Let us turn this morning to Luke
chapter 1. I'll begin in verse 57. Luke chapter 1 verse 57. Now Elizabeth's full time came
that she should be delivered and she brought forth her son
and her neighbors and her cousins heard how the Lord had showed
great mercy upon her and they rejoiced with her. And it came
to pass that on the eighth day they came to circumcise the child,
and they called him Zacharias after the name of his father. And his mother answered and said,
not so, but he shall be called John. And they said unto her,
there is none of thy kindred that is called by this name.
And they made signs to his father. he would have him called, and
he asked for a writing table or tablet and wrote saying, his
name is John. And they marveled all, and his
mouth was opened immediately, and his tongue loosed, and he
spake and praised God. And fear came on all that dwelt
round about them, and all these sayings were noised abroad throughout
all the hill country of Judea. And all they that heard them
laid them up in their hearts, saying, What manner of child
shall this be? And the hand of the Lord was
with him. And his father Zacharias was
filled with the Holy Ghost, and prophesied, saying, Blessed be
the Lord God of Israel, for he hath visited and redeemed his
people, and hath raised up in horn of salvation for us in the
house of his servant David. And he spake, as he spake by
the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world
began, that we should be saved from our enemies and from the
hand of all that hate us. to perform the mercy promised
to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, the oath which
he swore to our father Abraham that he would grant unto us that
we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve
him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him
all the days of our life. And thou, child, shalt be called
the prophet of the highest, for thou shalt go before the face
of the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation
unto his people by the remission of their sins, through the tender
mercy of our God, whereby the day spring from on high hath
visited us, to give light to them that sit in darkness and
in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.
And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, and was in
the deserts till the day of his showing unto Israel. Two weeks ago, we looked at the
angel Gabriel's announcement to this man Zacharias, that he
and his wife Elizabeth would have a son. Today, we're looking
at verses which tell of the fulfillment of that announcement. And we
saw how that the unbelief of Zacharias resulted in him losing
the ability to hear or to speak. So for at least nine months,
for at least nine months, Zacharias had lived in a world of silence. Think about that. For nine months,
silence. never hearing anything, and not
being able to speak, to communicate by speaking. We can only imagine
the good, the good that came out of that affliction. The psalmist
wrote, it is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I
might learn thy statutes. the good that Zacharias must
have derived by this affliction, what he learned about God's word
and learning from God's word about God himself. And the first
thing, this is impressive to me, the first thing that we see
that Zacharias did when God opened his mouth was He spake and praised
God. You see that in verse 64? Just as soon, his mouth was opened
immediately, and his tongue loosed, and he spake and praised God. Wouldn't it be wonderful if our
tongues were used to praise God? If we dedicated our tongues not
to murmuring, not to complaining, but to praising God. He's always
worthy of our praise, we know that. Now this morning I want
to make two observations and then we will look at the prophecy
of Zacharias, which is also called a song. The first I want us to
notice that Elizabeth's family and friends rejoiced with her,
in verse 58. At the birth of John the Baptist,
the scripture says, and her neighbors and her cousins heard how the
Lord had showed great mercy upon her, and they rejoiced with her. As I read that, I thought to
myself, in a world, in a world in which we live, where sin has
brought so much sorrow, We should learn to rejoice with
those who rejoice when there are opportunities, when there
are things that should cause us joy. You know, the Apostle
Paul later, in Romans 12 and verse 15, writing to believers,
to Christians, to those of us here this morning, he said, rejoice
with them that rejoice. and weep with them that weep. We have our Lord's example of
rejoicing with those who rejoice and weeping with those who weep. At the marriage in Cana of Galilee,
where he turned the water into wine, we know that marriage,
