The Gospel of Luke: Features of the Forerunner

Transcript

JRNT 58
05/26/2024
The Gospel of Luke: Features of the Forerunner
Luke 1:13-17
Jesse Randolph


Well, we are picking up our study of the Gospel of Luke here this morning and as we do so we're going to pick up in our study of this figure named Zechariah. Zechariah, you'll recall, was this Israelite priest, descendant of Aaron, the original Israelite priest. He was of the division of Abijah, he was married to Elizabeth who was also, we saw a couple of weeks ago, of the priestly line. He, like his wife, we saw back in verses 6-7, was righteous in the sight of God. He, Zechariah, like his wife, was walking blamelessly in all the commandments and righteous commandments of the Lord. But he and his wife who are now advanced in years had not been blessed with a child.

Well, Zechariah, faithful man that he was, kept plodding along and we saw that last time. And where we left off was seeing how this division of priests to which he belonged which was called to serve in the temple in Jerusalem for just two individual weeks out of the year was now on duty. And during his division's week of service Zechariah was performing his own priestly duties there in Jerusalem along with approximately 750 other members of the division of Abijah. And then the moment that he had literally been waiting for his entire life arrived. The lot was cast, his name was called as being that one priest from his division who would be allowed to enter the Holy Place, just outside the inner sanctum of the temple complex, the Holy of Holies. And he was going to have this opportunity to present an incense offering to the Lord.

And then surely with his heart pounding and realizing that this was his one shot to perform this sacred task had arrived, albeit later in life, Zechariah dropped whatever he had been doing out in the outer courtyard of the temple where all the animal sacrifices were being offered, where all the lambs were bleating and the priests were lopping and chopping and the blood was flowing. And then he proceeded into the Holy Place. And then likely using a sanctified set of utensils Zechariah would have grabbed a few burning coals off the altar in that outer courtyard and then placed them in a golden bowl and then proceeded inward into the Holy Place where, from what he had heard and what he had read, because he had never experienced this before, he was expecting to see in that Holy Place three items: that table of showbread, the golden lampstand and, of course, the altar of incense. And as he looked inside that Holy Place and looked in the direction of the altar of incense where he would be performing this once-in-a-lifetime service, what did he see?

Luke told us last week in verse 11 he saw an angel, verse 11 says, “And an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing to the right of the altar of incense.” And of course that's when Zechariah walked up to the angel and shook his hand, right, slapped him a high five, gave him a holy kiss? No. Look at verse 12, it says, “And Zechariah was troubled when he saw the angel and fear fell upon him.” Righteous and upright man that he was, Zechariah responded to seeing this angel the way that any right-minded and righteous person would respond to being in the presence of an angel as that angel was refracting and reflecting the divine glory of Yahweh. Zechariah responded in fear and in trembling. So there he was, this priest Zechariah, righteous, godly, there to perform this once-in-a-lifetime offer of incense to God in this Holy Place and now he finds himself fearful and trembling as he is in the presence of this angel, this angel that is standing at the right side of the altar on which Zechariah was supposed to offer this offering of incense.

And that's where we left off last time, this stare-down, so to speak, between a priest of God and an angel of God, with the angel of God exuding the glory and the majesty of God and the priest standing there a bit shell-shocked and understandably so. The tension is thick, the drama is real, and then comes our passage for today, verses 13-17. I'll read the passage in its entirety and then we'll take it line upon line and verse upon verse. God's Word reads, “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 will call his name John. And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth. For he will be great in the sight of the Lord; and “he will not drink any wine or strong drink,” and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit while yet in his mother's womb. And he will turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God. And he will go before Him in the spirit and the power of Elijah, “to turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children,” and the disobedient to the attitude of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” The title of this morning's message is “Features of the Forerunner” which comes from the content of what this angel Gabriel revealed to Zechariah in the scene that we see recorded here about this son who would soon be born to Zechariah and to his wife Elizabeth. As we are about to see in this encounter, the angel reveals eight features of the forerunner, this one who would be the son of Zechariah and Elizabeth, the one who would later be revealed to be John the Baptist, the one whose ministry prepared the way for the Messiah of Israel and the Savior of the world, the Lord Jesus to come.

We'll get into each of these eight features in just a moment as we work our way through these five verses here this morning. But before we do so, let's take note of these first few words of verse 13. Look at what Luke, the narrator and author of this Gospel tells us, he says, “But the angel said to him.” That by the way is significant, that is really, really significant because what is revealed here is that both with the angel's appearance back in verse 12 as we saw last week and the angel speaking now in verse 13, the 400 years of silence in Israel was now officially over. Whatever the angel was about to say next, the silent years in Israel had officially come to an end. And as we are about to see through this priest's encounter with this angel we're going to learn eight features about this child who would be born to Zechariah and Elizabeth, this one who would be the forerunner to the Messiah, John the Baptist.

Here is our first one, our first feature of the forerunner, he would be “A Prayer Answered.” If you are taking notes, he would be “A Prayer Answered.” Note the angel's first words to Zechariah, “Do not be afraid,” it says. That's a present imperative verb which could also be translated “stop fearing” or “stop being frightened,” or maybe you're used to it being read as “fear not.” Think about that, this is the beginning of any form of dialogue in Luke's Gospel and the first few words we see are, “Do not be afraid.” If we can just pause for a moment, and I know we have to be careful about how we take words in their context and bring them over to our context today, but if we can just think for a moment about those few words, “Do not be afraid.” What comfort ought those words to bring to every single one of us, each and every one of us here this morning, in whatever season we find ourselves in.

