One morning the 5-year-old son of a doctor overheard his father tell his mother "I don't know
when I will be home. I have been called out on a maternity case." A few minutes after his father left
the doorbell rang, and the little lad went to the door. "Is the doctor in," inquired the caller. "No sir,"
replied the boy. "Have you any idea when he will be back?" the man asked. "I don't know sir," the
boy answered, "He went out on an eternity case."
At first the boys mistake is only funny, and you see a bewildered caller convinced its hardly
worth waiting for a man on an eternity case. As you give the matter some thought, however, it has
profound implication. Maternity and eternity are not ill matched words infinitely separated in
significance. The story of Christmas and pre-Christmas events link these terms together intimately.
Dr. Luke is not sharing these birth stories and songs because of his interest in maternity only, but
because of his interest in eternity. The birth of Jesus and His forerunner John the Baptist are eternity
cases because the God of eternity has a direct involvement in these births. By means of them He will
open the gates of eternity to all people. Never were maternity and eternity most closely linked.
The birth of John the Baptist was the birth of one who would herald the coming dawn of a new
day, which would be made bright by the Son of Righteousness who, said Malachi, would rise with
healing in his wings. Malachi was the last of the Old Testament prophets. He predicted that a
messenger would go before the Messiah to prepare his way. Now after 400 years of silence this
prophecy is being fulfilled in the birth of John the Baptist. Some of the relatives following the rut of
family tradition are upset with Elizabeth over her insistence that the child's name be John. They
thought it only right to honor his father by naming his Zacharias. So they go to Zacharias assured
that he would back them up and put his wife in her place. To their shock he writes, "His name is
John, which means the grace of God, or the Lord is gracious." This was the name the angel gave
him, and in this act of obedience he is released from his 9 months of being imprisoned in silence, and
he breaks forth in a joyful song of salvation.
He has been silent but not blind. He saw the shining faces of Mary and Elizabeth as they sang
the praises of God. He saw the implication of what was happening, and he knew the dawn of a new
day of salvation was about to break, and he uses his first words to greet it with a song. The poet
wrote,
There's a light upon the mountain, and the day is at the spring
When our eyes shall see the beauty and the glory of the King.
Weary was our heart with waiting, and the night-watch seemed so long,
But his triumph-day is breaking, and we hale it with a song.
This was Dr. Henry Burton's description of how saints will greet the second coming of Christ.
Zacharias has the same mood as he greets the first coming. Nothing but song can begin to express
the emotions of men who are aware of the nearness of the Savior. Zacharias is glorious happy over
his son, and of the role he will play in preparing the way, but he devotes only 2 verses to that. He is
aware that this is more than a maternity case. It is an eternity case, and that is why the theme of his
song is salvation, and all else is secondary. This song is called the Benedictus from the first word in
the Latin version, which is blessed in the English. Like Mary's Magnificat, it has been a part of
Christian worship for centuries. St. Augustine back in the fourth century expressed how he loved it
and sang it daily.
"O blessed hymn of joy and praise! Divinely inspired by the Holy Ghost,
and divinely pronounced by the venerable priest, and daily sung in the church of God; Oh, may the
words be often in my mouth, and the sweetness of them always in my heart." In more recent times in
the Church of England the Benedictus was revived after years of neglect. In the Diary Of A Church
Goer, Lord Courtney describes the impression made on him by hearing the Benedictus sung in
church: "The choir to-day sang divinely the Benedictus....In my boyhood we rarely heard the
Benedictus. It was in the prayer book, doubtless, but practically never said or sung. Now days it is
reaccepted in use....nor is this surprising, for the Benedictus surely expressed the essence of all
religion...." Salvation is the essence, and that is what the Benedictus is all about. It is so packed
with the theology of salvation that we can't begin to look at all of its implications. Everything in thesong relates to salvation. Consider first-
I. THE AUTHOR OF SALVATION.
Blessed be the Lord God of Israel. God punished Zacharias for his unbelief, and for 9 months
he had to live in silence, and for 3 months watch Mary and Elizabeth sing and rejoice while he sat
mute. But he was not angry with God because of this discipline. He could not wait to join in
singing God's praise. The words of Wordsworth describe the prayer of his heart.
