question, how are you doing or what's going

on, a lot of us will begin with three words.

I've heard it many, many times in my life.

And these are the three words. Under the circumstances, how

many of you heard that before? Well, under the circumstances,

right. Think about what those words

mean. It means that we're OK Where are

you in relationship to the circumstances?

The circumstances are over you, Right?

Because I'm under them. And a lot of times we feel the

circumstances pushing us down, weighing us down.

Right. I don't think you'd heard that

from Mary. I think that Mary was living in

a different place. I think Mary was living over her

circumstances. And that is the essence of the

difference between the lower story and the upper story.

Mary refused to live in the lower story.

Sure, there was a mess in her life, right?

She was in the middle of a mess. Those were the circumstances of

her life. But she chose to get above those

circumstances. She interpreted that in a

different way than many of us do now.

Unlike Mary, many of the hardships and challenges and

pain that we have in our lives are of our own doing.

And this was not of Mary's doing.

This is something that came to her.

This is not something that was her.

And a lot of times the pain that maybe either we've done or maybe

it was other people around us that hurt us.

Well, there were plenty of people around Mary during that

time that were hurting her. Obviously plenty of

circumstances with regards to people that she had loved and

trusted that were causing her pain.

But she kept kept her focus on God and kept her focus on how

God viewed her. And I I have to ask myself this

question. I want you to ask yourself this

question. How much of your attitude, How

much of my attitude comes from how other people around me view

me or other people around you view you?

How much of your attitude comes from how you view yourself?

And how much of your attitude comes from how God views you?

Because I think that is the essence of what we see in Mary

here. Because Mary is looking at how

God views her. Her song makes that really

clear. She knows that people are going

to view her in a completely different way.

But she chooses to focus on how God views her.

And her response to that interpretation of circumstance

can be understood in two ways. Thankfulness and gratitude.

She's thankful and she's grateful.

And you know what? She made that choice.

She didn't have to make that choice.

How many of us make that choice when the circumstances of our

lives make a mess of our lives? Are we making a choice to be

thankful and to have gratitude? Mary has so much strength in

that choice. You think about her, she's

probably, what, 1415 years old when this all happens, when this

all goes down in her life, just a young teenager, not even

halfway through her teenage years.

And this is how she responds. Maybe that helps us to

understand a little bit why Gabriel would say you are highly

favored among women. And on Thursday night, I was

preaching this. And I said, you know, ladies,

there's a lot of great ladies that I'm talking to, but none of

none of you are as great as this one.

This is the greatest lady of all time.

And then I took it back because I thought it was sexist.

She's not just the greatest lady.

She's one of the greatest people of all time.

I mean, she puts me to shame. Did she put you to shame in how

she interprets the circumstances of her life?

With thankfulness and with gratitude had to be one of the

reasons God favoured her. She is truly a person who keeps

her eyes on the upper story instead of being dragged down

into the lower one. And you know what?

Thankfulness and gratitude. That's your choice as well, just

like it was hers. Now, I'm I'm sure in your life

there are plenty of reasons that you could give on why it's OK

for you to be bitter or discouraged or disillusioned.

But is it possible that you're choosing not to concentrate on

all the good things that God has done and all the things that God

continues to do for you? Mary kind of puts us in our

place, doesn't she? And you know what?

It's not just true then, but as you watch Mary's life unfold in

the pages of the New Testament, she is consistent in her choice.

I want you to think about when the wise men came, OK?

Jesus was not the wise men didn't come to the to the

Manger. It was a little later.

They were in a house at the time.

He was a toddler's under the age of two.

And the wise men came, but they they didn't come to her house

first. They actually went to Herod.

First King Herod. King Herod.

And they said, where is he was born King of the Jews.

Now, if you're King Herod, and you hear these people from a

distant land go, where is he was born.

King of the Jews. You're going.

Hey, hold on a minute. I'm the king of the Jews.

Well, Herod was an appointed king by the Roman government.

He was a puppet king. But they're saying who was born

king. Well, that got Herod's

attention. The Bible says that all

Jerusalem had their attention. When they said that, they didn't

realize it, but they were making a mess for Mary and Joseph

because this guy's nuts. Herod the Great killed 46

members of his own family. That's how important it was for

him to retain control and power. And so he puts on this show for

these wise men saying, you know, I want to go worship him too.

