Gospel, the first chapter. Let me read just a few verses to set the picture here. before us so we get a little bit of an idea of what's happening here as Luke actually embarks on tracing the life of our Lord Jesus Christ. I want to read verses 5 through 10. 5 through 10 of Luke's Gospel, chapter 1. Follow along as I read, and may the word of the Lord edify us in reading it in its pure form. There was in the days of Herod, the king of Judea, a certain priest named Zacharias of the division of Abijah. His wife was of the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless. But they had no child because Elizabeth was barren. And they were both well advanced in years. So it was that while he was serving as priest before God in the order of his division, According to the custom of the priesthood, his lot fell to burn incense while he went into the temple of the Lord. And the whole multitude of the people was praying outside at the hour of incense. It's mentioned that the hour of incense, there was a morning hour of incense, there was an evening hour of incense. And we don't know at which particular time Zacharias is serving in the temple. But upon reading the word of God, join me in prayer. Father, it is with thanksgiving that Luke took it upon himself, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, certainly he had that great sense of the Spirit of God moving upon his heart to compile a biography, a life of our Lord Jesus Christ, and then to send that manuscript to Theophilus, who no doubt read it and was edified and strengthened. We know he wrote a second volume, and that is the Acts of the Apostles. Again, writing to Theophilus, this man received a two-volume set of the life of Christ and the life of the early church. Lord, we thank you that in the providence of God, it was copied and preserved. through the ages to come down to us that we might profit from the research of this man. Under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, it was inspired and kept from error. And so we bless you and thank you for that. In Jesus' name, amen. Last week we looked at the first four verses of this book, opening it up, and it's stating basically his purpose for doing this project, he's doing it to fill Theophilus in into a lot of details that the other writers of scripture, that is the gospel accounts including John, the first three gospels are called and considered the synoptic gospels. the Synoptic Gospels, S-Y-N-O-P-T-I-C. Synoptic, and that is they basically give the same bird's-eye view of the life of Jesus Christ. There are many parallel accounts between them. John is a little different. He's writing later in the century, we believe, maybe in the 90s, maybe in the 80s, the close of the century. We know definitely the book of Revelation was written later at the end of the first century of the church. Nonetheless, we come back to this undertaking that Luke took upon himself. And just to supplement what we talked about last week in terms of the importance of this book, and you might say in your mind, well what does it add to the other accounts? It adds a lot of things. I take this information from someone else, so I On the surface, I want to give credit to where credit is due. I didn't formulate these things, but they're so beneficial that I don't think my fellow alumni from Dallas Seminary will mind. Bob Diffenbaugh, if I use his information, because he's posted it to be used, I give full credit to him. He says, first of all, about the gospel of Luke, that the gospel of Luke is the longest book in the New Testament. It's the largest book in the New Testament. And secondly, he says the gospel is unique in what it reported, and that is the information contained in this gospel. And the estimate is that over 50% of Luke's gospel is unique. You won't find it in the other gospel accounts. It contains material that's found nowhere else. And so without Luke, certain periods of Christ's life and ministry would be unknown to us. And particularly, these events dealing with Zacharias and then also Mary and the visitation of Gabriel to him, we wouldn't know that information. So in my opinion, I think Luke is supplementing the other two synoptic gospels, which no doubt he used, and that is Matthew and Mark. He is supplementing these with information that explains some things. And in this case in particular, it fills us in to the backdrop of that drama in Matthew chapter one, where Joseph is confronted with a dilemma. He has a pregnant wife on his hands. They were betrothed, which is equivalent in tantamount to marriage. The only way it could be broken was a putting away, which is the language of divorce. Joseph saw he was put into an awkward and an untenable position. He had to divorce this wife because he found her pregnant. And then God reveals to him in a dream, but Luke gives us the backdrop of this story as to how it all happened. How did she become pregnant? Well, it goes into more detail, and then it gives the backdrop of the forerunner of Christ, although he's mentioned in all the Gospels, and that is John the Baptizer. John the Baptizer, the Baptist. Just some added details. Luke has a greater focus on individuals than do the other Gospels. For example, he says Luke mentions 13 women not found in the other Gospels. Can also be said that Luke's gospel has more comprehensive range than the others. It begins with the announcement concerning the births of John the Baptist and Jesus, and ends with a reference to the ascension. So it takes you all the way in pre-birth, all the way up to the ascension of Christ. And it gives you this bookend of view. You say, bookend? What do you mean? Again, I throw the word out to you. It's called an inclusio. It tells us how he descended and came into this world. So you have