The fetters of my tongue do Thou unbind,
That I may have the power to sing of Thee,
And sound Thy praises everlastingly.
The God of Israel, whom he had served for many years as a priest, was the author of salvation.
The God of creation and revelation, who was the God of the Old Testament, was the one who was
breaking into history to redeem man and to give light to those that sat in darkness. The value of this
pre-Christmas song in the Gospel of Luke is that it knits the Old Testament and the New Testament
together in an unbreakable bond. God's plan of salvation is consistent and continuous. There is
perfect continuity as we move from the old to the new. The author of our salvation is the God of
Israel. The horn of salvation He raised up, meaning Jesus, was of the house of David, and was
promised to the fathers, and foretold by the prophets since the world began. All passed history has
been moving toward the events that Zacharias knew were to soon take place. Christmas was a
climatic fulfillment of the hope of the Old Testament, and the dramatic beginning of a whole new
program in God's plan of salvation. There is not break, however, for the Lord God of Israel is the
author of salvation in both the Old and the New Testament. Consider secondly-
II. THE ACTS OF SALVATION.
This is the main emphasis of this song of praise. The acts of God on behalf of man is what
thrills Zacharias. G. Campbell Morgan said, "This song is not in adoration of the God who acts, but
in celebration of the acts of God." In other words, it is a song about salvation, and not about the
Savior. It acknowledges the Savior, but it emphasizes what the Savior has done to save. He has
visited and redeemed His people. He uses past tense as if God had already acted, which, of course,
He has, for Mary stands before him with the Messiah in her womb. The incarnation is already an
historical fact. Nothing has happened yet outside the small circle of those intimately involved, but
Zacharias uses the prophetic past tense, which means that it is so sure that it is as good as done. God
has come to visit and redeem His people, and to set them free from the clutches of the earthly that
they might be a heavenly people reigning with Him in a kingdom not of this world.
Morgan points out that the word visit in the Greek is the word from which we get Episcopal,
which means to govern or to have oversight. Jesus came not just to look man's situation over, but to
take the reigns of authority, and to rule and guide and oversee. When God steps into the chariot of
history, it is not just to ride, but to take the reigns and guide. Zacharias in describing the acts of God
seems to imply that they will be physical, and that He will destroy the Romans and set them free
from political oppression. This was the hope of many who longed for the Messiah. However,
Zacharias goes on to make it clear that the salvation he sings of is spiritual. His son is to prepare the
people for the coming of the Messiah by giving them the knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness
of their sin. The goal is to serve God without fear in holiness and righteousness, and to be guided
into the way of peace.
The language is a mixture of the Old and New Testament concept of salvation. Salvation in the
Old was thought of in terms of being delivered from the enemy forces that sought to destroy you. It
was physical and collective. In the New Testament the stress is on the enemy of sin and the
individual being rescued from the forces of sin through the forgiveness of God. Here we see God
being praised for His acts of salvation on both levels. It is good for us to keep in mind that there are
different levels of salvation, and though they are not all of equal importance, they are all equally real
and valid. There is physical, mental and spiritual salvation, and Zacharias refers to each of them in
his song. The study of them puts us into a third category-
III. THE AIMS OF SALVATION.
God's actions on behalf of men for their salvation on each of the three levels have distinctive
aims. When Zacharias speaks of being saved from the hand of enemies and those who hate, he is
referring to physical salvation, the aim of which is obvious, and that is to preserve life and health.
When he speaks of freedom to serve God without fear, he is speaking of mental salvation, and the
aim is to have mentally alert servants and worshipers. When he speaks of forgiveness of sin, he is
dealing with salvation on the spiritual level, and the aim is eternal life and the sanctification of the
present life. We tend to think of salvation only on this 3rd and highest level because this is the
emphasis of the New Testament. Before Christ the emphasis was on the other levels, and so in this
song of transition we see them all.
The aim of salvation on any level is deliverance of some form of evil. If one is not at the mercy
of some evil, there is no need for a Savior. In the Old Testament Lot was saved from Sodom and
Israel was saved from famine, and from many enemies. This physical salvation may be less
important in terms of eternity, but when you are faced with physical destruction by a physical enemy
it becomes a desperate need. Mary Queen of Scots on the night before her execution wrote this
poem prayer:
O Lord God almighty! My hope is in Thee!
