Day 3 of the Christmas Story, Shut My Mouth

Good morning. I hope you are getting into this story as much as I am. I feel like I’m reading a novel and when you stop reading for the day, the character is just hanging in limbo until you return to read more. So, we left Zechariah in limbo yesterday, noodle legged and woozy from the appearance of an angel, telling him his prayer had been answered, telling him the Messiah was on his way, telling him his own son would be the one to point to him. Did he say “his own son”? Slow down....This is all too much to take in....
18 Zechariah said to the angel, “How can I be sure this will happen? I’m an old man now, and my wife is also well along in years.”
I could be wrong, but I’m thinking Zechariah got stuck somewhere at the point of being scared and realizing there was an angel in the room, because it almost seems like all the details he just gave him flew over his head and all he heard was “we’re gonna have a baby after all these years”. He must have been in a daze from that point forward. Did anything ever shock you enough that you couldn’t get past the initial shock of the first bit of information you just heard, to process what all was said after that? I think Zechariah was still “processing” and “sorting through” in his mind the very first thing the angel said. And, like we as humans always do, our little friend called “Logic” stepped in and started giving his spin and interpretation on the situation. Logic told him, immediately, in that split second of thought, “wait, how can this be, how can I be sure, I’m old, Elizabeth’s old (well along in years, as he put it, smart man not to say “old”). This is not making any sense, this could not logically happen. Yeah, okay, it’s an angel, but there’s got to be some logical explanation for this. Let me just clarify this for you.”
Did Zechariah realize what the angel just said? Remember, Zechariah was a priest. It is certain that he knew the prophecies of Isaiah better than the average person, and could quote the verses from memory! Did the prophecy of Isaiah 40:3 come to his mind at all? (He is a voice shouting in the wilderness: Prepare a pathway for the Lord’s coming! Make a straight road for him!) Did he realize the one that was going to be shouting from the wilderness was his own soon-to-be-conceived, born-miraculously-late-in-life, part-of-prophecy, Holy-Spirit-filled, locust-eating, Elijah-like wilderness man, offspring, that the angel had just told him to name John? He had heard the prophecy, no doubt, all his life, but to connect the fact of the prophet Isaiah’s words, and actually connect it into his own physical life and offspring being a part of it, that was probably too much to even comprehend at the moment! The two were probably not connecting at this point. It may not have been clicking at that moment. It was all happening so fast! So much information. What did he say? We’re going to have a child? How can this be? I’m old, Elizabeth is “well along in years” (she’s old). So, dumbfounded and shaking as he must have been, he and his friend Logic found the strength to blurt this very question out to the angel, who as of yet, was unnamed.
19 Then the angel said, “I am Gabriel! I stand in the very presence of God. It was He who sent me to bring you this good news! 20 But now, since you didn’t believe what I said, you will be silent and unable to speak until the child is born. For my words will certainly be fulfilled at the proper time.”
Ooops! I think at that moment, reality finally caught up with him. Gabriel seems very stern and direct in his answer to Zechariah. “Do you have the slightest idea who I am!!??? I am Gabriel. Remember the angel that spoke to Daniel and revealed the prophecy up until the end of time? Do you know I stand in the very presence of God? I wait for his words to send me to my post, to my assigned place. Do you know I don’t just show up all the time for some light announcement? Zechariah, get a grip on the gravity of this moment! I am the same guy that showed up and Daniel fell out cold! I came to him when God’s people were in bondage. Zechariah, they are still in bondage, and I am coming to tell you that bondage is about to end!!! And then, he pronounced it – a judgment upon Zechariah’s unbelief - - he was struck mute! He would be unable to speak until the time his son, John, was born. In fact, some translations of the word indicate he was deaf AND dumb and could neither hear nor speak. Talk about being cast into utter silence. What’s the first thing you’re gonna want to do as soon as this is over? Run out and tell somebody!
My husband and I were talking about this and asking why was he struck mute? And I think there are a lot of possibilities. One, when God is up to something big and he has set about to fulfill his plans, he does not want any talk of negativity or unbelief. It has no place in the work of God. It must be silenced. Later in Jesus ministry on earth, scripture said he didn’t do many miracles in his hometown because of the people’s unbelief. It certainly wasn’t because he couldn’t. It is because God shows up in an environment and an atmosphere of belief! Unbelief stifles the power and the work of God. How many times did Jesus tell a person their faith and their belief was instrumental in the miracle they received? Unbelief stifles the movement of God, and it still does today. If you have a dire situation and you want Christians praying, which ones are you going to surround yourself with? The negative, the unbelieving, the doubtful, those who can logically tell you your disease will kill you, or your child might never repent, or you will probably lose everything you have, or those who believe that God is faithful, God has a plan, God’s promises are trustworthy, that God can do more than we could even hope or imagine, and whatever God says he will do, HE WILL DO! Same thing here, there is no room for unbelief in the presence of God. Zechariah was standing right next to the holiest place of the Temple, the only thing on the earth at that time higher being the Holy of Holies, which he nor anybody else would never see. Only the high priest would enter that room, and only on one day a year, the Day of Atonement. Nobody had direct access to God! This is as close as you could ever get. And yet, he was about to get a direct message straight from the throne room. I wonder if later he would see the overwhelming picture! He was as close as he would ever get, and in that moment, the very messenger of God, who actually stood in his very presence day and night, in the most Holy of Holies, the actual dwelling place of God in heaven, was sent to him, that day, to reveal to Zechariah, an announcement that would shake the very foundations of the world until the end of time, that would change the course of life as they had known it.
Maybe God struck him dumb, so he would be alone with his thoughts for the next 9 months. Maybe God struck him dumb, so Elizabeth would also be inclined to pull away into deep thought and prayer.
Who knows, but you can be sure Gabriel was more than a little put off by this man’s unbelief. I would be too, had I come straight from the presence of God, to do his bidding. But you know, Zechariah is just like all of us. God sends his presence daily into an unbelieving world. This whole story is about him sending Jesus. Sending him to a world of “educated” Logical Thinkers, a world that cannot seem to believe, cannot seem to trust, cannot seem to understand there is more than the human eye can see, cannot acknowledge our need for Him, and always must understand and analyze. So don’t judge Zechariah too harshly. We might have done the same thing!
Today, realize that any area of unbelief in your life is an area that God will have trouble gaining access to. What is it he is trying to tell you? What is it in your time alone with God that he has said and you have swept under the rug? And what has your logical reaction and explanation been up to this point? Do you actually think your mind is infinite enough to begin to comprehend God’s ways? What is he wanting to do that you have questioned and not believed because it just didn’t make logical sense? One thing you will see throughout this month is a set of unlikely characters, all human in their own feeble ways, being found face to face with divinity, with an unstoppable plan, in the middle of an impossible situation, with God’s timing coming to fruition, with things they could not even begin to analyze enough to ever understand, and a picture that they probably wouldn’t begin to comprehend until maybe years down the road, maybe not even in their human lifetime. And that, my friend, is exactly how God likes it! Then.... and now. I think Zechariah’s muteness forced him to the end of himself.
I pray to God, shut our mouths when we cannot speak truth, when we cannot believe, when we cannot say “your will be done”, when our actions and words would interfere with the very work of the Holy Spirit in our lives, the lives of our family, and possibly the lives of the world. Shut our mouths God.
In quietness.
Teresa