Faithful Fulfillment

Introduction

Luke 1:57–66 ESV

Now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son. And her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her. And on the eighth day they came to circumcise the child. And they would have called him Zechariah after his father, but his mother answered, “No; he shall be called John.” And they said to her, “None of your relatives is called by this name.” And they made signs to his father, inquiring what he wanted him to be called. And he asked for a writing tablet and wrote, “His name is John.” And they all wondered. And immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue loosed, and he spoke, blessing God. And fear came on all their neighbors. And all these things were talked about through all the hill country of Judea, and all who heard them laid them up in their hearts, saying, “What then will this child be?” For the hand of the Lord was with him.

Thesis: God uses faithful people for His faithful fulfillment

Three points: God’s Faithfulness, Man’s Faithfulness, and God’s Fulfillment

God’s Faithfulness

We start this text shortly after Mary’s hymn of praise. She had stayed with Elizabeth for about three months after she was pregnant for six months. It is not unreasonable to say that Mary might have seen John’s birth, but the text itself gives us no evidence in that regard. What the beginning of this text does do, is give us a nice transition to Elizabeth’s miracle, more accurately the miracle working out of her. God has kept His end of the bargain. The angel’s message was proved correct, not only in her pregnancy, but in her giving birth to the promised son of a barren women. He has sustained Elizabeth through all nine months of her pregnancy, which is not something we can look past. Many problems can come with being pregnant later in life. All the risks of a normal pregnancy have increased odds with being pregnant over 40 years old, and they were at least that age, and without modern medical technology it was truly the sustainment of the Lord that kept her in good care. However, I would imagine that there would be some among them who doubted. Think about it, they haven’t heard anything from God in 400 years, why now? No one alive would have heard anything directly from God, so now all of a sudden a barren woman is pregnant and an old priest went deaf and mute? It wouldn’t be entirely unprecedented, especially since there were many false claims of being the Elijah to come. They could not deny once they saw the child of promise be born.

This also restored her status with her neighbors, as she stated in verse 25. For many people, because she hid herself away, they did not know of her pregnancy so unless they were in close proximity with her, they probably didn’t know she was pregnant until after she gave birth. And they did as we should all do when God does work in someone’s life, they went over and rejoiced with her! Our Lord commands us to rejoice with those who rejoice as well as weep with those who weep (Romans 12:15). We must do so rightly, we must not allow those who rejoice over unrighteousness or those who weep with righteousness be our company. There are times when we must stand against them in this way, but often even unbelievers share similar brokenness as us because we live in a world that is broken, and the reverse is also true. But among believers, we should rejoice and weep all the more! For we serve the same Lord and should be heading the same direction. What we rejoice in should be the same as what our Lord wants us to rejoice in! The birth of a child? Wonderful! The birth of a child to a barren woman? Fantastic! God be praised! A child of promise born to prepare the way for the Messiah, born to a barren woman who is passed the age of child bearing? What a wonderful and powerful God!!

Man’s Faithfulness

We move to the next verse where John, though yet unnamed, was to be circumcised. This would serve a secondary function for the neighbors to visit is that is was customary to have around 10 witnesses to the circumcision. In John MacArthur’s commentary on this text, he lists three specific uses for circumcision: hygiene, a covenantal sign, and a spiritual lesson. First, it was in God’s providence to keep the people not only religiously clean, but also physically to prevent diseases. Circumcision would protect the women from having added complications in child birth and also a lower risk of cervical cancer. We still see this today, though not to the same degree because of our modern medicine doing well at keeping us clean. We are not called today to be circumcised because Christ is our circumcision, though if you do it for hygienic reasons, it is not a wrong. The second reason is that it is a sign of the covenant with Abraham. Abraham did this to set himself apart from the other people, in obedience to God in Genesis 17:10. I would assume that if anyone has had this performed on them, it was very young, so there is a level to this that we can miss. Abraham was asked to do this when he was an old man, so this would have not only been quite painful, but also a big change. We have tighter clothes than they would’ve had, so it would be something that you would see and feel most of the day. It was to remind him and his descendents of all times that they were set aside for the Lord. And finally, a spiritual lesson was there to talk about how sinfulness must be cleansed in each generation. That we are born sinners and unclean from birth, and must be made clean by God’s commands. This fits what we know about Elizabeth and Zechariah: faithful Jews. This would fit the tradition of the people of Abraham. And this is something that is explicitly mentioned of John, but also our Lord Himself in His carnation, as we will get to in His birth account, was circumcised. This marks the faithfulness and Jewishness of the people who bore these God appointed men.

Elizabeth’s Faithfulness

Elizabeth had a test of faith. You see, many of the people who were there giving ideas for names. Now this may not seem normal in our culture. We tend to let the parents name the kids themselves, and based on some of the names we see out there, we could use more input. In that time this was not odd. Obviously, the final authority on the names would be the parents. Imagine this with me, you are visiting Elizabeth. She just had her baby after her husband saw an angel for the first time in 500 years. God has broken His 400 year silence from up high. You are excited, and you go, “This is great! God hasn’t forgotten us. We should name the child something that resembles that. Zechariah’s name literally means God remembers, so why don’t we name him after his father? It would be awesome and so fitting.” Hypothetically, Elizabeth could go with the flow. She could name her son whatever she wanted. What does it matter, God has given me a child. I’m good.

Zechariah’s Faithfulness

God’s Fulfillment

Conclusion