Luke 1:11-20 Baby Promise
Format for Your Devotions
Instructions: Do not read my example devotion until you have completed your own devotional time in the scriptures. Reading my thoughts first may limit your own understanding. Let the Holy Spirit speak to you alone before looking to see what anyone else has to say, whether it is me, a Bible commentary, or a friend. Let God speak to you before you let another person speak to you. I have provided a format, but modify it to fit your needs. For example, I usually combine my application and prayer together talking to God about the application to my own life. You can go through this devotion process mentally, speaking out loud, or in writing as you wish. Don’t worry if you are not following this process exactly. Sometimes, I add extra information and sometimes I emphasize one part more than others. However, you should always think about what you learn about God from this passage.
Step 1: Pray–Ask for the Holy Spirit’s guidance first of all and that God may reveal the lessons that He wants you to have that day. Request that God protect you from Satan’s distractions (and the devil will try to distract you whether it is pinching the baby or putting you to sleep). Ask to see God more clearly as you read and think about the passage.
Step 2: Read the passage–Read to get an overview of the information first. Then start looking at specific parts after the first reading. You may read a larger or smaller section than I have here because you do not have to follow my organization at all.
Step 3: Understand the passage–You can summarize, ask and answer your own questions about the passage, visualize the story, analyze the characters, and relate this passage to other scriptures and personal experiences.
Step 4: What does this reveal about God?–What do you learn about the Father, Son, and/or Holy Spirit from this passage?
Step 5: Apply this to your own life.
Step 6: Prayer
My Example Devotion: June 8, 2018 Luke 1:11-20
Note 1: In the devotion examples, I leave my questions and thought processes in the text because I am trying to demonstrate that a devotional time is a dialogue with God about what you are reading from His word. As such, any questions or ideas that you have should be explored by talking it out with God. These example devotions are not my attempts to teach you what the meaning of a particular scripture is. They are an attempt to teach you the process of devotions, which is a combination of prayer and Bible study where you explore ideas with God as you read His word.
Note 2: I was experimenting with using my sanctified imagination at this point of time. I would place myself in the position of the main character and try to imagine what he thought and felt as the actions in the text played out. This devotion eventually became part of a sermon. If you want to see a video of a presentation based on this devotion and my research from the previous day’s devotion, go to the dropdown menu of the section called Articles/Videos and choose Videos. Choose the video entitled The Sanctuary–Zachariah’s Prayer.
And there appeared to him an angel of the Lord standing on the right side of the altar of incense. And Zechariah was troubled when he saw him, and fear fell upon him. But the angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John. And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great before the Lord. And he must not drink wine or strong drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother’s womb. And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared.” And Zechariah said to the angel, “How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years.” And the angel answered him, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. And behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time.”
(Understanding the Text) Zechariah was probably excited. He was old, and the lot to burn incense had passed him by time and again, so he may have despaired that he would be one of those priests who had never been chosen to burn incense. I wonder if not being chosen made people feel unworthy? Would the combination of Elizabeth’s barrenness and Zechariah’s never having burned incense have felt like God was displeased with Zechariah somehow?
Today, Zechariah felt confidence that God was pleased with him, and he felt nervous that he had to do everything just right now that his opportunity had finally arrived. He waited as his friends first carefully swept the old ashes into a container and then placed in new burning coals from the outside altar of sacrifice. When it was time for them to go, they may have shared a smile with Zechariah because he was finally getting his chance to serve in the Holy Place. As soon as the others left, Zechariah focused all of his attention on his duty to Yahweh. He carefully placed the incense on the coals while reciting the prayer for his people that he had learned as a small child. As he prayed the prescribed prayer another rose in his heart, a longing for a child that he knew would never be his, a sigh for a hope that could never happen. He was being honored before God on this day and part of him wished that his beloved wife could also feel honored by God, but it was not a fully formed prayer; it was more of a regret.
As he finished his prayer for Israel, he suddenly became aware that there was someone else standing in front of him and to the side. No one could have passed him to get to that position as he had been praying. Where had he come from? The Most Holy Place? No one was ever allowed in there except for the high priest once a year. Zechariah’s heart started beating rapidly as he realized that the person he was seeing was not a man, but an angel. Fear rose in him. Did he do something wrong in his duties? Had he been judged unworthy for this job? Was a mistake made when he was chosen by the lots? As fear and worry rose inside of him, he heard the angel speak words of reassurance. “Don’t be afraid. I’m here to answer your prayer.”