like the birth of a child, is a time of great joy. And he rejoiced,
he was there at that time of rejoicing. And then we see him
in John chapter 11 at the graveside of Lazarus with his two sisters,
distraught, no doubt, with grief, how the Lord Jesus Christ wept. Rejoice with those who rejoice
and weep with those that weep. Know the gospel of the Lord Jesus
Christ. The kingdom of God is not meat
and drink, the Apostle Paul said, but it is righteousness and peace
and joy in the Holy Ghost. We should rejoice. Paul exhorted
the believers. That tells me that in that letter
to Philippians, the church at Philippi, he said that he wrote
that two times, rejoice. And again, I say rejoice. That
just intimates to me that maybe as believers, we're not given
to rejoicing like we should be. As God's children, rejoicing
in what He's done for us and what He's doing for us and all
of His promises, all of His goodness and everything that He has done
for us. We always have so much in which
rather we should rejoice. Rejoice, knowing that all things
work together for good to those who love God, to them who are
the called according to his purpose. There's a proverb which says
a man that hath friends must show himself friendly. Her neighbors,
her cousins, they came together to rejoice with her. And you
notice what they were rejoicing in is that the Lord, look there
in verse 58, and her neighbors and her cousins heard how the
Lord had showed great mercy unto her. Great mercy and giving her
a child. Great mercy and delivering her
of this child. Great mercy. God is a God of
mercy, isn't He? Great mercy. The scripture says
that He delighteth in mercy. That judgment is a strange work
unto God. Oh, thank God for His mercy today. We'll see more of that in just
a moment. But a second observation is the sureness of God's Word. When we read the Word of God,
are we sure that whatever God tells us here in His book, in
the Word of God, this is the truth and this is going to be
accomplished. Whatever He tells us. If He says,
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved, you
believe on Christ, rejoice. You're saved. You have His Word. You have His Word. Now we see
the sureness of the word of God in this passage of scripture.
If you look back to verses 13 and 14, what the angel told Zacharias
that day, he told him three things that were going to happen in
verses 13 and 14. But the angel said unto him,
fear not Zacharias. For thy prayer is heard, and
thy wife Elizabeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call
his name John, and thou shalt have great joy and gladness,
and many shall rejoice at his birth. Three things. Zacharias,
you and Elizabeth are going to have a son. He's going to be
named John. and many are going to rejoice
at his birth. And isn't that exactly what we
read here today in this passage? You know, at first, the neighbors,
they thought, well, he should be called Zacharias. He should
take the name of his father. The mother, somehow over the
nine months, either God, we know she was filled with the Holy
Spirit, Elizabeth was, We've skipped over her song, her song
of praise that's recorded here. When Mary came to visit her,
her cousin Mary came to visit her, and she was filled with
the Holy Spirit. But somewhere, somehow over that
nine months, either by the Holy Spirit directly revealing this
unto Elizabeth or Zacharias writing, his name is John, Well, she said,
we're going to call him John. That's what the angel had said.
But the people said, no, no, we're going to call him Zacharias.
You don't have any Ken folk named John. Call him after his father. No, the angel said, he's going
to be called John. That's God speaking right through
the angel. He had God's word. And what a,
what a, uh, example to remind us that The Word of God is like
the author. Now let that sink in. The Word
of God is like its author. Who is the author of the Word
of God? God. God, the Holy Spirit. God doesn't change. God's Word,
the scripture says, is settled forever in heaven. Yes. No word of his shall ever be
untrue, shall ever fall to the ground. When we go through a
spiritual drought, I'm talking to God's children this morning,
and if you've been saved for any length of time, you know
there are times when you go through a spiritual drought and your
heart feels as hard as a stone. You know that your heart should
be tender toward God, but it's just as hard as a stone. You ever have anything like that?
I have. I sure have. When you go through
a spiritual drought, you hang on to God's word. For he has
said, he that believeth on him is not condemned. That's what
the Lord Jesus told Nicodemus, isn't it? He that believeth on
the Son of Man is not condemned. Well, I don't feel safe. Didn't
say anything about feeling. Well, I just don't see any signs.
