Read Luke 1:5-25
Life is full of interruptions. The older I get, the more I want a quiet life, free from adventurous, spontaneous surprises.
Zechariah was no different. He was old. We’re not told exactly how old, but we know that his wife, Elizabeth, was too old to have children. He seemed to have accepted that he was going to live out his retirement in peace.
And then Gabriel appeared.
Every year, the priests would gather and randomly select one man to go into the temple to light incense. It seemed random to them, but God doesn’t do random. Being chosen “by lot” was similar to eenie-meenie-miney-mo, or selecting the card with the “your it” on it. Zechariah was chosen for a very dangerous task. Exodus 30:1-10 sets up the expectations for this room: once a year, a priest in the line of Aaron was to go into the temple and burn incense as a way of atoning for sin, but unauthorized incense would anger God. Jewish tradition says they would tie a rope around the priest’s ankle so they could pull him out in the event that he died inside the temple.
Zechariah knew what to expect. But then Gabriel appeared. “He was startled and was gripped with fear,” the Scripture says. Of course he was. He was supposed to be alone in there! It should have been a silent and holy place, but suddenly there was someone standing next to him.
Not only is someone in there with him, but then this someone informs him that he’s going to be a father. Zechariah is reprimanded for his disbelief, but honestly, I would have been just as skeptical. His wife is post-menopausal and he was supposed to be alone in the temple.
By the time he exited the temple, he had been in there long enough to raise suspicion, but not long enough for his cohorts to pull him out by the rope on his ankle. He couldn’t talk. God had muted him for the duration of Elizabeth’s pregnancy. The people knew he had been in the presence of God.
While we link this story with the Christmas story, this was more than a year before Jesus was born. Evidence of God’s presence filled every nook and cranny in Zechariah and Elizabeth’s lives. What evidence do you see in your life of God’s presence?