The Wonder in the Waiting

Luke 1:5–13 In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. Both of them were righteous in the sight of God, observing all the Lord’s commands and decrees blamelessly. But they were childless because Elizabeth was not able to conceive, and they were both very old. Once when Zechariah’s division was on duty and he was serving as priest before God, he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to go into the temple of the Lord and burn incense. And when the time for the burning of incense came, all the assembled worshipers were praying outside. Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. But the angel said to him: “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife, Elizabeth, will bear you a son and you are to call him John.” CONSIDER THIS There’s a quote I love that’s attributed to Mark Twain that reads: “All good things arrive unto them that wait—and don’t die in the meantime.” Let’s face it. Waiting can be insufferable. Have you ever considered how much of our lives we spend waiting? A recent poll discovered that the average person spends nearly two hours a day waiting on something. Maybe it’s waiting for someone to respond to a text, waiting for traffic to start moving again, waiting for the web page to refresh, or waiting for the latest app to download on your phone. Whatever the waiting, that time adds up. Think about it. Almost two hours a day may not sound like a lot, but eventually the numbers stack up! That’s about twelve hours of waiting a week and, over the course of a year, it’s more than 624 hours spent doing one laboring, excruciating task: waiting.1 Can I be honest? I hate waiting. Personally, waiting seems like such a waste. What if a waiting season is not a wasted season? Luke’s Christmas story begins with Zechariah and Elizabeth. Odds are, you won’t find them in your nativity set (unless you’ve gotten really creative), but theirs is a love story that plays a major role in the wonder of Christ’s arrival into the world. There is a lot of Zechariah and Elizabeth’s past we don’t know, but in our passage today Luke gives us three very thoughtful details that are important to note: (1) They were righteous and blameless before the Lord. “Righteous” is what the Lord sees; “blameless” is what others see. One is internal, the other is external. I think it’s important to note that for the children of God today it’s not one or the other, it’s both/and; (2) Elizabeth was barren and they were both “very old” (v. 7). How old do you have to be to be slapped with the title “very old”? We’re not exactly sure. Many commentators believe they were somewhere between the ages of sixty and seventy years old. (As I write this, I am fifty-two years old. I will gladly now be referred to as a young adult!) Whatever the age was, we know this: in her waiting season, she had been unable to conceive and give Zechariah a child; and (3) Luke reminds us that Zechariah was of the priestly division of Abijah and about to serve out his priestly duties in the temple. That’s the context. For Zechariah, it was an ordinary day. But on this ordinary day, God had an extraordinary revelation waiting just around the corner. As lots were cast, Zechariah’s name came up and he was given the incredible opportunity to go into the temple of the Lord and burn incense. It’s believed that as many as 18,000 to 20,000 priests gathered in Jerusalem to serve various positions in the temple during a two-week period. Many served their entire lives and never got the chance that Zechariah got to enter the temple and burn incense before the Lord. What a moment! I can imagine Zechariah’s heart skipped a few beats when he saw his name drawn. However, little did Zechariah know that his heart was about to get a serious workout as, just beyond the door of the temple, an angelic encounter awaited. As Zechariah’s eyes fell on Gabriel, he heard the following words declared over him: “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John” (v. 13). I wonder: How long had Zechariah been praying for he and Elizabeth to have a child? Forty years? Thirty years? Twenty? Honestly, was it even a prayer within the past ten years? Had he given up completely on the hope of ever having a child? We don’t know. But we know this, it was a prayer he had prayed. In that moment, Gabriel declared five little words that, if we’re not careful, we might completely miss in the story: your prayer has been heard. Two reminders for today: (1) You may see this as an ordinary day. Look out—God may have extraordinary moments waiting for you around the corner, and (2) the Lord hears your prayers, my friend. He knows your heart, and he loves the sound of your voice. THE PRAYER  Loving God, we thank you that, even in a waiting season, it’s not a wasted season. Today, open our eyes to the truth found in your Word that our prayers are heard and, even greater, allow that truth to travel from our head to hearts. THE QUESTIONS How are you in the waiting? In what areas in your life are you “waiting upon the Lord”? What might the Lord be saying to you in this season? NOTES John Anderer, “Average Person Loses 26 Days Each Year to Wasted Time,” Study Finds, January 17, 2022, https://studyfinds.org /loses -26-days -wasted-time/.