WWUTT 2251 Gabriel Afflicts Zechariah with Muteness (Luke 1:18-25)

Gabriel’s Announcement to Zechariah and the Promise of John the Baptist

An angel came to a man named Zechariah and said that his wife would be with child and that child would be John the Baptist. Zechariah didn't believe him. But even though Zechariah did not have faith, that wouldn't thwart God's plan.

When we understand the text.

This is When We Understand the Text, a daily study of God's Word that we may be filled with the knowledge of His will. For questions and comments, send us an email to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.

Here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. Well, we come back to the Gospel of Luke, picking up where we left off last week. We have to finish up this conversation between the priest Zechariah and the angel Gabriel, who told Zechariah that his wife Elizabeth would be with child.

And that child, of course, would be John the Baptist. So let me read the angel's announcement once again. I'll start reading in verse 13 and go through verse 25. This is still in chapter one of the Gospel of Luke.

Hear the word of the Lord. But the angel said to him, do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard and your wife 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.

For he will be great before the Lord and he must not drink wine or strong drink. And he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother's womb. And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord, their God, and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just to make ready for the Lord a people prepared.

And Zechariah said to the angel, how shall I know this? For I am an old man and my wife is advanced in years. And the angel answered him, I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God and I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news and behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that these things take place because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time.

And the people were waiting for Zechariah and they were wondering at his delay in the temple. And when he came out, he was unable to speak to them and they realized that he had seen a vision in the temple and he kept making signs to them and remained mute.

And when his time of service was ended, he went to his home. After these days, his wife, Elizabeth conceived and for five months, she kept herself hidden saying thus, the Lord has done for me in the days when he looked upon me to take away my reproach among people.

Zechariah’s Doubt and Gabriel’s Rebuke

So the section that we're mainly looking at here is verses 18 to 25. So after, after the angel has given this announcement to Zechariah, we start with his reaction. How will I know this? Because I'm, I'm old and so is my wife.

And the angel says, well, because you didn't believe what I said, you're going to be mute. So first of all, we have the exchange between Zechariah and the angel. And then Zechariah comes out of the temple and he's unable to speak and the people are amazed at this.

So we have an interaction between Zechariah and the people. And then we have the praise of Elizabeth who praises the Lord because he has given her.

A child.

And that's in verses 24 and 25. So this whole section showing the goodness and faithfulness of God, even though Zechariah really did not have the faith to believe what it was that the angel said. Yet Zechariah's prayer would still be answered.

And the things that God promised would still be fulfilled in their time, though Zechariah did not believe. It's all to the glory and praise of God. So let's come back to verse 18, where Zechariah said to the angel, how shall I know this?

For I am an old man and my wife is advanced in years. So where Zechariah says, how shall I know this? It's kind of the same as saying, how can this possibly be? How could this occur? How would I know this?

How would I experience this in my life because of how old I am and because of my wife being advanced in years? Now, you might recognize this as being similar to something that Abraham said to God when the Lord said that she would have a child this time next year.

I'm thinking of Genesis 18, when God and the two angels with him came and visited Abraham by the Oaks of Mamre. And Abraham had food prepared for him, and they sat there under the trees and talked. And God said, I will return to you about this time next year, and Sarah, your wife, shall have a son.

And it says, Sarah was listening at the tent door behind him. Now, Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in years, and the way of women had ceased to be with Sarah. So Abraham had questioned God and had said, how will this be because I am an old man?

And Sarah doubted it, and she laughed. It says in Genesis 18, 12, Sarah laughed to herself saying, after I am worn out and my Lord is old, shall I have pleasure? And note that it says in Genesis 18, 11, that the way of women had ceased to be with her.

So it was more than just saying that she was old. There was no physical, biological way for her to have a child. She'd basically gone through menopause at this point. And the same thing can be assumed of Elizabeth, which is why Zechariah responds in the way that he does.

Not just that he is old, because even an old man can still sire a child. But even that his wife, being advanced in years, was unable to have children anymore. So I am an old man and my wife is advanced in years.