the descent of the Son of God. who comes into the world through the incarnation. And then you have the ascent of the son, which includes his gospel, yet that he includes again in the book of Acts. And so the one leads into the other, and that is Luke leads into Acts, but it ends on that note. So it serves as sort of a package saying, here he is coming into the world, And here he is leaving the world. He has accomplished in between his condescension and his ascension the work that God has designed for him to do. So I think that's important. I think that is significant. Another feature of Luke's gospel, it's impossible to say how many miracles Jesus performed during his ministry. And the reason is because sometimes it gives an account of a collective administration of miracles. There's groups, there's lots of people coming to him at the time, so how are you going to count all those? You can't. There are about a dozen passages in the Gospels that miracles are summarized for us. In other words, they expand into the accounts. There are 35 miracles specifically detailed in the Gospels. 20 of them are found in Luke. So he puts a special emphasis upon the miracles. And of that 20 that Luke mentions, seven are unique to his gospel alone. Also, there's 51 parables spoken by Christ. Needless to say, the number is not fixed, since there's some disagreement what constitutes a parable. Of the 51 classified as parables, 35 are found in Luke, so it puts an emphasis on Christ's parabolic stories and using them to teach from. And a further note there, there are 29 events in the life of Christ which are not included in any other gospel writer. other than Luke. So he has unique information. I want to pass that along because this book is special. It's a special account of our life. It's a research document. Luke was not only a physician, he was a historian. And as I mentioned last week, Sir William Ramsey, who followed the accounts of Luke through Asia Minor and found them to be so accurate in detail as to where the apostles were ministering during the expansion of the church into Asia Minor and then into Europe. So that to say that we can trust Luke, We can trust his accuracy. We can trust his certainty on the matters that we'll be studying and reading in this book. Does that make sense to you? I hope so. We need to delight in it. And during this Advent season, it gives the accounts of the Advent and be very instructive and edifying to read that. Another feature of Luke's gospel is that it's unique in portraying intimate information about the thoughts and feelings of people involved. Luke, for example, informs us that Mary treasured these things in her heart. I just found this fascinating. And that's dealing with her innermost thoughts or fears and so forth. Brother Bob Diffenbaugh writes further. He says, from Luke's point of view, it is the uniqueness of his gospel which justifies the effort he has taken to write it. And that's what we looked at last week. Last week, we looked at the detailed and exact way he went about writing this for Theophilus. And then he reminds him in verse 4 that you may know the certainty of those things in which you were instructed." So this gospel, as well as the second volume, the book of Acts, is to fortify this one man. But thank God, it got copied and then spread around. And so it's fortified and edified a lot of people, like me, like you. information that we would not otherwise have. That's a blessing, to have the complete package of what God wants us to know to defend the faith once for all delivered to the saints. I was talking to my physician not too long ago, one of them, I call him my nutritional physician, and he was talking about his association, he professes some faith, I think, and I was wondering some questions that I should have probed him with. And one of those questions that I had was, I'd like to present, and I present it to you, just for thought. The Bible says, and we study this in Luke, not Luke, but Jude, that he intended to write a document about salvation, but because of the situation that existed in the church, he had to change directions and write a document to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. And my question to him, question to you, is what is the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints? What is the content? Because he's talking about a creed. And that is, as we have the New Testament, what are the features that make up the faith? which Christians were and should believe throughout the ages. And has that altered? Has it changed? And so I wished I would have asked him that question. What is the faith? I would have gotten, I think, further in our discussion about it. But that's an aside. The New Testament has given to us those essential parts of what we believe is the faith once delivered to the saints. Diffenbaugh points out that the accuracy in accounting the facts and focus of the gospel, it is inaccurate. Luke appears to appeal to Gentiles to be writing the gospel, particularly to the Gentile masses. And the apostle had Luke as part of his missionary entourage, as we see from the book of Acts in the we sections. Whoever wrote to Theophilus included himself in that group of men with the Apostle Paul in his ministry. And so it's believed that this man to whom he's writing is some Roman official, a preeminent official, some magistrate in the Roman government. Some believe if he wrote it from Rome, there's that suggestion. Some believe he may have wrote it from Caesarea. But still, wherever he wrote it from, there were those in the purview of his life who were Gentiles. And broadly speaking, this gospel then is with a particular Gentile emphasis, Theophilus himself being a Gentile. And then lastly, Luke's gospel is derived from many