The Sound of Silence (Part 1)

No Compromise Radio

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:12

That's a pretty long 12 seconds, wouldn't you say? But if you're at 1 .5 speed, then who cares?

00:18

Mike Abendroth here at the helm. Engage. This is no compromise radio.

00:26

What's the old tagline? Dedicated to the truth of the gospel, standing firm against all discernment ministries.

00:35

Always biblical, always provocative, always in that order. Is that the old tagline?

00:40

The new one's duplex gratia. Christ for pardon and Christ for power. You can email me, mike at nocompromiseradio .com.

00:49

If you wanna get in touch with me. What's on the docket here new? Pat Abendroth's new book,

00:54

Covenant Theology. You can get that at Amazon. I'd suggest you do that. Gospel Assurance, both the devotional and guide are on Amazon, working on a parenting version, sanctification version, maybe even a law gospel version of those.

01:10

Who knows when they'll be out? I'm just tinkering around at the moment. And also the

01:16

Discovering Colossians commentary by S. Lewis Johnson. I signed the contract and I've got to have it finished.

01:23

Oh, probably out and published in nine months. So I've been working on that. Most of it I think is done.

01:30

It's just a matter of a few odds and ends. I started preaching through the gospel of Jesus according to Luke and it has been fun.

01:41

And I'm only my third sermon in. Of course, there's more things in life to fun, but it has been fun.

01:49

It has been exciting. And it's the longest book in the New Testament, Luke.

01:54

It has a sequel, Acts. And it's written by, we think Luke, the physician.

02:00

Technically anonymous, but most everybody thinks it's written by Luke.

02:07

Lots of details like a physician would record. It's a detailed account so that you might have certainty.

02:13

Remember Luke wrote the book to Theophilus. That was a man's name. And he wanted to make sure that Theophilus and all those who would read, including you, if you're a

02:24

God lover would have certainty concerning the things regarding Jesus Christ.

02:30

So that if you're a believer, you are strengthened in your faith. If you're an unbeliever that you might believe.

02:37

And some think Theophilus was not a believer and he read the book of Luke and then became a believer because he's called most excellent

02:45

Theophilus in Luke, which is never used for a Christian. Allegedly, I didn't do the research, just read it somewhere.

02:54

And he's called Theophilus in Acts. So then we don't give him that most excellent because we don't call

03:00

Christians most excellent. There's only one most excellent, I assume, presume. Et cetera.

03:08

Luke is this detailed account. And in the past, and I'll just admit it because I'm dumb, not dumb to admit, but just dumb in life.

03:21

In the past, the John the Baptist birth narrative, Zechariah in the temple, lighting incense,

03:32

Gabriel shows up. I mean, I just read it in passing. And of course I affirm it, I believe it.

03:37

I think it really happened, but I never really grasped the significance of it until I've been studying it the last two weeks.

03:46

And so today on No Compromise Radio Ministry, I have a goal. Here's my goal, to be a discernment ministry.

03:56

There's a lot more giving when it's a discernment ministry. If you just talk about Jesus, the funding goes down.

04:03

I think I say that all the time, but hey, I'm old. If you are like me, you do believe the

04:11

Bible to be true. And then you say, well, certain sections I highlight with a yellow marker and other sections

04:17

I don't, yet it's all inspired. It's all God breathed. And I want you to be excited about Luke chapter one and the

04:26

John the Baptist forerunner birth being foretold.

04:32

That's what I want you to be excited about because why? Well, that's part of the show today, but I just want you not to skip this and not want you to think, well, it's just, this is just the preliminary stuff.

04:43

It is preliminary, but Luke is writing and he's compiling this narrative of things that have been accomplished among us.

04:53

He said, among the apostles and those close to the apostles like Luke. And he says he wants eyewitnesses.

05:01

Remember that's the word for autopsy to see for yourself, to look very carefully. That's what they would do at an autopsy to try to figure out cause of death, et cetera.

05:11

They're ministers of the word. That is their servants of the word. They're under the word, not over the word. It's been delivered to Luke and the apostles in a very formal handing down, passing the baton of truth way.

05:26

That's a wrong sentence, isn't it? How many commas do you put there? But there's something that's in verse two that's very important in Luke chapter one.

05:35

From the beginning, John one, of course, starts off with the beginning before there was a beginning.

05:43

And the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God. Mark is talking about Jesus as servant.