O Jesus beloved, now liberate me!
In durance the drearest, in bonds the serverest,
My desire is to Thee!
In sign and crying, on bended knees lying,
I adore-I implore Thou woulds't liberate me!
This is not a prayer for the salvation of her soul, but it is for physical salvation, and who can
doubt that it is a valid prayer? Zacharias longs for salvation on the physical level. He wants to be
free from enemies and oppression. This kind of salvation will not get anyone into heaven, but it
makes life on earth so much more pleasant. Jesus gave a large portion of His minister to bringing
physical salvation to people. He delivered them from disease, hunger and death. Salvation on the
mental level was also an important part of His ministry. He delivered people from ignorance, fear
and anxiety by means of the truth. Millions of volumes have been written about mental salvation,
for it has been the heart cry from many, as it was from the poet who wrote-Out of my unreality,
My false seeming,
My fond dreaming,
Good Lord deliver me,
And knit my heart to Thee!
Out of my instability,
Aimless action,
Frenzied faction,
Lord, bid me come to Thee,
Thee Hav'n where I would be.
Into Thy deep tranquility,
Thy still being,
Thy clear seeing,
Lord, bring my soul at last,
This tyranny o'erpast.
Here is a cry for deliverance, not for the body, but for the mind and soul, and not from sin, but
from the evils that make life aimless and frustrating. This is a legitimate level of salvation, and a
level that Christians should long to attain. The point is, however, these first two levels of salvation
can be experienced by all people. Jesus is not the exclusive Savior on these levels. A gun can save a
man from physical destruction, and from his enemy. Medicine can save his life from disease. Food
can save him from starvation. Psychiatry and rest, and various kinds of therapy can save from the
evils of mental breakdown. There are many saviors on the first two stories of the three-story
building of salvation.
In the last part of this song the emphasis is on spiritual salvation, which is deliverance from sin
and being led out of bondage to darkness into the light of peace with God. On this level Jesus is the
exclusive Savior and hope of man. In verse 77 he says that forgiveness of sin was the essence of the
salvation the Messiah was to bring. This is the essence of what is new about the New Testament.
God in Christ finished the three-story building of salvation, and He made the 3rd level adequate to
accommodate all.
The beautiful benedictus ends on the high note of spiritual salvation, the aim of which is to
redeem man from sin, darkness and death. Zacharias saw that the dawn of a new day of salvation
was about to break. The light, which lights every man was coming into the world. Before the dawn
the birds sing and usher in the day with song. Here, in the modest home of an obscure priest, the
dawn of a new day of salvation is ushered in by the songs of Mary and Zacharias. The bright and
morning star is on the horizon.
Look and see, the orient morning
Breaks along the heathen sky;
Lo! The expected day is dawning,
Glorious dayspring from on high!
The beauty of the benedictus lies in its eloquent description of the salvation of the Messiah. Inverse 78 the tender mercy of God is behind the beautiful dawning of the new day. God did not flood
the world with the light of His glory in a single sudden flash, for that would destroy man as certainly
as the flood of His wrath. In tenderness He gently comes like the dawn in the form of a child. The
aim, says Zacharias in verse 79, is to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of
death, to guide our feet into the way of peace. Man is lost and in darkness, and he lives in the fear of
death. This song celebrates the giving of the Savior who saves the whole man-body, mind and spirit.
If Zacharias could sing so joyously at the dawn of this new day, how much more ought we to sing
who live in the noon day sun?
Now, death is life! And grief is turned to joy!
Since glory shown on that auspicious morn,
When God incarnate came, not to destroy,
But man to save and manhood's state adorn.
We need not sit in sin's dark prison,
the Son of Righteousness has risen.
The light He brought can give release,
and guide us in the way of peace.
This is the aim of salvation for which the author of salvation performs the acts of salvation.
Focus your mind on the theme of salvation, and open your heart to God's gift of salvation in Jesus
Christ, and Christmas will always be a season of song. It is the glory of the story of salvation that
makes this song of Zacharias a beautiful benedictus.