eyewitness accounts. That's what he says in verse 2, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses, that would be the apostles, And part of that group would be the 500 brethren that the Apostle Paul includes in his letter to the Corinthians. There was a lot of believing people within the confines of Israel who had experienced encounters with the Lord. And so therefore, I can only imagine that he's interviewing people. I think I've referred to this gentleman before. Are you familiar with Lee Strobel? Lee Strobel? I see some heads. He was a Chicago Tribune reporter, journalist for them. And he graduated, I think, from Yale University and had a particular emphasis on reporting on matters that relate to judicial reporting. But he's a very diligent and accurate reporter. His wife came to faith in Jesus Christ, short story. And what he set out to do was refute the faith that his wife had in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so he said, if I can refute this doctrine of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, surely, My wife will abandon her faith." So he set out on that pursuit. He thought, well, I can knock this off in a weekend. Took him months. And after the months that he spent in studying the proof and validity of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, not only did he write a book to that effect, But he was convinced himself and he embraced Christ in salvation based on his research. I say that to say part of it he is dealing with interviews of people, scholars and experts on the gospel accounts trying to support his thesis that the resurrection is false. But it's not false. It's true. And that's what Luke is doing. He's a researcher. He's a researcher. I hate writing research papers. But that was part of college. That was part of seminary, is writing research papers for every class that you were in. And I like what my brother would say. We wrote all these papers in college, but do we go back and look at them? No, but it's to teach you a discipline about the importance of research and the importance of being accurate. You always go to primary sources. You don't go to secondary sources. And that's what Luke is doing in this gospel account. And I believe what we see in these first two chapters is the coming together of the providence of God. I am a strong believer in God's providence, that he controls the universe, and he controls the universe even through the choices that you make. A classic illustration I use is that of Peter. Jesus said, Peter, you're going to deny me three times. And lo and behold, Peter goes out there and voluntarily does it. And yet he's fulfilling a prophecy that he states about Peter that in the short term would happen. And it happened. And then Peter, after the fact, hears the rooster crow and he scratches his head and starts crying. Wow. and repents of his denial. That's the providence of God. God's providence, and that's contained in Romans 8, 28, and we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose. God is working. in our lives, in the circumstances and the peoples in our lives to accomplish his outcome. In the midst of all the choices and decisions that people make, God is accomplishing his purpose. That's the mystery of it all to me. But I have to fall back on the affirmation that God alone is wise and his wisdom is infinite. It's not like anything that you can compare to in this life. We know a lot of smart people, we know a lot of wise people, but God is infinitely wise that he could bring this universe into existence and bring a planet into existence whereupon life could not only come into being, but be sustained, and many lives be sustained, not only human lives, but animal lives, bug lives, sea life, all of it sustained on this planet. And it's an expression of the infinite wisdom of God in his creation. And so he governs in the affairs of men. We believe that, and I think we have illustration of that here in the lives of Zachariah and Elizabeth, along with Mary, and the shepherds, and the child Jesus. There was a series several years ago It's called the A-Team. I remember that series. Colonel Hannibal would always come to the end of it. He says, I love it how a plan comes together. He didn't know how. He's got all his troops with him, his four companions. And they're supposed to do something, accomplish something. And then finally, it all happens. And he says, I love it when a plan comes together. The plan of redemption in the sequence of God's providence, and especially the plan of redemption, is unfolding in the lives of special people. Special people only from the standpoint it is God using them. They are not people that we would choose necessarily. If we were choosing someone to be the father of John, we would not choose Zacharias and Elizabeth. Because it's believed that they were, although they were of the priestly order, both he and his wife, descendants of Aaron. They were not significant. The priest had two communities, one in Jerusalem and then one in Jericho. Those were the two localities where there were a high concentration of priests. Zacharias is not part of that. We don't know what city. Some suggest it's to the south of Jerusalem in the hill country of Judea. Not clear on that, but they were not significant people. Same with Mary. This little virgin, this young lady from Nazareth, an obscure place. The only way it gains notoriety is because God chose her and put it on the map, so to speak. Otherwise, we wouldn't know about it. And when you think about your own life, God chose you. Not because you were one of fame There's a text of scripture that I always fall back on, and that's 1 Corinthians 1, 1 Corinthians 1, and it gives us an insight. Who would have chosen Abraham, this pagan from Mesopotamia, to