God's Word reminds us over and over and over, not just here but elsewhere, that as His followers we have nothing to fear in this world. Isaiah 41:10 says, “Do not fear, for I am with you,” He is speaking to Isaiah directly there, “do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God.” Psalm 27:1 says, “Yahweh is my light and salvation; whom shall I fear?” Bringing it over to the New Testament, Paul says in Romans 8:15, “For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry out, ‘Abba! Father!’ ” And then of course Hebrews 13:5-6 says, “He Himself has said,” referring to God, ‘I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you’ so that we confidently say, ‘The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What will man do to me?’ ” The point is God's people of which righteous Zechariah certainly was one, with sights on eternity, have nothing to fear. And that's because our salvation is secure, our eternal dwelling place in glory is prepared and waiting for us, there is nothing that could happen in this world, there is no one in this world, who could ever rob us of the glorious future that awaits us. That's the type of assurance that the angel here was giving Zechariah; he had nothing to fear.

And here this angelic announcement, “Do not be afraid,” verse 13, is tied to the fact that the Lord had heard Zechariah's prayer. Look at the next part of verse 1, here is how Luke records it, it says, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard.” Now to the unrighteous person, the unsaved person, they would have to face the reality of Isaiah 59:2 which says, “But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear.” Not Zechariah. Zechariah's prayers had been heard and the fact that God had heard Zechariah's prayers was directly in line with what Proverbs 15:29 indicates, “Yahweh is far from the wicked, but He hears the prayer of the righteous.” So the angel then begins by saying to Zechariah, “Do not be afraid,” fear not, and with these words he, the angel, is providing this comforting word of care to Zechariah and intentionally so. He is calming Zechariah's fears and relieving his anxieties. There was no need to fear whatever the angel was about to say or do and that's because, as we are about to see, the angel was there to deliver good news to Zechariah, the good news being that his prayer had been heard.

In fact, take a look at the rest of verse 13, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard.” Now that opens up another question, one we have to untangle a bit. What was the nature of Zechariah's prayer in the first place? Of course, we know how Zechariah's prayer was answered as we get further into verse 13, it will say, “and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son.” That would be the answer to prayer. But that doesn't ultimately answer the question of what it was that Zechariah had been praying for to begin with. Now over the years as you look through the commentaries and the theologies you see that there have been two general lines of thought offered to answer that question, what was it that Zechariah was praying for? On one side are those who would say that God here was answering Zechariah's prayer for a child and specifically his prayer for a son. And those who hold to that view will point out the proximity of the words in verse 13, “Your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son.” And then they'll go on to point out in verse 13 that this was likely answer to prayer that Zechariah and Elizabeth had offered years ago back when they were both younger and more of the conventional childbearing and child-rearing years. That would be one view, the view that this was an answer to prayer specifically for a child.

On the other side you will have those who will say that the answer to prayer mentioned here had to do with ongoing prayers that Zechariah had been praying for the deliverance of Israel through its promised Messiah, and that the angel's announcement later in this passage that Elizabeth would have a son, verse 13, was directly an answer to prayers that Zechariah had offered for the Messiah to come who he knew would be preceded by a forerunner.

Now I don't want to be accused of playing on both sides of the fence here this morning, but I don't see why the answer to that issue or that question can't be both, like both are true. In other words, it's entirely plausible and possible, if not likely, that the angel's reference here to Zechariah's prayer having been answered had both a personal component and a national component. There are solid exegetical reasons, biblical reasons, to support the idea that there are dual answers to prayer being issued here in this text. First, there are reasons to believe from the text that the prayer being answered here had to do with Zechariah's and likely Elizabeth's earlier prayers for a child. That includes the fact that we just saw in verse 13 that there is this natural flow between what we see here in verse 13, “your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son.” A natural reading of that passage in its logical order is that Zechariah had prayed for a son and now that prayer for a son was being answered, or at least a child. Another of those reasons that this is a viable option is that we think about the shame and the embarrassment and the disgrace that this couple would have felt over their childlessness. In fact, Elizabeth alludes to it later in verse 25 of chapter 1, where she says later down the road, “This is the way the Lord has dealt with me in the days when He looked upon me to take away my disgrace among men,” that disgrace being her barrenness, her childlessness. And the disgrace that Elizabeth experienced surely would have driven this righteous woman to pray and to pray specifically for a child, the very thing she desired, with this prayer now apparently, in verse 13, being answered. So that's one side of things, that this very much could be God answering this couple's prayer specifically for a child.

But there are also very good biblical reasons undergirding that other side of things, that this prayer that was being prayed that was now being answered in verse 13 was a Messianic prayer, that is one in which Zechariah had been praying specifically and continuously for Israel's promised deliverer, the Christ, the Messiah, that Messiah would finally come. And in support of that view is the fact that Zechariah, we saw this last time, was offering incense and praying during the time of the evening offering, which at that time customarily in this phase of Israel's history was when prayers were offered for the people, the nation of Israel. So Zechariah likely was, as he did his temple service, praying for Israel as a group, as a people, as a nation. Not only that but when we take into account all that the angel will say here in the verses we'll be in this morning, much of what the angel says back to Zechariah about the answer to his prayer has to do with matters of national concern. Look at verse 14, “Many will rejoice at his birth;” or verse 16, many of the sons of Israel will turn back to the Lord their God; or verse 16, He is making ready a people prepared for the Lord. These are corporate identifiers.

