E-Book, Englisch, 992 Seiten
Reihe: Preaching the Word
Hughes Luke (2 volumes in 1 / ESV Edition)
1. Auflage 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4335-3837-7
Verlag: Crossway
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection
That You May Know the Truth
E-Book, Englisch, 992 Seiten
Reihe: Preaching the Word
ISBN: 978-1-4335-3837-7
Verlag: Crossway
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection
R. Kent Hughes (DMin, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School) is senior pastor emeritus of College Church in Wheaton, Illinois, and former professor of practical theology at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Hughes is also a founder of the Charles Simeon Trust, which conducts expository preaching conferences throughout North America and worldwide. He serves as the series editor for the Preaching the Word commentary series and is the author or coauthor of many books. He and his wife, Barbara, live in Spokane, Washington, and have four children and an ever-increasing number of grandchildren.
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THE CLOSING LINES of Luke’s first chapter describe the birth of Jesus with a haunting metaphor—“The Sunrise from on high” (1:78 NASB). The night before that sunrise had been long and dark. But the faithful, bright flashes of hope from God’s Word assured them that one day the night would end. Malachi had assured those who loved God that “the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall” (Malachi 4:2). Isaiah had promised that before “the glory of the LORD shall be revealed,” there would come “a voice [crying]: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God’” (Isaiah 40:5, 3). Malachi spoke similarly as he penned the final words of the Old Testament: “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes” (Malachi 4:5).
When Luke wrote his Gospel, more than four hundred years had passed since Malachi’s time without a word of prophecy or any sign of a prophet of God. But the long darkness was about to experience sunrise.1 Great plans, laid in eternal ages past, now began to activate. Angels scurried around busily preparing for the dawn. The focus of the activity would be Herod’s great temple, which Josephus dramatically described as a building that
wanted nothing that could astound either mind or eye. For, being covered on all sides with massive plates of gold, the sun was no sooner up than it radiated so fiery a flash that persons straining to look at it were compelled to avert their eyes, as from the solar rays. To approaching strangers it appeared from a distance like a snow-clad mountain; for all that was not overlaid with gold was of purest white.2
This shimmering grandeur housed the heartbeat of Jewish piety, and some who had attached themselves to the temple were anxiously awaiting the sunrise (cf. Luke 2:25–29).
A Supernatural Appearance (vv. 1–12)
The Dramatis Personae
Luke introduces us to two major players—an exemplary couple named Zechariah and Elizabeth who had received the grace of God in large measure.
In the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah, of the division of Abijah. And he had a wife from the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. And they were both righteous before God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and statutes of the Lord. But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were advanced in years. (vv. 5–7)
Zechariah was an ordinary country priest, one of an estimated eight thousand living in Palestine at the time.3 The priests were divided according to an arrangement first instituted one thousand years earlier under King David and reconstituted as twenty-four divisions after the Babylonian captivity.4 Each division numbered about three hundred priests. Zechariah’s division, the eighth division of Abijah, served for two one-week periods per year, as did the others. Fifty-six priests were chosen by lot to participate each day.5
The name Zechariah was a popular priestly name that meant “The Lord has remembered,” and in his case it would prove dramatically prophetic. Elizabeth was also of priestly descent, and she had the same name as Aaron’s wife, a preferred name for a priest’s wife. Significantly, her name pointed to the promise keeping of God. Both Zechariah and Elizabeth were “righteous before God” (v. 6), beautiful people in God’s sight. This does not mean they were sinless, but their lives conformed to God’s Law, as the rest of verse 6 emphasizes. They were magnificent flowers in the Jewish religious system garden.
Their house surely enjoyed the happiness that comes to homes where both husband and wife are righteous, except for one thing—the couple had not been able to have children. In any culture infertility is an aching disappointment, and for some an almost unbearable stress. But the burden cannot be compared to that borne by childless women in ancient Hebrew culture because barrenness was considered a disgrace, even a punishment. For example, Hagar looked down on Sarah when Hagar conceived but Sarah remained barren (Genesis 16:4). Leah referred to her former barrenness as “affliction” (Genesis 29:32). Infertile Hannah wept bitterly (1 Samuel 1:5–8). Barrenness even carried a moral stigma because in Jewish thinking it was not the fate of the righteous (see, for example, Leviticus 20:20, 21). So Elizabeth had undoubtedly suffered smug reproach. She called her barrenness her “reproach” (v. 25).