be the leader of a people, so to speak, be the progenitor the producer of a nation of people through his son and through his grandson, Jacob, to produce a nation and establish them back in this land that he was promised in Israel. But in 1 Corinthians 1, we read the words of the Apostle Paul as he writes to the believers at Corinth at the close of the chapter. Verse 20, where is the wise? And that is, he's appealing to his readers. He's asking a series of questions. Again, using questions to ascertain thinking and how would you answer this? How would the readers answer this question? Where is the wise? And that is the people who are recognized in society as the great philosophers, the great thinkers. If you go into the Christian community, do you find, yes you do, you find great thinkers and philosophers. But for the most part, no. Where is the scribe? The one in Jewish circles who is responsible. for transmission of accurate transmission of the scripture and also interpreting the law. Where's the disputer of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? Yes, that's the answer to that question. For since in the wisdom of God the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For the Jews require a sign, Greeks seek after wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified. Stumbling block to the Greeks, foolishness. But to those who are called, both you and Greeks, Christ, the power of God, the wisdom of God, because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men, for you see your calling. Look at yourself, readers, he says, for not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty. Not many noble are called, but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise. God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty. and the base things of the world, and the things which are despised God has chosen, the things which are not to bring to nothing, the things that are wise, that no flesh should glory in his presence." Think about that. When we come back to these, we could consider them stars, so to speak, in the hall of fame of faith, and they are. But who would have gone into southern Judea And who would pick Zacharias to be the instrument of the sun? How did it all come together? God's providence. You think about the circumstances in your life and the conversion in your own life and how it all came together. I think about it, I think about it a lot. I'm going to see my family in a couple weeks, week and a half or so. And they've asked me, along with my brother and my sister, to give testimony. And I'm going to have a chance to recount again how God's saving work in my life happened. And so I hope it touches the lives of some of my nieces and nephews. But to recount that, to recount the circumstances of your own conversion, you have to attribute it to providence. Because you'd never figure it out on your own. Never in a million years. And that's so that no boasting will be done. We boast in our Lord Jesus Christ. That's what Paul said. Looking back at our text, in the days of Herod, that would be Herod the Great, king of Judah, he was not known to be a very good man. He was the one who was instrumental in leading the raid into Bethlehem to destroy the infants there, thinking that this king of the Jews that these wise men came seeking was somehow going to be a threat to his reign in Judea. He was a very deceitful man. And so in these days, the king of Judea, a certain priest named Zacharias of the division of Abijah. There were 24 separate divisions that were chosen by Lot. Turn to first Chronicles chapter 24, 1 Chronicles chapter 24. It begins at verse 4. First Chronicles, this is the division of the priest. And there were more leaders, verse four, found in the sons of Eleazar than in the sons of Ithamar. So Eleazar had a larger contingent of descendants than Ithamar. And thus they were divided. Among the sons of Eleazar were 16 heads of their father's house. and eight heads of their father's house among the sons of Ithamar. Thus they were divided by lot." Now notice that's significant. The way that they were chosen was by lot. And what that involved was generally they'd have a pot, an urn of some sort. And they would take a stone or take a piece of clay. And they would inscribe on that the name of each of the divisions, each of the tribes. And they would put it in this urn, so to speak, shake it up a little bit, so that from that, they began to choose who's lot number one. Oh, it's so-and-so. They set that aside, pick up the next one. Well, this guy's next in the lot in his rotation. So it was all done fairly under the providence of God. You see the providence of God at work. Verse 5 tells us, And they were divided by lot, one group as another. There were officials of the sanctuary, and officials of the house of God, and from the sons of Eleazar, and from the sons of Ithamar. And the scribe Shemaiah, the son of Nathanael, one of the Levites, wrote them down before the king, the leaders, Zadok, the priest, Ahimelech, the son of Abiathar, and the heads of the father's house of the priests and Levites, one's father's house taken for Eleazar and one for Ithamar. Now the first fell on the lot of Jehoiarib. Verse 10 plugs us in here to where we are in the sequence of the administration of these priests, who would have known centuries before that Abijah would have been chosen eight in the lot. And his turn would come around. They usually serve twice in a year. Verse 10, the seventh, Hakkos, and the eighth, Abijah. So he was in that cycle of the eight. And so the providence of God would have it such that he would be serving in Jerusalem in the temple. And the unique thing about this, again, the instrumentality of lots, the casting of lots, the picking, Who would go in