when God first called him, but his wife, she didn't get pregnant. She didn't get pregnant. Years pass, years pass, years pass. She's still not having a son, and yet God has said, in thy seed shall all the nations be blessed. But he has no seed. But he believed God. Strong in faith. Knowing that what God had promised he was able to perform.

What God has promised you, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Believe. Believe in Christ. He's able. You're not able. I'm not able. The church is not able, but he's able.

Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of death. to see if a man could be saved, a woman could be saved, be made righteous in the sight of God by their works, then that person would have whereof to boast, but not before God. Scripture very clear, not before God. Then the reward would be of debt. You earned it. You deserve it. You merit salvation. Oh, but eternal life, is not earned, it's a gift. It's a gift. Yes. Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt, but to him that worketh not, but believeth on him, believeth on him, the object of faith that justifies the ungodly. You know that's a very important phrase there that justifies the ungodly. A person says, well, I've got to clean up my life. I've got to make some changes. No, you don't. What you need to do is believe. Trust Christ. He justifies the ungodly. And that's what we all are until we're made righteous, declared righteous, justified. by the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ.

Well, that's the third thing we read. Both parents were righteous before the Lord. The fourth thing is, I'm going to say they took the word of God seriously. Verse number six, Zacharias and Elizabeth, they took the word of God serious. They would order their steps They would live according to the word that God has given us. And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord, blameless.

Now, I want you to know blameless doesn't mean sinless. And we're going to see, read on down in the chapter here, Zacharias was guilty of unbelief. Is unbelief a sin? A very, very wicked sin. Not to believe God is to call God a liar. Yeah. They weren't sinless. They were blameless, the scripture says. They took the word of God seriously. And I'm sure if you'd ask Zacharias or Elizabeth, what about yourself? What do you think about yourself? They would both confess their failures, just like you and I do every day. We're not sinless. We're just righteous before God, but we still live in a body. And when God created that new spirit within us, within you, if he has, in the new birth, he didn't eradicate that old nature, the flesh, and it's still there. And there's that struggle that's always ongoing in a believer's life.

You know, I've got down here in my notes, when you consider the words of the Savior as they're recorded in the Song of Solomon, it's a picture, right, of the heavenly bridegroom, Christ, speaking and dealing with his bride, which is a church, and what he says about her. It's just amazing. That's all you can say. Thou art all fair. That's what he says about you and me, about every child of God. Thou art all fair, my love. And oh no, oh yes, we know about his love, don't we? He loved us so much that he gave himself for us. Thou art all fair, my love. And then he kind of, you drive a nail through a board and then we used to turn the board over and turn the nail over, you know, that kind of made it secure. Well, the Lord, he drives his nail through the board, thou art all fair, my love, and then turn it over. There's no spot in thee. No spot in thee.

And before God Almighty, every child of God dressed in the perfect righteousness, that garment of salvation that he gave to everyone who believes in him. There's no spot in thee. Thou art accepted in the beloved.

The last thing, the fifth thing I wanted to point out about this couple, they prayed. Verse 13, the angel told Zacharias, fear not, Zacharias, for thy prayer is heard. What prayer? What prayer? Well, I'm sure that they had prayed for children. You know, Elizabeth, when she speaks down further in the chapter, she speaks about God taking away her reproach. Today we can't really understand what a reproach it was among the Israelites for a woman, a married woman, not to have a child. But they prayed for a child.

But was that the prayer? Was it the prayer for a son or was it the prayer that the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, that he might soon come into the world. That's who they believed in. That's who they were expecting. That's who they were looking to. Was it a prayer that he might soon come? And here's a lesson about prayer. If you would like to turn with me back to chapter 37 of Ezekiel.

You know, sometimes people say, well, Why pray if God's already promised? He's given us a promise. No need in praying. Well, let me just say this to answer that question. First of all, why? Because he said pray. That's enough, isn't it? Man ought always to pray and not to faint. But listen, these promises of things that are going to take place That's not to discourage us in prayer, but it is rather to encourage us, to ask, to ask. For if we ask anything according to His will, He heareth us, and we have that which we ask. This is brought out to us here in this chapter of Ezekiel.

