(Luke) 02 - Zacharias — Ed Miller

Focus our affection and our eyes upon the Lord Jesus. We'd ask again this evening that you would turn our eyes unto Him and that we might, by beholding Him, become more like Him. We thank you for every part of the Bible in a special way tonight for the Gospel of Luke.

Will you guide our fellowship and our meditation as we look at Chapter 1? We thank you, we can trust you for this because we ask it in the all-prevailing name of our Lord Jesus. Amen. Okay, I'll ask you to turn please to Luke Chapter 1.

Luke as the Gospel of the Son of All Mankind

Welcome to our abbreviated study of the Gospel of Luke. For the past two weeks I've been trying to get the heart of this book before your hearts. The book of Luke presents our Lord Jesus as the Son of all mankind.

It's different from the other Gospels because it's not just the Son of all the Jews. There's a great emphasis on the Jewish nation in the other Gospels. But here it's the Son of all mankind. Luke Chapter 3 and verse 6.

Luke Chapter 3, verse 6, "...all flesh shall see the salvation of God.". And then one of our key verses, Luke 19, verse 10. In Luke 19, verse 10, "...the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.".

All monosyllable. And it illustrates Luke's purpose. That Christ didn't just come for circumcised flesh. He came for all flesh. And to seek and to save all that was lost. In the Gospel of Luke we see the Lord Jesus reaching out to the neediest of mankind.

He goes after the poor in Luke. He goes after the captive, the lame, the blind, the helpless, publicans and sinners, harlots, tax collector, the prodigal son, the thieves, lepers, the downtrodden. That's the emphasis in Luke.

The great appeal of this Gospel is that Jesus is the Son of all mankind from the lowest, the down and outer, and the up and outer. He just reaches everybody in this book. Jesus is the Son of all mankind and all those who are in union with Christ will become sons of all mankind.

That's one of the things God wants to accomplish in our hearts in the study of Luke is to make us like Jesus. And He was the Son of all mankind and as we're conformed to Him, we also will become sons and daughters of all mankind.

Now studying Luke is not designed to fire you up to start some new program to win the laws. They don't need some new program. There's plenty of programs out there and they don't need that kind of thing.

But what the message of Luke does, it will make you see Jesus. And when you see Christ by the revelation of the Holy Spirit, when you see Him as He is in Luke, then you'll become like Him as He is in Luke and naturally you will want to pour out your life for those who are the most helpless.

That's just a by-product of seeing Jesus. Now in our introduction lesson, I called attention to six great emphases in the gospel of Luke. I'm not going to review them, but I'll just list them for you.

Luke is a great book on mission. Luke is a great book on the down and outer. Luke is a great book on the Son of Man. Luke is a great book on joy and rejoicing. There's more songs in Luke. I think the only other book that's as happy as Luke is the book of Psalms or maybe Philippians in the New Testament.

But otherwise, this is just filled with joy. It starts with joy, joy in the middle, ends with joy. Only in this book will you find the expression leaping for joy and joy in heaven and the Father rejoicing and so on.

It's a book of joy. And then Luke also emphasizes amazing contrasts. And we saw that last time. And finally, it might surprise you to learn that it's the gospel of Luke, even more than the gospel of John, that emphasizes the Holy Spirit.

And so the gospel of Luke has that as one of its unique emphases. I won't review those great themes, but keep your eye open for those as you study under the guidance of the Holy Spirit this wonderful gospel of Luke.

The Three-Part Outline of Luke

Let me just get the outline we're following before your heart, and then we'll pick up our new material. We divided the book into three parts, some divided into four parts. I've chosen three. The middle part is rather long.

Chapter 1, verse 1 through 4, verse 13. We just call that the preparation for the Son of all mankind. That's all about John the baptizer and the preparation of Christ and His circumcision, His temptation up to the baptism.

Just the preparation for Him to become Son of Man. And then chapter 4, verse 14 all the way to 1928. That's the ministry of the Son of Man. Up through 950, you have His Galilean ministry. And then after that, you have His Judean and Parian ministry.

In the Galilean ministry, that's where you get all His miracles. In the Parian ministry, that's where you get all His parables. But both of those, the Galilean and the Parian ministry, present His ministry where He becomes the friend and teacher of all mankind.

