Zechariah

I've now watched something like three different productions of the Nativey Story this year. My sisters school did a production from the viewpoint of the angels watching over the arrival of the Savior, a couple of other kids from that school that we know did a concert mixed with a living nativity, I watched the film The Nativity Story for the first time, and its a film thats been growing in the back of my head, I'm just loving it more and more with each passing day. But throughout all these productions I've found myself drawn more and more towards a small but important player, the priest Zechariah.

Luke 1:9-20
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 call him 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 before he is born.
16 He will bring back many of the people of Israel 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 parents 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 said to him, “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 appointed time.”

Boom, how awesome is that? An angel of the Lord shows up in the temple and tells him that he is going to have a son. And when Zachariah voices his doubts on whether or not this is actually going to happen. Gabriel is all like "Who do you think is talking to you? You're going to doubt me? I stand in the very presence of God and He, the creator of the universe, has chosen me to deliever to you this message. You don't believe it? Fine, but you are not going to spoil this wonderous thing with your doubts. You can keep them to yourself."

And shazam! Zachariah is struck speechless until that which God told him was going to happen actually does happen.

And I was sitting there, watching the rather wonderful production of the youth at Lighthouse Christian church, listening to David Crowder music and thinking about Zechariah and I realized that when you can't talk about something, or in fact can't talk about anything you spend an awful lot of time watching everyone around you and thinking.
And how much time do you think Zechariah spent thinking about what was going on around him? How much time to do you think he spent in those nine months of silence considering the implications of what he was seeing unfold before him?

Zechariah, for all his moments of foolish doubt, was not a stupid man. He was a priest, he was educated, he knew what he was watching unfold.

He knew the Messiah was coming.

So lets look at what is happening right in front of him. Look at what God is doing in the space of these few chapters.

God is doing some incredible things, God is showing up in ways that hadn't even been dreamed of in 400 years. There are no less than four angelic visitations. God creates life from nothing to create a child unburdened by the curse of sin, the first time since the creation of the universe.
There are choirs of angels, it says in Luke that there are multitudes of heavenly beings.

Now, lets take a step back for a moment and ponder this: what do you think of when you think multitude? Because I know when I watch Christmas plays it means like, 15 tinsel covered little children.
But for a real view of what it means for a multitude imagine Acquire the Fire, or Winter Jam, or a baseball game, maybe the super bowl. Now imagine every one of those people are angels, beings that the sight of just one of them caused people to fall on their faces in pure unadulterated fear and wonder if they were dead.

Now imagine a stadium full of that, except their scattered across the sky and they are singing. No, not just singing, they are worshiping God with every fiber of their being.

Its a thing of beauty, precisely crafted by the creator God to welcome His son to earth.

So know this, that God did not want the birth of His son to be forgotten or ignored. In fact He made it pretty much impossible to miss. The biggest and best birthday party EVER. It was epic, it was awesome, it was God welcoming His son to earth.

Now there comes a time every year when I'm walking through the house, maybe to grab a snack or whatever. The lights are off, my families asleep but the Christmas lights on the tree have been left on and there it is: a glowing thing of beauty, with presents piled overflowing around the base of the tree and I just take a moment or three and sit there and stare at it. Sometimes I pray, sometimes I find a bible and read the story of Jesus's birth but most of the time I just sit and stare at this thing I'm constantly walking by and really barely noticing during the day.

And its great to take that time to really just think about the fact that its Christmas and everything that means to me.

It says in Luke 2 that after all the angels and the wise men and everything else that happened to mark the birth of the Savior that Mary did what?

Luke 2:19
19 But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.

So, I just want to encourage you. Grab your bible, take some time between now and Christmas, get away from everybody, or maybe do it with your sister or your brother or your parents and read through this story and ponder it, and take some time to wonder what it means to you personally.