The Prayer of Hope

Open: The 1st Sunday after Thanksgiving marks the transition into the Christmas season. It is the season of Advent, and with it, we turn our thoughts and focus on the Arrival of Jesus. The people of God in the Old Testament were focused (or should have been focused) on the Coming One - the long promised Messiah. As God’s people in the Church Age we are focused (or should be focused) on His 2nd Advent - the Triumphant Return of the King.

The people we read about in the first chapters of the NT Gospels were those who were going to see for themselves the Arrival of the Messiah. They were the final generation of God’s people which had to live in expectation - they were privileged to live in the Reality of the days of the Messiah!

Transition: God willing, we are going to study the lives of several of this final generation of OT saints as portrayed in the Gospel of Luke. We are going to see how they responded to the news of the Messiah’s Arrival and hopefully learn how God would have us live in the light of Jesus’ Future Return.

Our text for this morning is Luke 1:5 - 24 and it highlights a priest named Zacharias and his wife Elizabeth. Let us prayerfully read this account and discover how Prayer Positions is to be used by God for His Glory.

READ THE TEXT

Believers are to recognize that God is the solution to life’s problems (Luke 1:7, 13)

Explanation: Zacharias and Elizabeth were both godly people, but they had a problem. Elizabeth was barren, meaning that she was not able to conceive a child. Not only was she barren, but she was also old (well stricken in years) and past the age of childbearing. While there are some married couples that choose not to have children in our present society, such was not the case then. Children were necessary to help out with the needs of the family and were viewed as economic assets. More importantly to Jewish families, children were viewed as a visible expression of God’s blessing on your life. In a negative sense, however, the lack of children was viewed as a sign of God’s disfavor. Zacharias and Elisabeth were living as social outcasts - the couple that other people talked about.

Example: The disciples simply assumed that someone’s sin was responsible for the blind man’s lack of vision (John 9;2)

Argument: Z & E took the master to God in prayer. They had a problem and they took their problem to the Lord and prayed specifically for a child. How do we know they prayed for a child? Gabriel shares this truth in v. 13 when he declares, “thy prayer is heard, and thy wife Elizabeth shall bear thee a son”

Application: You CAN take your problems to the Lord in prayer. We are told to cast on cares on Him (Ps 55:22; 1 Peter 5:7). You are also to be persistent in prayer. We often pray for something three or four times, but we stop if we don’t have an answer. The text doesn’t give us the number of years that Z&E prayed for a son, but they likely started in the early years of their marriage when they were young and God had them wait on His answer until they were old. You are to Persevere in prayer for the glory of God.

Believers are to Serve God faithfully while we wait with Hopeful Expectation. (Luke 1:5-6, 8-9)

Explanation: Zacharias was a descendant of Aaron and was serving as a priest. While the priesthood was limited to only Aaron’s descendants, not all of them served as priests. Zachariah was able to serve because of his bloodline, but he was chosen to serve at the the Temple to offer incense (v. 9) because he had not allowed his problems to sideline him. He served God faithfully during the years of no answer.

Verse 6 summarizes the attitudes of both Z & E when Scriptures declares that “they were both righteous before God.” These two servants of God did not allow their personal disappointment to bring bitterness into their lives. They did not give in to despair, but kept their faith and hope in the God of all Grace.

Illustrate:

Argument: God is the One with the important Agenda; not mine and not yours. When we allow our personal desires and expectations to rise to the top we wind up with a distorted view of reality, and we put ourselves in the position for discouragement and despair. Consider for a moment those Israelites who lived in the Silent Years - the 400 years between Malachi and the birth of Jesus. They were waiting upon and praying for the Messiah, but He did not come during their lifetimes.

Does that mean God did not hear their prayers? Did that mean God did not care or love any of those generations? No, it doesn’t mean that at all. It simply means that God’s Agenda and His timetable is more important than ours.

Consider for a moment the 2,000 years of Church history since the Ascension of Christ - Jesus did not Return in His 2nd Advent during their lives, but their service and their faithfulness matters. It matters to us who are alive today. And our faithful service today will matter to future generations as Christ tarries in His Return.

Application: You CAN wait upon the Lord and continue with Faithful service. The prophet declared “those who wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength” (Is 40:31). The picture of waiting IS NOT one of sitting back in a recliner doing nothing until God shows up. Instead, it is the picture of one who serves (as a waiter) with the desire to please the One who is being served.

How we respond to God’s answer is important (Luke 1:18-20, 24-25)

Explanation: God answered the prayers of Z&E in an extraordinary and supernatural manner. God sent His Angel Gabriel to appear to Zachariah while he was in serving in the Temple. Being the one chosen out of hundreds of other priests was probably already an answer to prayer. Zachariah was serving at the Altar of Incense, the very altar that represented the prayers of the people. On top of that, an Angel supernaturally appears and starts talking to him.

We can understand his fear - most, if not all of us, would have been just as scared. Fear is the typical reaction to the appearance of angels and personal visitations by God Himself. That is why the 2 words “Fear Not” make up one of the most repeated phrases in the Bible.

Gabriel even tells Zachariah that his prayer has been heard. That is why it is troubling that Zachariah responds to the Angel of the Lord’s message with unbelief. It is sometimes more difficult to interpret a response without hearing the tone, but the context and the consequence of Zachariah’s muteness bear out this interpretation.

Illustrate: In the action movie Air Force One with Harrison Ford as the US president, he has to call the White House from a satellite phone on the plane during a crisis. He tells the receptionist he is the president and needs to be connected to the VP in the emergency room. The receptionist voices words of agreement, but the tone conveys she does not believe it is him.

Argument: Zack is not asking for clarification because he is confused about the details, he is being sarcastic. It’s like he is saying. “yea, right - when pigs fly!” Not a good response to the Angel of the Lord. Before we are too hard on Zacharias let’s consider how we often respond to God’s response to our prayers or when He reveals His agenda for us. We may not verbalize it, but our attitudes are similar. It’s like we are saying, “yea, right God. You want me to do ______ (fill in the blank).

When we say or think things like “there’s no way for this too happen. Not even you God can pull this off.” Oh wait, we don’t actually say stuff like that, but we think it.

Application: Our God has not been diminished over time. He has not lost any of His abilities. Our circumstances are different, He is the same. Yes, we realize the Incarnation was a one-time, non-repeatable event, but that doesn’t mean that God is limited just because He is dealing with other events.

Gabriel told Zacharias that his son John would be used of God to turn people to God, that John would prepare the way for the Messiah, that he would be used to restore families. That was indeed a powerful ministry and one blessed of God.

Is that ministry still operational and is God using other believers to fulfill it? Jesus told a group of people that John the Baptist was one of the greatest men that had been born (Matt 11:11a). Then Jesus told the crowd, “notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of Heaven is greater than he.” (Matt. 11;11b)

Believe that with God all things are possible. Ask God for a fresh vision of His Glory and then respond like Isaiah when he said, “Here am I, send me.” (Isa 6:8)