The Nativity of St. John the Baptist

June 24, 2012; Nativity of St. John the Baptist; Texts: Ps 85 (1-6) 7-13; Isaiah 40:1-5; Acts 13:13-26; Luke 1:57-80; Title: The Light Will Shine; Rev. Tim Beck

Grace, mercy and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ

Have you seen a gray, overcast day suddenly become a glorious theatre of sunbeams and color? Have you seen how Scripture’s saints for the most part led ordinary lives, until into the daily routine heaven breaks in like a sunrise? Now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son. What could be more normal than that? Only, it wasn’t so simple. Pregnant Elizabeth was past childbearing years, and her husband was mute by divine cause: he doubted an angel’s God sent message, so was clap-trapped. Things were not ordinary, even if carried along in ordinary ways; nevertheless, people got used to mute Zachariah and pregnant Elizabeth, like we too get used to going to church, hearing God’s Word, receiving the Holy Sacraments. How dull can we be when we have reason to rejoice! And her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her. 

          For what reasons did they rejoice? Consider the importance of childbearing in that age, in most ages. Not only did your future depend on it, children are a blessing. Children are a blessing, not a curse or inconvenience. Those with many children were not shunned like today, but respected because children are God’s blessing. People wondered about Zack and Liz, “why don’t they have kids, what’s wrong with them, what sin in them, and her husband’s a priest?”  Then after giving up hope, she has a child. But this is not just about having a baby, there’s more. The “more” is the real reason to rejoice. The Lord magnified Elizabeth. He showed great mercy, he made her conspicuous… which is what this word for “show” means. Beyond the size of her tummy, beyond her safe birth is the show of mercy attached to this birth like an umbilical cord never meant to be cut. Folks couldn’t imagine what was really taking place. But the grey clouds were bursting with color and majesty. (I wonder how many happenings in our lives are actually divine appointments. How does the Lord use the tangled skein of our days to embroider his tapestry?) So Zechariah and Elizabeth act in the ordinary fashion, yet a fashion full of promise… And on the eighth day they came to circumcise the child. And they would have called him Zechariah after his father, but his mother answered, “No; he shall be called John.” And they said to her, “None of your relatives is called by this name.” And they made signs to his father, inquiring what he wanted him to be called.

          Elizabeth is not only delighted with the child, she sees the babe through God’s promise. How do we know that? The couple had the boy circumcised on the eighth day. They believed the promise attached to circumcision, as did all true Israelites. Further, they called the boy by the name given by God. Ordinarily he’d be named after his father; and Zechariah is a good name. Zechariah means “the Lord remembers.” That’s a mighty message, a clear confession and a powerful anticipation.  When we wait for the Lord’s promises what do we say to each other? Do we stare at the wall with blank looks? No, we say “the Lord remembers.” When we are in need we say He remembers. He remembers to save when we go down with the ship. He remembers to give life when we are dying. “Zechariah” means the Lord remembers so that we remember the Lord remembers, so that we remember to say the Lord remembers and to say what the Lord remembers.  In your needs, what is it the Lord remembers? He remembers you according to the promise. As for the child’s name, Elizabeth obeys Zechariah and says what the angel said “His name is John.”  Actually, she said “His name shall be John.” She said it in the future tense, not because the ceremony was about to happen; rather,   the future points out the name is a promise. In a future way she “remembers” what this child shall be, what he shall accomplish in the wilderness before his head is lopped off into a basket.  He shall be called John because the Lord remembers; He remembers the meaning of the name Zechariah. The child shall be called John - from the Hebrew word “God has been gracious.” God has been gracious, past tense. The promise is fulfilled in John.

          From our Lord’s perspective, everything is taken care of. He’s done it all, taken care of it all.  For example, when our Lord’s last word was uttered, “tetelestai,” meaning “it is finished,” it was    finished.  Our redemption was complete, and we in God’s eye are complete. As to the claim that John’ s day reached into the past and into the future, folks had their doubts, so they asked the head of the house, Zechariah, “what is your will?” Zechariah remembers and he asked for a writing tablet and wrote, “His name is John.” And they all wondered. In part, they wondered because Zechariah gives up naming his son after him. That was really important in those days. That’s how family lines kept going. They wonder more because Zechariah gives up an ordinary good for the extraordinary, something only faith can see. He writes “God has been gracious.” The folks wonder not only at breaking custom, they marvel at the promise. The Lord God has fulfilled the covenant to Israel… so Zechariah prophesies. Has he really done that in the hour of baby circumcision blood? Is the Lord really so near in what looks so ordinary but is attached to a promise, like baptism and the Lord’s Supper?  Is the Lord near to you always? In His gifts is heaven closer to you than earth? Is He really dwelling in you who believe? That is indeed extraordinarily gracious.

