God's Grace - Luke 1:5-25
INTRODUCTION:
Since this is the first of December I thought that we would turn our thoughts this morning to the incarnation of Jesus Christ including the events leading up to His birth and I thought that we would do this by looking at the account that we have for us in the book of Luke. Luke is the only Gentile to write a book of the Bible, in fact he wrote two books, both his Gospel and the book of Acts. Luke was a physician and as we see in his Gospel a historian, his Gospel by far is the most chronological of the four Gospels. As a historian he starts at the beginning of the events, when God broke the silence. You see the last prophet of the Old Testament was Malachi and when his book ended there were no more prophets, there was no new revelation from God, there was silence for 400 years. The temple continued to function, but the religion of Judaism became more outward and a religion of works. Luke begins his Gospel by tying it to the Old Testament, showing us the continuity between the Old and the New Testaments. For example, in Luke 1:78 we have a reference made of the Sunrise from on high visiting us. This is a reference to the Messiah, that He will visit us, where does this reference come from? It is from the prophet Malachi, in chapter 4, verse 2 he writes, “But for you who fear My name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings; and you will go forth and skip about like calves from the stall.” (Malachi 4:2, NASB95)[1] The sun of righteousness is speaking of the Messiah and those who fear the name of the Lord will rejoice on the day in which the Messiah, the sun of righteousness rises. This idea of the Messiah being a light in the world of darkness is also found in Isaiah and some of the other prophets. This is one way in which Luke ties the Old Testament to the New showing that there is continuity throughout.
Malachi in the last verses of his book spoke of Elijah coming before the coming of the Lord, coming to prepare the people for the coming of the Messiah. This is where Luke begins his Gospel, where Malachi left off, Elijah will come, a forerunner or herald of the Messiah. When we see him, we will know the Messiah is soon to follow, identify the forerunner and you will be able to identify the Messiah. Let’s pray and then get into our passage for this morning.
SCRIPTURE:
Turn in your Bibles this morning to Luke 1:5-25 a passage where God shows His grace to the world by breaking the silence. Please stand if you are able in honor of the reading of God’s Word and follow along as I read.
Luke 1:5-25,
“In the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zacharias, of the division of Abijah; and he had a wife from the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. They were both righteous in the sight of God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and requirements of the Lord. But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and they were both advanced in years. Now it happened that while he was performing his priestly service before God in the appointed order of his division, according to the custom of the priestly office, he was chosen by lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense. And the whole multitude of the people were in prayer outside at the hour of the incense offering. And an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing to the right of the altar of incense. Zacharias was troubled when he saw the angel, and fear gripped him. But the angel said to him, ‘Do not be afraid, Zacharias, for your petition has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will give him the name John. You will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth. For he will be great in the sight of the Lord; and he will drink no wine or liquor, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit while yet in his mother’s womb. And he will turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God. It is he who will go as a forerunner before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children, and the disobedient to the attitude of the righteous, so as to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.’ Zacharias said to the angel, ‘How will I know this for certain? For I am an old man and my wife is advanced in years.’ The angel answered and said to him, ‘I am Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. And behold, you shall be silent and unable to speak until the day when these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their proper time.’ The people were waiting for Zacharias, and were wondering at his delay in the temple. But when he came out, he was unable to speak to them; and they realized that he had seen a vision in the temple; and he kept making signs to them, and remained mute. When the days of his priestly service were ended, he went back home. After these days Elizabeth his wife became pregnant, and she kept herself in seclusion for five months, saying, ‘This is the way the Lord has dealt with me in the days when He looked with favor upon me, to take away my disgrace among men.’” (Luke 1:5–25, NASB95)[2]
GOD’S GRACE SEEN IN JUSTIFICATION (Luke 1:5-7)
Luke begins his record of events by giving us a person in history to which we can attach a date, he writes in the days of Herod, king of Judea. This Herod is Herod the great or Herod the first, he ruled from 37 – 4 B.C. This give us the time period for the events that are about to unfold.