How will I get to know and experience what it is that you say? How could this thing possibly be fulfilled? Now, Zechariah should have taken the word of this angel, because remember, at the beginning of their exchange, the angel saying to him, do not be afraid and suddenly appearing there in the temple where there was nobody but Zechariah, because only he could walk in there and burn the incense.

And yet here's a man standing right there by the altar. How did this man get there? Where did he come from? How is it that by his appearance, Zechariah is more than just startled? He's afraid of him. And remember, I mentioned last week that this fear that we have of angels is more than just their miraculous appearance, but it's that they are even holy.

And we sense that. We understand that because we are not holy. And so standing in the presence of one who is holy, the holy angels, as the scripture describes them, would certainly give us a feeling of unease, since we are sinful people dwelling among sinful people.

Or the way that Isaiah said of himself, I am a man of unclean lips, dwelling amidst a people of unclean lips. So Zechariah should have believed the word of this man and yet doubts and says, how could this possibly be?

How could it happen? Because I'm old, my wife, it's impossible for her to have children. It was not possible for Sarah to have children either. And yet God gave her a son and that son was Isaac. And from Isaac would come Jacob and from Jacob would come Judah and from the line of Judah would come the Christ.

So all of this by the sovereign hand of God. And he's still fulfilling in this day with the coming of John the Baptist, who's going to be the forerunner of Christ. He's still doing even in this day, those things that he was doing in times past, just as he gave Sarah a child when it was impossible for her to have children.

So he was going to do the same for Zechariah and Elizabeth, though it was impossible for Elizabeth to have children. Now, this is not going to be the same kind of miracle that God would do in Mary. And that's the next announcement that's coming up.

We get to that one tomorrow where the birth of Jesus is foretold to Mary, who is in Galilee in a town named Nazareth. The same angel, Gabriel, is going to come to her six months later. So the announcement here regarding John is miraculous, just not the same as the kind of conception that Mary is going to experience, for she will be a virgin who will be with child, the only one in the history of mankind who was ever a virgin who would be with child.

Here, it's Elizabeth no longer has the way of women. It would still come about the way that women get pregnant. She would know her husband, Zechariah, and then she would conceive. So it's not that she conceived without that intimacy.

Mary would, but not Elizabeth. And again, the name of the child was even given to Zechariah. The angel said, you will call his name John, which means Yahweh is gracious. John is really more pronounced Yohanan.

That would be closer to the Hebrew pronunciation of it. And it means Yahweh is gracious. Now Jesus is really the name Joshua. It's the same name. And that name means Yahweh saves. So you have Yahweh is gracious who is going to proceed Yahweh saves.

And these are the names that the angel has said are going to be given to these children. We've already read in Matthew chapter one that the angel said to Joseph, you will call his name Jesus. So here an angel has spoken to Zechariah and has said that you are going to call his name John.

Zechariah doesn't believe it. So how does Gabriel respond? The angel answers to him, I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God and I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good.

News.

Gabriel’s Identity and the Meaning of His Message

Now the angel being Gabriel, we would know exactly who that is. As you have been reading through your Bible, you've been through Daniel chapters eight and nine, where an angel named Gabriel came to him and explained to him a vision that he was given from the Lord.

So in Daniel chapter eight, verse 15, when I, Daniel had seen the vision, I sought to understand it and behold, there stood before me one having the appearance of a man. And I heard a man's voice between the banks of the Uli and it called Gabriel, make this man understand the vision.

So he came near where I stood. And when he came, I was frightened and fell on my face. But he said to me, understand, oh son of man, that the vision is for the time of the end. So Gabriel begins to explain the vision that God had given to Daniel.

Now in Daniel chapter nine, his name comes up again. Daniel had been praying. And while I was speaking in prayer, it says in Daniel nine 21, the man, Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the first came to me in swift flight at the time of the evening sacrifice.

This was 600 years or so before this announcement was given to Zechariah and the announcement that will be given to Mary. So Gabriel over six centuries, angels, as we probably understand it, don't die.

They don't have a life cycle necessarily. So it's the same angel that had appeared to Daniel is now appearing to Zechariah and to.

Mary.

