Lenten Tour of the Gospels

Luke 1: One Final Hope

In a loud voice she exclaimed: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear!"

Does any human emotion run as deep as hope? Fairy tales, which are nearly universal, pass down from generation to generation an irrepressible sense that in the end the forces of evil will lose the struggle and the brave and good will somehow triumph. For the people Luke introduces in this first chapter of his Gospel, all hope seems like a fairy tale. As Middle Eastern empires rise and fall, the tiny nation of Israel can never truly break free from the domination of greater powers. No prophet has spoken to the people in four centuries. God has long threatened to hide his face, and indeed a dark shadow has fallen across the planet.

For four centuries, the four hundred years of God's silence, the Jews have waited and wondered. One flicker of hope remains, the ancient promise of a Messiah. On that promise the Jews stake everything. Then, suddenly, stories spread about the birth of a baby unlike any other. Luke takes care to relate these stories to the predictions of a Messiah given by the Old Testament prophets who originally stirred the hope. He portrays John the Baptist as an "Elijah" sent to prepare the way for the Lord.

It was Elizabeth and Zechariah who were among the very first to sense the change that came with the Messiah. Devout believers from priestly families, they represented the best of the old order. They had devoted many years to serving God under the Old Testament law. Yet a cloud of sadness hung over their lives, for they were growing old, and the greatest blessing they could imagine had been denied them. Childless, they knew their line would die out when they passed away.

Then the new era abruptly broke in. One day as Zechariah was performing his duties in the temple, an angel brought some astounding news: He would have a son! Zechariah, long past the age of parenthood, asked for proof and got perhaps more than he had bargained for (1:20) A short while later a relative of Elizabeth's named Mary brought even greater news. The Messiah, the Savior the Jews had been longing for, was on the way! Not only had God answered Elizabeth's and Zechariahs' personal prayers; their nations long waiting would soon come to an end as well.