That's the middle section. And then finally, chapter 1929 through the end of the book, chapter 24, the victory of the Son of Man taking us further than any other gospel. Not only the cross, not only the resurrection, but Luke ends with the ascension of our Lord Jesus as High Priest into heaven.

And so that's the divisions we're looking at. When we closed last time, we were discussing the first four verses in chapter 1. I'll only remind you about verse 3. The word Theophilus. Luke writes not only in the Gospel of Luke, but also in Acts, to his friend Theophilus.

Theophilus and Certainty in Luke

Now, we don't know who Theophilus was, but we know the meaning of his name. It comes from two words, theos, which is God, and phileo, which is love. The word Theophilus means a lover of God. And I like to word it this way.

You say, Luke wrote to Theophilus. Yes, he did. But he also wrote to lovers of God. He wrote to all Theophiluses. He wrote to every one of us who is a lover of God. And so we're very thankful for the meaning of his name.

Say, how am I going to get the most out of Luke? Approach it as a lover of God. If you come to this book loving Jesus, you're going to get the most out of this book. If I come to this book loving Jesus, it was written for me.

Look at chapter 1, verse 4, please. It was designed to give the lovers of God certainty. Verse 4 says, "...so that you might know the exact truth about what you've been taught.". Luke wrote to his friend so that this lover of God might be filled with assurance, filled with certainty, filled with persuasion.

Now, usually when we think about a book of assurance, we think of the little epistle of 1 John. Over and over again in 1 John, we read, "...that ye might know," "...that ye might know.". It's a book of assurance.

But also, Luke is written, "...that ye might know.". Now, God doesn't want lovers of God to wonder or to guess or to wish or to hope. He wants them to know. And Luke is a wonderful book designed to instill certainty in every lover of Jesus, every lover of God.

Historical Fact as the Foundation of Faith

Now, let me take up from there our new material. And I want to show you that Luke drives home this idea of certainty in at least three ways. You'll see this all through the book. Number one, Luke stresses historical fact.

The whole book is based on the fact. He just states it. He gives historical reference. Luke is a historian. Nobody does it like Luke does. Read Luke. Read the book of Acts. He points to contemporary dates.

He points to political figures. Just glance, if you would, at chapter 3, verse 1, as an illustration of this. In chapter 3, verse 1, "...in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was tetrarch of Galilee...".

Tetrarch means the land was divided into four parts. A tetrarch is a ruler over one of those four parts. "...tetrarch of Galilee. His brother Philip was tetrarch of the region of Euteria and Trachonitis.

Licinius was tetrarch of Abilene.". Why does he give us those facts? You see, he wants our faith to be built upon solid ground, on facts. It's not like some of the cults who claim they had some special vision somewhere on a hill, far plain, in a lonely spot that no one can verify, and that they received tablets or something else from God, and then they were taken away before anybody could investigate.

Luke says, I want you to investigate the facts. I want you to know that this is verifiable. In a lot of the cults, nothing can be proven. But Luke lays it all out in history. Even unbelievers can look up in the profane literature and in the secular world and go back and prove that Pontius Pilate was there and that Herod was there and so on.

They can check the records on those things. Imagine in a courtroom today if someone was on trial for something and he brought in 500 eyewitnesses. You say, wow, that judge would be happy to see him. If he got 500 eyewitnesses, that can be examined and cross-examined.

Then it's pretty solid. Well, there were more than 500 witnesses to whom the Lord Jesus appeared after His resurrection. And that's Paul's point in Corinthians. He said, look them up. They're still alive.

Go ask them. Examine them. Cross-examine them. Everything about the Christian faith is built on historical facts. It sort of reminds me about that old TV program I used to watch, Dragnet. Remember Sergeant Joe Friday?

Just the facts. Just give me the facts, ma 'am. Only the facts. Well, that's Luke. For example, thanks, Pat, for that. Christmas. Christmas is the birthday of Jesus. That is a historical fact. So what we do is we take the fact and from the fact we get a doctrine.

The doctrine is the incarnation of Christ. But that's built on the fact. Then from the doctrine we get an ethical outworking. If He's God, you better obey Him. But it all starts with the fact. The same thing with Good Friday.

Good Friday can be dated. It's a fact. Jesus died on this fact. It's verifiable. From the fact we get the doctrine called atonement. From the doctrine we get the outworking. If Christ died for us, then we better trust Him.