So where I ultimately land on this is that Zechariah the righteous priest had prayed not only for his own personal needs and wishes, namely a child or a son, but he had also been praying expectantly for the Messiah of Israel to come. And now what we see here in verse 13 is that God was answering both prayers, answering the prayers not only of a desperate couple but answering the prayers of a desperate people. So that's our first feature of the forerunner, John the Baptist. He represented and he was “A Prayer Answered.”

Now as we read on we're going to see this second feature of the forerunner which is that he would be “A Portrayal of Mercy,” “A Portrayal of Mercy.” Look at the next part of verse 13, after telling Zechariah that his prayer had been heard the angel continues on by saying, “And your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will call his name John.” So through Elizabeth, aged though she was, Zechariah was being told here he would become the father of a child, and not just a child but a son, a son who like his father Zechariah would be qualified, based on his lineage and his family tree, to become a priest, to serve as a priest. And not only would Elizabeth bear Zechariah a son, but the angel here issues this command concerning the naming of that son. Look at the language, it says, “and you will call his name John.” The angel doesn't give Zechariah a baby names book and say, “You pick, what are your favorite three and we'll back and forth and trade names until we come up with one.” No, the angel doesn't give Zechariah the option of naming his son after himself, which would be natural and cultural at that time. No, the son was to be given this very specific name, John.

Because God was the One who had given the couple this child and because God was the One who would claim and shape this child's life, God would be the One who named this child. This would be very similar to what God did with Hagar back in Genesis 16:11, He said, “Behold you are with child, and you will bear a son; and you shall call his name Ishmael.” This is what God did with Josiah in I Kings 13:2. “thus says Yahweh, Behold a son shall be born to the house of David, Josiah is his name.” This is what God did in the infamous account in Isaiah 7:14. “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin will be with child and bear a so, and she will call his name Immanuel.” This is what God did in the account of Jesus' conception in His mother Mary's womb. Look down the page here in Luke 1 at verse 31, Luke 1:31, it says, “And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus.”

So the one, back to our text, who would come before Christ, the forerunner, was given a name with a specific meaning, John. In Hebrew that name would be ‘Johanan’ which is the melding together of two different Hebrew words, one being ‘Yahweh,’ the personal name of God, and the other being ‘chanan’ which means to be gracious or to be merciful. John's name, in other words, putting those two words together, would mean something like Yahweh has shown grace or Yahweh has shown mercy or the Lord is merciful. And that reflects the grace and the mercy that was going to be shown God's people, the Israelites, through John.

And note, by the way, the significance of his son's name, the forerunner John, was not lost on his father, Zechariah. If you'll go down the page with me to Luke 1:76, this is Zechariah's prophecy after his son John's birth. He gives this prophetic word in Luke 1, we'll pick it up in verse 76. He says, “And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High, for you will go on ‘before the Lord to make ready His ways,’ to give to His people the knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of their sins,” and then get this, “because of the tender mercy of our God, with which the Sunrise from on high will visit us.” John, the forerunner, the one that would one day be in Elizabeth's womb was “A Portrayal of Mercy.” That's our second feature of the forerunner, he was “A Portrayal of Mercy” as indicated by his name, John.

With that we get to our third feature of the forerunner, turning back to Luke 1 and now in verse 14. Look at the angel continues on by saying, verse 14, “And you will have joy and gladness and many will rejoice at his birth.” That's our third feature of the forerunner, he would be “A Provider of Joy,” “A Provider of Joy.” The joy, by the way, that this forerunner would bring is clearly laid out here in verse 14 along two different lines. First, we see that he would bring joy to his father Zechariah and, of course, by extension to his mother Elizabeth. That's all wrapped up in the first part of verse 14 where it says, “and you,” personal, individual, “will have joy and gladness.” But also look at the second half, there is this broader group that would experience joy, specifically, the many, “And many will rejoice at his birth.”

Now before we take a look at both of those lines of thought here in verse 14, it is worth noting that Luke frequently uses the word joy in his Gospel. And when he does so he is oftentimes linking the idea of joy or the word “joy” to salvation. We think of John the Baptist leaping for joy while in his mother's womb in Luke 1:44. We think of the “good news of great joy,” Luke 2:10, that the angel brought to Mary and Joseph. We think of Jesus' teaching to His disciples in Luke 6:22-23, He says this, “when men hate you, and exclude you, and insult you, and scorn your name as evil, for the sake of the Son of Man,” you are to do what? He says, “Be glad in that day and leap for joy.” We think of the joy that comes to those, Luke 10:20, whose “names are recorded in heaven.” Or we think of the parables of the lost sheep and lost coin and the prodigal son, all in Luke 15, where joy comes in connection with somebody finding something, that which was first lost is now found. That's, of course, a picture of salvation.

