Gracious Father, thank you for your holy word. Thank you that it is inspired by you and authoritative for our lives. And even now it continues to do its work on our hearts. And so would you transform us as we sit under it. By the power of your Holy Spirit and for your glory in Jesus' name, amen. Luke one, starting in verse 57, let's give attention to God's holy and errant, inspired and therefore authoritative word. Now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son, and her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her. And on the eighth day, they came to circumcise the child, and they would have called him Zechariah after his father, but his mother answered, no, he shall be called John. And they said to her, none of your relatives is called by this name. And they made signs to his father, inquiring what he wanted him to be called. And he asked for a writing tablet and wrote, his name is John. And they all wondered. And immediately his mouth was open and his tongue loosed. And he spoke, blessing God. And fear came on all their neighbors. And all these things were talked about through all the hill country of Judea, and all who heard them laid them up in their hearts saying, what then will this child be? For the hand of the Lord was with him. May the Lord add his blessing to the reading and preaching of his word. At 2.41 p.m. on Monday, August 21st, four years ago, 2017, a solar eclipse came through Columbia and you either had to be not alive or under a rock to not know it, But many of us celebrated here at First Press. Dr. Thomas was our biggest cheerleader, and he put a party together. He asked Chef Rich to get food. The staff gathered together in the bridge parking lot, and we waited outside, and what we were really wondering was, what's really gonna happen? What's about to happen next? And as we waited for this eclipse to take place, the city went completely dark for two and a half minutes. Completely dark. But for me, that wasn't actually the spectacle. What really happened was that the crickets began to sing. Like it was evening time. They came out and began to glorify their maker and sing. And then, from the rooftops and from the different areas in town, we began to hear people cheer. Crowds burst into joy and song and laughter and happiness. They were thinking to themselves, what's really happening here? We were thinking to ourselves, what is God really up to? What could he do next? What's happening? Sometimes we find ourselves actually asking that question spiritually. God, what are you up to? What might you really be doing? And what's gonna happen next? We see that here in this passage. What God's really up to all the time is fulfilling his promises to his people. That's what he's up to. And when he does that, there's joy of mercy, wonder of grace, and awe of his presence. And that's what we're gonna think about tonight. First, the joy of mercy here in verses 57 and 58. We need to go back a little bit here as we think about setting the scene for what's going on with Elizabeth and Zechariah. In chapter one, they were somewhat, probably despondent. They were old in years. Elizabeth was barren. And yet, they were living a pretty good Jewish life. Elizabeth was a daughter of Aaron. She had a good lineage. Zechariah was a priest working in the temple. He had a good title. And yet, they didn't have the thing they wanted most. They couldn't have children. And Gabriel appears to them in a society where not having children was a sign of shame and fear of lack of security in the future. Gabriel's going to appear to them, but you can imagine their feelings. The pain that they might have felt, the shame that they might have felt all these years, the anger perhaps, the sadness. You could imagine maybe the societal reaction of pouring out shame upon them. The lack of eye contact when they walk through the city. You can imagine even the internal questions. Is there something wrong with us? Have we done something wrong? Is God punishing us? Are we under his curse? They had heritage and they had status, but it doesn't really matter what your title is, what your lineage is, when what you want most actually eludes you. They wanted a child. They were in a low place. But God shows up in chapter one and he makes really a series of promises, but first he says, you will have a son and the people will rejoice. You'll have a son and the people will rejoice. It wasn't because of their heritage. It wasn't because of their titles. It wasn't because they lived a good Jewish life. But God loves circumstances like these. You see it all through the scripture with barren women in a tough spot. He actually likes, if I can say it this way, God loves to show off. Now I don't mean that the way maybe we think about that. I heard this week that Instagram, on Instagram all the rage now is beautification filters. I'm not on Instagram, because I'm righteous. I'm not on Instagram, it's okay if you are. But the rage are these filters, right? So you can filter a picture and you can make it even more beautiful. I read this quote actually, I looked this up just to see if my wife was lying to me about this. And it said this, you snapped a perfect photo to share on Instagram and there's only one thing that can make it even better, the perfect filter. Now I didn't know that perfect got better, but one thing can make perfect better, the perfect filter. So now the goal is