Didn't say anything about signs. Our Lord Jesus said, he that
believeth on the Son of Man is not condemned. That's God's word. Now, let's look at the prophecy.
The prophecy of Zacharias. And I call, before we begin to
look at the prophecy, I call our attention to two things about
it. First of all, it's inspired. This is an inspired prophecy. You know, back years ago, I was
involved in some things that I realized now that it was just
ignorance. But so-called spiritual church
services, and men would stand up and they would say, thus saith
the Lord. You ever been in a service like
that? Thus saith the Lord. Well, most
of what they said, unless it came from the word of God, and
many times that's what they would say, they'd repeat something
out of the scripture. But if it was just them talking,
speaking, claiming to be prophesying, it proved to be uninspired. You say, how do you know? Because
it did not come to pass. That's how I know. They were
false prophets. And remember this. I was reminded
of this the other night. Remember this about false prophets.
They do say some good things. They really do. Balaam, one of the most well-known
false prophet in the scriptures, he said some of the greatest
things about God that is recorded in the word of God. But he was
still a false prophet. He still died in unbelief. This
prophecy that we're looking at this morning is an inspired prophecy. We know that because we see that
Zacharias was filled with the Holy Ghost. Verse 67, and his father Zacharias
was filled with the Holy Ghost and prophesied saying, So this
prophecy we're looking at is an inspired prophecy. It's not
just somebody off the cuff, you know, just talking out. No, no. This is a man filled
with the Holy Spirit. God opened his mouth and he began
to speak and the word that he spoke was the word of God. And
a second thing I noticed about this prophecy is it was given
in the context of the Old Dispensation. You say, what do you mean? What
do you mean by that? I mean that we look at the scriptures
or at history as containing two dispensations, an Old Dispensation
and a New Dispensation, an Old Testament and a New Testament. And the new dispensation began
when the Lord Jesus Christ died and said, this is my blood of
the New Testament, the new covenant. The new dispensation began when
he upon the cross cried, it's finished. And in the temple there
in Jerusalem, that veil that separated the holy place from
the most holy place was rent from top bottom, and it manifested
that the way into the holiest of all was now manifest. Thus I say this because you notice
he begins his prophecy with an old dispensation blessing. Notice
how he begins, blessed be the Lord God of Israel. That's an
old dispensation blessing. Blessed be the Lord God of Israel.
What is a New Testament blessing? Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in Christ Jesus before the world began. See the difference? Blessed be the God of Israel,
blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now
let's go through the prophecy. There's two parts of it, of course.
The first part concerns the Lord Jesus, beginning with verse 68. Blessed be the Lord God of Israel,
for he hath visited and redeemed his people. The Lord God of Israel,
Lord Jesus Christ was at this time, when Zacharias was speaking,
he was growing in the womb of the Virgin Mary at this particular
time. But you notice his work is spoken
of as being already done. Blessed be the God of Israel,
for he hath visited and redeemed his people. The Bible speaks
of the work of Christ as being a lamb slain from the foundation
of the world. You say, well, what does that
mean? It means that in the purpose of God, the Lord Jesus Christ,
his coming and his dying was purposed from before the foundation
of the world. His coming is not plan B after
plan A failed. You know that. It's always his
purpose. He hath visited. He just visited
here. He didn't come here to stay.
The Lord Jesus Christ came into this world. He visited it. Lived
here about 30, 31, 32 years. He visited and he hath redeemed
his people. And notice how it tells us he
redeemed his people. It doesn't say he redeemed the
whole world. You know, so many people today,
consciously or unconsciously, they think the redemption of
Christ is really not a redemption. A redemption redeems. It does. A redemption redeems. And he redeemed his people. He was given a people from before
the foundation of the world. And he came as their representative,
as their surety. And he redeemed them. And there's
plenty, as the scripture says, there's plenty of redemption
with him. Why? Because he's God. He had
to be God to pay that redemption price. Can you imagine the price
that had to be paid for the redemption of his people? We're not talking
about redeeming a few people. John was given a vision in heaven
and he said the number was so great you couldn't number it.
