Here at Theology Mix and at church, I have started a series on Christmas songs. Not Christmas carols or pop songs – not the ones we hear on the radio October through December—some of which grow increasingly sappy to me every year.
Not to mention the ones that are theologically troubling. (“So let’s give thanks to the Lord above ’cause Santa Claus comes tonight!” I think, I just, wait, but…never mind.)
I mean the songs of Scripture. The ones sung by people right there, in real time, Ground Zero of Jesus’ birth. The songs that ushered him in. The songs that people couldn’t help belting out when they knew he was finally on the way.
We dealt with Mary first. Now, it’s time for her much older cousin-in-law.
Back story. Zechariah was a priest. The Bible says that he was chosen to go into the temple to light the incense and offer the prayers for the people. There’s a whole order here I didn’t know about. Three entire priests were necessary for this incense thing.
Seriously, the lack of efficiency is astounding. You’d think the Lord didn’t care at all about good, sensible time management.
One took away the ashes from the last time the fire was lit. One brought in the new smoking coals for the next offering. Finally, a third man came in to sprinkle the incense on the burning coals, and while the beautiful smell rose up to tickle his nose and calm his head, intercede in prayer for his people.
This was Zechariah’s job, and it was the most important and most sacred. I believe the fact that he was chosen for this job says something more than we realize.
Surely, in all those prayers he lifted up, one of them was a desire that the promised Messiah would come. Zechariah woulds never have let the opportunity pass him up, when given this chance to pray for the nation, to pray for its salvation through their shared hope.
Zechariah loved his people. That much will become clear.
Suddenly—Surprise! An angel shows up at the altar, right in front of where he stands praying. Angels terrify those who see them. Sweet, lovely, harp-strumming angels do not exist in Scripture. Universally, they scare the heck out of people, and almost always they must first utter the words, ”Don’t be afraid” before they can say anything else to cowering, trembling humans.
Zechariah was shaken and overwhelmed with fear when he saw him. But the angel said, ‘Don’t be afraid, Zechariah! God has heard your prayer. Your wife, Elizabeth, will give you a son, and you are to name him John.’ (Luke 1.17-19)
Zechariah had questions. He doubted Gabriel’s word. This was a very bad idea.
Then the angel said, ‘I am Gabriel! I stand in the very presence of God. It was he who sent me to bring you this good news! But now, since you didn’t believe what I said, you will be silent and unable to speak until the child is born. For my words will certainly be fulfilled at the proper time.’ (v. 19-20)
Zechariah ended up unable to speak as a result of his unbelief. Still, let’s not be too quick to judge him. The scripture also tells us, concerning him and his wife, “Both of them were righteous in the sight of God, observing all the Lord’s commands and decrees blamelessly.” So no one can say he’s struck mute out of disobedience. God must have had other reasons.
He spends over nine months speechless. Let that sink in. I am a pastor myself, and I know what it would be like to carry out my daily work without being able to speak. I know how difficult it would be to care for people without being able to speak to them of their troubles. I know how I would hate not singing worship to God. How does Zechariah manage?
One day, his one and only son is finally born—but the enforced silence is still not over.
“When the baby was eight days old, they all came for the circumcision ceremony. They wanted to name him Zechariah, after his father. But Elizabeth said, ‘No! His name is John!’ ‘What?’ they exclaimed. ‘There is no one in all your family by that name.’ So they used gestures to ask the baby’s father what he wanted to name him. He motioned for a writing tablet, and to everyone’s surprise he wrote, ‘His name is John.’”
And he finds his voice.
What that voice says will be the subject of the next blog. Why it was silent for so long is my curiosity for this one. Why would God silence a man he himself calls good? Why is Zechariah punished for questioning an angel while Mary appears to have been blessed for the same behavior?
Here’s what I’m thinking. I don’t think it’s punishment. I think it, too, is a blessing.
Perhaps this was God allowing Zechariah some time to listen.
(Some assume from the verse about the people making gestures that he is also deaf, but this is unlikely. Probably, they simple raise their eyebrows or gaped open-mouthed, arms outstretched, signifying that he had better intervene immediately, speechless or not, because his wife is about to do something unheard of! In any case, ten months of observing the world, unable to speak or hear, would be no bad thing, either.)
Can you imagine all that Zechariah learned during that ten months or so? What did he hear? What that he had never noticed before did he suddenly find fascinating? What people to whom he had never really paid attention did he finally truly hear? What did he learn from them?
Did he come to deeply appreciate the squealing laughter of children playing by the road, the passionate prayers of his friends, or the tender, quiet voice of his wife at night? Did he learn from the disenfranchised who rarely were able to catch the ear of a priest, but whose calls and cries he suddenly began to heed?
Did he open his eyes to people with whom he didn’t agree, since he had no choice but to listen and not immediately argue back?
Could an awful lot of us use that?
He is a good man—that much has been established. Yet he has lessons to learn. For us, this is a hard but beautiful pill to swallow.
Maybe, God doesn’t punish us for being bad people as much as sometimes, he pushes us to be better people than we would otherwise bother to be.
Zechariah has lessons to learn, even though by all counts be is plenty good enough already.
I do, too.
- Sometimes it’s when we’re good already.
- When we’re smart.
- When we’ve followed a while and know the ways of Jesus.
- When we’re pretty sure we’ve got this God thing down.
Sometimes it’s then that we trip up. We believe in ourselves.
We find ourselves on a detour out somewhere, unable to speak or really listen, because we thought we could navigate it alone.
One thing we learn from Zechariah is that we must never believe so much in our own goodness, right intentions, best plans, or knowledge of truth that we aren’t teachable.
What might we learn if we listen?
- If we closed our mouths, cut off the quick reply.
- Stopped thinking about what we were going to say.
- Refused the defensive comeback.
- Chose to hear what someone we don’t agree with feels.
What would we hear and learn?
I’m so fascinated by Zechariah’s silence that I’ve decided my word for 2020 — Listen! I want to experience what this man had no choice but to do. I want to know the depths of other people’s hearts, and of God’s. I want to learn. If Zechariah at his age still had much to learn, certainly so do I.
Photo credit: Jill Richardson
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