Luke then identifies for us a priest named Zacharias. Zacharias was of the priestly division of Abijah, let me explain what a priestly division is, in the days of King David there were so many descendants of Aaron, Moses brother, who received the priesthood from God and it was promised to him that his descendants would be the priests of Israel forever. There were so many in David’s day that he divided them into 24 divisions each division named after there ancestral father. Theses 24 divisions rotated serving at the temple, each division served for week twice a year, so a total of two weeks but not consecutive weeks. The sons of Abijah were the 8th division. When the people returned to Israel after the exile under Zerubbabel only four of the priestly divisions returned but for the sake of tradition they divided these into 24 divisions again and used the ancestral names that David had used for each division even though the divisions were not made up of the sons of those ancestors any longer. So, Zacharias was a priest in the division of Abijah, but not a descendant of Abijah. Now understand that Zacharias was just one of thousands of priests that ministered at the temple twice a year for a week at a time.
Luke goes on to tell us that Zacharias was married and that his wife’s name was Elizabeth and she was of the daughters of Aaron, meaning that she was a priest’s daughter, Zacharias had taken a wife from the tribe of Levi but not only from the tribe of Levi but from the priestly line of Aaron. Priests were free to marry any virgin from any tribe, but to marry a woman of the priestly line was considered to be the best as you kept the bloodline of the priests pure. Because Elizabeth came from a priest’s home where her father and brothers were priests, she would understand everything about the priesthood and the service that the priests performed. Zacharias and Elizabeth did not live in Jerusalem, but out in a village in Judea and twice a year Zacharias would travel into Jerusalem to serve his week at the temple as a priest.
Luke goes on to tell us that Zacharias and Elizabeth were “both righteous in the sight of God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and requirements of the Lord.” (Luke 1:6, NASB95)[3] Is Luke telling us that they were righteous because they perfectly kept the Law of Moses? No, that is not what Luke is saying, rather he is saying just what we talked about the last two weeks in Romans 8:1-4, they were righteous in the sight of God because they believed the promises of the Old Testament that God would send a Messiah, a Savior who would take away their sin. They knew Isaiah 53 which speaks of the Messiah dying for their sin, becoming their substitute, suffering God’s wrath against sin on their behalf and they believed and trusted in God’s promises of a Savior crying out for God’s mercy and grace and they were declared righteous in the sight of God because of their faith. The truth of Isaiah 61:10 was true of Zacharias and Elizabeth, the prophet wrote, “I will rejoice greatly in the Lord, My soul will exult in my God; For He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness, As a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, And as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.” (Isaiah 61:10, NASB95)[4] They had come to salvation the same way each of us does, by grace through faith and they were declared righteous, Christ’s perfect righteousness was imputed to them. The second half of verse 6 in Luke one speaks of what happens once we are justified, then the process of sanctification begins. Remember we learned last week that we were justified so that the requirements of the Law might be fulfilled in us. Zacharias and Elizabeth were not walking by the flesh but by the Spirit and had longings for holiness and were carrying out the requirements and commandments of the Lord blamelessly. Does this mean they no longer struggled with sin? No, they were being sanctified just as we are and struggled with temptation and at times gave into it, but their new nature desired to be blameless in all they did so when they fell they would confess their sin and God would forgive them and cleanse them from all unrighteousness. Zacharias and Elizabeth belonged to a small group in Israel that had not forgotten the promises of God to send the Messiah, to send a Savior and they believed His promises and just as we in faith are justified and sanctified so were Zacharias and Elizabeth. They had received God’s grace through faith.
Though they were righteous in the sight of God, they were not in the sight of men. Luke tells us that they had no child because Elizabeth was barren, and they were both advanced in years. In Jewish culture to not have a child was evidence of God’s disfavor, there must be some sin in your life that God has closed your womb and withheld children from you. Zacharias and Elizabeth lived with this stigma attached to them their whole married life that somehow in some way they had come under God’s disfavor. The fact that they were both advanced in years, a statement that refers to people that were over 60, we do not know how old they were but they could have been up to 80 since the priesthood was for life, it seemed impossible humanly speaking that they could ever have a child. They had prayed earnestly for a child for many years, but as they aged and the child-bearing years were passed they resolved that they would have no child. This view of God’s disfavor was the view of the people around them, but it was not true, God in His grace had chosen this couple to be the parents of a very special child. Just as God had chosen Abraham and Sarah to be the parents of Isaac, the child of promise, when Sarah was barren, and Abraham and Sarah were old and past their child-bearing years. God had promised that He would send a forerunner to announce the arrival of the Messiah, the Savior, and God chose to do this in a miraculous way through a couple that loved Him and believed in His promise to send a Savior.