The text says the two were “advanced in years” (v. 7). Nature’s planned obsolescence had taken its course, and there was no hope. They had never heard of Hippocrates, but he had put it perfectly: “A man, when his growth is over, is dry and cold.” The fountains of maternity were dry. The spotted, worn hands of this righteous couple would never hold a child of their own.
The Occasion
They did not know that dawn was about to break.
Now while he was serving as priest before God when his division was on duty, according to the custom of the priesthood, he was chosen by lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense. And the whole multitude of the people were praying outside at the hour of incense. (vv. 8–10)
The Mishnah states that before each of the two daily services, four sets of lots were used to determine the participants (Yoma 2:1–5). In this case the incense lot finally fell to Zechariah, and in an instant he was at the apex of his personal history. The honor of offering incense was the grandest event in all his earthly existence. Many priests never had the privilege, and no priest was allowed to offer it more than once.
Zechariah’s adrenaline began to flow, and with it came the alert attention that notes every detail. What joy he would have in telling Elizabeth.
Zechariah was serving God with his cohorts in the heart of the gleaming temple, in the Court of the Priests, where the sacrifice was to be made. Outside, in the Court of Israel, faithful worshipers were praying. Then came the moment to step into the Holy Place. Before him rose the richly embroidered curtain of the Holy of Holies, resplendent with cherubim woven in scarlet, blue, purple, and gold. To his left was the table of showbread. Directly in front of him was the horned golden altar of incense (Exodus 30:1–10; 37:25–29). To his right stood the golden candlestick. Zechariah purified the altar and waited joyously for the signal to offer the incense so that, as it were, the sacrifices went up to God wrapped in the sweet incense of prayer.
The Encounter
His heart soared upward with the curling fragrance. But suddenly it spasmed in divine arrest because “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” (vv. 11, 12). To the right between the altar and the candlestick was a supernatural being. There is no indication whether the angel was in the conventional image of man or whether it assumed a dramatic form, perhaps like the pyrotechnic display of the angel who appeared to Manoah (Judges 13:19–22). But we do know that the angel’s appearance was dramatic because of the extreme fear that fell upon Zechariah.
This “angel of the Lord” was none other than Gabriel, who had appeared in Babylon over five thousand years before (cf. Luke 1:19 and Daniel 8:16). There is divinely intended parallelism in these appearances.6 Gabriel appeared to Daniel at the time of the evening sacrifice (Daniel 9:20, 21), and now Gabriel appears to Zechariah at the time of sacrifice, which was probably the evening sacrifice.7 Daniel described his fearful response by saying, “I fell into a deep sleep with my face to the ground” (Daniel 8:17), and Zechariah matched his terror (v. 12). Daniel was temporarily rendered speechless, as would be Zechariah (cf. Daniel 10:15 and Luke 1:20, 22). Daniel’s encounter and vision had to do with the revelation of future messianic times, and Zechariah’s encounter with Gabriel signaled the dawn of messianic times.
Luke the theologian was perfectly aware of these parallels and artistically drew them out under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Some critical scholars have even seen an allusion to the seventy weeks of Daniel 9:24 in the explicit and implicit chronology of Jesus’ infancy. There are six months (180 days) between the announcements of John’s and Jesus’ coming births. Mary’s pregnancy took nine months (270 days). And there were forty days from Jesus’ birth to his presentation in the temple (cf. Leviticus 12:1– 4). 180 + 270 + 40 = 490 days, or seventy weeks. This is, of course, a highly tenuous view. But what is certain is that the prophetic eastern sky had assumed a predawn glow, and in a moment messianic fulfillment would light the Jewish landscape.
A Prophecy Given (vv. 13–20)
Stricken Zechariah needed comfort. “But the angel said to him, ‘Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard’” (v. 13a). The verb tense used here seems to refer to the prayer Zechariah had just uttered as he offered incense. Therefore, some think that he had been praying for a son. But given his incomprehension and unbelief at being told he would have a son, it is more probable that he was praying for the redemption of Israel. He would never have dreamed that his having a son would be the beginning of the answer.8
Whatever the case,...