not just to capture a picture and share with your friends, the goal is actually to snap the perfect picture that shows your friends how awesome you want them to think you are, and then put a perfecter filter on it. Put a better filter on it to make it even more perfect. When we show off, there's something sad about it, isn't there? There's something self-centered, self-focused, arrogant. But when God shows off, He's worthy. He's glorious. He's perfect. In fact, if he doesn't show off, we don't get to see who he is. That's actually part of what glory means, is he shows himself for who he really is. If we don't get to see that, it's to our demise. We don't get to see what a wonderful God we have. We don't get to see that we need a savior. We don't get to believe on Jesus and worship God because he never showed us who he was. He never showed us his character. And here in the passage, He's showing something of himself. In verse 58, the scripture says that he had shown Elizabeth great mercy. Another way to say that in the Greek is he had magnified his mercy. He was magnifying his mercy to this little couple, Zechariah and Mary. And actually Luke is grabbing a hold of Mary's magnificat in the passage before because she says, my soul magnifies you, Lord. My soul magnifies you, same word. Mary and Elizabeth are magnifying the Lord. The Lord is actually magnifying himself through their lives and through these miracles. He's causing himself to be made known. He's exalting himself. He's glorifying himself. And magnification's interesting because we can magnify something in two ways. We can get a microscope out and we can look at something really, really tiny and we can make it bigger than it really is. That's probably what we do with Instagram in some ways. But that's not what we do with God. With God, we can pull out a telescope and we can zoom into something that's more vast than we could ever imagine and just grasp a bit of it. Wow, look how glorious that is. I can only see a little bit, but it's phenomenal. Think how much more magnificent it must really be. Mary and Elizabeth, they've honed in on something wonderful about God. And it's his mercy. The Lord is magnifying his mercy. Last week, and even this morning, Dr. Thomas actually spent a lot of time emphasizing this, that this idea of mercy here in the Greek is really the Greek translation of the Hebrew idea of hesed. The Old Testament idea of hesed, the steadfast love of God. the fierce loyalty of God to his people, the covenant faithfulness that God shows to us, the loving kindness. Actually, this word is the most repeated word in the Psalter, 119 times. Steadfast love in your English standard version shows up. Chesed shows up almost every single chapter of the Psalter. The people of God are claiming this is who our God is, and we love him for it. These women, and Zechariah, they knew that they didn't deserve Chesed. They actually, in their culture, in their conditions, they deserve shame for various reasons. And yet, God shows up with Chesed. It's a bit like Ephesians 2, 1 to 3, where Paul says that we are dead in our trespasses and sins in which we formerly walked, and according to the ways of the world, and the lust of the flesh, and the prince of the power of the air, and by nature we were children of wrath. What we don't deserve is for God to show up and make a promise. We deserve, actually, death and wrath. But when what we don't deserve shows up, hesed, we can't help but rejoice. And that's actually what happens here. Not only do they rejoice, but here in 58, the crowds rejoice. The crowd goes wild, actually. William Barclay draws out in his commentary that in Palestine when a baby was born, and in particular at that time when a son was born, there were neighbors, there was family all around, and there were musicians. And when the son was born, the band played. They burst out into song, they burst out into music. It's much like when there's a touchdown in Death Valley or Williams-Brice, the band plays, the crowd goes wild. That's actually what's happening in this setting. They're going wild because God has magnified his mercy. He promised a son and he gave him. He brought him forth. When God fulfills his promise, there's joy. There's the joy of mercy. Secondly, there's the wonder of grace. Here in 59 through 63, there's the wonder of grace. So the eighth day comes. It's the time for good Jewish parents to take their sons and to give them the covenant sign of circumcision. And tradition had grown that they would actually name their son during this time. Jesus will be circumcised and named on the eighth day a little while later in Luke's book. Narrative naming in scripture again as Barclay brings out can be done for a multifaceted reasons we might Name our children. They might name their children based upon circumstances like like he saw in Jacob Or they might name their child based upon appearance like Laban who was blonde or white or they might name their child based upon their their parents name and Or they might name their child based upon something along the lines of the parent's joy. Samuel and Saul both mean asked for, and their parents named them after that. Or, like I think's happening here, they might actually name their child based upon their own faith in God's promise, God's character. that they're naming their son based upon something that God had revealed to them and a promise that