Let's read a few verses here. Verse 24, beginning with verse 24. And notice what God here says he's going to do. And David, my servant, shall be king over them. Now, of course, that's not speaking of King David, the father of Solomon. That's a spiritual reference to Christ, who is the king of kings. They all shall have one shepherd, Notice these shalls and wills. All shall have one shepherd. They shall also walk in my judgments and observe my statutes and do them. And they shall dwell in the land that I have given unto Jacob my servant, wherein your fathers have dwelt. And they shall dwell therein. And they and their children and their children's children forever. And my servant David shall be their prince forever.

And verse 26, moreover, I will make a covenant of peace with them. That's the everlasting covenant. And yet God here tells them that for these things that he has promised, he would be inquired of. In other words, men would pray for these things that are promised. That's our Lord in Matthew chapter 6. You say, well, my father already knows what I have need of. He does. He knows you need food, you need clothes, you need shelter, you need a job. He knows these things, yes. He knows all things. But yet, we're told to ask him for these very things that we know he knows.

Well, let me go on hurriedly, hurriedly to my second point. Someone told me earlier, said, well, if we don't have two services on Sunday, just preach two hours. I'm not going to do that, but God willing, But second, I want to point out, I mentioned five things that we have recorded there about Zacharias and Elizabeth. Now I want to look at five things about their son that is mentioned here.

First of all, in verse 13, he would be named John. Now you know from the scriptures that many times names reveal certain truths about the person. This name John, it indicated that God would bless him and make him a blessing. For the name John means the grace and favor of God. The grace and favor of God. You know Zacharias became dumb that day because he didn't believe the word of the angel. And so until the day of the birth and when they came to name the baby, Elizabeth said, we're gonna call him John. And her kinfolk, they balked at that, oh no. No one in our family's ever been named John before. But I like what we read down, if you look down to verse 63, what they made signs that somehow communicated with Zacharias, and he asked for a writing tablet. Luke 1, verse 63, and wrote saying, his name is John. Like, it is a, maybe we'll name him John, or perhaps we'll name him John. No, he said, his name is John. Angel named him before he was born. Yes.

The second thing, if you look in verse 14, the angel told Zacharias that at his birth would cause joy and gladness. Thou shalt have joy. Zacharias, you shall have joy and gladness. When a child is born, only God knows if that child will be a blessing, will bring joy or not. I heard a man one time make this statement. He had a son named John. I guess he had named his son John. But he said, I don't know. His son was small. I don't know if he'll grow up to be a John Calvin or John Dillinger. And that's true when a baby is born. Grace, grace doesn't pass through the blood, does it? Many a father In the scripture, for instance, Samuel was a man of God, served God, but he had two wicked sons, didn't he? Hophni and Phinehas, I believe were their names, yeah. No, but this son, John, yeah, Zacharias, he's going to be for you a cause of great joy and gladness.

The third thing, he would be great in the sight of the Lord. Notice that in verse 15. For he shall be great in the sight of the Lord. What a lesson here we have about this world that you and I are not to love. The child of God is not to love the world. John tells us in 1 John, love not the world, neither the things in the world. The angel told Zacharias, now this son shall be great in the sight of the Lord, but he wasn't great in the sight of the world. The world said, he's got a devil. He's got a devil. That's what the world said about him. Yeah.

He would be a Nazirite. We read that when we see that he would not drink any wine. What was a Nazirite? It was a vow in the Old Testament law, actually, that a person was separated and especially devoted unto the Lord. And it could be for a month, a vow could be for a year, it could be for life. We know in the Old Testament that there were several who was Nazarites for life. Like Samson, he was a Nazarite. And Samuel, I mentioned him, he was a Nazarite. And to be a Nazarite, they would drink no wine, they wouldn't even eat grapes. because the wine came from the grapes. Sometimes even the mother, while she was carrying the baby, she could not drink wine or eat grapes. They let their hair grow. They didn't cut their hair. The men didn't with this vow. Now, the Lord Jesus Christ, you know, when he died, he nailed the handwriting of ordinances which were against us to his cross. He did away with all those ceremonies, that's true. But all believers, all of us here this morning as God's children, we should be like the Nazarites in the sense we should be separate. We're in the world, but we're not to be of the world. And not only separate, but devoted. They were devoted to God. And every child of God, we know, is to be devoted to God and his work.

