please turn with me and your Bibles back to Luke chapter 2 and to those verses that we read together earlier. I wonder how would you have reacted if you were in Mary's sandals? She was, to all accounts, a very ordinary young lady of lowly circumstances. She was engaged to be married to her beloved Joseph. But yet as we read the opening chapters of the Gospel of Luke this ordinary young lady had much to cope with. As these chapters bring us remarkable circumstances surrounding the birth of her first child we see various stages, the responses that she made at each step of the way. In chapter 1 we read of the appearance and the greeting of Gabriel. You know, I've never seen an angel. It must have been pretty shocking to just be there, wherever she was, and suddenly the angel Gabriel has confronted her and says to her, rejoiced, highly favoured one, the Lord is with you, blessed are you among women. Just imagine that! How would you have coped with that? Well, we read in verse 29 that when she saw him she was troubled at his saying and considered what manner of grating this was. She was troubled but she was also thoughtful about what was going on at this juncture. Well, as the angel Gabriel continued to speak with Mary and told her that she would bear the Son of the Most High, as Gabriel spoke about this One who would reign upon the throne of His Father David for ever and ever, we then see in verse 34 that Mary was perplexed. Here I've got an angel, he's got an incredible greeting and now he's told me I'm going to bear a son and he is going to be the son of the Most High. And so she says, I think I might have said a bit more than this, but she said, how can this be since I do not know that? So she was perplexed about what was going on. So Gabriel answers her question and tells her what is going to happen, the Holy Spirit is going to overshadow her, and says with God, nothing will be impossible. And so, Mary then says, Behold, in verse 38, the maidservant of the Lord, let it be to me according to your word. That's incredible, isn't it? The space of a few minutes. She's gone from being troubled, and being thoughtful, being perplexed, and now she's just got a calm trust, a calm faith in God. Wow! If I'd been Mary, I think I might have struggled to get to that point so quickly. But she did and praise God she did and what a great example it is to us. We then read of Mary visiting her relative Elizabeth and again Elizabeth has a great message for her and says that she's going to be blessed among women and the fruit of her womb is going to be blessed. And as she hears about these things we then have that song of praise in verse 46 onwards. She responds in worship of the Lord and gives thanks and praises him for all the things that he has done and will do. How would you have reacted in such circumstances? Her human mind had to take in some extraordinary truths She had met an angel, the Lord had blessed her. She was going to have a son although she was a virgin. She was going to bear the son of God who will be king forever. The Holy Spirit was going to overshadow her. Not easy for a godly teenager, even a godly teenager, to take in. But yet we too have been confronted with some incredible truths in recent days. We've been reminded of God made flesh. We've seen that this idea must be of the Lord and it must be revealed of God and it must truly have an impact upon our lives. We've seen that God made flesh reveals the glory of God, the greatness of His love, His wisdom and His justice and it reveals the Trinity to us. It struck me on Wednesday, we wouldn't know what the Trinity looked like had not God become flesh. and we've seen even this morning that the fact that our Lord Jesus Christ God become flesh means everything to us it changes our lives totally upside down in fact totally the right way up these are incredible truths but how have you And how will you respond to these things? What are you going to do with the truth of God incarnate? Which is one, of course, of only many, many glorious truths in the Bible. Well, to help us, I want us to consider two more responses of Mary tonight. And I trust that we'll apply them to our consideration of the awesome fact that God has become flesh. that we might give him the glory which he deserves. The verse is found in the first part of our reading this night. It's found in verses 8 to 20 and in particular verse 19. We've had a reaction here of Mary. Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. At this stage, Mary would have been very sore and completely exhausted remember she'd had a baby we might forget that you know all these things are going on she's actually that day that night had a baby so she's probably not in the best of strength then she has a visit from some strange men I don't know if you're in your hospital bed Ladies, and you've just had a baby and a bunch of strange men come along. Shepherds, rough, tough guys. You think, what's going on here? They come and they tell her an incredible story of the appearance of angels. Now, of course, Mary's familiar with angels now. But, wow, this angel came with this message that there's born in the city of David a saviour who is Christ the Lord. It's for all people, this message. and well we must go and see him and we'll find a babe wrapped in swaddling cloths and they recount all that happened and they're rejoicing in this, they're glad about this, they're excited about that and they go and tell everybody about it and as they go there's Mary left sore, exhausted what is going on? Wow! What an incredible truth This baby I'm holding is the Christ. This baby is the Saviour. This baby is the Lord. He is born for the world. And as these things are penetrating her mind, and as other things that have been said by Gabriel and others come into her mind, we then read of her reaction. Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. Let's just think about those two aspects for a moment. She kept them in her heart. The meaning here is that she treasured and retained them in her inmost being. She preserved them Kept them close, kept them safe. Perhaps you've watched some films and there's a guy, he's got lots of precious stones, maybe he's a mining magnate and he's carrying his precious jewels with him. And he's got them in a briefcase, a padded briefcase, and he chains them to his arm. And he's not gonna let this briefcase go, because these are precious. These are going to keep him into his old age. And he doesn't want anyone to snatch him away from him. So he keeps them safe. He keeps them close. He preserves them. These truths were so precious to Mary that she didn't want to lose them. Didn't want them to go away. So she made sure that they were locked in her mind and her heart so that they could not escape. I don't know what the security is like in the Bank of England vaults. But I guess you can't just get a little yell key and open the lock and get in. You have to go through one level after another of security to get through. We want to keep all that gold we've got as a nation secure. This was Mary making every effort to keep these and the other truths safe. Now my friends, to what extent do you keep the truths of God's Word safe in your inmost being? Perhaps a subsidiary question would be, how precious are these truths of God's Word to you? You know, the things that are most precious to us we will give most effort to keep safe. Whether that's physically, whether that's in relationships or whatever, that is the case, isn't it? The psalmist says concerning the Word of God, the law of the Lord, all these truths of our great God, he says in Psalm 19 verse 10, more to be desired of they than God yea the much fine gold sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb the words of the Bible the doctrines of our God and our Lord Jesus Christ are so precious and if they are so precious to us we should strive to keep them close to preserve them, to treasure them. How can we do this? How can we keep these things in our heart, in our own inmost being? Of course we can seek as we are able to memorize these things, to have the very words of scripture within our minds and let them penetrate our hearts to affect our lives. We can continually remind ourselves of them as we share in fellowship with one another, as we speak together of the wonderful things of our God. We can do this by reading and reading about them, by coming and listening to sermons preached concerning them. And to not let these things go, but to treasure them up in our inmost being. This is what Mary did. Yes, she was exhausted, she was sore. But she kept all these things within her heart. But the other aspect of her reaction is that she also pondered them in her heart. Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. Really this is connected with and also an extension of keeping them within her heart. Now the word ponder literally means to throw together, to confer, to put one thing with another as we consider them. So this is what Mary was doing, putting one truth with another and thus building up a bigger and better picture. So as she pondered she thought, well this child that is born, Gabriel said, he is the son of the highest. And she put that together with the fact that the shepherds said, well, he's a saviour. She put together the fact that she was a virgin with the other truths, with the Christ, and just fitting it all together, pondering, thinking, considering, conferring, so that she'd have a greater picture. of all that had been told her and the truth about this one that was born to her. He's like perhaps an archaeologist. He goes to the tombs there in Egypt and discovers a new tomb. And there's new treasures there. A mask and the different receptacles and different treasures that he might have. And he looks at them and thinks he's brilliant. But he really needs to work out, if he's going to work out the culture and the situation, what was going on, he needs to put together the place where these things are found. He needs to investigate other passageways where he might find other treasures. He needs to put it together in terms of where it fits in the history and with the other things that have been found in different places. He will put different things together. He will confer. so that he gets a greater picture. The situation, the culture, and the background of the person perhaps who was buried in that tomb. Perhaps to put it more simply, he might have got a jigsaw puzzle for Christmas. And you can get one bit out of the jigsaw puzzle and stick it on the table. And you think, well, what's that? You don't look at the picture on the front. You might get another bit out of the box and you stick it there. And you just think, well, I guess I can't see what's going on. And you get more and more of the bits out and you put them together. And gradually, bit by bit, the picture becomes clear. You see the whole. This is what Mary was doing. As she was pondering these things in her heart, she was putting the pieces together like a jigsaw puzzle. Now this is massively important for us. We will hear often about a doctrine here or a doctrine there. We'll look at a passage in one place or a passage in another place. We'll have Oliver preaching on one thing in the morning and myself preaching on another thing in the evening. We might have our readings from the book of Colossians one week. We might have our readings in the book of Zephaniah another week. We might read a book that we take up and we see a certain truth there and another book another week and we see a truth there. What we need to do is ponder that. Put them together. As it were, join up all the dots. Consider scripture with scripture, truth with truth, so that we make up the whole. And we see the beauty and the glory of God and his wonderful purposes for us. It's incredible, isn't it? Even as we've just thought briefly about God incarnate in this past week, How that single truth impacts on all manner of other doctrines. How the truth of God incarnate impacts upon the truth of the Trinity. God incarnate impacts upon the theology of God being love and wise and just. But it impacts upon the doctrine of man, it impacts upon the doctrine of salvation. And we can go further and we can say it impacts upon the doctrine of the church because if he is not God incarnate, how can he be the head of the church? We can think it impacts upon what Oliver has been preaching on the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. How can he come in power and in glory and in victory if he is not God incarnate? We can think about the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. How can he send the Spirit? How can he give the Spirit to his church if he is not God incarnate? they all fit together. We can build up a picture as we ponder these things within our hearts. Sadly error is often found in an imbalance in scriptural understanding of emphasizing one doctrine, one area of doctrine