Luke 1:67-80
Intro: Letters that children wrote to Santa Claus. "Dear Santa, you did not bring me anything good last year. You did not bring me anything good the year before that. This is your last chance. Signed, Alfred."
One went like this: "Dear Santa, there are three little boys who live at our house. There is Jeffrey; he is 2. There is David; he is 4. And there is Norman; he is 7. Jeffrey is good some of the time. David is good some of the time. But Norman is good all of the time. I am Norman."
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas. You’ve heard the song. You can’t avoid it if you get out at all right now. The point of it seems to be that it’s not yet quite Christmas, and everywhere you go you can see evidences that Christmas is fast approaching. And that’s supposed to make you happy or drive you crazy or something. Look around. It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas.
The evidences that we’re getting ready to celebrate Jesus’ birth are all around. You can tell it by the nativity scenes and the billboards that wish you a “Happy Holiday.” Wait, most of those forget to make Jesus the focus. Maybe you can tell it by the selflessness and good cheer of retailers. Wait, that’s not what they’re after! Maybe you can tell it by our prayers: “Dear Santa, I mean, Jesus, here is a list of the things I want this year…
Hold it! What should we look and sound like before Christmas? And exactly what should our prayers before Christmas be? We have a great one to consider this morning.
One of the evidences that Jesus’ birth was approaching is contained in the last words of the OT. For 400 yrs, God doesn’t speak to His people. Right before that temporary sign-off, here’s what He says:
Malachi 4:5-6
"See, I will send you the prophet Elijah before that great and dreadful day of the LORD comes. He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers; or else I will come and strike the land with a curse."
The gospel of Luke opens with Zechariah in the middle of the scene. He’s a righteous man. He keeps God’s commands. His name may be translated either Zechariah or Zacharias – same guy. Imagine being Zechariah, priest of God. Your entire life, you’ve waited for the day when it would be your turn to go into the holy place and burn incense on the altar of incense. It was a once in a lifetime event. You’d want it to go perfect, so you’d be very careful about getting everything just right. Only, when you turn around, there next to the altar stands a man – an angel.
It’s Gabriel, and he has news. He tells Zechariah that God has heard his prayer. He’s going to finally have a child, even though he and his wife are past the age for bearing children. He goes on to describe the child in vv14-17 –
…many will rejoice because of his birth,…for he will be great in the sight of the Lord…he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from birth…Many of the people of Israel will he bring back to the Lord their God.
In an ideal world, Zechariah’s response would have been more like Mary’s that we looked at last week. Instead, he wrongly questions the news. Gabriel reminds Zechariah that he’s an angel, that he stands in the presence of God. For his skepticism, Zechariah will be unable to speak for one whole pregnancy. From that moment on, he can’t say a word.
So, a baby boy is born, and on the 8th day, when they officially name him, Zechariah writes on a tablet “His name is John,” and suddenly, he can speak again.
Now, you’ve seen an angel. Your son, the miracle boy, was just born. All during the 9-month pregnancy, you didn’t speak a word. Suddenly you’re able to speak?
What do you say?
Zechariah was immediately filled with the HS and he burst into a prophetic prayer. This prayer is commonly referred to as the Benedictus from the Latin word that means “blessed.” Now, there are ways to pray that seem especially suited to certain times. This is no exception.
Do you realize what it is? It’s 6 months before Jesus’ birth. What we’re looking at here this morning is a great pre-Christmas prayer, offered by a righteous man who hasn’t been able to speak for 9 months. What should he say? Or, better yet, what should we say in this pre-Christmas time that we’re in right now? It seems like that has been a struggle especially this year.
I want to outline for you a guideline for a pre-Christmas prayer. It’s modeled after this prayer we read in Lk 1. If you’re taking notes, they all start with “R.”
I. Repeat The Mighty Deeds of God
Have you ever been around someone who feels like he has to “toot his own horn”? You know, a guy who’s constantly turning the conversation back to what he did and what he said and what he’s like. Before long, no one wants to hang around a guy like that.
On the other hand, have you ever been around someone who had stories about what God did? - Stories from the mission field, from ministries, stories of lives changed forever by the power of God; stories about incredible things that God did. There’s quite a difference, isn’t there? I could listen all day to someone telling stories about the great things that God has done.