So again we have these dual aspects of joy being described here in verse 14. First, is the personal joy that Zechariah and Elizabeth would have experienced as a first time father and as a formerly barren mother. But secondly, there is this broader, corporate component wrapped into the angel here saying, “many will rejoice at his birth,” meaning the forerunner would bring joy and gladness not only to his parents, but to others living in his generation. And remember the people living in this generation were people to whom God no longer was sending prophets. That's the reason for the 400 years of darkness and silence that precede this era. So under these bleak circumstances the arrival of the forerunner would bring great joy to many of this generation, and precisely because of who it was the forerunner would be forerunning, who he would be preceding -- the Messiah of Israel Himself.

Now this forerunner, by the way, it's not like he would bring joy to everyone, joy to all. Recall that this forerunner, John the Baptist, would go after the Pharisees and the Sadducees in Luke 3:7, calling them a “brood of vipers.” He didn't bring joy to them. This forerunner would end up imprisoned by King Herod, in fact, by Herod's orders be beheaded. He didn't bring joy to King Herod. But he nevertheless would bring joy, as it says here in verse 14, to many, many in Israel who were awaiting and anticipating the coming of their Messiah. So that's our third feature of the forerunner, that many would rejoice at his birth.

Here is our fourth feature, the forerunner would be “A Picture of Greatness,” “A Picture of Greatness.” Look at the beginning words of verse 15, this is still the angel speaking to Zechariah, still in the Holy Place, and he says this, “For he will be great in the sight of the Lord.” Now that fourth feature, and you can see this from the way it reads here, is actually a continuation of the same thought given by the angel back in verse 15, what we just looked at, where the angel said that “many will rejoice at his birth.” In other words that many would rejoice at the forerunner's birth was grounds for, here in verse 15, identifying him as “great in the sight of the Lord.” And that language, by the way, “great in the sight of the Lord,” anticipates what Jesus Himself would say about John the Baptist later in the Gospel of Luke. Our Lord would put it this way in Luke 7:28, speaking of John the Baptist, the forerunner, Luke 7:28, Jesus speaking, He says, “I say to you, among those born of women there is no one greater than John.” Or in Matthew 11:11 Jesus said, “Truly I say to you, among those born of women there has not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptist!” So not only did the Holy Spirit in moving Luke to write the words of this Gospel highlight the greatness of John through the words of an angel, spoken to Zechariah in the Holy Place, but the Lord Jesus Himself testified publicly that John was great.

And back to our text, Luke 1:15, note the description which the angel attaches to John's greatness here, he would be “great in the sight of the Lord.” This child to be born to Zechariah and Elizabeth would be great before God. And why? Well, because certainly he would be a man who would in his prophetic role live to serve the Lord. And it certainly would be because he would be that one who would direct the attention of the people to their long awaited Messiah. This is the one who we know in John 1:29 would say, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” He also would be the one, we saw in Luke 1:77 from Zechariah's prophecy, who would “give to his people the knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of their sins.” He would be the one, this great one, who would call on his kinsmen to repent in preparation for the Messiah's coming. But this is really worth stressing here, John the forerunner would also be the one who would resist drawing attention to himself and instead recede into the background as the Savior of the world arrived. This is the one as we saw in the Scripture reading this morning who would say, “He must increase, but I must decrease,” [John 3:30]. And that's where true greatness lies, does it not? In the pursuit of humility, in fading into the background so that the only One who is worthy of any sort of praise and acclaim, Jesus our Lord, is given primacy and centrality and praise and glory. Indeed, that's how Jesus defines greatness, that's how in His earthly ministry He defined greatness. He didn't define greatness in terms of awards or fame or titles or prestige or anything of the sort. No, Jesus defined greatness in these terms… Here is Luke 9:48, “the one who is least among all of you, this is the one who is great.” Matthew 18:4, “Whoever therefore will humble himself as this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” Mark 9:35, “If anyone wants to be first, he shall be last of all and servant of all.” John the Baptist, the forerunner, embodied this type of greatness. Not only was he a herald and a prophet, he was a humble servant. And because of that the forerunner is described by this angel to Zechariah, his father, before he is even conceived as being great in the only sense that matters, great in the highest sense of the term, “great in the sight of the Lord.”

That's four features of the forerunner, now comes the fifth in the next part of verse 15, it reads, “And ‘he will not drink any wine or strong drink.’ ” Here is our fifth feature, if you are taking notes, he would be “A Proper Ascetic,” not aesthetic like concerned with artistic beauty, but rather ascetic, like someone who is committed to engaging in forms of severe self-discipline, abstaining from all forms of indulgence. That was John the forerunner, he was an ascetic, and specifically, it says here he wouldn't “drink any wine or strong drink,” or if you have the NASB it would say he would “drink no wine or liquor.” Now we have a couple of items to work through here about this fifth feature of the forerunner.

First note that the angel here uses two different terms, “wine or strong drink” or “wine or liquor” to describe what the forerunner would abstain from. Now that first word wine, of course, refers to an intoxicating beverage derived from grapes while the second term, strong drink or liquor, refers to an intoxicating beverage that is derived from grain like barley or corn. You can fill in the blanks. Now I could teach a historical seminar up here on what alcohol consumption looked like in this era and parts per million and that sort of thing. I could wax poetic if I'd like about how Christians ought to think about alcohol consumption and developing a biblical ethic about such matters. But I think that would actually take us too far from the point of our text and the point of the angel's announcement to Zechariah here, which is that the forerunner to the Messiah, John the Baptist, would be one who abstained from any sort of intoxicating drink regardless of the material from which it was made, and his abstaining from intoxicating drink, as we're going to see in a moment as we look at the next feature of the forerunner, was mentioned here to really highlight something specific about him, which is that rather than filling himself with wine or liquor or strong drink, he instead would be filled with the Holy Spirit, which sounds a lot like what the Apostle Paul would write many years later in Ephesians 5:18, where he says, “Do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Holy Spirit.”