But it all starts with the fact. The resurrection of Christ, Easter, is a fact. From the fact we get the doctrine. The doctrine of the resurrection. From the resurrection we get the outworking. If Christ is alive and Lord, we better surrender.

We better yield unto Him. The ascension of Christ is a fact. There were eyewitnesses. It's history. From the ascension we get the doctrine. The doctrine is the mediatorial high priesthood of Christ. From that we get the ethical outworking.

We can come boldly to the throne of grace because we have such a high priest that is touched with the feelings of our infirmity. We can find grace to help in time of need. And so in our faith He always begins with the fact and then moves to the doctrine and from the doctrine to the application of the doctrine.

And what was true continues to be true. What lies ahead for us is history. Jesus will come back again. That's history. And they're going to record it as fact. Jesus will set up a kingdom. There will be a judgment seat.

And so on. It's all fact. And out of the fact comes the doctrine and from the doctrine the outworking of that doctrine. So that's the first thing Luke does. And all the way through the book you're going to see he calls attention to dates and names and tetrarchs and high priests and this priest was here and this priest was there so that you can look it up.

He wants you to look it up. He wants you to investigate because the purpose is that lovers of Jesus might be certain. Your faith will not develop through possibilities or probabilities. You don't need my opinion.

You don't need anybody else's opinion. You need fact. I need fact. And when there's fact then faith has a solid ground. And so Luke said I'm going to just give you the facts. Only the facts, ma 'am. Nothing but the facts.

And that's what Luke does. I said there's three ways Luke drives home certainty. Not only does he give us historical fact but the second thing he does and he does it all the way through he stresses the simplicity of childlike faith.

Childlike Faith and Luke's Medical Precision

All the way through the book you're going to see that over and over and over again he appeals to childlike faith. Remember in Colossians 4 .14 Luke is called the beloved physician. Luke was a medical doctor.

The whole book some say is written in terms of these medical expressions. You go through Luke in Acts I don't know if you're familiar with Harnack but Harnack wrote a book on Dr. Luke and he calls attention to the fact that all of his writing is just colored by these medical terms and references.

I don't know if that's true or not but I know how technical doctors can be. And sometimes you talk to a doctor and he throws around these 50 cent words and your head spins. You don't even know what he's talking about.

And when he signs a prescription you can't read his writing. Doctors are like that. And you don't always know what a doctor is saying. Doctors are always looking for the natural explanation for everything.

There's a reason for this and a reason for that and let's be reasonable and reason this thing out. Some time ago I had to go to an ophthalmologist in order to see if I needed reading glasses. I started seeing spots and all that foolishness and lights and so on.

Well the doctor found out I won't call his name but he's in town. The doctor found out I was religious. And you know once a doctor finds out you're religious he wants to discuss religion. And so he proceeded while he had that thing in my eye to explain to me how David killed Goliath.

See I didn't know before but now I know. Because Goliath had a pituitary problem. And that's why he was nine foot nine. Because he had that problem. Now when you have a pituitary problem says my ophthalmologist your peripheral vision is impaired.

And you only can see out in front of you. You got this problem you see through a tunnel. And what David did the little rascal is he scooted on the side the blind side of Goliath when he wasn't looking because his peripheral vision was impaired.

And then pow he let go of that rock and he slung his sling. And that's how he got Goliath. Well that's how doctors reason. They've got to have this explanation for everything. All of that to say Dr. Luke didn't try to rationalize anything.

Dr. Luke doesn't hem and haw when he records for example the surgical miracle our Lord Jesus did to replace the ear that Peter cut off Malchus. He just gives you the facts man. He says that Jesus picked it up and put it on and it was done.

Thank you Dr. Luke. And he just tells us the facts. He doesn't apologize. He doesn't hem and haw. He has certainty on his mind and he wants us to be certain. I love the doctrine of the virgin birth. That Jesus was virgin born.

Now I would have believed that if Matthew told me. I would have believed it if Mark told me. I would have believed it if John told me. But I'm so glad that God let Dr. Luke tell me about the virgin birth.

Because Dr. Luke's a doctor and he would know about those kind of things. And he didn't try to give some rational explanation. Now Luke, the Bible says Luke was not an eyewitness. He never saw Jesus. Never heard him teach.

Never saw a miracle that he did. Never heard him preach. Never heard the parables. But Luke chapter 1 tells us that he sought out every eyewitness. He sat him down. He questioned him. He wanted to know.