Those were the kinds of stories the Israelites told. God reminded them to do it, so that every generation would have reasons to believe and follow Him. “Junior, many years ago, when my great, great, great grandfather was alive, our people were slaves in the land of Egypt. But God took them out – He parted the Red Sea, Israel crossed on dry ground, and then He closed it over the armies of Egypt. He led them through the desert and took care of them for 40 years. He drove out their enemies from the Land of Canaan….”
A lot of what Zechariah speaks here has to do with what God did in the past. He even quotes from Isaiah 9.
We need to be repeating the mighty deeds of God.
In a sense, we’re like Zechariah. Maybe we doubted that God will keep up His end. Maybe we hesitated to speak when there was a silence that needed to be broken. Maybe we were afraid because we heard a report about someone who was scolded for daring to say “Merry Christmas” in front of an atheist.
And in our case, it’s not God but instead it’s the world that has gagged us – or tried to – or that has tried to make us believe we’re gagged. By the way, we’re not gagged! For every silly lawsuit that erupts over a nativity scene in a public place or a prayer at a school function, there are dozens of others that go on just as they have for decades. The news doesn’t report those because, well, they’re not “news.” It has to be about controversy, about upset emotions, about conflict, before it makes it on the news. Our community is a pretty good example of that. There have been plenty of songs about Jesus and about Christmas at the concerts I’ve attended. Why? Because that’s what Christmas is about. Go ahead and speak about it plainly. Send cards that tell about Jesus. Put a cross up in the midst of your lights. Play the music that speaks of what God did.
The American Civil Liberties Union wants to convince you that it’s not your civil liberty to speak about Jesus. I’m sorry, but too many good people have sacrificed way too much for us to let that nonsense gain any more ground! Repeat the mighty deeds of God!
Jeremiah 9:23-24
This is what the LORD says: "Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom or the strong man boast of his strength or the rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boasts boast about this: that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight," declares the LORD.
It’s time for us to repeat the mighty deeds of God. Boast in the Lord. Many of you already know how to sit around and talk about how wonderfully your favorite team is doing, or your favorite player is doing. This is nothing new to you. Now, how about making our conversation about the great things God has done?
And how about making our prayers around this time of year a reflection to God about the things He has done? That’s not so off the wall either. Have you ever listened to a young boy bragging to his dad about his dad? “Daddy, you must be stronger than anybody! Daddy, I’ll bet you work harder than everyone else does! Daddy, you’re so tall I’ll bet you reach to the moon!” And any good dad hears that and it brings a lot of joy to his heart. Why not speak to God, regularly, about how great He is and about how amazing He is? Especially this time of year, we’re reminded that we have some things about God to repeat.
Another aspect of pre-Christmas prayer is to
II. Reflect on The Plan of God
Here’s another evidence that Zechariah was a godly man – he understood the history of Israel and how it applied to his current situation. He understood how history should be interpreted in light of God’s plans…
Luke 1:69-73
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.
It was around 2,000 years before Zechariah that God first called Abraham and began what would become the nation of Israel. Zechariah read the OT. He was able to look back that far and put it together with where he lived. So, as he speaks, he’s reflecting on the way God’s plan for humanity is coming all together. He understands that what was going on wasn’t just the birth of his son John, it’s the fulfillment of the prophecy made hundreds of years before by Malachi and Isaiah and in the Psalms. It marks the entrance of God into the world – deliverance for oppressed people - redemption from sin. That’s what Zechariah sees.
You and I need to take that same approach to life.
Less than 2,000 years ago the rest of the Bible was finished. Now you and I have an opportunity to do the same – to look back on the whole Bible and reflect on the plan of God. When we talk about the Christmas season, we need to help people see how Christmas spans all of human history. It wasn’t invented by Macy’s or WalMart or Bing Crosby or Coca Cola. It doesn’t just involve Dec.
This idea that God was going to come into the world to save us is mentioned as early as Genesis 3:15, and that fact that He’s coming back again is mentioned as late as Revelation 22:20. Everything that happened and is happening until then is a part of this huge plan that God set into motion from the very beginning. We need to see life in light of it all.