One more item, though, before we turn to our next feature of the forerunner and that is this, and it needs to be worked through a little bit here. Would this forerunner to the Messiah be a Nazirite? You're thinking, “A what, what is such a thing?” That question arises, especially for the Bible scholars in the room, because the language you'll recognize here in Luke 1:15 where it says, “he will not drink any wine or strong drink,” it appears to be taken from, and appears to be quoting, Numbers 6:3. And in Numbers 6:3 one aspect of what it means to be a Nazirite is that such a person “shall abstain as a Nazirite from wine and strong drink.”

Now a bit of a refresher on some Old Testament history. What was a Nazirite, who were the Nazirites, and how does that tie into what we see here? Well, to put it simply, in the days of Moses and Aaron (we saw this a couple weeks ago actually) to become a priest was hereditary, it was a matter of lineage, it was a matter of the type of family you were born into. It's like farmers around here, by and large I am told, you are born into it, right? Same thing with the Levites and the priests back in the day. And in ancient Israel the Levites, meaning those who were of the tribe of Levi, were the priests. And getting more specific, the Levitical priests came from the line of Aaron who himself was from the tribe of Levi. And what this meant, practically speaking, is that it wasn't like a person who wasn't a Levite could simply apply to be a priest. He couldn't say, you know I'm just sort of feeling a call to be a priest, I'm going to go with that career option. It didn't work that way. No, priests came from a certain bloodline.

Now while the priesthood was restricted to those who were of the tribe of Levi or of the sons of Aaron, that doesn't mean there weren't ways for devout worshipers in this era to specially consecrate and devote themselves in service to God. There were, and one of the ways that a person could do so was by becoming a Nazirite. In these times a person could become a Nazirite, whether a man or a woman, by making a public vow. And what the person who made the Nazirite vow would be doing was communicating that they were completely devoting themselves and consecrating themselves in service to God. And it would be this devotion and this consecration which was marked by certain external behaviors they engaged in or didn't engage in, like abstaining from intoxicating drink, not cutting their hair and avoiding contact with the dead.

So what about John the Baptist, the forerunner to Jesus' arrival here on earth. Was he or was he not a Nazirite? Does the angel's apparent reference here in Luke 1:15 to Numbers 6 compel the conclusion that the forerunner would be a Nazirite? I don't think it does. Rather, all that is recorded here, if we take the plain text for what is being described here, is that this forerunner who we now know is John the Baptist would be a man who refrained from partaking of any wine or strong drink, that's it. But the fact that he would forgo alcohol does not lead to the conclusion that he was a Nazirite in any other way, like anybody in this room who chose to abstain would be a Nazirite. No, you choose to abstain, especially when here there is no mention of any other aspect of the Nazirite vow. There is no mention of a prohibition on cutting his hair, there is no mention of his avoiding contact with the dead.

It's just a decision that he made to separate himself, to consecrate himself, by not drinking alcohol. The focus here is not on John being a Nazirite, the focus here rather is on John being an ascetic, meaning his voluntary life of self-deprivation, in this case, his willingness to deprive himself of wine or strong drink to set himself apart for service to the Lord. This would be very similar to the Levitical priests of Leviticus 10:9 where it says, “Do not drink wine or strong drink, neither you nor your sons with you, when you come into the tent of meeting.” And yes, this would be similar to the Nazirites and the Nazirite vow to not partake of wine or strong drink, but again the point being made by this angel was not even about the wine or the strong drink, it was about the consecration unto Yahweh, this forerunner would be specially devoted and consecrated unto the Lord, and one of the ways he would do so and demonstrate it would be by his abstaining.

That takes us through five features of the forerunner. Next we come to number six which is that he would be, get this, “A Prenatal Phenomenon,” I gotta keep the “Ps” going, “A Prenatal Phenomenon.” Look at the next part of verse 15, it says, “And he will be filled with the Holy Spirit while yet in his mother's womb.” Now at the outset, just like I mentioned earlier that joy is a prevalent theme in Luke's Gospel, it is also true that the ministry of the Holy Spirit is on display in the Gospel of Luke. It is very clear as you read through the Gospel of Luke as a whole, that the ministry of the Holy Spirit was important and was significant to Luke and he wanted to highlight it as he wrote his Gospel account. And this reference, by the way, in verse 15 is the very first reference to the Holy Spirit, of many mentions of the Holy Spirit in Luke's Gospel. And this first mention of the Spirit is fascinating and for a few reasons.