to the holy part of the temple and administer at the altar of incense before the veil leading into the holy of holies? Well, the lot falls on Zacharias. What luck. Wasn't he a lucky guy? Or was it God's providence at work? I contend it's God's providence. Even in casting of lots, the outcome is from the Lord. According to the book of Proverbs, when they chose a replacement for Judas, they cast lots. And Matthias came up as a replacement. So they used lots as a means of impartial selection. You know, gamblers used to, eight years ago, they would mark cards so that they could come out on top in an outcome. There's no way that they could come in unless everybody in that jug was named Zechariah. And so it was unique. It was unique, not only in the providence of God, but it was unique. that it was at this particular time and in the providence of God leading in, and I believe this is where we're going, we're seeing the unfolding of God's redemptive work in time and space. We've seen it in pictures and types throughout the Old Testament leading up to this point. And God is causing his program to blossom and to unfold. And Zacharias is part of the mix of that, whom otherwise we probably wouldn't even know if it wasn't for God's goodness and providence. And so the personalities involved here are important, not only from the standpoint of them being part of Luke's research, but also from the standpoint of their character. Verse six tells us, they were both righteous before God. They were just before God. Walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord, blameless. Does that mean they were sinlessly perfect? No. But the overall tenor of their lives was a life of devotion and meticulous obedience to God. There's some that suggest that they were just living their lives in conformity with Judaistic regulations and so forth. And that it's no commentary here upon whether they're believers or not. But I suggest to you it's different. It's different. I like John MacArthur's note on that. He believes that this is A true expression. Verse 6, he writes this, they are believers. By this designation, both are righteous before God. Not in their behavior per se, but they have a righteous standing before God. They are just. They've been justified. They are Old Testament believing saints. And the proof that they are believers is that they are meticulous about their lives in keeping with the law. Now, we know one purpose of the law, as it was given, is to expose our sinfulness. But one purpose, another purpose of the law, is for believers to comply with in their lives. In the Old Testament, there was always in Israel, the broader nation, a remnant, according to what Paul says, the election of grace. There was always a remnant of believers among his people. You look at the time of the Exodus. How many of those people were actually believers? I don't know. But a remnant of them were. Clearly, the Levites were. They stood against this idolatrous worship. God has always had a remnant of believers, and here, I believe, is an illustration of it. And I think it's true today. God has a remnant of those who are his and those who follow him. Here in view, Aaron and Elizabeth. They're righteous before God. They're just. They've been justified. And they're walking in all the commandments and ordinances. I believe that, I'll give them this designation. They are Psalm 119 believers. They're Psalm 119 believers. Look back at that Psalm with me for a moment. Psalm 119. And this is the difference. This man who wrote this psalm clearly loves God's law. He doesn't grate under its influence. He doesn't hate its requirements. He doesn't dismiss them. He doesn't excuse himself. But clearly, this writer is a believer. I wanna go to the latter part for sake of time to just plug us into what I want us to see. Look at verse 70. Verse 70, seven zero. The heart is as fat as grease, but I delight in your law. I delight in your law. Verse 77, your law is my delight. Verse 78, I will meditate on your precepts. This guy's a believer. Verse 92, unless your law had been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction. I call him a Psalm 117, that is Zacharias. He's a 117 along with Elizabeth and probably others. Believers, they love the law. They delighted in meditating on it. They delighted in living it. Verse 97 of Psalm 119, oh, how I love your law. It is my meditation all the day. I think about it. I'm consumed with it. That's a believer. It's not one of those flimsy Christians, say, oh, this doesn't apply here. He says, your word, verse 105, is a lamp to my feet. and a light to my path. Verse 106, I have sworn and confirmed that I will keep your righteous judgment. Verse 113, I hate to double mind it, but I love your law. Verse 119, therefore I love your testimonies. Clearly this man has a different view than many of the Israelites who are willing to obey it. disobey it and enter into idolatry, enter into unlawful covenants with unbelievers and things of that nature. That's not Zacharias. He is a one Psalm 119 believer in the law, loving the law. I move on from there quickly, walking in the commandments and the ordinances of the Lord blameless. Effectively, no one could point a finger at him and say, this guy's out of line. And if he was, he would take the necessary measures to amend his conduct by taking the necessary trespass or sin offering to the tabernacle here at the temple. I give this important note in verse 7 about the personalities here, and that is the barrenness of Zechariah and Elizabeth, which was considered by many to be a judgment of God that if you couldn't bear children, that was the purpose of the creation mandate. Go back to Genesis 1. Be fruitful and multiply. And there are many Old Testament instances. Abraham being