I fear we become too shallow in our whole approach to life. We see situations and we relate to them based on a movie we saw or some book we read or some video game. We hear about some news and rather than relating it to what God is doing, we wonder how it will affect the Dow Jones average or the world of politics. No wonder so many statistics show that there’s not much difference between people who claim to be followers of Christ and people who don’t. We’ve gotten used to interpreting life by shallow perspectives.
I don’t mean to say that every time something happens we’re supposed to go out and carry signs that say “The end is near.” But we are supposed to be able to look at life and understand it in light of God’s plan:
Of course there are going to be disasters. We live in a world that’s subjected to futility until the Lord returns. Of course the Church is going to be challenged. Jesus said that most people won’t take the narrow road that leads to life. Of course our physical bodies are going to age and die. That’s what happens in this current world.
I appreciate about Zechariah that he understood his current situation in light of what God had said about His plan. He looked back over 2,000 years and applied it to where he was then living. That’s exactly what you and I need to be doing – to reflect on God’s plan and interpret life in light of what’s really going on in God’s plan. When we do that, the present will make a lot more sense, and the future will be a lot less intimidating.
Here’s a question: Who can do that the best? What people are going to be most able to reflect on God’s plan and to see how life’s events fit into that plan? It’s the people who are the most familiar with God’s plan and with how He has been working that plan all along. In other words, you need to be in the word. You need to read through the Bible in 2006. Get in tune with God’s plan so that you can apply it to today. Reflect on God’s plan.
III. Rejoice that You Have a Part in It
Just how important was John the Baptist in the big picture of human history? He was given an important job. He was the one who was to prepare the way for the coming of the Messiah. His birth was a miracle. He developed a following of disciples who were thoroughly devoted to him. Some would even have a tough time changing over from following John to following Jesus. Jesus said of John
Luke 7:28a I tell you, among those born of women there is no one greater than John…
John was going to be terribly important. Only, that was John, not Zechariah. He could have turned resentful. He could have said, “God, please, how about just a little piece of the pie for me in this too?” Instead, just like any good dad, Zechariah was happy to be used by God. His son was going to far outshine him, and he was just glad to have a part in it all.
Luke 1:76-79
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.
What do you know about Thomas Edison’s father? What can you tell me about Abraham Lincoln’s father or George Washington’s mother? You see, we don’t even remember their names, but I guarantee you those parents all had a vital part in the history of our nation.
What if you’re called by God to be the parent of someone who will do great things for Him? What if you’re great calling in life is to be the parent of some great missionary or writer or preacher? What would you do with that? The right thing to do would be to rejoice that you have a part in God’s plan!
Too often we look at some of the roles we’re called by God to play and we consider it drudgery. Zechariah was able to look at his given role and praise God. He’s amazed that God would even use him for such an honor.
What if God has called you for some other role that seems unimportant – not in the spotlight – a task that no one else will really know about- what do you do with that?
Rejoice that you have a part in it at all! It makes it so much easier to volunteer to help with Wee Worship, to clean up when others forgot, to be a parent to teenagers, to be someone who boxes up the Christmas decorations on New Year’s Eve, to quietly give when no one else will find out about it. All those things become so much easier when you’re able to not care about notoriety and instead to rejoice that God used you at all!
Conclusion:
I know Christmas is 7 days away. It’s not too late. Let’s decide this morning how we’re going to look at Christmas. Every retailer in the country has pitched the way they want me to look at Christmas. The ACLU has attempted to decide for me the way they want me to look at Christmas…er, the holiday season. Even traditions that go way back have given me a certain version of Christmas. But we have a choice about what we’re going to do with this time of year.
Will we see it as a time of year that emphasizes how and why God came and lived among us?
Will it be for us a reminder of how God was in control back then, is in control now, and that His plan is completely on schedule?
Will we make it a time for us to not be caught up in ourselves and instead to just find joy in the way God uses us for whatever He wants us to do?
I want to be classed with people like Zechariah. He messed up, but the Lord took this imperfect servant who wrestled with his doubt and used him. That’s a familiar story, because that’s the story of one person after another sitting here this morning. That can be your story too…