What a special angel that God had called to him, to his service, that he would reveal a prophecy to a great prophet while he was in exile, and then also revealed to a priest, the child that is going to be born, it would be the forerunner of the Messiah.

And that angel would announce that Mary would be with child with that Messiah as well. So Gabriel announcing himself, I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God and I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good.

News.

Praise the Lord for Luke writing this down, investigating these things, finding these details and the places and events and the persons behind them and everything that he said that he was that he had set out to write down that we read about at the beginning of the gospel because Luke is the one that gives us this account and we don't have it anywhere.

Else.

So this is eyewitness testimony likely that came from Zechariah and Elizabeth who spoke of these things and said it was the angel Gabriel who had appeared to Zechariah in the temple. He was the only eyewitness to it.

There was no one else who was there and testified. It was this angel who said to me that Elizabeth would be with child, even though Elizabeth wasn't able to have children and that his name would be John.

So Gabriel saying, I stand in the presence of God. Gabriel means man of God or hero of God. It can also be translated that way. That's that's what my name means. And I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news.

I'm meant to bring to you gospel. I'm speaking to you the good news of the of the fulfillment of the prophecy that the one who would precede the Christ would come and it would be through you. You and your wife would bring about this child verse 20 and behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that these things take place because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time.

So because Zechariah didn't believe Gabriel, then he is afflicted with muteness and it's apparently more than muteness. It's not just an inability to speak. He was apparently also deaf. And we know that because later on, when John the Baptist is born, the people who are there celebrating his birth sign to Zechariah what he wants to name the child.

So they don't ask him. They don't say it to him. They sign it to him. So apparently he can't hear either. He's he's both deaf and mute. So it's more than just muteness. He also cannot hear. So this is what the angel afflicts him with.

And and by this, he will know that he had a miraculous encounter with a being who was more than just a man, for he was miraculously afflicted in this way. But he would also know the miracle of God that would be done in his wife.

And that is that's just the graciousness of God, you know, fulfilling the name that the angel said you would call your son John, which is Yahweh is gracious. God is still gracious to Zechariah, even though he doesn't believe Zechariah's lack of faith was not going to thwart God's plan.

He was still going to fulfill exactly that which had been prophesied centuries before. And though Zechariah did not believe yet, Elizabeth would still be with child, as we'll see at the end of this section, and she would praise the Lord.

And surely Zechariah would as well, for we have his prophecy that will come up at the end of chapter one. But first of all, verse twenty one, you have the exchange between Zechariah and the people and the people were waiting for Zechariah.

They were wondering at his delay in the temple. And when he came out, he was unable to speak to them. And they realized that he had seen a vision in the temple and he kept making signs to them and remaining mute.

So first of all, the people are wondering where he's at. If something's happened to Zechariah, who's going to go in there and get him now? The presence of God was not in the temple. There may have been a belief among the people that if we set foot in the holy place when we've not been invited to go there, that God will strike us down.

But that was that was really a misplaced fear since God's presence had not come back into the temple when it was rebuilt the second temple period, which, as you'll remember, is written about in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah, who rebuilt the temple after this temple was rebuilt.

It was smaller than what Solomon had built, and the presence of God did not come into it like had been observed in first Kings and in Second Chronicles. When Solomon finished the temple, then the presence of God came down in fire and filled that place and the presence remained there until God removed himself from the temple prior to the Babylonian exile.

God removed his presence from his people so that the enemies of Judah would move in and do to them what God had promised would be done to them because they had turned from God and had worshipped idols.

But then when that second temple is rebuilt, we don't have anything said in Scripture of God coming back into that place and dwelling with his people. So even here in this temple, this is Herod's temple, which he has constructed, and yet God is not in this place either, not even in the Holy of Holies.

God will still tear that curtain that separates the holy place from the Holy of Holies, from the most holy place. When Jesus is crucified, that temple or that curtain rather tears from top to bottom. But that is to show that God will not dwell in buildings that are made with hands.

He will dwell in his people by giving his Holy Spirit. It wasn't that he was living there in the most holy place at the time, but showing that he would not dwell in buildings made by human hands any longer.