05:51

And so you don't have genealogies for servants, right? They're just servants. It's kind of like the people who were slaves and they didn't know when they were born.

05:59

What year, what day? I mean, why record it if you're having slaves, I guess. Sadly.

06:06

And so Luke is writing things from the beginning. So what's the beginning? And of course, the exciting thing here is remember, there's been silence.

06:19

Malachi has been written. It ends pretty much with doom and gloom.

06:24

Let me just flip back to the end of the Old Testament just before Matthew.

06:31

And Matthew, oh, there's a whole section here in this ESV study Bible, theology of the

06:37

New Testament, Jewish groups, Herodian dynasty. Now, I thought I'd just go to Matthew one and flip back a page, but there's a lot of other stuff here.

06:46

Excuse me. Should've used the cough button. And he will turn their hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.

06:59

This is what the Lord says. It's a great day of the Lord. Behold, I'm gonna send you

07:04

Elijah the prophet. It's gonna be a great day, an awesome day. And there's silence.

07:12

10 years goes by, 25 years go by, 100 years, 200, 300, 400.

07:19

Does God keep his promises? Does God's word fail? Does God's word fall short and doesn't hit its intended purpose, intended target?

07:30

Right, if you're not strong enough, you can take a bow with a bow and arrow and you try to shoot the target. You just can't make it all the way because you can't pull the bow string back far enough.

07:42

I did a lot of bow and arrow shooting when I was younger, but it was for fishing. And so we took some kind of C clamp, not a

07:51

C clamp, but some other kind of clamp and clamped a Zebco 808 fishing reel on the bow.

08:01

You would have to depress that little button. So let the slack out. And we'd use pretty heavy test line because it's not like you're going to hook a fish in its mouth and it can just swim through the water.

08:14

No, you have to shoot it on the side and you've got to kind of pull it against itself. It's not a silhouette then, it's kind of pushing water with more displacement than the way a fish would swim through the water.

08:28

Anyway, bows, arrows, strength. God has not said anything directly through prophets and these silent 400 years, what's going to happen.

08:41

And so if we go to the beginning, the beginning is God has

08:46

Gabriel show up to say something to Zechariah. And of course, to all those that would read

08:52

Luke from Theophilus to every other God lover, even if your name isn't

08:57

Theophilus. What is happening? Well, let's look at the beginning. At the beginning is there's a forerunner, a spirit of Elijah, who's going to come.

09:08

And forerunners mean that somebody comes after them, an after runner, an after person. There's for, an after, before, after.

09:16

And it's going to be the Lord Jesus, of course. And if you're going to have a forerunner, you're going to get excited because then here comes the

09:22

King. And even these days, if you watch what happens with the secret service and American presidents going places, they get there ahead of time and they scope everything out and they change up plans, they keep everything secret.

09:37

Where are we going to go back up plans? Are the windows easily holding snipers?

09:44

Let's go a different path, whatever they do. Here we have a forerunner and it's at the beginning.

09:49

And so it's exciting because God keeps his promises and we're going to see that promise unfold in Luke chapter one.

10:00

One of the things that Luke does is he begins at the beginning, not the beginning of time or before the, you know, in Genesis one, one or something like that.

10:11

No, but he's going to start at the beginning because he said, I'm going to give you an orderly account. I'm going to talk about two births, one birth,

10:20

John the Baptist, one birth, Jesus. I'm going to talk about two mothers, Elizabeth and Mary, two supernaturally involved conceptions, one more supernatural than the other because I guess old people could have children later on in life, but old people, young people, no people can have babies if they're virgins, right?

10:43

And Luke wants to make sure that he picks up where Malachi leaves off.

10:49

And he, of course, Luke is a historian and he sets everything in the right frame of time.

10:58

Luke 1 5, in the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zachariah of the division of Abijah.

11:05

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

11:13

Lord, but they had no child because Elizabeth was barren and both were advanced in years. And now we say to ourselves, look at the setup here.

11:22

This is during the time of King Herod. We'd call him King Herod the Great or King Herod the

11:28

Awful or King Herod the First. This is the king that wanted to kill all the baby boys during the time of Jesus's birth because he wanted to be the only king.

11:39

He's called Aaron, Herod the Great, but some have said maybe great when it comes to evil, that would be better.

11:50

Some have even called him Herod the Heinous. And this is not a good time for Israel.

11:56

This is not a good time for the people. This is a dark day and it's not any better because you haven't heard from God.

