Scripture
Luke 1: 57-66
57 Now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son. 58 Her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown his great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her.
59 On the eighth day they came to circumcise the child, and they were going to name him Zechariah after his father. 60 But his mother said, “No; he is to be called John.” 61 They said to her, “None of your relatives has this name.” 62 Then they began motioning to his father to find out what name he wanted to give him. 63 He asked for a writing tablet and wrote, “His name is John.” And all of them were amazed. 64 Immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue freed, and he began to speak, praising God. 65 Fear came over all their neighbors, and all these things were talked about throughout the entire hill country of Judea. 66 All who heard them pondered them and said, “What then will this child become?” For, indeed, the hand of the Lord was with him.
Devotion
There is no possible way that I am a father of a sixteen-year-old. These are the thoughts and feelings rummaging around in my head as I write this blog. Today is my son’s sixteenth birthday. Sixteen years, where did that come from? Where did they go? Last time I looked we were teaching him how to walk and write letters, now I must teach him to drive, I do not think so. I sit here in disbelief, that the reality staring at me in the face is that I am a middle-aged father of a coming-of-age young man. My jaw is now firmly on the floor in incredulity and denial. Disbelief.
So too was Zechariah in disbelief. His problem was not that he has an almost adult child, his problem was that he had no children and he and his wife Elizabeth were beyond the childbearing age. So, when the angel Gabriel tells him he is going to have a Son who will return the people to God and prepare the way for God’s Messiah, Zechariah cannot and will not believe it. His response is not one of acceptance that God can create as God’s good pleasure and will choose, his response is one of astonishment that certainly two old people cannot make a baby. Unlike Mary who will graciously accept the Word of God, Zechariah mentally rejects that same Word of God as something completely impossible and untrue. Where did this come from? How could that happen? I do not think so. Disbelief.
We all have a little Zechariah, or perhaps a lot, inside of us. We hear the Word of God and instead of accepting it like Mary, we reject it like Zechariah. There is no way that God could make me into a saint. There is no way that God could forgive me. There is no way that I could learn a new way of life. There is no way that I am a sinner. There is no way that the Word became flesh in Jesus of Nazareth. There is no way that that Jesus rose again from the dead. There is no way that…. We are after all living in the world of the scientific method, where miracles are excluded due their unprovability, where reason reigns as Lord over creation, where mathematics, physics and history have theorems and laws that must be respected and believed in more so than the power and good pleasure of the Word of God to re-create and to rule. Disbelief like Zechariah instead of faith like Mary.
However, the Word of God is more than capable not only of enabling Elizabeth and Mary to conceive but also of enabling of Zechariah and us of believing. For Zechariah, the method of teaching him the power and good pleasure of the Word of God is the curse of being unable to speak. Until the day of the baby’s circumcision, Zechariah cannot speak. Until the day, that Zechariah acknowledges the Word of God spoken to him, that Elizabeth will conceive a son, and that Son has s Godly destiny prepared by God and for God. Until Zechariah believes and accepts the Word of God by naming the baby “Yohanan”, which means “God has shown favor” in Hebrew, Zechariah cannot speak. His muteness is teaching him that God can do anything God chooses to do. The important lesson is that the God through God’s Word can and does teach and transform Zechariah into a believer. At the end he gets it, by believing in God like Mary believes in God, and he not only talks again, but gives God words of praise instead of denial. Faith.
Can the Word of God not do the same for us? Do we not have the same lesson to learn? Will God not also succeed? The answer is always yes. We might be like Zechariah, but the Word of God can and does change us from disbelieving “Zechariah’s” into believing “Mary’s.” The tool of that creating and transforming Word of God, is the testimony about the miracles of God, the written and spoken Word of God. We read of miracles of speaking people becoming mute and speaking again, all at the Word’s behest and will. We read of miracles about barren women, conceiving, carrying, birthing, nursing, and circumcising Sons of Destiny, all at the Word’s behest and will. We read of miracles about the crucifixion and resurrection of that same Word of God made flesh, all at the behest and will of the same Word. And the only possible result is the transformation of us from disbelief into saving and justifying faith: all because the Word wants to and can!
As we begin this Christmas Season Proper, perhaps we need to be reminded of the miraculous nature of God’s saving work, both in John and in Jesus. But more than being reminded of the nature of Christmas miracles, we need to be reminded of the purpose of such things: to bring doubters and disbelievers into the sphere of the faithful elect. The purpose of the miracles of Christmas is to change us from the skeptic into the disciple. The Word of God did it in and to Zechariah, may the Word become flesh in Jesus Christ, do it in and to us. This is a time of Christmas miracles, may the miracles of John and Jesus, lead to the miracle of faith in you and in me! Amen.
Prayer
Dear God of Grace and God of Glory, we praise you for the gift of miracles this Christmas Season. Use the miraculous to create in us not only a sense of awe and respect for your creative power but use them to create in us the same acceptance and belief that Zechariah and Elizabeth and Joseph and Mary had by being miraculous parents of the Sons of Destiny. By the power of your Word become flesh, help our flesh to believe and accept your will for our lives. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.
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