he'd made to them that they had believed by faith and now their son's name will actually reflect it. And so the family and the neighbors gather and they wanna name the son Zechariah after their father and Elizabeth throws a curve ball and she says, no, he shall be named John. And this makes me laugh a little bit just thinking about the southern equivalent of this. Maybe you've all been in this circumstance where someone in the family chooses a bit of an odd name for their child and maybe the father-in-law says something like, John. Sweetheart, nobody has that name in the family. And the mother-in-law says, well, bless your heart. You want to name him John. But have you considered? Yes, we considered. We considered and this is what we named our child. And that's what's actually happening here. And they turn to Zechariah and they play charades. He probably is not just mute, but he probably is mute and deaf. That's why he has this tablet, that's why they're playing charades to see what he thinks about the name. Okay, Elizabeth, let's find out what Zechariah actually thinks. And on this tablet that no doubt he had been writing on for months since he had doubted Gabriel in the temple and he had disciplined him with silence, no doubt he probably wrote down this name to Elizabeth. And now he's asked to reiterate what she said, and he writes down emphatically, his name is John. His name is John. In fact, in the Greek, it's John. John is his name. Zechariah and Elizabeth were responding by faith to the promise of God. God had not simply promised a son. He actually had promised a son named John. That was part of the promise. And they were responding by faith to name him John. John means God is gracious. He'd magnified his mercy, but now he'll put on display his grace throughout all of John's life. This unmerited, this demerited, as Gabe used to like to describe it, favor to a little couple in a blip town in Palestine. He wants to showcase his grace, and their son's name will actually tell the story of God's grace everywhere he goes for the rest of his life. In verse 63, and they all wondered at this. They all wondered. They were, I think, astonished by the unity between Zechariah and Elizabeth, the faith of Zechariah and Elizabeth, and the unique way that they named this child after such a beautiful aspect of God's character. He's so gracious to us. Isn't God so gracious to us? When's the last time that you wondered at his grace in your life? You just stopped and like that eclipse in the sky, you stopped and you just wondered, God, you are so gracious to me to love me, to set your affection upon me, to send your son to die for me, to regenerate my heart, to save me, to begin the process of sanctifying me, to promise that you'll glorify me and that you'll return for me. You are so gracious to me, not to mention all the other blessings too. When's the last time we wondered at the grace of God in our lives? That though we deserve death and wrath, Ephesians 2, 4 says, but God being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace, by grace you have been saved. What a wonder. There's the joy of mercy, there's the wonder of grace, and finally there's the awe of God's presence. The awe of God's presence here in verses 64 to 66. So Zechariah hadn't spoken in months. He was being disciplined actually for doubting God's promise. But it's interesting because with the discipline, there's actually an added promise that God makes to him. Back in chapter one, Gabriel says, you will be silent because you didn't believe the promise. and you'll be unable to speak, but then he says, until the day that these things take place. These things will take place, and then you will speak. There's a promise on top of the discipline. And what's Zechariah to do with that? Well, he could, he could be mad at God. Who is God to give me hardship? He could, he could abandon God. I had a pretty good life going, if God's like this, I don't want anything to do with him. Or, he could submit. He could submit to God. And in his submission, he could believe, he could trust, he could obey, and he had nine months to think about it. I don't know how patient you all are. He had nine months to think about it. Really, this is a choice that we have in our own culture, isn't it? And really, this is what we studied a while back in Revelation, the letters to the seven churches, that there's constantly this choice of, will we bail on God? Will we presagect when things don't go our way? When we go through hardship, when we go through suffering, that he actually promises? Or will we believe? Will we trust? The world constantly tells us to define God as this sort of snuggly puppy. And when hardship comes, we should press eject. But Zechariah doesn't do that. He believes God. He waits for God. He trusts in God. And he actually endures discipline just like the author of Hebrews tells us to do in Hebrews 12. He endures discipline as from a loving father who only brings it because he wants his people to grow. to be more like Jesus, and he's refining them, and he's refining us. And so at the end of the day, he names his son John, just as Gabriel told him to, just as he was called to believe and obey, and once again, God fulfills another promise from chapter one, and immediately he loosens his tongue. Immediately is a theme in Luke. Immediately, God loosens Zechariah's tongue, and what has he found doing? Praising