A fifth thing we read, he would go before the Lord in the spirit and power of Elias, verse 17. If you were, and I know you've done this, you've read through 1st and 2nd Kings, you know about Elias, but notice he would be compared to Elias, Elijah, and the power, it says, in spirit of Elijah. Elijah He spoke before kings, King Ahab and his wicked wife Jezebel. And he didn't back down either. John the Baptist, he prophesied before wicked King Herod. And we know he was in prison for telling him, it's not lawful for you to have your brother's wife. That's against God's law. You've sinned. Nobody likes to hear that. And men in authority, kings, people high up in the world, they sure don't like to be rebuked. John the Baptist rebuked him. What happened? Put him in prison. What happened? Got his head cut off.

He would be like Elijah. And I noticed something else. When Elijah, at one time, he said, I only am left. He told the Lord that. We have a term we call the Elijah syndrome, I believe. You know, sometimes we get to think we're the only ones. We're the only church. I'm the only believer. You know, he said, Elijah got like that. Lord, there's none but me. I'm the only one. But you know, the day that he was taken up to heaven in a chariot of fire, over his lifetime, the schools of the prophets had been established over which he saw. And there was 50 that came out from the school in Bethel. There was 50 that came out from the school in Jericho. There was 50 that came out from Jordan. And yes, John the Baptist, it is foretold that many Many of the children of Israel shall turn to the Lord their God. He was in the spirit and power of Elijah.

Now, my last point, the most beautiful part, the most beautiful part of the angel's message to Zacharias is the promise of the birth of the Christ. the birth of the Lord Jesus, the long-promised Redeemer, would soon appear. The angel, I want you to notice, the angel spoke of the Savior using these three terms, Lord, God, and Him. You see that in verses 16 and 17. Many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord, their God, and he shall go before him. Lord, God, and him.

Here's a promise from Isaiah in which we find both of these terms. This is Isaiah 25 and verse 9. And it shall be said in that day, lo, this is our God. That's who John the Baptist would go before, God, in that day. It would be said, lo, this is our God. We have waited for him. Yeah, had waited years. Years waiting after the promise was first given. and he will save us. This is the Lord. We have waited for him. We will be glad and rejoice in his salvation. So we see those two titles, God and Lord in that promise and that him, he shall go before him. What is him? What is the word him? It is a personal pronoun. And doesn't that remind us of his incarnation? Personal, the God who is a spirit, the God who cannot be seen with the naked eye, that he shall be made manifest, him. He shall go before him. The word was made flesh and dwelt among us, And we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. When Zacharias came out of the temple that day, the people were disappointed. They had expected to hear that blessing that the priest would put upon the people when he came from burning the incense. And that blessing was given, God gave, to the priests the blessing they were to put upon the people. It's a beautiful blessing. Numbers, the Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord make his face shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee. The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace. Bless, gracious, and peace.

But all three of those things are found in Jesus Christ. No, he couldn't pronounce the blessing, but the one who was promised to come. In him, God's people are blessed with all spiritual blessings. That's what it says in Ephesians 1. You, me, every child of God. You've been blessed with all spiritual blessings in Christ before the foundation of the world.

And then grace. Where will we find grace? And that's what we need. That's what every sinner needs. For by grace, you say, where will we find grace, unmerited favor? In Christ. In Him. And where will we find peace in Christ? In fact, the scripture says in Ephesians, he is our peace. There's no peace for any man or woman or girl apart from Jesus Christ, no peace with God. Because you say he made peace by the blood of his cross.

May the Lord bless His word to all of us here this morning.