one. Sarah was childless. Hannah being another one. A special birth there. God gave her a son. His name was Samuel. Same with Samson and their parents. And so there's Old Testament illustrations and precedents to show people who struggled there. And here they struggled, and to compound the situation, not only was she barren, that was bad enough, but they were beyond the years, I think that's suggested, she's gone through menopause. She can't produce children anymore. Advanced in years, and so it was while they were serving as priest before God in the order of his division, There it is. According to the custom of the priesthood, his lot fell to burn incense when he went into the temple of the Lord. So it's there, and this would happen if they were allowed, and this is an important point, if they were allowed at all in the course of their lifetime to serve in the temple, that would probably be it and no more. It's not something that he did regularly. The lot fell on him to do it at this juncture. The privilege, the enormous privilege, that in his lifetime, well aged as he was, to now to be able to come before the Lord at the altar of incense before the Holy of Holies. And to put incense on the altar, which was burning constantly. Coals were added to it so that it was lit all the time. to come in there and to perform this service. And it came by lot, and uniquely in the providence of God, so that one of his messengers, an angel from the very throne of God, Gabriel by name. Daniel knew Gabriel, Daniel chapter 9. God gave special revelation to Daniel about 70 weeks that would be accomplished for his people Israel. Great prophecy given. Back to the point of hand. God is orchestrating here things in their lives to set a stage to tell us the providence of God and the power of God to accomplish his purpose even in the midst of the greatest obstacles and difficulties that might stand in their way. He went into the temple. His lot fell there, and the whole multitude of the people was praying outside at the hour of incense. So there's a great multitude out there. Nedab and Abijah, it was always a backdrop in the minds of priests that when you go to the altar of incense, you don't desecrate it in any way. Desecrate the performance of your duty. God's fire came out and destroyed those two sons of Aaron. And there's all that nagging thought in her mind. And as you see the narrative unfolding here, there's this profound reality that he's taking more time than is necessary to do that with his little interview with Gabriel. And so there's this crowd out there praying. And he is being very careful and meticulous in how he carries out his duty, this one-time opportunity to perform that. If you ever heard the testimony of Martin Luther, the first time that he entered into the priesthood and performed a priestly function in the mass, it was a mess. He was so nervous in doing it. It was an embarrassment to his father, as I understand the story. But he took his vow, took his ministry seriously, knowing that he was ministering before the Lord. And then the angel of the Lord, an angel of the Lord appeared to him standing on the right side of the altar of incense. So he's facing the veil, and on his left side, is the lampstand. On the right side is the table of showbread. And this angel appears on the right side of this altar, just, you know, appears ostensibly out of nowhere. And when Zacharias saw him, he was troubled and fear fell upon him. We'll stop here at this point and pick up the narrative, the story here, and see God's providence at work. in the gospel story, that even in the one who was to prepare the way, he was the preparer, the son of Zacharias and Elizabeth, John, it was providentially scripted by God that Zacharias be where he is, Elizabeth be barren, and that Elizabeth is reinvigorated, I would understand, similar to Sarah. And maybe even Zacharias, who was beyond years, was reinvigorated by the Lord so that they could produce a child. In many ways, he was a miracle child. God bringing life out of death. But I think the same is true here. that all of us who've experienced the hand of God in salvation have seen the hand of God working in circumstances. And I can tell you the providential circumstances in my own conversion is God moving, God seeking, God drawing, God bringing me. That moment in church July, April 2nd, 1967, I came to faith in Jesus. Even though I had made a profession four years earlier, it wasn't real. This one was. It's because the Father drew me to Himself. And the prayer that I prayed didn't bring salvation. It was just a capstone of what God produced in my life, a believing heart to trust His Son, Jesus. Now if you don't find this exciting and helpful to confirm to you the providence of God, I don't know what it would take. And I think that's the way Luke is writing this narrative, is to assure Theophilus as he's reading this, the hand of God was in it all from beginning to the end. And he gets the glory, he gets the honor from it all. Let's pray. Father, we love to read these stories, but as we dive into them and see some of the details, we cannot help but come away from this text of scripture, adoring the Lord who saves, the Lord who orchestrates the very preparation. That's why this is important. It's preparing the way of the Lord. John would do that, and you prepared the vessels through which he would be prepared to lead the way, to bring a host of people to conversion and demonstrating that into the waters of baptism. Oh, our Father, your grace is magnificent. Your providence is glorious. We know that all things work together, or as some translators put it, and we know that God works all things together for good. To those who are called, oh God, bless us, affirm our faith to us in Jesus' name, amen.