Now, it's not an infinite number, I realize that. God knows how
many, and He knows each and every one. But let's never think of
it as a small number. He redeemed His people, and the
prophecy speaks of it as though it were already done. And you
and I, we know how He redeemed His people, with His blood. with His blood. Then the second
thing we see is that He is their powerful Savior. Not only He
is the Redeemer of His people, but He is their powerful Savior. Notice in verse 69. and hath
raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant
David." In the scriptures, I'm sure most all of us here know
this, but in the scriptures a horn speaks of power. Animals have
horns by which they push and by which they defend themselves. And the Lord Jesus Christ is
pictured here as a powerful savior. For a man, we have arms. And with our arms, we defend
ourselves. Animals have horns by which they
show their power and overcome their enemies. As Zacharias here speaks of the
Lord Jesus Christ, a horn of a powerful savior. We see this in the greatest picture
of redemption in the Old Testament. When God redeemed Israel out
of Egypt, you remember they were redeemed first with blood. Excuse
me. First with blood, by blood, the
blood upon the doorpost of their houses. But then they came to
the Red Sea and they were redeemed with power, by power. Oh, power. How do you measure the power
of God? You can't. Some of you men, you go to the
gym and you put on those weights and you can press so many pounds
and you can determine your power, right? Not God. Not God. Oh, when they came to that Red
Sea, Pharaoh's army was behind him. They were enclosed. No hope. God just opened up the sea. That's all he did. He just opened
up a sea. You say, you believe that preacher?
I do. I do. And I believe he's not
only a redeeming savior, he's a powerful savior. And he had
to be a powerful savior because as he said later on, the strong
man who we know referred to Satan, he keeps his house, house in
peace. And that's where all of us came
into this world under the tyranny and power of Satan. We couldn't
get ourselves out. We couldn't deliver ourselves,
even if we had wanted to. But oh, one more powerful overcame
him. And that he did at the cross,
didn't he? When he dealt him a death blow, that he might release
his people, his chosen people. The third thing we see has been
the subject of all the prophets from the beginning of the world. Christ is the message of the
Bible, isn't he? This is what Zacharias, inspired
as he was, said, this is what the prophets have been saying
from the very beginning and all the way to this time. This has
been their message. There's only one message of salvation,
and that is Christ. He's been the subject of all
the prophets, Zechariah said, from the beginning. Some say
Adam was a prophet. The first man, Adam, that he
was a prophet. How did he prophesy? When he
named his wife Eve, the mother of all living. We know, as we
go through the Old Testament, we see one after the other, don't
we, who prophesied of Christ, who spoke of Christ. Some dimly,
but they all said the same thing. Someone's coming. Someone's coming. And now he's come, right? That's what this is all about.
Now he's come. And notice the fourth, he's come
to save his people, verse 71, that we should be saved from
our enemies and from the hand of all that hate us. His people, we all have the same
enemies. You say, what are they? Well,
first of all, sin. Sin. Sin brought its curse upon
us. I'll tell you another enemy some
people don't think about The law of God. The law of God. Say, how could
that have been our enemy? Because the law required perfect
obedience. And we couldn't obey it. Satan, we all recognize him as
an enemy, yes. Death. We're set in the shadow
of death. He overcame to save his people. He has overcome us from sin. You say, how did he do that?