He investigated. And from reading chapters 1 and 2 I have no doubt in my mind he got hold of that blessed virgin Mary and sat her down and began to interview her. There are some things in chapter 1 and 2 unless God Himself, by a miracle, and He could do that, directly told Luke.

He had to talk to Mary. There are some secrets here only Mary knew. And she just poured out her heart to Dr. Luke. And anyway, look how he records it. Take chapter 1, 26. Now in the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph of the descendants of David.

The virgin's name was Mary. Dr. Luke doesn't wonder about it. Was she just a maiden? She was a virgin. Luke tells you. And then jump down to 34. And Mary said to the angel, How can this be since I am a virgin?

And the angel answered and said to her, The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. And for that reason, the holy offspring shall be called the Son of God. And behold, even your relative Elizabeth has also conceived a son in her old age.

And she who was called barren is now in her sixth month, for nothing will be impossible with God. And Mary said, Behold, the bond slave of the Lord, be it done to me according to your word. And the angel departed from her.

Oh, that's just the facts. Isn't that glorious? Dr. Luke doesn't try to explain it and he doesn't question it. He doesn't hem and haw. He lays it out to be received by childlike faith. You're going to see that here in the first two chapters.

You're going to see it all through the book. Again, I'm so thankful that God chose Luke to tell me about the virgin birth. There's one other way Luke, in his Gospel, stresses certainty. He not only underscores historical facts, he not only calls attention to childlike faith, but Luke ever holds the Lord Jesus Christ Himself before your heart as the object of faith.

Christ as the Object of Faith

And what I mean by that is, in one sense I say he appeals to childlike faith. But he doesn't do it in such a way to turn your eyes to faith. Luke always turns your eyes away from faith and to Christ the object of faith.

For example, in this book, Matthew says that Jesus received children, that parents brought their children. But only Luke tells us that parents brought their, the Greek word is infant of days, babies that were only days old.

They brought to the Lord Jesus. Now, if I were writing it, I would probably emphasize what faith these parents had to bring their babies to Jesus. That's not how Luke writes it. He's not talking about the faith of the parents to bring their babies to Jesus.

He calls attention to Christ and His great willingness to receive babies and to bless. That's a different direction altogether. If He was reluctant to receive them, if He stood back and on some ivory tower someplace, they'd never bring their babies to Jesus if it looked like they would be bothering Him.

You wouldn't bring your baby to somebody right in the middle of a sermon and hand your baby to someone who's trying to speak if you thought for a moment He didn't want that baby. But the Lord Jesus was all smiles and He had His hands outstretched in invitation and welcome.

Those women couldn't help but give Him their baby. He's standing there like this, oh, bring your little baby here. And those who dared stand against Him, even His own disciples, He rebuked them. And He said, don't you say that.

You let those babies come of such as the kingdom of heaven. And it wasn't faith that brought babies. It was Jesus who was there willing to receive the babies. And faith becomes easy when you see Christ.

You're not going to have trouble running to Jesus if you see how wonderful He is. We put all this emphasis on faith. Luke didn't do it. You know why? Because he wants you certain. He wants you sure. And once you start looking at faith, you wonder, did I believe enough?

Was my faith strong enough? Did I believe soon enough? Did I use the right words? Was I sincere? And you begin questioning all these things. That's the opposite of certainty. And so Luke takes your eyes off faith and turns them to the Lord Jesus Christ.

It wasn't faith that restored the prodigal back into the family privileges. It was the Father's heart. It was the Father's love. It was the Father's forgiveness and the Father's joy. And so over and over through this Gospel, he calls attention to Christ Himself.

So Luke wants us certain. All you lovers of Jesus, he wants you to know. And that's why he stresses fact. And that's why he stresses childlike faith. And that's why he calls attention to Jesus who is the object of faith.

The Structure and Purpose of Luke Chapter 1

I'm going to ask you to turn to Luke chapter 1, if you would. If we were going to continue our lessons on Luke, I'd probably approach this a little differently. But since I don't want to leave anything up in the air with some loose ends, I'll be a little more general as we look at this marvelous chapter.

Now, without the slightest doubt, there's no question about it that we're going to leave most of this chapter untouched tonight. For one reason, just glance at it. There's 80 verses in this chapter. This is one big chapter.

And so we can't do justice in one lesson. But let's look at what we can look at. In Luke chapter 1, Luke tells two stories. One is the story of Zacharias and Elizabeth, the father of John the Baptizer.

