My spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior,
But we magnify him by having higher, larger, truer conceptions of him; by making known his mighty acts, and praising his glorious name, so that others, too, may exalt him in their thoughts. This is what Mary was doing: she was a woman who was given, in after-life, to pondering. Those who heard what the shepherds said concerning the holy child Jesus wondered; but "Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart." They wondered; Mary pondered. It is only the change of a letter; but it makes a great difference in the attitude of the soul, a change from a vague flash of interest to a deep attention of heart. She pondered; she weighed the matter; she turned it over in her mind; she thought about it; she estimated its value and result. She was like that other Mary, a meditative woman, who could quietly wait at her Lord's feet to hear gracious words, and drink them in with yearning faith. It is no idle occupation thus to get alone, and in your own hearts to magnify the Lord; to make him great to your mind, to your affections; great in your memory, great in your expectations. It is one of the grandest exercises of the renewed nature. You need not, at such a time, think of the deep questions of Scripture, and may leave the abstruse doctrines to wiser heads, if you will; but if your very soul is bent on making God great to your own apprehension, you will be spending time in one of the most profitable ways possible to a child of God. Depend upon it, there are countless holy influences which flow from the habitual maintenance of great thoughts of God, as there are incalculable mischiefs which flow from our small thoughts of him. The root of false theology is belittling God; and the essence of true divinity is greatening God, magnifying him, and enlarging our conceptions of his majesty and his glory to the utmost degree. But Mary did not mean, by magnifying the Lord, merely to extol him in her own thoughts; being a true poetess, she intended to magnify the Lord by her words. No, I must correct myself; she did not  intend to do it, she had been doing it all along, she was doing it when she came, panting and breathless, into her cousin Elizabeth's house. She said, "My soul doth magnify the Lord. I am now in such a favored condition that I cannot open my mouth to talk to you, Elizabeth, without speaking of my Lord. My soul now seems filled with thoughts of him. I must speak, first of all, about  him, and say such things of his grace and power as may help even you, my goodly elder sister, still to think grander thoughts of God than you have ever before enjoyed. My soul doth magnify the Lord." We must recall the fact that Mary was highly distinguished and honored. No other woman was over blessed as she was; perhaps no other could have borne the honor that was put upon her to be the mother of the human nature of our Savior. It was the highest possible honor that could be put upon mortal, and the Lord knew, at the appointed time, where to find a guileless, lowly woman, who could be entrusted with such a gift, and yet not seek to filch away his glory. She is not proud; nay, it is a false heart that steals the revenues of God, and buys therewith the intoxicating cup of self-congratulation. The more God gives to a true heart, the more it gives to him. Like Peter's boat, which sank into the waters the more deeply, the more fully it was laden with fish, God's true children sink in their own esteem, as they are honored by their Lord. God's gifts, when he gives grace with them, do not puff us up; they build us up. A humble and lowly estimate of ourselves is added to a greater esteem of him. The more God gives thee, the more do thou magnify him, and not thyself. Be this thy rule "He must increase, but I must decrease." Be thou less and less. Be thou the Lord's humble handmaid, yet bold and confident in thy praise of him who hath done for thee great things. Henceforth and for ever, let this be the one description of thy life: "My soul doth magnify the Lord; I have nothing else to do any more but to magnify him, and to rejoice in God my Savior." A week might be profitably employed were I to attempt to preach upon each part of Mary's song; but with quite another purpose in view, I am going to present it to you as a whole. As I put before you this instrument of ten strings, I will ask you, just for a minute or two, to place your fingers on each of them as they shall be indicated, and see whether you cannot wake some melody to the praise of the great King, some harmony in his honor; whether you cannot, at this good hour, magnify the Lord, and rejoice in God your Savior. Luther used to say that the glory of Scripture was to be found in the pronouns; and it is certainly true of the toss. Look at the personal touch of them, how it comes over and over again!  "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and  my spirit hath rejoiced in God  my Savior." At one of our Orphanage Festivals, I put before our many friends who were gathered together several reasons why everybody should contribute to the support of the children; indeed, I said, nobody ought to go off the ground without giving something. I was struck with one brother, who had no money with him, but who brought me his watch and chain. "Oh," I said, "do not give me them; those things sell for so little compared with their value;" but he insisted upon my keeping them, and said, "I will redeem them to-morrow, but I cannot go away without giving something now." How glad I would be if every child of God here should be as earnest in adoration, and say, "I am going to give some praise to God at this service: out of some of those strings I will get music; perhaps out of them all. I will endeavor with my whole heart to say, at some portion of the sermon, and from some point of view, 'My soul doth magnify the Lord'! Do I hear you whisper, "My soul is very heavy." Lift it up, then, by praising the Lord; begin a psalm, even if at first the tune must be in a minor key: soon the strain will change, and the "Miserere" become a "Hallelujah Chorus." I. The first string which Mary seems to touch, and which, I trust, we, too, may reach with the hand of faith, is that of THE GREAT JOY WHICH THERE IS IN THE LORD. "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior." Let us bless God that our religion is not one of gloom. I do not know of any command anywhere in Scripture, "Groan in the Lord always; and again I say, Groan." From the conduct of some people, we might almost imagine that they must have altered their New Testament in that particular passage, and thus woefully changed the glory of the original verse, "Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice." The first I ever knew of Christ my Master truly, was when I found myself at the foot of his cross, with the great burden that had crushed me effectually gone. I looked round for it, wondering where it could be, and, behold, it was tumbling down into his sepulcher! I have never seen it since, blessed be his name, nor do I ever want to see it again! Well do I remember the leaps I gave for joy when first I found that all my burden of guilt had been borne by him, and was now buried in the depths of his grave.