First, as we've just seen, the forerunner would abstain from wine and from strong drink, but instead, and here is the contrast, he would “be filled with the Holy Spirit while yet in his mother's womb.” That sort of foreshadows what again we'll see in Ephesians 5 with Paul saying in Ephesians 5:18, “Do not get drunk with wine for that is dissipation, but instead be filled with the Spirit.” In other words, in this context, Luke 1:15, what is being stressed here is that this forerunner would not derive his strength or his inspiration from earthly means, he wouldn't need a grape from the vine, he wouldn't need grain from the ground, to sustain him. Instead he would be strengthened and draw his strength from the Holy Spirit.

Here is another thing that's revealed here in this part of verse 15, the way in which the Holy Spirit would be involved in the forerunner's life. See, when we read Old Testament narrative, the words of the old kings and accounts of the old prophets, we do learn that the Holy Spirit was active in the lives of those prophets and in those kings. But when we read in the Old Testament it's usually some reference to the Spirit of God descending upon a prophet or a king, or rushing upon a prophet or a king as He temporarily fit them for some task or work or service, but then he departs again. That's the account of King Saul in I Samuel 10:10 where it says, “the Spirit of God came upon him mightily.” Or we think of the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 61:1 where Isaiah says, “The Spirit of Lord Yahweh is upon me.” Or Ezekiel in Ezekiel 11:5 says, “Then the Spirit of Yahweh fell upon me.” But here in Luke 1:15 the angel told Zechariah that his son, the forerunner to the Messiah, would be… it's a different idea there, “filled with the Holy Spirit.” That's different, the idea here is that the forerunner would be in this regular state of being controlled by the Spirit, in this continuous state of being empowered and directed by the Spirit. What is being described by the angel here is that there would be this intensification of the way the Spirit had been present among the Old Testament prophets now in the days of John and, of course, Jesus. There would be this escalation of God's work through the Spirit in the days of the forerunner.

Here is another observation about this section of the angel's announcement, the angel's words here, and this is where we get “A Prenatal Phenomenon,” is that the forerunner would “be filled with the Spirit while yet in his mother's womb,” it says. What in the world does that mean? Does this mean that the forerunner would somehow be saved or converted immediately upon conception and prior to birth? Is this referring to some sort of prenatal sanctification phase that the forerunner would be undergoing? No, and no. Instead what this is describing is that the forerunner would be controlled by the Holy Spirit even before his birth, even causing him, as we'll see down the page in Luke 1:44, even causing him to leap in his mother's womb when Elizabeth, his mother, was there with Mary, the mother of Jesus. The point is God's Spirit would be in him and with him in a special way, in a unique way, in a way that is unique from our experiences when we were in our mother's wombs. It would be much different. By the way there are hints of what is alluded to here in Luke 1:15 back in Jeremiah 1:5. You always see the invites to the ladies' baby showers and they start with the words in Jeremiah 1:5, “Before I formed you in the innermost parts I knew you.” They usually leave out the next part, “and before you came out from the womb I set you apart, I have given you as a prophet to the nations.” That's usually not on the invite, but even then the comparison to Jeremiah breaks down because this forerunner mentioned here in Luke 1:15 and announced to Zechariah, would have a special mission, a unique mission, a once-and-forever mission to pave the way for the arrival of the Messiah.

We've worked our way through six of the features of the forerunner. If you're taking notes I'll review those real briefly. Again we have “A Prayer Answered,” “A Portrayal of Mercy,” “A Provider of Joy,” “A Picture of Greatness,” “A Proper Ascetic” and “A Prenatal Phenomenon.” Now we come upon the seventh feature as we turn to verse 16. The seventh feature is that he would be, here is our seventh heading, “A Proclaimer of Repentance,” “A Proclaimer of Repentance.” Look at verse 16, it says, “And he will turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God.” At the heart of that seventh feature of the forerunner is that verb “turn,” “epistepho” in Greek. The Messiah's forerunner, John the Baptist, would be instrumental in pointing the people of Israel back to their God and preparing them to meet their promised Messiah. He would be from a line of priests, but he would be a prophet, a mouthpiece for the living God, the God who had set His love upon Israel and made promises to Israel and who expected obedience and allegiance from Israel, but who had since been shunned and rejected by Israel.

By this time in their history the people in Israel were a people who honored Yahweh with their lips but their hearts, we know, were far from Him. And so God was going to send this forerunner into the world who would be used by God, verse 16, to “turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God.” And we know, by the way, that this is exactly what happened, this is exactly what is recorded of John the Baptist's ministry as the Gospel accounts do record that various groups of Israelites did, in fact, turn to the Lord through his ministry. In fact, go with me over to Matthew 3, if you would, where we see the impact of John's ministry recorded this way and we see the fulfillment of what is said in Luke 1:16. Matthew 3 starting in verse 4, Matthew 3:4 says, “Now John himself had a garment of camel's hair and a leather belt around his waist; and his food was locusts and wild honey.” Usually we stop there and just kind of think about what that scene must have looked like, but read on, “Then Jerusalem was going out to him, and all Judea, and all the district around the Jordan; and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River, as they confessed their sins.” Something very similar is said over in Mark 1:4-5, it says, “John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And all the region of Judea was going out to him, and all the people of Jerusalem; and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins.” Those passages reflecting John the Baptist's ministry are in fulfillment of what we see here in Luke 1:16 where it says, “And he will turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God.”