12:04

Oh, true, that the Bible, the Old Testament was written and could be encouraging to people and they could look for the promises, but Elijah has been promised to come, someone in the spirit of Elijah and so far 100, 200, 300, 400 years, right?

12:21

If you look back to America, 1776, what is it now?

12:28

If you had 400 years to that, it seems like a long time ago, 1776, but 400 years, where's the

12:37

Lord's promise? Is he slow in keeping his promises? Herod the

12:43

Great, he was an awful man. He was a great builder, by the way, and he was helping rebuild the temple, by the way, the temple, and what do you do?

12:54

Well, Herod kills his children, he kills his wives, he's awful, he thinks he's the king of the

13:01

Jews, and on the flip side, you have this priest. You've got Herod the

13:07

Terrible, or as Charles Barclay says, Terrible, and you've got a godly priest and you just see this unfold.

13:19

You've got a person who is holy and you've got a person who is unholy.

13:26

Zacharias means Yahweh has remembered. Even that, you're thinking, yes, God has remembered.

13:33

And we know Zachariah and Elizabeth were holy people because it tells us they were righteous before God.

13:40

This has nothing to do with imputed righteousness of the

13:47

Messiah who'd come. Oh, that's important, of course. This just talks about how believers live, whether they're

13:55

Old Testament believers or New Testament believers here, similar to Noah and the description of Noah and others, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and statutes of the

14:06

Lord. And we're not talking about they're perfect, their righteousness that was credited to them, of course, is perfect, but what is righteous in the sight of God?

14:16

Here, the text tells us, observing the commandments and requirements of the Lord. They were holy people, they sinned, they asked for forgiveness, they offered sacrifices, but they were holy.

14:26

We have the heinous one, Herod, and we have the holy ones, Zachariah and Elizabeth.

14:33

And when it comes to living out their lives, we see a difference. And of course, the world would say, if you do the right things, or even a lot of people in the church, if you do the right things,

14:46

God blesses you. And there's some degree of truth to the fact that God blesses obedience.

14:55

But what are those blessings? And are they tangible? Are they physical? Are they financial? Are they, what are they?

15:04

Well, you think if you had two people that were holy and blameless and righteous, and they were doing the right things as believers in Yahweh, that God would bless them.

15:16

Well, he did bless them, but there's something that didn't happen that you think might happen, and they don't have children.

15:23

And Elizabeth's barren, and now they're older, which means they don't really have any chance to have children.

15:30

What was going on back in those days when it comes to people who could not have children? Maybe there's a little stigma today even, but it was a lot different back in those days.

15:40

Rachel said to Jacob, give me children or else I die. I mean, infertility is hard for everyone.

15:50

But here in the Hebrew culture back in those days, it's kind of like it was a punishment.

15:56

It was, yes, a disgrace, but divine punishment is often how people saw that. They're punished for something that they didn't do or that they did do.

16:06

They didn't do something righteous or they did do something sinful. But we just are told that this has nothing to do with sin.

16:14

This is like John chapter nine, where the man was born blind for the glory of God. And here we're going to see the same thing.

16:20

God's sovereign plan, God's wise plan, God's a plan that has great knowledge, this decree of God.

16:26

It has nothing to do with fertility being because she was disobedient. It doesn't have anything to do with that.

16:33

We're going to see what God does here in a supernatural way. And as much as they wanted children back in those days, as much as they long for children in those days,

16:42

God had a plan and God's plan always is fulfilled and his timing is always correct.

16:49

And this man, Zechariah, was remembered, in fact, by God. And he,

16:55

Zechariah, had to do some things as a priest. And wonder what he had to do as a priest.

17:02

What were his priestly duties? Well, we're going to find out.

17:11

And of course, big picture, what do priests do? They serve in the temple, they pray, right?

17:17

So from sacrifices to incense, to other things that they might have to do in the temple, and they pray.

17:23

But specifically, in big picture, sacrifices and pray.

17:28

And we have this encounter after all these silent years, silent days, silent months.

17:35

And the text says in Luke 1 .8, now, while he was serving as a priest before God, when his division was on duty, there's a lot of priests by then, so you've got to divide things up.

17:45

According to the custom of the priesthood, he was chosen by Lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense.

17:51

And the whole multitude of the people were praying outside at the hour of incense. I mean, boy, this is exciting.

