Blessed is the one who believes...
Christmas is about God keeping a promise! That’s where we’re going today. Will you open your Bibles to Luke 1: 41. Mary had just had a God encounter; the angel told her that she was going to give birth to God’s son. She headed to a town about five miles away to visit her cousin, Elizabeth, on the outskirts of Bethlehem. Now as she is approaching we read in the 41st verse: "When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb. The baby was Jesus’ cousin, John the Baptist. Elizabeth was six months pregnant when Mary came. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit." This means that Mary recognized these as God’s words through Elizabeth. Here’s what God said: "Blessed are you among women and blessed is the child you will bear." Now "blessed" means to be integrated, to be complete, to be wholly together.
A blessed person is a whole person, a together person. Now notice verse 45, what makes her blessed or an integrated, complete person? "Together is she who has believed that what the Lord has said to her will be accomplished." Complete, wholly together is the one who believes what the Lord has said will be accomplished.

I. Live In the Promise
What makes a complete person? A wholly together person? A complete person is a person who lives in the expectant promise of God. Regardless of the circumstance they find themselves in at the moment, they believe that what God says is going to happen.

What’s In a Promise?
Promises, promises. What’s in a promise? It depends on who makes the promise. A year ago last summer, I was going to drive my son down to Florida to play baseball. He was in the eighth grade and fourteen years old at the time (he’s going to be 16 tomorrow). He said to me, "Dad, we need to go a couple of days early." I said, ‘Why do we need to go a couple of days early?’ He said, "Well, Dad, as far back as I remember you always told me that we were going to go to Disney World. You told me, you told me, every year you told me, but we have never gone to Disney World so you haven’t kept your promise."
Have you ever heard that before? I remember one night when I had a meeting with my bishop in Columbus and Jonathan had a program at school. I said, ‘Jonathan, I promise you.’ "Now Dad, you’re going out of town, you’re going to miss my program, you’ve known about this program," said Jonathan. ‘No, I promise I’ll be back for your program.’ I was coming back from Columbus in plenty of time when all of a sudden traffic came to a complete halt on Interstate 70 on the other side of Springfield. I sat there for almost an hour and a half due to an accident - an overturned truck. "Dad, you didn’t keep your promise," is what Jonathan said to me.
Now when we say "promise," what do we mean? We mean, ‘I am going to do everything in my power, I’m going to try as hard as I can.’ But when we say "promise" as a human, we do not mean absolutely or definitely, right? Because some things may happen that make it definitely impossible, so we emphasize "trying."

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