Luke 1:5-23 December 9, 2001
In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. [6] Both of them were upright in the sight of God, observing all the Lord's commandments and regulations blamelessly. [7] But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren; and they were both well along in years.
[8] Once when Zechariah's division was on duty and he was serving as priest before God, [9] he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to go into the temple of the Lord and burn incense. [10] And when the time for the burning of incense came, all the assembled worshipers were praying outside.
[11] Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. [12] When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. [13] But the angel said to him: "Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to give him the name John. [14] He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, [15] for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from birth. [16] Many of the people of Israel will he bring back to the Lord their God. [17] And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous--to make ready a people prepared for the Lord."
[18] Zechariah asked the angel, "How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years."
[19] The angel answered, "I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. [20] And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their proper time."
[21] Meanwhile, the people were waiting for Zechariah and wondering why he stayed so long in the temple. [22] When he came out, he could not speak to them. They realized he had seen a vision in the temple, for he kept making signs to them but remained unable to speak.
[23] When his time of service was completed, he returned home.
CCI: When we listen, we will hear God address the deepest needs of our hearts.
Preached in 1st person.
Zechariah enters
Good morning my friends. It is a blessed morning and it was more exciting than you can imagine for me to see Sheri follow Jesus in the waters of baptism. That symbol is one that is really significant to me personally. I was baptized by my own son. John was his name, his mother and I are so proud of that boy. Jesus once called him the greatest man who had ever lived up to that time. But I am getting ahead of myself, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Zechariah, Zechariah Cohen.
I am a priest of the tribe of Levi, and my wife, Elizabeth, is also a Cohen, a descendant of Levi, her father was also a priest as were all our ancestors. We were a blessed family. Pure blooded and faithful to our Lord.
But let me tell you what brought me here today. I wanted to see what God was doing in this part of the world. And so this morning He gave me special permission to come and talk to you about one of the greatest days of my life.
As I told you, I am a descendant of Aaron, a member of the tribe of Levi, a priest of the people of God. The priests of the Jews are required to work at the temple. However, because there were almost 2 ,000 of us who could trace our ancestors to Aaron at that time, we did not work in the temple full time, in fact, we only worked two or three times a year at the temple. We were divided into 24 classes of priests. And so, twice a year I would go to Jerusalem and serve on the temple grounds. These were weeks I looked forward to. While they were busy they were also the most inspiring times I ever experienced.
Some times I was allowed to be the keeper of the door, other times I would clean the grounds. Once I was called upon to help offer the sacrifices. These were wonderful times as I prayed for God's people in God's temple. As I worked each day of my schedule at the temple, I remembered the words of the psalmist, "One thing I ask of the LORD, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple." Whatever I was doing, I was living out that Psalm. These were the times of my life.
But there was a terrible sorrow in my life as well. Elizabeth and I had been faithful in our walk with the Lord all our lives. We were thankful for all he had done for us, but there was something missing. The Psalmist had written, "As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: he shall not be ashamed." And that was what was missing. Though we were late in years, still we had no children. And without children, we believed our lives ended with our deaths. There was a proverb among the people that compared the life of the childless to the life of a dog. It was a curst to be without children. And that was our great burden.
Everyday we would open our hearts to God and every day we would thank him for what he had done and for his great love and for the blessings we received. And every day we would ask God for the impossible, we would ask Him for a child.
It was in the winter one year when my week came to serve in the temple. I went with my class, almost 1,000 of my relatives. We went to carry out our duties at the temple. Now every day, two people were chosen from the class by lot, numbers were drawn. These two people would have the privilege of entering the Holy Place, and burning the incense. One did it in the morning and one did it in the evening. The incense in the temple was a symbol of the prayers of God's people rising to the heavens. As the incense burned, the chosen priest would offer prayers for the people. They would pray for the peace of Jerusalem, they would pray for the welfare of God's people. They would pray for the healing of the land. They would ask God to send his Messiah to free us. They would pray for the destruction on God's enemies. After praying, the priest would come from the Holy Place and then he would pray for the people once again. At that time all the activity would stop. The conversations would cease, the selling of the offerings would pause and even the offering of sacrifices would halt while the priest prayed for the people.