Zechariah wondered what prayer was being answered? He had only spoken the prayer for Israel as he had been taught. He listened in astonishment as the angel told him that his wife Elizabeth would have a son. Elizabeth was an old woman. It was too late for her. Oh, it would have been possible maybe for him still to have a son with a younger wife, but he had loved and respected Elizabeth too much to hurt her more than she already hurt because of her barrenness. She was a joy to be with and loved him more than any younger woman would. Now this angel was saying that not just would he be the father, but Elizabeth would be the mother of a baby.
The angel went on with instructions that Zechariah could barely comprehend. He was to name his child John and raise him as a Nazarene. The child would do great things and be filled with God’s Spirit from the beginning. Not only was Zechariah to believe that there would be a miracle baby in his old age, but also that his own son was going to be a great man of God. It was too much for an old man to comprehend, much less believe. He knew that when he went home and told Elizabeth, she would think that he was crazy. What could he point to so that she knew he wasn’t becoming senile? He asked for a sign as Gideon and others in the scriptures had received. He was thinking of some kind of miraculous object or event; instead, the angel simply stopped him from talking and told him that he didn’t believe the messenger from God, but his disbelief would not change the events. The sign would come when God’s word was fulfilled before his eyes.
(Revelation of God) Prayer was happening on two levels in this situation. There was the formal prayer that he was intoning as part of the ceremony, and there was the heartfelt longing that he had felt in his heart every day since he married Elizabeth and which had grown stronger with each passing year even as his hope had grown weaker. At first, he had prayed strongly and offered sacrifices, but as the years went on and his hope of having a child vanished, he stopped praying, but kept longing. Paul says the Spirit intercedes for us and that God searches our hearts. God had searched in Zechariah’s heart and knew his longing, but remained silent until Zechariah had given up all hope. Then, God showed him a miracle that justified every bit of faith Zechariah had placed in Him while showing Zechariah that he did not have the faith that he should have had in God.
Zechariah’s situation sheds light on what Paul says about prayer in Romans. “But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers” (Rom 8:25-29). Hoping for what we do not see means hoping even when we can no longer believe. It means longing for the impossible. It means knowing that there is nothing except God’s word to say that something is true, and believing anyway because we trust God. Zechariah’s unbelief was not in stopping his prayers for a son all those years before; it was in not believing God when He told Zechariah that his prayers from years before were about to be answered.
When we pray for something, we are instructed not to expect an answer right away, but to wait with patience. However, when we are weak in belief just as Zechariah was when all the evidence pointed to the impossibility of his prayer being answered, Paul promises us that the Spirit Himself will help us with our weakness. The Spirit takes our words and our heartfelt desires and brings them to the Father in a pure form. The Father hears the cleansed form of our prayer, the answer that will bring us joy and holiness. Our prayer is not our petulant impatience or our frustration. The prayer that reaches Jesus through the Spirit is our hope, our joy, our ache, our need, our willingness, our sympathy, our anger, our mortification, our desire for closeness. Our prayer is more than our words; it is the longing in our hearts below the surface of the words. The Spirit brings this to Jesus who presents it to the Father. The answer to those prayers are to bring about the best possible outcome for we who have chosen to belong to Jesus. The answer is to bring us more and more into the image of Jesus. Because ultimately, the best possible outcome to my prayer is to live in joy and peace with Jesus eternally. Ultimately, the best possible outcome to my prayer is to live in a new world without sin and death.
Zechariah longed for a son, but he also longed for the Messiah. He longed for a better world than the world he lived in under the yoke of the Romans. He longed for a glorious kingdom that he dimly thought would be a repeat of David and Solomon’s reigns only better. He had no conception of the true glorious kingdom that God was promising nor could he have understood the method that God would use to bring that kingdom into existence. Zechariah’s knowledge and understanding was too limited for that, but he longed for something better, for something more. Even without a correct or complete understanding of God’s ways, God still used Zechariah’s willingness to serve to further His own kingdom while answering Zechariah’s prayer.
Unlike Samson’s parents, Zechariah and Elizabeth imparted their own faith in God to their son. John grew up knowing his God because his parents showed God to him from his earliest memories. God was able to answer Zechariah’s longing because even though Zechariah was limited in his faith and understanding, Zechariah had dedicated himself to following God wherever God led him.
(Application / Prayer) I would be just like Zechariah, not believing even though I had prayed and prayed for something. My faith is weak even when I claim it is strong. God, like the father of the demon-possessed son, I come to you with a prayer. “I believe. Help my unbelief.” I need You to give me the faith that I need.