And here is a point I really don't want us to miss here, before we get ready to move on. We might be tempted as we read these Gospel accounts and, specifically here, as we read of John the Baptist and the birth, and Zechariah and Elizabeth and their grief over not having a child, and we might be tempted to think this whole narrative is about this couple and their childlessness and then their joy in eventually being blessed with a son. But the much larger and much grander storyline that's being told here is that of God's calling His people Israel to repent and to return to their God. This was a call that God was issuing and would carry out through His chosen messenger, the forerunner John the Baptist. Verse 16, he would be the one who would “turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God.”

With that we come to our eighth and final feature of the forerunner, which is that he would be, number eight, “A Prophetic Witness,” “A Prophetic Witness.” Look at verse 17, our final verse for today and the culminating words of the angel as he spoke to Zechariah in the Holy Place. The angel said, “And he will go 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, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” Now right away there is something very important to highlight here. Note how the angel begins this thought, he says, “And he,” that's the forerunner, “will go before” capital H, “Him.” Now who is the Him there? It's actually pretty clear when you read the whole section entirely as a whole. Him, which is capitalized, is referring back to verse 16, “the Lord their God,” he would go before Him. We think of Him, and we think he's going before Jesus, he's the forerunner.

Well, how is Jesus described up in verse 16? The Lord their God, He is described as both Lord and God. What does that mean? That the One who Zechariah's son, John, would go before, Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, is not only the Lord as in ‘Lord of all’ and ‘Lord of our lives,’ He is God. He is “the Lord their God.” What we have in this passage, in other words, is an often overlooked indication of the deity of Christ, that Jesus would not only be a great man who would follow John, that's why John would say in John 1:27 that he is not worthy to untie the strap of His sandal, he's revealing that this One who would follow John would be the God/Man, God veiled in flesh, incarnate deity. All that to say when you are witnessing to somebody who denies the deity of Christ, whether it's a Jehovah's Witness or somebody that has ever even contemplated that Jesus is God, this is a passage you can take them to, especially for somebody who likes to see the development of historical narrative. Take them through the account of John the Baptist and take them through the fact that John the Baptist preceded Jesus of Nazareth and take them to the way that the grammar works out here is that this Jesus, the One who would come, the One who John came before was not only Lord, but God.

Well, next we see that this One who would go before Him, the forerunner who would precede the Christ, the God/Man, would do so, verse 17, “in the spirit and power of Elijah.” Now note that he wouldn't be Elijah reincarnated or Elijah resurrected. He wouldn't literally be Elijah. In fact, in John 1:21 there is this account where John the Baptist is asked the question, “Are you Elijah?” And he answers the question truthfully and directly by saying, “I am not.” He would rather, as we see here in Luke 1:17, minister to Israel in “the spirit and power of Elijah.” And what did Elijah do? Do you guys recall what Elijah did, what his ministry looked like? Did he have some spirit behind what he proclaimed and some power behind what he proclaimed? Absolutely. I'll give you some of the highlights. It was Elijah who confronted King Ahab over his wicked wife Jezebel and her worship of false deities. It was Elijah who stood up to the 400 prophets of Baal and the 450 prophets of Asherah in that infamous showdown on Mt. Carmel.

Well, Zechariah's son, the forerunner here to the coming Messiah, would be like Elijah in that he would be known for his bold, unwavering stance and stand for truth. Again, this would be the one, John would be, the forerunner, who would tell King Herod that it was not lawful to take the wife of his brother, Philip, in Matthew 14. It would be this forerunner who would tell the Pharisees and the Sadducees, the religious leaders of the day that they were a brood of vipers. And it was this forerunner who would proclaim a message unashamedly of repentance to the wayward people of Israel. The forerunner, in other words, mentioned to Zechariah here in verse 17, would be thoroughly Elijah-like in his approach. He would come in the spirit of Elijah, meaning through his righteousness and fearlessness. And he would come in the power of Elijah, which doesn't mean miracles because John 10:41 says that John did no signs, but instead it would be about his witness and his influence. So the forerunner, the angel said, would “go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah.”

And then the angel lays out what these Elijah-like workings of the forerunner's ministry, what they would all look like, we see that in the words that follow in verse 17. There really are three categories here of what his Elijah-like ministry would look like. First, he would “turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children.” Second, he would turn the “disobedient to the attitude of the righteous.” And then third, it would all be ultimately “to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” Let's take those one by one and then we'll wrap up our time together this morning.

First, the forerunner would, verse 17, “turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children.” There has been a lot of debate over the years as to what that means, turning the hearts of the fathers back to the children. Some have concluded that this is referring to the fact that with the forerunner's coming, with John the Baptist's coming, familial strife would be ended and disunity among families would be remedied and fractured homes would be healed. That's an interesting interpretation, to say the least, especially when we consider that the One who John the Baptist, the forerunner, preceded was Jesus. And Jesus says of His own ministry in Luke 12 [verse 51-53], “Do you think that I came to grant peace on earth? I tell you, no, but rather division; for from now on five members in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three. They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.” In other words, it would be quite odd for John the Baptist and his ministry to be reconciling families only for Jesus to say I'm actually going to be a dividing line in families.