17:58

This is once in a lifetime. You get to go to the temple, you get to serve with other priests, you get called in.

18:04

What an honor, what a wonderful thing, if you're Zechariah, to get asked to do such a thing.

18:11

You can just imagine what was going through his mind. And even as he would go in that very day to do what he was called to do, and he would put on those robes, he would walk through the temple court area, and everybody's out there ready to pray, and they knew what would happen.

18:29

And he goes into the holy place, and he sees what? He sees a variety of things that God had said to put into the temple.

18:38

And of course, he sees the lampstand, and he sees the table of bread.

18:45

And I would imagine it's pretty dark in there. And you've got the lampstand, at least illuminating some.

18:53

And there he goes up to the golden altar of incense, which is by the curtain that leads into the

19:00

Holy of Holies. What do you think was going through his mind? This was what would go through my mind.

19:07

Nadab and Abihu, they offered up strange fire before the Lord. They were

19:12

Aaron's sons. And in Leviticus chapter 10, they were killed. What would be going through your mind?

19:21

Zacharias goes in to the holy places, the holy place rather, and the crowd is praying.

19:29

And you can just imagine what's going on. And he's chosen by lot. The whole people were praying outside, and they were waiting for him to do his job.

19:43

He's close to the Holy of Holies. He's right there, once in a lifetime opportunity.

19:49

And what happens? There appeared to him an angel of the

19:54

Lord standing on the right side of the altar of incense. I mean, it's probably dark.

20:00

It's spooky already, not in a Halloween kind of spooky thing, but in terms of just scared, reverence, awe, respect, fear of the

20:13

Lord. And sometimes, you know, you just are doing something. You get that feeling that somebody else is there.

20:20

Well, that somebody else was an angel named Gabriel and standing on the right side of the altar of incense, just appeared.

20:30

Zachariah was troubled when he saw him and fear fell upon him. But the angel said to him, do not be afraid, Zachariah, for your prayer has been heard and your wife,

20:38

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.

20:46

For he will be great before the Lord and he must not drink wine or strong drink and he will be fulfilled with, excuse me, he will be filled with the

20:53

Holy Spirit, even from his mother's womb. And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the

20:59

Lord, their God. And he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of the fathers toward their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just to make ready for the

21:09

Lord, a people prepared. You're excited, you walk in, people are praying outside, you get to light the incense.

21:20

And of course you think about the incense, it goes up to heaven. And it's like you can see and smell

21:26

God's accepting our prayers as they reach up to heaven as the smoke goes to heaven. So to our prayers go up to heaven.

21:35

Here's this angel that shows up. Lots of angels around the time of Jesus. J .C.

21:41

Ryle thinks that's because we need to make sure we realize that those angels, they're not dying for anyone's sin.

21:48

It's the Lord Jesus and the Lord Jesus alone. One person said, through the fog of the incense,

21:55

Zacharias must have wondered if he was seeing things. That sounds like exactly what would go through my mind.

22:03

What? What in the world? All of a sudden, a holy, dazzling, great angel shows up in front of a righteous yet, but sinful man, fear, and he has a message.

22:20

And it's got God's backing to it. I mean, you can be holy and you can be godly and you can be righteous and you can be blameless when it comes to sanctification and generally obey when you stand in the presence of a divine messenger.

22:37

There's some real trepidation there because not of the messenger, but who's the one that sent the messenger?

22:48

And of course, the first thing the angel says is don't be afraid. Your prayer has been heard. We finally, after 400 years of silence, we hear some words from God through the messenger, the angel.

23:00

That's what angel means, messenger. 400 years since God had spoken through Malachi.

23:06

And it's interesting that the last words that Malachi has recorded are talking about the forerunner,

23:16

John the Baptist. And that's what we're gonna talk about here now. Don't be afraid, Zechariah. Your prayer has been heard.

23:23

Well, what prayer is that? I'm sure when he's inside praying, he's praying for the nation. Herod the

23:29

Great is running things. The Romans are using Herod the Great. It's not really a good day for Israel.

23:39

Wouldn't we like the Messiah to come back? Or excuse me, to come? When we longing for the day where Elijah will come, the someone in the spirit of Elijah as a forerunner so then the real king can come?

23:52

We want the Messiah. We want the anointed one. We're looking forward to that day. Will that day ever come?