with little thought to other areas of doctrine. It can be found, error can be found by ignoring the flow of redemption history. It can be found in misapplying the Old Testament without the light of the New or the New Testament without the light of the Old. What we need to do is to put all the pieces of the puzzle together. And this will not only avoid error, but give us greater assurance, greater understanding, greater blessing, and it will equip us to be more informed witnesses to counteract error and to show forth the glory of Jesus Christ pondering is a great thing but I wonder how often do we take time to ponder it seems to be the spirit of our age for us to live busy and noisy lives our lives can be filled with travel, it can be filled with being up-to-date with the news, it can be filled with fill our ears all the time with music or with texting or with gadgets or games or with work or with, with, with, with, with so that we have little uninterrupted times of quiet to ponder these things within our hearts Surely it is of great importance that we take time, that we make time to do this, that we put in effort to piece together all that we hear. Mary, on that night in which she had given birth, She kept these things and pondered them in her heart. The last reaction I want us to look at of Mary is found if we fast forward 40 days and we go to verses 21 to 35 and particularly we see her reaction as well as that of her husband Joseph in verse 33. There we read Joseph and his mother marveled at those things which were spoken of him. Here we are 40 days forward after the days of purification Jesus was presented in the temple with the appropriate sacrifice being made. In God's providence yet another stranger approached them. In our day The stranger came up to you in a public place and said, can I hold your baby? You would run a mile. No way you'd get your hands off. Call the police, whatever. But it wasn't so, of course. In the days of Mary. And Mary handed her child over to Simeon. He had been looking forward to the coming of Christ. He'd been looking at the promises of God and waiting for the consolation of Israel. And he'd been promised by God that he would see the Christ before he died. So, as he took up the child, he took him up with praise upon his lips. And he said, Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace according to your word. For my eyes have seen your salvation which you have prepared before the face of all peoples alike to bring revelation to the Gentiles and the glory of your people Israel. More information, more amazing things, more for Mary to keep and ponder. But as she and Joseph listened to Simeon we read that they marveled they marveled at those things which were spoken of him they basically wondered they were in awe of these things these things were so incredible that We can imagine their mouths were just stopped. Modern pilots, they're all gobsmacked. Totally astonished. Just like we may have had it in some households today. A child just receiving that incredible gift that they could never have imagined. And they just go, wow. Their eyes come out on stalks. Wow. marvelling, wondering. It's like perhaps if you have a clear night and you look up into the sky and you see the stars. You see one, you see two, you see three. And the more you gaze, the more you see and the more you wonder. Wow! What has God made? and you marvel your mouths are stopped you think this is glorious this was the reaction of Mary as well as Joseph wow this way this baby that I'm brought to the temple today he is a light to bring revelation to the Gentiles he's the glory of his people in Israel this is amazing this is beyond words the truths that we have heard concerning Jesus even God incarnate are enormously exciting Yet they are incredible to take in, aren't they? Who can truly work it out? They are out of this world. Listen to some of the Scriptures that we are familiar with. Perhaps we are often over-familiar with them. But let us think again and be reminded of Isaiah 9, verse 6 and 7. For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. and the government will be upon his shoulder. Listen to this, his name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. The increase of his government and peace, there will be no end. Upon the throne of David and over his kingdom to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward even forever. that is astonishing we've read in John's gospel chapter 1 again familiar words but in the beginning was the word the word was with God and the word was God he was in the beginning with God all things were made through him and without him nothing was made that was made in him was life and the life was the light of men and the light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not comprehend it so as you marvel at the stars in the sky and think wow that is glorious you think well hang on the one who made the stars became flesh became a baby Who can take that in? It's sadly that some reject these things in disbelief. It is too remarkable to believe. It is not logical concerning our own minds. God becoming flesh. Many refuse to accept them because they cannot understand them Joseph and Mary didn't react in that way their marvel and wonder were of faith of trust of glad acceptance though they were hard to take in though they were remarkable yet they were true and they believed them My friends, let us believe these things. These things are true. All right. We cannot fully fathom them out. We cannot fully explain them. We cannot fully understand the mind of God, but they're true. And let's accept them. As we hear these things preached, as we read of these things, as we see the glory of God revealed to us, As we listen to the beautiful truths of the Gospel, let us marvel and wonder in faith. Let us climb the heights and have our breath taken away at the panoramic vista of the glory of God in Jesus Christ our Lord. And as we think upon these things, as we keep them in our hearts, as we ponder them, May that be turned to praise and worship and obedience towards our glorious and majestic God and King. My friends, how will you respond to the message of Christ the Lord? How will you respond to God incarnate? May we respond like Mary did. Yes, she was ordinary. But she was blessed. And she kept these things. She pondered them in her heart and she marveled at the glorious and gracious purposes of God. May we do this for the glory of his name. Amen.