          And immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue loosed, and he spoke, blessing God.  And fear came on all their neighbors. And all these things were talked about through all the hill country of Judea, and all who heard them laid them up in their hearts, saying, “What then will this child be?” For the hand of the Lord was with him. Who understands the fullness of that promise, of the eternal surrounding us in our day to day struggles? There is a glimpse through clouds now and then. There is the resurrection, there is the crucifixion, and Zechariah spoke. We notice that miracle in our text. But the Scripture’s grammar points to something other than the miracle as most important. Namely, He blessed God. Zechariah announced God’s grace is here; he lifted up the name of the mighty one. He remembered Him who remembers. In that ordinary moment faith saw heaven and earth united, as in the song of the Sanctus, the Triune God’s eternal praises before the Throne. It’s like the glory of the Lord shining round about and the shepherds trembling. It’s like the glory of the crucifixion and the disciples trembling behind locked doors. It is a holy fear. This fear Zechariah mentions literally, it “dwells on those about.” Where is the rejoicing now? Is it overcome by our unworthiness – by sin’s shadow revealed by the light of God’s glory?  Yes and no.

          Being blessed by God is not easy. Perhaps for sinners to be blest by God is like having a child (so I’m told)? The pangs, the pains, the moments of agony from the law’s condemnation, then the great joy when a new life is laid upon the mother’s breast. Yes, God has been gracious – “John.”  God has been gracious so that we do not fear. Yes, we pass through trials, including the pangs of death to say “the Lord remembered. He has been gracious indeed!” He blesses us and we rejoice – we are blessed, and through our trials we learn to bless God in holy fear that turns to joy. That’s why we listen attentively to the promise, to what the priest Zechariah prophesied about the God who remembers to be gracious.   We listen to an ordinary gray-bearded mouth sent by the Ancient of Days, the everlasting, the Alpha and Omega. And his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, saying, “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David, as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from of old…

          He was filled with the Holy Spirit. He was to put it rather strangely, literally, “accomplished” by the Holy Spirit. He delivered exactly what God intended to say. He prophesied… giving words that continue forever… so the grammar implies. He remembers to praise the Lord God of Israel because God visited His people. That could be terrifying! Only Zechariah remembers the name John. The Lord remembers our need of grace. There is joy. He redeemed His people, simple past tense. Heaven is opened, the glory revealed, the clouds beam, gleaming. He redeemed, that is ransomed, washed the guilt away, opened the mercy seat and atoned for His people. We hear the words, do we realize how extraordinary? The words are wonderful, to us who know the slavery of sin, the bondage to the devil, the things you do you that do not want to do. The worlds are marvelous, to us who know mental anguish, fear death, and are mortal, fallible, often troubled; for God remembers. He is gracious. He has done everything for you, “tetelestai,” it is finished. He has raised up a horn of salvation, of deliverance for us. This is announced in John’s birth. He completed what was promised to David about a shoot of Jesse that is yet the root of Jesse: As he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from of old… Literally from of ages, from eternity, forever.

          It’s not just that the prophets spoke long ago; they spoke from of old… from the Alpha, even as Elizabeth says “shall be” speaking in reference to the Omega, the beginning and the end. The Word of God has always been and is always being and shall be. At times it appears like light through the clouds, a sun burst, the Son’s death, the blinding resurrection, the ascension light, our Lord’s rule, “tetelestai.” God remembers all this – His graciousness from Zechariah, to John, to you, to the Second Coming... that we should be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us; to show the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, the oath that he swore to our father Abraham, to grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies, might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.   

          You are promised paradise, and though at times in this life crushed; you shall be built up and established.  He “shows” mercy. In this expression He literally “does mercy”… to all who trust the promise past, believe the promise present and await the promise future. He remembers his holy covenant; God remembers to fulfill every promise from Adam to the end of time. He delivers us from our foes to deliver us to serve Him. Think on that a minute. It is fulfillment and joy… because it is service without fear. Where the law holds no threat, we are whole, having the righteousness of Christ. Where we are declared righteous, we are promised to see God’s face and beam in reflection. Clothed in Christ’s imputed righteousness, we shall be made truly righteous. Eden will be restored. This is what we celebrate in John’s nativity. And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us  from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” And the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness until the day of his public appearance to Israel.

          So the Lord’s promises are fulfilled in the flesh.  So deliverance came with a child named John. He was the last prophet of the former covenant, pointing to God made man, our Saviour. John grew up as an ordinary child, disappeared into the wilderness, wore clothing unmistakable as Elijah’s and preached the final Old Testament sermon. His message becomes the new, repentance for the forgiveness of sin. Filled with the Holy Spirit, he prepared the way and gave knowledge. He declared “God remembers” and “God has been gracious,” preparing us for the name “Jesus,” which means Saviour.  John’s cousin according to the flesh broke open the gray clouds to let in heaven’s light and life, through the forgiveness of sin. Through the tender mercies of our God, sins are dismissed, prisoners released, the guilty pardoned, the bound liberated, and peace restored. This He has done for you, in ordinary ways joined to the promise that give the extraordinary.

The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Amen)