One day, to my heart's delight, I was chosen to offer the incense for the evening offering. All day I thought about that opportunity. All my life I had looked forward to doing exactly this. And then the moment came. I went into the temple. I lit the incense. I began to pray. And then I looked up and there, just to the right of the altar was a man standing there. I had never seen one before, but there was no question that this was an angel of the Lord. I was terrified!
As I stammered for words, the angel spoke. He said, "Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to give him the name John. He will be a joy and delight to you." The angel went on and said he would bring joy to many. He told me that my son would prepare the way for the Lord Himself!
I did not know what to say! I certainly had hoped for something like this all my life, but now that it was happening it did not seem possible. And then I asked, "What are you talking about? I am old, my wife is old, how can this happen." The angel simply looked at me, he was sad now, and he said, "I am Gabriel, I stand in the presence of God. God himself sent me to tell you this. I wish you had believed. But because you did not, you will be unable to speak or hear until all this happens."
Immediately, everything went silent. I started to scream, but nothing came out. I was supposed to pray when I left, but now I couldn't. I decided to wait a few minutes, and maybe my voice would come back. I waited and I waited, and then I decided I had to go out. It tried to speak, but it was no use. Soon the people surmised that I had seen an angel, but no one knew what it was all about.
That evening my mind was full of confusion. How could it be? But then again, How could not be? I finished my week in Jerusalem and then went home. Even before I got there, Elizabeth knew that I was unable to speak. She met me and took such good care of me. It wasn't long after that she came to me with a sheepish, childlike grin on her face. She wrote me a message, it said, "Zach, I know this is going to be hard to swallow, but I think I am pregnant!" Oh, we celebrated so! God had heard our deepest pain and had touched us with his blessing. Elizabeth was so excited, she went into her own seclusion. I think she was just enjoying being pregnant!
Then one day there was a knock on the door. And who was it but Elizabeth's cousin, Mary. When she walked in we could tell something was gong on. She beamed, though there was fear in her eyes as well. Immediately Elizabeth knew that she too, was pregnant, she burst into song blessing her cousin. Then Mary burst into song herself. It was the second most amazing thing I have ever seen. I wish I could have joined in the song, but I was still unable to talk. Mary stayed with us for about three months. Those two talked about everything that had happened to them. We worried about Mary more than a little those days. We knew that things would be rough for her when she got home. Then when the time came near for our son to be born, Mary returned to Nazareth.
I had hoped that when my son was born, my voice would return, but it did not. However, after almost a year of communicating by writing, I was getting pretty good at it and so I encouraged Elizabeth to schedule the naming party. On the eighth day, the guests all arrived. The Rabbi performed the ceremony and then it was time to name my son. Elizabeth told the Rabbi his name was to be John, but my brother, bless his heart, insisted that he be named after me. Finally, I got there attention and on a piece of paper I wrote, "His name will be John!"
The neighbors were amazed. And suddenly, my tongue, which had felt like a rock up until then, was loose again. And the song that had been building in my heart burst out!
"Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come and has redeemed his people.
He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David (as he said through his holy prophets of long ago),
salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us -
to show mercy to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant,
the oath he swore to our father Abraham:
to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear
in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.
And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him,
to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins,
because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven
to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace."
God answered our prayers in the most amazing way! I wonder do some of you today have a sorrow that is buried deep down inside much as our sorrow about being childless was? Are there circumstances or events that gnaw at your soul? Then I would encourage you to continue to bring them to God in prayer. And I would encourage you to listen with your heart for His answer. I was working on the most important day of my life when God answered my prayer in away I had never imagined. Elizabeth's cousin was simply praying that God would use her when God said, "Yes, I will." And so this morning, just as you witnessed Sheri obediently follow Jesus, I would encourage you to obediently listen to the voice of Jesus.
The Psalmist wrote, "Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart." What I learned was when I found my delight in the Lord, my other desires dried up as I wanted more and more of Him. And then on the day he answered our prayer, we realized we had everything and more.
I pray you, too, will make that discovery. Jesus came so you could know life in all it's abundance, that it could be full and meaningful. And he wants to carry those burdens and sorrows that you keep deep within yourself. So today, open your heart to him, delight yourself in him, and find in him the desires of your heart.
