One of my favorite passages in the Bible is the first chapter of the Book of Luke and the account of the birth of Christ! I love how all the pieces fit together – the birth of the cousin of the Christ, John the Baptist, the visits of the angel Gabriel to Zacharias, and then to both Mary and Joseph, and then the anticipation of the births of these two special boys! There was so much fear mingled with the subdued joy these women must have had during this time, but how they rejoiced when Mary was able to finally visit Elizabeth. It was during that visit Mary made the proclamation in Luke 1:46, “And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord.”
I thought we would look in tonight’s
lesson at M is for MAGNIFY!
Remember, in her time of great joy and excitement, Mary said, “My soul doth magnify the Lord.” I
decided to study what the Bible has to say about how we should “magnify the
Lord.”
I.
What SATAN Magnifies
We’ll
begin in the Book of Beginnings. Let’s
turn in our Bibles to Genesis, Chapter 1, Verse 27:
27 So God created man in his own
image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. 28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be
fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have
dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every
living thing that moveth upon the earth. 29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing
seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the
which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. 30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the
air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is
life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so. 31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it
was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
Now,
let’s turn to chapter 2, verse 16:
16 And the LORD God commanded the man,
saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: 17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou
shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely
die.
Let’s
continue reading in Chapter 3:
1 Now the serpent was more subtle than
any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman,
Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? 2 And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the
fruit of the trees of the garden:
3 But of the
fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye
shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. 4 And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely
die: 5 For God doth know that in the day ye
eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing
good and evil.
As we
read the verses in Genesis, did you notice what Satan did? Satan took the words
that God Almighty spoke to Adam and Eve and he “magnified” their restrictions, while minimizing the blessing. I like to teach my preschoolers this by
drawing a board full of black trees with one colored tree in the middle
representing the tree of life. Remember
God says in Genesis 1:29, “I have given you . . . every tree,” and in Genesis 2:16, “And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree
of the garden thou mayest freely eat.” So, with the preschoolers, I point to the board
and we say, “God said, ‘Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat!
Eat! Eat! Eat!
Don’t Eat!” to remind them that the choices for Adam and Eve
were vast! But Satan comes in with the magnifier and uses it to his advantage
to distort what God had said.
Look
again at Genesis 2:17, “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou
shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely
die.” Those were the exact words
of God, but Satan comes up to Eve and says, “Ye
shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall
be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.” Satan was causing Eve to
focus on her restriction, the ONE tree that was forbidden, and then telling her
it was because God wasn’t being fair, God didn’t want her to have everything!
He was distorting the truth!
We must remember what John
wrote in his Gospel in John 8:44, “Ye are of your father the
devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the
beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When
he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.”
When it seems that our life
is “out of focus” and life doesn’t seem quite fair, we need to ask ourselves,
could Satan be magnifying the wrong things?
Am I looking at life through a magnifying glass and not through God’s
truth? Instead, when Satan would defeat
us, let us lift up our hearts like the Psalmist who prayed in Psalm 35:22-28:
22 [This] thou hast seen, O LORD: keep
not silence: O LORD, be not far from me. 23 Stir up thyself, and awake to my judgment, [even] unto my
cause, my God and my Lord. 24
Judge me, O LORD my God,
according to thy righteousness; and let them not rejoice over me. 25 Let them not say in their hearts, Ah, so would we have
it: let them not say, We have swallowed him up. 26 Let them be ashamed and brought to confusion together
that rejoice at mine hurt: let them be clothed with shame and dishonour that magnify [themselves] against me. 27 Let them
shout for joy, and be glad, that favour my righteous cause: yea, let them say
continually, Let the LORD be magnified,
which hath pleasure in the prosperity of his servant. 28 And my tongue shall speak of thy righteousness [and] of
thy praise all the day long.
II.
What GOD Magnifies
One of Brother Rick’s favorite verses in the Book of Psalms
is Psalm 138:2, “I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy
name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name.”
This verse holds such great importance because of its profound truth. When we search for the word “magnify” in the Scriptures, we find
again and again where people do things to worship God and, as is written in 1 Chronicles 17:24, “Let it even be established, that thy
name may be magnified for ever,
saying, The LORD of hosts is the God of Israel, even a God to
Israel: and let the house of David thy servant be established
before thee.” Man tries to magnify
God’s name, and rightly so, as we shall see, but God says He has magnified His WORD above His name! That
is a profound truth. God’s WORD is of
utmost importance. WHY?
John 17:17 – “Sanctify
them through thy truth: thy word is truth.”
Romans 10:17 – “So then
faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”
2 Timothy 3:16 – “All scripture is
given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for
reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:”
Hebrews 4:12 – “For the word of God
is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing
even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow,
and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”
1 Peter 1:23 – “Being born again, not of corruptible
seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for
ever.”
2 Peter 1:21 – “For the prophecy came not in old
time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by
the Holy Ghost.”
So it is incumbent upon us to continue on our quest that we
began this year to read the Bible faithfully each and every day, to hide God’s
Word in our hearts. If God says His Word
is most important of all, we must be faithful to make it a part of our lives,
right?
2 Timothy 2:15 – “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that
needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”
III.
What CHRISTIANS Should Magnify
Our final
thought tonight is a simple one. We know
we should ignore what Satan magnifies
or tries to distort in our lives. We
should stay in the Book – what God magnifies. But what should we magnify? Psalm 34:3 says, “O magnify the LORD with me, and let us exalt his name together.” We should lift up the LORD! Remember what Mary said? Luke 1:46, “And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord.”
Paul wrote in Philippians
1:20 & 21, “According
to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be
ashamed, but that with all boldness, as always, so now also
Christ shall be magnified in my
body, whether it be by life, or by death. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is
gain.”
Let’s go magnify
the Lord!
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