Others have taken the position that this is a reference to the long deceased patriarchs of Israel, the ancestors of John's generation who previously had been looking upon their descendants with displeasure but now with John the Baptist's arrival they would be looking on the Israel of Zechariah's day and John's day and Jesus' day with favor. In other words, they had somehow changed their mind in glory about how they viewed the people of Israel at this time. There is no biblical exegetical reason to take that view, there is nothing that would support a changing of the mind in Abraham's bosom, let's say. I think it's interesting, but I think it's an all too mystical, and ultimately a biblically unsupported take.

The best option is seeing the angel's words here in verse 17 about this promised forerunner as saying that he would be yet again Elijah-like as he paved the way for the Messiah. And the best reason for this option to say this is just another way of saying he would be Elijah-like, is to go over to the book of Malachi. The last two verses of the Old Testament are in Malachi 4:5-6. Turn with me over to Malachi 4:5-6, and note if you see something similar here to what we see in our passage, Luke 1:17. Malachi 4:5 says, “Behold, I am going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and awesome day of Yahweh.” And then look at these words, “And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children.” By telling Zechariah, back in Luke 1:17, that his son the forerunner was going to turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children, this angel was clearly drawing on those final words from Malachi and communicating to Zechariah that his son as the forerunner was going to fulfill this prophecy as he came “in the spirit and power of Elijah.”

Next the angel, back to Luke 1, told Zechariah in the next section here that his son the forerunner would “turn… the disobedient to the attitude of the righteous.” The disobedient here, of course, would be the people of Israel, the unrepentant and stiff-necked Israelites of Zechariah's day. Through the forerunner's ministry, through the forerunner's message, many of these disobedient ones would now turn from their iniquity and turn to the Lord. Not all of them, we know there was opposition, but many would turn. And that takes us back to what I read earlier from Matthew 3:4-5, where it says “Jerusalem was going out to him,” that's John the Baptist, “and all of Judea, and all the district around the Jordan; and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River, as they confessed their sins.” That's in fulfillment of what we see here in Luke 1:17.

And then at the very end of verse 17 the angel told Zechariah that his forerunner would “make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” For some that might call to mind Isaiah 40:3 where it says, “A voice is calling, “Prepare the way for Yahweh in the wilderness.” But what this is really pointing to is another clear allusion to Malachi. Look at Malachi 3:1 which says, and this is God Himself speaking, He says, “Behold, I am going to send My messenger, and he will prepare the way before Me.” Did you catch that language there? “He will prepare the way before Me.” That is awfully close to what the angel said to Zechariah of his son the forerunner when he said of the forerunner that he would make a people ready, prepared for the Lord. So is one the fulfillment of the other? Would this forerunner that is spoken of here in Luke 1 be the fulfillment of Malachi's prophecy, of this one, this messenger, who would prepare the way? Absolutely, this is absolutely and certainly in fulfillment of that prophecy. And how can I say that with such confidence? How can I use the ‘absolutely’ and ‘certainly’ words? Well, I can say that because that's what Jesus said. Turn with me, as we close, to Matthew 11 starting in verse 7, Matthew 11:7 says, “Now as these men were going away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds about John,” that's our forerunner, “What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind? But what did you go out to see? A man dressed in soft clothing? Behold, those who wear soft clothing are in king's palaces! But what did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and one who is more than a prophet. This is the one about whom it is written, ‘Behold, I send My messenger ahead of You, who will prepare Your way before You.” That's Malachi 3:1. Jesus confirms here that John as recorded in Luke 1:17 is the fulfillment of what we saw in Malachi 3:1, he was the messenger ahead of the Messiah.

That's a fitting place for us to close this morning, with the words of Jesus who there affirmed that the one who came before Him, the forerunner, would not only be as we have seen this morning “A Prayer Answered,” “A Portrayal of Mercy,” “A Provider of Joy” “A Picture of Greatness,” “A Proper Ascetic,” “A Prenatal Phenomenon,” “A Proclaimer of Repentance,” but also “A Prophetic Witness,” one who would make ready a people prepared for the Lord. This morning we have been looking entirely and exclusively at what the angel said to Zechariah, next week Zechariah speaks up. I'm looking forward to that time together.

Let's pray. Lord, thank You for this time in Your Word. Thank You for this reminder even from this account of this angel visiting Zechariah in the Holy Place in preparation for the coming of the Messiah, that all of this was put together perfectly according to Your sovereign hand and Your sovereign will. Thank You that You have laid out a perfect plan by which You would reveal mankind's hope for salvation through Christ that goes back before the foundation of the world in every single detail, that we have already seen in the first seventeen verses of Luke is an important and key part of that plan. God, I know that we are going through many different details of the Holy Place and Zechariah and Elizabeth and barrenness and so many things and so many details in our study, but I do pray that we wouldn't lose sight of who You are, what You have done, what You have purposed through Christ, where this is all pointing ultimately in the study of Luke's Gospel. And that through our study as we who have believed upon this Christ, we'd be encouraged in our faith, strengthened for what You have for us. And God, I do pray for anyone here who has not put their faith in Christ or maybe just playing church or checking in or coming because someone told them to come, that they would understand that it is not merely studying the Bible and not merely going to church, by which a person is saved, but rather by trusting in what Jesus Christ did on the cross for them 2000 years ago. God, I pray if there is anyone here who is having those thoughts right now that they would be honest with themselves and come to the end of themselves and put their faith in Jesus Christ and be saved. Thank You for this day, thank You for this text. May You be glorified in our lives this week. In Jesus name, amen.