GOD’S GRACE IN ANSWERED PRAYER (Luke 1:8-23)
I am not going to spend a lot of time this morning on verses 8-23. I have preached messages on this passage before and gone into detail on these verses. I just want to focus on two facts: first, the display of God’s grace to Zacharias as he was chosen to be the first to hear from God after God had been silent for 400 years. Second, God’s grace shown to Zacharias by answering a prayer that had been prayed many years before, but most likely had not been prayed in recent years, a prayer that became forgotten as the couple aged.
Zacharias was ministering at the temple for one of his two yearly weeks that his division served. Because each division was so large the duties of the priesthood were decided by lot and at this particular time on this particular day the lot to burn the incense on the golden altar fell to Zacharias. This was a huge honor and would only happen once in a priest’s lifetime. Incense was burned morning and evening at about the same time as the morning and evening sacrifice. Zacharias was most likely chosen for the evening offering as the people were waiting outside for him to come and pronounce the blessing on them.
It is while he is in the holy place of the temple alone that God chose to break the 400 years of silence. As Zacharias is burning the incense and praying suddenly standing next to him is an angel of the Lord. Zacharias thought this could only mean one thing, he thought this angel of the Lord had come to judge him. We are told that he was gripped with fear, he was terrified. The angel of the Lord breaks the silence of 400 years with the words, “Do not be afraid, Zacharias, for your petition has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will give him the name John.” (Luke 1:13, NASB95)[5] Zacharias is given wonderful news, the prayers of this godly couple for so many years, that they had forgotten had not been forgotten by God, their prayer would be answered in God’s time by God grace to this old couple, your wife Elizabeth will have a son and you will give him the name John which means “God has shown grace.” The silence is broken with the good news that God’s grace is about to be shown to the world, the silence is broken with the good news that God’s grace is shown to this couple in that they will have a child, the world will see that this couple has the favor of God, and the fact that this child will be born miraculously in their old age will tell the world that this child is special. The angel even tells Zacharias that this child will be great in the eyes of the Lord and will be filled with the Holy Spirit while yet in his mother’s womb. He will be the forerunner of the Messiah and he will go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah. Malachi had said that Elijah would come before the coming of the Lord to prepare the hearts of the people to receive Him. Here is one that is not Elijah, but comes in the spirit and power of Elijah to announce the first advent of Messiah, on another day Elijah will come to announce the second advent of the Messiah.
You know the rest of this event, Zacharias asked for a sign because humanly speaking this was not possible, but in doing this he forgot that the words spoken to him were God’s words and they could be trusted and should be trusted without question and that is what Gabriel tells him and then gives him a sign by making him mute, unable to talk until hat God has said comes true. Zacharias comes out of the temple and is unable to pronounce the blessing because he is mute, and the people understand by his gestures that he had seen a vision in the temple.
GOD’S GRACE IN FULFILLED PROPHECY (Luke 1:24-25)
As we come to the end of this passage, we once again see God’s grace displayed in the life of Zacharias and Elizabeth, because Luke tells us that God kept His word and opened Elizabeth’s dead womb just as He had so many years before for Sarah. Luke says that Elizabeth became pregnant and she kept herself in seclusion for five months, probably the last five months of her pregnancy when she was showing. She knew the excitement and questions that would be asked if she was out in public, she used this time in seclusion to worship the Lord for His grace that she felt He had showered on her. She speaks of God’s favor to her when all her married life she had been told that she had God’s disfavor, but she rejoices that this is not true, He has shown her grace, or favor and has taken away her disgrace among men.
CONCLUSION:
We will see this couple again in a few weeks when Elizabeth gives birth to her son and they name him John as the angel Gabriel had commanded them. God has shown His grace, the meaning of John’s name is a fitting title for the events that have taken place in this godly couple’s lives. God showed His grace to them in justifying them for their faith in His promise to send a Savior to take away their sin. God showed His grace by choosing Zacharias to be the one to whom God spoke through Gabriel to break the silence and He showed His grace by answering a prayer that they had forgotten, a prayer for a son. He showed them grace by fulfilling His word and miraculously opening Elizabeth’s dead womb and allowing her to conceive. God has shown His grace to us in that the son that Zacharias and Elizabeth points us to the Savior of the world, if we know who the forerunner is, we know who the Savior is because he points Him out for us. John many years after his birth as he saw Jesus coming toward him, pointed to Him and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world!” (John 1:29b, NASB95)[6] God’s grace that is greater than all our sin because the Lamb of God came to die in our place as our substitute paying the penalty for our sin.
[1]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[2]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[3]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[4]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[5]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.
[6]New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995.