He paid the sin debt, and he suffered. Suffered what God's justice demanded. Overcame Satan. Don't you know
when the body of the Lord Jesus Christ was lying in that tomb,
for those three days that Satan, wherever he was, we've got him
now. We've got him now. We've won
the victory, finally. But on that third day, he came
out of that grave. The law, the law cannot accuse
you. Why? Because you fulfilled the
law and your surety. Death, he's saved you from not
physical death, but spiritual death, eternal death. And notice, he's come because,
Zechariah says, he's come because God has remembered his mercy. Verse 72, to perform the mercy
promised to our fathers and to remember his covenant The oath
which he swore to our father Abraham that he would grant unto
us that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might
serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him
all the days of our life. This is all the result of God's
mercy and grace. This one coming to save, to redeem
his people. You know, notice here, he saves us that we might serve
him. You see that? To perform the
mercy promised to our father and to remember his holy covenant,
the oath which he swore to our father, that he would grant unto
us that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might
serve him. without fear. You know, the New
Testament, the New Covenant, God's people serve him. Now let
me just say that. God's people serve him. We love
him because he first loved us. But we do not serve him out of
fear. Paul said that love of Christ
constraineth me. We serve him because he loved
us. And there's a big difference, right?
That old dispensation, they served, they're out with service, but
it was out of fear. It was out of fear. We don't
serve the Lord out of fear. It's sad, but some people use
that, you know. If you don't come to church,
God's gonna get you. If you don't tithe, God's gonna
take away your house or your car. I mean, they use fear tactics,
right? That doesn't motivate a believer,
not at all. Believers like Job, when he had
lost everything, I mean everything, though he slay me, yet will I
trust him. Well, let me finish briefly with
what he said about his son. And thou, he turns now from the
promised one, the Redeemer, to his own son. and thou child shall
be called the prophet of the highest. If we had no other verse in the
Bible to show the deity, the godhood
of Jesus Christ, that'd be enough right there. That's sufficient. John the Baptist was a prophet
of The highest. Who's the highest? God. He was the forerunner of the
Lord Jesus Christ. He was appointed to that office.
You know, in the Bible, the word prophet has two meanings. And
most of us only think about one, but it really has two meanings.
The word prophet, it means to foretell something that was yet
future, but it also means to teach. to teach the word of God. And John was a prophet in both
ways. He foretold the baptism of the
Holy Spirit, you remember. He said, there's one standing
among you. I baptize you with water, but
there's one standing among you who will baptize with the Holy
Spirit. And we know that happened, don't
we, on the day of Pentecost. And he also taught. He taught
the people. His ministry would be to go before
the face of the Lord to prepare his ways, to be his, there's
a word they use, harbinger. His harbinger. Kings and important
people in that day, especially, they had people that would go
before them. You know, when the President
of the United States, when he goes to visit a foreign country,
There's a few airplanes that land there before his does, you
know? I mean, there's transport planes
that bring out the limousines and everything else that the
Secret Service, the ambulances, and everything else that's going
to be there to announce, here's the man when he steps off that
plane. The Lord Jesus Christ, he had
an announcer that came before him. and that was John the Baptist. He would go before the Lord,
as the scripture says here, to prepare the way of the Lord Jesus. Let me point this out and then
I'm going to close. In verse 76, to give knowledge
of salvation unto his people by the remission of their sins, That tells us what salvation
is. It is our sins being remitted, being forgiven, yes. But this
is what struck me, to give knowledge of salvation. John, you're going
to go before the Lord and your message is to give knowledge
of salvation. I can't give a person knowledge
of salvation. Only God can do that. Isn't that
right? People can sit in a church and
hear the pure gospel preached all their lifetime and it never
come home to them. They never understand it. They
never love it. Only God, that saving knowledge,
only God can impart. But what I see here, while that
is true, God uses the preaching of the gospel. John is going
to be a preacher of the gospel, and God will bless his preaching,
and through that preaching, he's going to give men and women the
knowledge of salvation by the remission of their sins. John had the privilege even though
he was persecuted, and we know eventually he was executed. His life was taken from him.
But you know, he had the privilege of actually pointing out that man. There he came. I wish in our
mind's eyes today everyone here could see him, that is Christ. Behold, the Lamb of God which
taketh away the sins of the world. He had that privilege, didn't
he? To point him out. And you know, the scripture says,
from that time, two of John's disciples followed the Lord.
They followed him. I pray the Lord would somehow
bless this message.