So the people, nonetheless, they have this idea that if something's happened to Zechariah, we're going to have to go in there and get him and what will happen to us. But they didn't have anything to worry about because here, Zechariah comes walking out and he's unable to speak to them, and they realized he had seen a vision in the temple.

He's gaping, his eyes are wide, he's gasping, he's unable to speak words, and they understand Zechariah has been given a vision because they all have from the Hebrew writings that when people encounter visions from God, it is amazing, it's astonishing, and sometimes they are stricken with the inability to speak.

And he kept making signs to them, but they don't understand what it is that he's saying. And it's not like he knows sign language, that he can communicate something to them or that they even understand what he's saying, but he remained mute.

And in verse 23, when his time of service was ended, he went to his home. This was after the order of Abijah had finished his time, because, of course, he was of that order, serving in the temple, was chosen by Lot to go in and burn incense.

Well, his time of service is over, so he goes back to his home. And what does Zechariah do? He sleeps with his wife, and she gets pregnant. And so, verse 24, after these days, his wife Elizabeth conceived, and for five months, she kept herself hidden.

We don't know why she kept herself hidden for five months. Nothing is told to us about that. But she sings unto the Lord. She says, The Lord has done for me in the days when he looked on me to take away my reproach among people.

It was considered a disgraceful thing for a woman to have never had children. You think of the beginning of 1 Samuel. There was a priest with two wives, and one's name was Hannah, and she did not have children, whereas the other wife, Penina, did have children.

And Penina would rub it in Hannah's face that she had children, and Hannah did not. And so, Hannah pled with the Lord. She asked that God would give her a child, and she would submit that child to the Lord's service, would commit him to service in the tabernacle.

And so, God gave her a son, and that son would be Samuel. And so, you have Hannah's song there in 1 Samuel chapter 2. And also, Rachel, for example. Genesis chapter 30. Rachel and Leah, the two sisters whom Jacob had married.

God blessed Leah, and she had many children, but Rachel did not have any. She was the favorite wife of Jacob, and yet God had closed her womb. But then, in Genesis 30 verse 23, she conceived and bore a son and said, God has taken away my reproach.

And she called his name Joseph, saying, may the Lord add to me another son. And she would have another one whose name was Benjamin. But this was considered to be a disgrace for a woman, to have never been able to have children.

But here, God had closed the womb, had providentially kept Elizabeth's womb closed until this day. They had prayed many years for a child. Gabriel says to Zechariah, the Lord has heard your prayer. He's going to give you a son.

And even though Zechariah didn't believe, God fulfilled his promise anyway, answered Zechariah's prayer anyway. And so again, my friends, it is the Lord's doing, and should always be to the praise of his great name.

When he hears our prayers and answers our requests, he does this for his glory and for his greatness, and conforming us to his plan and to his purposes, that we might be involved in this process through our prayers.

And God answering through our prayers would accomplish his will. So as Zechariah and Elizabeth had prayed for many years for a son, so God has given to them, and Elizabeth saying, thus the Lord has done for me in the days when he looked on me to take away my reproach among people.

And so in God's faithfulness, he provides the Savior that had been prophesied, the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's what we'll read about next time. That's what we get to tomorrow, the announcement of the birth of the Savior when Gabriel comes to a woman named Mary in Nazareth.

Praise God that by his mercy and his grace, we have come to salvation. As the apostle Paul put it in 1 Corinthians 1 .30, because of him, you are in Christ Jesus to the praise of his glorious grace. So let us rejoice in what God is doing in these days, lest we miss out on the joy of something great.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for what we have read. And I pray that we would continue to be grown in our knowledge of you and of your will and purposes for us. May we be in submission to your every good plan.

We know that all of this is from above, that you have the end planned from the beginning. And even those whom you would call into your kingdom, these things have been determined from the very start. And you have ordained not only the end, but even the means to that end.

And so may we be in submission to you as your good plan and purpose is fulfilled in our.

Life.

And grow us in holiness and in righteousness before you. It is in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

Gabe is the pastor of Providence Church in Casa Grande, Arizona. For more information about our ministry, visit ProvidenceCasagrande .com. Join us again tomorrow as we continue our Bible study, when we understand the text.