So let's figure this out. And at the time, all of the

genealogies of the nation of Israel were housed in the

temple. And I'm sure he took the priests

and the scribes and they went to find out who would this person

be. Now, two of the most boring

passages in your New Testament are Luke chapter one, Excuse me,

Luke chapter 3 and Matthew chapter one.

Luke 3 · chapter mention

Because those two chapters say this and so and so begat so and

so. Who begat so and so?

Who begat so and so? Who begat so and so?

Who begat so and so. And you can't pronounce half the

names and they're like 5 syllables long and way too many

consonants, right? Actually, those are incredibly

important scriptures. Matthew chapter one is the

genealogy of Joseph. And you're going, wait a minute,

Joseph was not the natural father of Jesus, but he was.

But he was the legal father. He was the legal father of

Jesus. And Matthew one shows that

Joseph's lineage goes back through all the Judean kings,

all the way to David's throne and then back to Abraham, which

meant that from birth, Jesus had a legal right to the throne.

There was a curse to that line. I'm not going to get into that

right now. Hence Luke chapter 3.

Luke 3 · chapter mention

Luke chapter 3 has a different set of names than Matthew

Luke 3 · chapter mention

chapter one. What you find out is that Luke

Luke 3 · chapter mention

chapter 3 isn't a genealogy of Jesus through Joseph, it's the

genealogy of Jesus through Mary. They didn't even use those

genealogies. They use the males for

genealogy. And yet that's her genealogy,

because her line was not cursed. And it shows that her line goes

all the way back to David as well.

So here is this confluence of the legal right to the throne

and the blood right to the throne.

By the way, Jesus didn't have one drop of Joseph's blood in

his veins. They were all merry.

It's all merry, no curse. And in 70 AD, every genealogical

record of the Jewish nation was destroyed when the Temple was

destroyed. And there is only one genealogy

that stands up 2000 years later to prove once and for all

there's only one king. There's only one king who could

be king with the legal right, with the blood right and the Son

of God, and that's Jesus Christ and Christ alone.

He can prove it. Well, Herod figured that out,

and he decided to have every baby that was two years old or

younger murdered in Bethlehem. How did Mary feel about that?

Did that mess up her life? Well, it sure did.

But do you know what the Bible says about her when she thought

of these things? Uses this word.

She treasured them in her heart. Does that sound like a negative

word? Does that sound like a bitter

word? Does that sound like a

disillusioned word? Does that sound like a

discouraged word? What is that?

She treasured these things in her heart.

When the wise men left Mary and Joseph and the young Jesus, they

left gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh.

What do you think funded their escape to Egypt?

I'm sure that Mary looked at that as God's provision.

When Jesus was presented in the temple on his eighth day, he had

to be redeemed. That's where we find out how

poor they were. And he was circumcised that day.

And there was an old man named Simeon that came up to Mary and

he prophesied. And he said, now God can close

my eyes in death, for I have seen the salvation of the Lord

when he looked at this little baby.

That's not all he said. He looks at Mary and he goes, A

sword is going to Pierce your soul as well.

Well, that's so uplifting. So glad to hear that.

I wonder if they have a Hallmark card that says something about a

sword piercing your soul. She was under no illusions that

her life had been and would continue to be very difficult.

But there is a consistency in Mary, even though tough times

were ahead, even though she didn't know how tough they would

be. Throughout her life we see this

consistency, whether it was becoming a widow, which she did

because you read about Joseph being there when Jesus was 12,

but not when he's 30 being widowed.

She's a single parent, and not just to Jesus, but to his

brothers and sisters as well. A whole house full.

Not easy to take care of that family.

Easy to get bitter, discouraged or disillusioned.

You don't hear it. And if nothing else, witnessing

the brutality and the torture that happens to her son when

he's 33. And then to have to be there and

witness and see with your own eyes this horrible death of her

son, only to be replaced with the euphoria of his resurrection

from the dead. To receive him back from death

and then to lose him again 40 days later when he ascends into

heaven. Talk about an emotional

rollercoaster. And then later on with John, the

Apostle having to leave her country for a foreign land,

Ephesus in Asia Minor, modern day Turkey, You know what she

does. She stays locked in on that

upper story and the faithfulness of God, as she said, who will

always keep his word. And I doubt if any of us has

ever had to endure difficulties like Mary did.

I'm sure that we can connect on some level with some things, but

nothing to the level that she endured.

