Luke 1:37 For with God nothing shall be impossible
There is a difference between biography and fiction. Fiction is like The Little Engine That Could that you might read to your kids or grandkids. Biography is the accounting of a bio, a life. There are hagiographies, holy writings, where people are flattered beyond the truth when accounting about their lives. Others may basically be an attack against the person in question, but the biography is nonetheless the story of that person. Recently, I was at the Harry Truman home in Independence, Missouri. He moved back to this house after the presidency and lived there until 1972. I’ve seen his house, his living room, things just as they were years ago. You can talk to people and see places and things that speak to the life of Harry Truman.
When you come to Luke 1, it is a biography and does not pretend to be anything else. It is not fiction. It is an accounting of God the Son. Luke 1:1 says, “Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us, even as they delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were eyewitnesses, and ministers of the word; it seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order….” He wrote the accounting of the earthly ministry of God the Son. God is not hiding anything and He leaves no room for equivocation. This story from start to finish is totally supernatural, either ridiculous or miraculous. That is obviously what God is trying to get across here.
For instance, right off the bat in verse 11 we have the first of several accountings of angelic announcements. This particular announcement is from Gabriel to Zacharias. Gabriel was the exact same angel that spoke to Daniel seven hundred years before. That is either ridiculous or miraculous. In verses 7 and 18 the angel relays to Zacharias that he and his wife Elizabeth would bear a child in their old age. The child would be John the Baptist. I don’t know how old Elizabeth was, but bearing a child in old age was improbable at best.
Then you come to verse 34. The angel announces the miraculous birth of the Christ child, a virgin birth. Who was the first to question the virgin birth? The first to question the virgin birth was the Virgin Mary. She did not doubt it. In fact, she said that she believed. She did have questions, and surely Luke himself, whom God used as a penman and was a physician, had questions. Do you think Luke would have said that a virgin birth was a thing? Of course not! It is impossible unless there is a God. If there is not a God, everything in the Bible, even the mildest miracle, would be ridiculous. If there is a God, it would be ridiculous if there were no miracles. So, the Bible says in verse 37, “For with God nothing shall be impossible.”
We are talking about God, not me or you or a frail human. Both the virgin birth of Christ and the resurrection of Christ have been hotly contested because upon these hang the clear meaning of God in the Word of God. I Corinthians 15:6 says, “After that he [Jesus] was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present.” So, speaking of the resurrection, he said there were more than five hundred people who saw Jesus and most of them were still alive. It was almost a challenge. “Hey, Christ is risen. There is someone who knows. Go talk to them.”
I see two takeaways. First, the blessed life is the life that believes the truth. Speaking of Mary, verse 45 says, “And blessed is she that believed: for there shall be a performance of those things which were told her from the Lord.” God is going to keep His word and blessed is she that believed. So, the blessed life is one that believes the truth. Are you governed today by your feelings, your peers, and your circumstances or are you governed by the truth? Sometimes I don’t feel the truth or see the truth, but the truth is independent of me and the truth is the truth. So, I live a blessed life when I believe the truth.
Second, the blessed life is a life of joy. Verse 46 says that Mary was magnifying the Lord. She said, “My spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.” She boasted and bragged and rejoiced in God her Savior. What a wonderful song and a contrast to the religious leaders who just had to keep Christ down, and when He had risen from the dead paid off people to say that the disciples stole His body.
Without a God there are so many things that are not a possibility, but with God all things are possible. Nothing shall be impossible. God is not hiding the ball in Luke 1. The story of Jesus is a heavenly story, miraculous and not common. If there is no God, all this is ridiculous. If there is a God, nothing shall be impossible.