I still have the habit every now and then of calling him John the Baptist. He's not the Baptist. He's the Baptizer. I try to correct that, but every now and then I keep forgetting. He was the forerunner.

He was the one who baptized. I don't want anybody to think, you know, oh, he wasn't Presbyterian. He was a Baptist. That kind of thing. He was a Baptizer. So one is the story of Zacharias and Elizabeth, the parents-to-be of the forerunner, of the Son of Man.

And then the second is Gabriel's announcement to Mary that she was going to become the mother of the Son of Man. The chapter begins and ends with Zacharias. Zacharias' story. Verses 5 to 23 and then verses 57 to 80.

And in the middle of that is the story of Mary in verses 24 to 56. Now, of course, there's overlapping because Mary goes and spends three months with Zacharias and his wife Elizabeth. Now, we'll only this evening get as far as Zacharias.

The Four Hundred Years of Silence and the Beginning of Luke

So let me just try to get that before your heart. Before we look at the Zacharias story, let me try to tie in this first chapter of Luke. Show how it fits right here in the Bible itself and then how it prepares us for the study of Luke.

As I suggested in our first introductory lesson on Luke, that in this first chapter, God is going to break the silence that he's held for 400 years. As you know, between the last book of the Old Testament, Malachi, and the first book of the New Testament, Matthew, there were 400 years when there was no word from God.

He'd ever talked to a prophet. There was no dream, no revelation, no oracle, no sign from heaven. God was silent. In one sense, he wasn't silent. He was very noisy because it was during those 400 years that he was preparing Rome and preparing the Greek language and all of that, a very noisy year.

But as far as revelation is concerned, they were very silent years. So our hearts would naturally want to know, when did God break the silence? And what did he say? And what were the first words after 400 silent years?

Well, they're right here in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 1, verse 5. Let me describe the scene for you. In the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a certain priest named Zacharias of the division of Abijah.

He had a wife from the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. Now, both Zacharias and his wife were from the priestly family. If you notice, verse 8 and 9, Zacharias was chosen by Lot to enter into the holy temple to burn incense there on the brazen altar of incense.

Now, let me give you some facts. You don't need to remember this, but I think it will help set it up. Aaron was the first high priest. He had four sons. Two of those sons were killed by God in a special judgment.

The other two sons began to grow and grow until 24 families of priests sprang out of those two sons. The problem was that this Aaronic family line was very prolific, and they got so many priests, they didn't know what to do with them all.

There were priests everywhere. The problem is there's only one temple and thousands of priests. How can they all minister? And so it came to pass that they had to draw straw. They didn't draw straws. They cast lots.

But it's the same idea. In the days of David, this was finally organized. 1 Chronicles 24 tells us that he divided the priesthood into 24 courses. In other words, each course was selected and they would each serve for two weeks.

And then they'd cast lots to see who got to serve in the temple. And wherever the lot fell, all right, let's roll for the showbread. And they'd roll for the showbread. All right, let's roll for the seven-pronged candlestick.

Who's going to take care of that? And they would cast lots for all of the duties. Luke 1 .7. Luke 1 .7 says that both Zacharias and his wife were advanced in age. We don't know how advanced. God doesn't tell us their ages.

The Aaronic priests were not under the same law as the Levites in Number 9 that they had to retire at age 50. So these old priests did not have to retire. And they're all hanging around waiting for the lot to fall.

They're looking for a duty. We're told that some priests actually lived and died and never served God in the temple because their lot never came up. They lived and they died and they never served God.

Josephus, the historian, tells us in New Testament days that just in Jerusalem, without counting the other places, there were more than 24 ,000 priests waiting around for their lot to be drawn. Now you get, with that as a background, you can understand a little bit what it must have meant to this old priest to have the eighth course picked and then to have his name come up to have this marvelous service, to stand in front of the veil of the Holy of Holies and minister incense in the brazen altar of incense.

This was such an honor. In verse 9, he was chosen by lot to enter the temple of the Lord. We have no way to know this, but it's possible that this was the only opportunity in his life that he ever had to do this.

And it's very probable that that's so as well. And so he received this rare privilege and according to history then, he got all through his ceremonial cleansing and all his five baths and seven washings, put on the white robe and the bells along the bottom, and barefoot he stood before this marvelous altar of incense.