God. Blessing God. He's glorifying God. And not only he, but in verse 65, fear and awe and wonder come upon everyone. Everyone is blown away by this. This kind of promise fulfillment by God and this kind of faithful obedience by his people, it gets people talking. And that's what it's done in this little town. When God fulfills his promises, when his people obey him by faith, it's different than the world and it gets people talking and pondering. Verse 66, they laid up in their hearts, what then will this child be? What does God have in store? And we know the rest of the story. We know what's gonna happen with John, but they don't know that. They actually have 30 years to think about it, roughly. before he goes into the wilderness and fulfills his ministry. What on earth is God actually doing with John? We've already seen him fulfill, he's gonna have a son, they're gonna name him John, everyone's gonna rejoice, Zechariah's tongue is gonna be loosed again to speak, but what else is God gonna do with this child? It's easy for us to cheat and think, well, we know what he's gonna do. They didn't know that. They were living in their normal earthly circumstances like we live on a regular basis. And I wonder how much they held on to these promises over the next 30 years. Did Zechariah and Elizabeth actually even live to see these promises fulfilled? They were already up in years. Did they even see it? John will go into the wilderness, he'll put on camel's fur, he'll eat honey. Can imagine the neighbors coming along and saying, I know God promised Zechariah and Elizabeth, but he's a bit unkempt. I don't know if he's really gonna pass licensure. It's easy for us to forget and doubt the promises of God. In fact, Calvin has a great quote in his commentary on this passage. He says, while empty and trifling matters stick firmly in our minds, the memory of the graces of God that should flourish forever quickly slips away and is gone. Isn't that true? How much trifling material do you and I know, and yet the promises of God elude our grasp? Do you ponder the promises of God? He's promised salvation to you. He's promised forgiveness. If we confess our sins, He will forgive and He will cleanse. He's promised assurance that we search out and can experience. He's promised sanctification, that he who began a good work in us will complete it at the day of Christ Jesus. He's promised glorification, that he who caught us, justified us, sanctified us, will also glorify us. He's promised, actually, a new heavens and a new earth. He's promised to work everything in between now and then for our good and for his glory. He's promised to one day wipe away every tear from our eyes. He's promised that when Christ returns, then we also will appear with him in glory. And he's promised that he is a covenant father to us and to our children forever, that he'll never leave us and he'll never forsake us. And sometimes he might have to silence us so that we might stop and believe these promises afresh, that we might search them out, that we might memorize them, that we might hold on to them, that they might encourage our hearts but He will always bring His promises to pass. So I thought we might wrap up with a Ralph quote. It is Sunday evening, and he wrote a Luke commentary, and that's fitting. Here's what he says about this passage. You won't see any section in theology books on the fascination of God. Isn't that classic, Ralph? Or run into 30 pages there discussing his unguessable and interesting ways. I don't see material like this in any systematic theology books I know about. But that's still no excuse for not seeing it in the biblical text. God does things with a little spice. He's not caught in the conventional. He's not stuck in a rut. which is why he's so refreshing, isn't he? Your life, my life actually might be stuck in a rut right now. It might feel really mundane. It might feel like there's no way that God could have called me to this and there's no way that he's gonna come through and fulfill his promises to me in this sort of way. That's gotta be how Zechariah and Elizabeth felt in old age and barrenness and yet God made a promise and they believed it. A promise that they doubted initially, but it would come to pass, and it would bring joy, and it would bring wonder, and it would bring awe, not just to them, but to the surrounding community. What else might God be up to? The hand of the Lord was with them. The hand of our fascinating Lord is near to his people. And even in the mundane, or maybe the suffering, he's up to something. Namely, it's fulfilling his covenant promises to his people until he consummates his marriage with us at the great marriage supper of the Lamb when he comes again in glory. Just wait, and we'll see it. Let's go to him in prayer. Gracious Father, you are a wonderful, glorious, beautiful God. And you didn't have to reveal yourself to us, and yet by your grace and through your word, you did. And not only so, but you, by your grace, set your affection upon us. You didn't give us what we deserved. You poured out upon us blessing after blessing that we might know that you were with us and stand in awe of you, covenant-making and covenant-keeping God. And so Father, would you help us? Would you help us to be a people who learn and know and ponder and claim the promises of our great God. And would you get all the glory for it in Jesus' name, amen.