Sermon Tone Analysis

*Luke 1:46-56 **(The Magnificat is a song of Joy)** **( Psalm for this 3rd SUN of ADVENT)*

*Who is this young girl and Why is She Singing?*             \\  *In the run up to Christmas the media hype grows daily.

They want us to spend more and more and consume more and more each day.

We are constantly told that if only we would buy the latest product we would be happy.

Their message seems to be: ( the more you consume the happier you will be.)

*

*But what really makes you happy?**    *

*I realize that people may have more than a million answers to that question.

*

*   *

*       ** Here Is Mary’s answer.*

*In Mary’s song of happiness (the Magnificat, her response to the coming of the Messiah) she makes it clear that the reason she is singing is because God makes her happy.

She says: My soul rejoices in God my Savior   \\ We may think that’s easy for her to say.

But Was it?

Look at her situation: (She was a member of the poorest class of her people having no political power or rights.

A young girl in a culture that treated women as little more than property.

An unwed mother, which was often an automatic death sentence in her community.

In spite of all she can be worried and sad about, she sings for joy even when it seemed she was numbered among the losers in life.)

She found her joy in the Lord and it was a joy that couldn’t be shaken, nor taken away by anyone or anything... \\                                                                                                                                      Notice in Mary’s hymn of happiness that Mary knows God personally.

God she says is my Savior.

Her relationship is real and personal.

\\                                                                                                                                      Notice also that Mary needs God as her Savior just as anybody else does.

Mary is very special, but she is human and needs God, just as you and I need God.

\\                                                                                                                                                                 Finally, notice how she feels about her relationship with God? Joyful.

That word literally means to jump up and down for joy.

Think of a child, so happy it literally leaps for joy.

This is how Mary describes her relationship with God.

*

*John 15:11 “These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full.”

\\ One wise man put it this way: \\ Happiness of heart can no more be attained without God than light and sunshine can be had without the sun.

On every side, in every part of the world men and women are seeking happiness and cannot find it because they do not seek it from God.

Unless we find our happiness in God, we will never truly be happy.

On hearing the angel’s message this young girl, Mary, is singing for she is Mary, the mother of Jesus who finds her happiness in God.  (Her song is an invitation for  us to find our happiness in God,) \\ Adapted by Terry Casey CSSp*