She was truly in the middle of a mess, but only from a certain

point of view. And my question to you today is

what is your point of view? There's an old poem has two

lines to it. It says two men look through

prison bars. One sees the mud and the other

sees stars. It all depends on the direction

you're looking. And Mary chose to look up

instead of the look down. She chose to live over her

circumstances instead of under them, and the way that she

managed that was through gratitude and thankfulness.

I want you to think today about what God has done for you.

I want you to think about what He has given you.

Who He considers you to be is children and the purpose that

He's called you to. There is no doubt that there

will be messes, but you can choose to lift up your eyes

above the mess. And like Mary, you can see that

God has something better for you.

We're moving to a time of decision.

Look pretty nice. Don't I put a jacket on, you

know, And you look really great too.

Just want to say, isn't it a good thing that you can't really

see past my being cleaned up? And isn't it great that I can't

see past yours? Because the truth is, I'm a mess

and so are you. And some of you might be going

why? Why would God ever put up with

me in the mess that I am? Oh, that's nothing.

Just take the whole crossing, all of our locations and

everybody's watching about 12,000 people and pile all of

our messes up together. That's a pretty big hill, isn't

it? That's like a big old hill.

Mess. Yeah, stinky mess.

What if you were to take all of our communities, Not just the

ones that go to church, but the ones who don't?

Oh my goodness. Get some Febreze out here.

What a mess. What about the whole world?

How you are you feeling good about the condition of the world

right now? Don't you just feel like, well,

we've got it together, don't we? It's so good.

No, you know better. I do too.

What a mess. Couple that, not just in the

moment, but in all of human history.

And that was the mess that Jesus died for on the cross.

Some of you are here and you are so arrogant, You are so

egotistical that you actually believe, which is the dumbest

thing I think I could. It's in my head that you can

actually fix your mess. You can't do it.

You never have. You can't fix it.

And the sad thing about people who don't have a relationship

that's intimate and personal with Jesus Christ is you don't

have anybody to help you. You're on your own.

You got to figure it out yourself, and and you're not.

I can tell you ahead of time, you're not going to figure it

out. You're going to fail at this.

You have been failing. You'll continue to fail.

And the pathway to your help is a door that is locked to you.

It is locked to you. But I'm here to tell you good

news today because Jesus came to this world because of what he

did when he died on the cross. And when he rose from the dead,

he opened a door that you could never open.

The Book of Revelation. He said I was dead and I'm alive

again, and I hold the keys to death and hell.

The door that was locked to you is now open through Jesus

Christ. He uses a lot of metaphors to

describe himself, and one of the metaphors he uses is I'm the

door of the sheep. He says the things that I open

no one can shut, and the things that I shut nobody can open.

And he has opened a door to you. But you have to come through

Christ. You have to come through Jesus,

because he's the one holding the keys and he's the door.

There is nothing in your way at this moment in time and

eternity, nothing in your way except for you.

And if you want to walk through that door and to have the help

you need, someone who can come and clean up the mess.

You can do that today. There'll be somebody right over

there by that baptistery love. Nothing more than to show you

the way. Many of you.

You're here today and you're like, well, I accepted Jesus as

my savior, Jerry. So there, I'm going to let you

in on a little secret. I didn't need a savior just

once. I have to have a savior in three

tenses. I have to have a savior that

saves all the stuff I've done. I have to have a savior that

saves all the stuff I'm doing. And I have to have a savior that

saves all the stuff that I'm going to do.

And if you're even the least been honest with yourself,

you're in the same boat that I'm in.

I need a savior in all three tenses.

And he is so you can bring all of the mess that you have today

up here to these steps, lay it down, and let him have lordship

over it right now. Jesus taught us that.

He said Bring all your burdens and your cares to me because I

care for you. Bring your burdens to Jesus.

Let him have him. Let him have the mess.

My God is a God who cleans up messes.

My God is a God who takes broken and ruined things and he makes

them better than new. And he can do that with your

life because he loves you. And for all the mess that is in

this whole world, all of the power of that mess, it is

nothing compared to the incomparable love that Jesus has

for you. Just you.

Would you stand with me, Heavenly Father in Jesus name,

would you please take this moment Quiet all the white noise

around us. Help us just to to hear you.

I've sung this next song in the two previous services.

At the end of last service, the song that we're about to sing,

Heavenly Father. It was like I was hearing Mary

sing it, and I want to be like her.

I want to be the person you want me to be.

Oh God, help me just to hold on tight to your son Jesus, because

he fills all the gaps, puts broken things together,

including me, all my brothers and sisters.

Here we go to him and to you now.

In Jesus name, Amen.