Now at that time, as today, many were just plain priests. They were just going through the motion. They were just going through the ritual and so on. Not Zacharias and his wife. They were not playing a game.

Look at verse 6, please. They were both righteous in the sight of God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and requirements of the Lord. Now, blameless is not faultless. That's not saying that they had no sin.

But these folks were real. And these were priests whose hearts were open to the Lord, to minister unto the Lord. And on this great day of privilege, an amazing thing happened in the temple. Chapter 1, verse 11, an angel of the Lord appeared to him standing at the right of the altar of incense.

Don't read that la, la, la. According to verse 19, the angel answered and said to him, I am Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God. I've been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. The hero of God.

That's what Gabriel means, hero of God. The hero of God. The angel that stands in the presence of God. We know two angels by name. Unless you hold the apocryphal books, then you know seven angels by name.

But we know two angels by name, Gabriel and Michael. Gabriel kept showing up as the angel of mercy. Michael keeps showing up as the angel of the wrath of God. Gabriel hadn't appeared on the earth for almost 500 years.

Last time he showed up was to talk to Daniel. And now all of a sudden, there's Zachariah in the temple and this Gabriel appears. Luke 1, verse 12, Zacharias was troubled when he saw him and fear gripped him.

You better believe it. You'd be troubled too. That expression, fear gripped him, in the original language, it has to do with an outward tremor. In other words, he shook in his boots. He was trembling.

He saw this angel just show up. And I don't know what the angel looked like if he was all light and bright and all that. I don't know. But it scared the daylights out of Zachariah. And what message did the angel bring?

Because now for the first time in 400 years, heaven is about to speak again. He hadn't talked for 400 years and now he speaks. And here's what he says, verse 13. These are the first words since the end of the Old Testament.

The angel said to him, Do not be afraid, Zacharias, for your petition has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son. You'll give him the name John. You will have joy and gladness and many will rejoice at his birth.

He'll be great in the sight of the Lord. He'll drink no wine or liquor. He'll be filled with the Holy Spirit while he's yet in his mother's womb. He'll turn back many of the sons of Israel to the Lord their God.

And it is he who will go as forerunner before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children and the disobedient to the attitude of the righteous so as to make a people prepared for the Lord.

That's what the angel said. Now listen as I quote the last two verses of the Old Testament. Malachi 4, verses 5 and 6. Here's how the Old Testament ends. Behold, I am going to send Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord.

He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers lest I come and smite the land with a curve. The Old Testament ends with the promise that Elijah would come before the great and terrible day of the Lord.

So the question comes. Now God breaks the silence. Elizabeth's going to have a baby. Is that Elijah? The Old Testament says Elijah's going to come. Zechariah said, here's a baby. You're going to have a baby.

He'll come in the spirit and power of Elijah. Is that the fulfillment of that prophecy? In Matthew 11, verse 14, Jesus was talking about John the baptizer and He made this comment. If you care to accept it, He Himself is Elijah who was to come.

Jesus said John the baptizer was Elijah who was to come. You say, well, He came as the forerunner of Christ in His first coming. Is that the complete fulfillment? No, John was just a partial fulfillment.

Elijah's going to come again. You say, how do you know that? I know that because after John the baptizer died, after he was beheaded, they came to Jesus and said, tell us about the end. What's going to happen?

What's going to come? And in Matthew 17, verse 11, He said, Elijah is coming and will restore all things. So after John was dead, Jesus said, Elijah's still coming. So John partially fulfills the prophecy.

He prepares the way before the first coming. Before Jesus comes again, there will be another Elijah. Will it be Elijah in person, the one of the Old Testament? Some think so. I don't know. Maybe it will.

He never died. He might come around just to die. I don't know if it's going to be him or someone in the Spirit and power, but you see right at the beginning of Luke how God unites the Old Testament and the New Testament.

Luke Between Israel and the Gentiles

I laid great stress on the fact that Luke is the only Gentile writer of the Bible, and he's writing to Gentiles. I said it this way. You'll never find a more non-Jewish book than the book of Luke. In fact, all through the book of Luke the Jews were getting pretty mad because of his emphasis.

It looked like he was sort of rubbing the Samaritans in their face from time to time. He's so non-Jewish. But here's an amazing thing. Though there's no more non-Jewish book than Luke, I have never seen more Jewish chapters than Luke chapter 1 and Luke chapter 2.