23:59

400 years later, what's going on? Your prayer has been heard. I'm sure Zechariah was praying for the

24:06

Messiah to come, for God's promises to be fulfilled. That's certainly true. But the text here even gives a little insight into what this prayer might be.

24:17

And your wife, Elizabeth, will bear you a son. You should call his name John. Now this could have been a prayer in the past.

24:23

And if certainly he must have prayed this, would you please open my mother's womb? That would be a different prayer.

24:32

Thank you for opening my mother's womb. I'm sure he prayed this, of course.

24:37

And it's been heard. So of course, while he's in there doing the duties of a priest, he would be praying for the nation and praying for the people and praying for God's promises and praising

24:46

God. And that's all true. But here he shows up, the angel does, and says, your wife's going to bear a son.

24:56

Your prayer has been heard. Don't be afraid. Stop being frightened. Have faith.

25:03

And your request for a child is going to be answered.

25:10

Yes, he could have been interceding for Israel. Must have been. But in the past, he's prayed for a child.

25:15

I don't think he's probably in there praying for a child, not during his priestly duties. He's there to represent the people. But he wants the kingdom to come, prays for it.

25:25

And by the way, tied in directly for the kingdom coming is this child that his wife is going to bear.

25:32

They're not really disjointed if you think about it. Lord, bring in your kingdom.

25:38

Lord, bring your Messiah. Lord, fulfill your promises about the anointed one.

25:43

Oh, and you're going to have a son. Prayer answered. Give me a son. Except the son is the forerunner, so all these other things will happen.

25:54

And you, Zechariah, because of this, not just because you're going to have a son, will you have joy, but because the son is going to be the forerunner.

26:03

By the way, this son is going to be the one that Jesus said, there's no greater person, no greater man on earth than John the

26:09

Baptist. This John the Baptist that will say, I can't even stoop down and tie his sandals.

26:14

I'm not worthy for that. Jesus must increase and I must decrease. Look at this Jesus. Behold, he's the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

26:24

Joy and gladness you'll have, Zechariah, and many will rejoice. Why will many rejoice?

26:31

Because the forerunners here, that means who's coming after that?

26:36

The Messiah. The Messiah is going to come. Many will rejoice, of course, not everyone will rejoice.

26:43

There are going to be people who don't rejoice, but many will rejoice. And this baby that you're going to have is going to be great before the

26:51

Lord and he's going to be set apart, not with a true Nazarite vow for a short time, but for a long time, he's going to have a special vow under the

27:02

Lord, a consecration similar to Nazarite vow, but not exactly the same. He's not going to drink wine and he's not going to drink strong drink.

27:10

Instead, he'll be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from the mother's womb. You can do a whole sermon about, what does that tell you about life in the womb and the sanctity of life in the womb?

27:21

And is it a baby in the womb? Is it a fetus in the womb? What is it in the womb? Well, it's a person, a living person with a living soul filled with the

27:31

Holy Spirit. Can just plasma be filled with the Holy Spirit? Just matter, right?

27:39

Some kind of contaminant, some kind of parasite, as some people have called little babies in the womb.

27:47

He, John the Baptist, is going to be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother's womb. This is exciting.

27:55

Joy and gladness for the family and joy and gladness for those waiting for the messianic kingdom.

28:02

Behold, this is our God from whom we have waited that he might save us. Isaiah 25. Well, my name is

28:08

Mike Abendroth. I'm just trying to dip my toe into the pond that says, of course, we're going to start at the beginning and what's the beginning?

28:18

Here comes the forerunner and we're going to have finally after 400 years, the messenger of God, Gabriel, explain to Zechariah what's exactly going to happen and off we go.

28:28

And it's gonna go fast after that because the next supernatural birth announcement is going to come with Mary.

28:35

Well, my name is Mike Abendroth. This is in fact, No Compromise Radio Ministry. You can write me, mike at nocompromiseradio .com.

28:43

Matter of fact, I just got an email from someone today named Micah and Micah lives down in Alabama.

28:52

And Micah said, just wanted to shoot you an email and say, I really appreciate your podcast and Twitter account here recently.

28:58

I followed you and your brother Pat's podcast for about a year now and they've been great encouragement to me. Graduated from Auburn University last year.

29:06

So I'm trying to absorb as much knowledge as I can as a young man looking to honor Christ. If you're ever near Alabama, shoot me an email or call and I'd love to buy you lunch and chat.

29:17

Well, you can call my agent, Micah. Seriously, thanks for writing.