The Silence of God -- Part 2

The Silence of God – Part 2

In Luke Chapter 1, we find the first prophet in all the land since Malachi, over 400 years prior. A prophet brought words from the Lord since the Holy Spirit had not come to indwell all believers, and no one heard from the Lord for those 400 years despite searching high and low for anyone who had heard a Word. They clung to God’s previous teachings and versed themselves in what words and guidelines they already had that came from Moses. Some had stepped in and put themselves in charge as Pharisees, teachers of the Law, and added with some supposed divine authority many other laws.

What Luke has to say about this prophet that would come in the spirit of Elijah is the fulfillment of Malachi’s prophecy. He begins with Zacharias – the Levite and husband of Elizabeth who was cousin to Mary, fiancé of Joseph – who was serving his turn tending the altar of incense in the temple this particular year. It is no coincidence that the altar of incense was the representation of the prayers of the people, a place of conversing with God. During this precise duty, the angel Gabriel visited Zacharias with a word from the Lord. That alone would make a man speechless, but the fact that Zacharias laughed in true disbelief at the message is what made him literally speechless for the next 9 ½ months during his wife’s pregnancy.  There’s that theme of silence again.

Jesus confirmed that John was the Elijah the people were waiting for but he was not the Messiah they were waiting for as they thought Elijah would be (Matthew 11:14; 17:11-13).

Now, what’s really exciting is that Malachi’s very last words, and thereby God’s last words were, “Watch for the forerunner to prepare people’s hearts for the Messiah, the sonship of God the Father.” Then the forerunner shows up. We see in Matthew that many people missed their Elijah, the forerunner. But notice how God shows up.

John 1:1, 14

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. …And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us.

FINALLY!!! God speaks!!! John was the first prophet since Malachi but he was born only 6 months before Jesus was so he wasn’t talking when Jesus was born. No, Jesus was God in the flesh, the living Word from the living God. The silence was broken by the birth, even conception of Christ!

God even provided every opportunity for people to hear Him. If you do the gestational math of Luke 1, you’ll find that, because the Jews watched for Elijah to return at Passover (they even set an empty seat at the Seder table for him and left the door open for his return), then it’s most likely that John was born around Passover. If this is true, then that places Jesus’s birth very near the Feast of Tabernacles. That would fit Herod’s wicked tactics to tell the Jews they could not come to Jerusalem for the last of their three pilgrimage feasts, but instead had to return to their town of origin, which led to Jesus being born in a manger. The point is, the Feast of Tabernacles is also called the Feast of Booths. Jesus’s blood ran rich with the Tabernacling metaphor. Any attentive student of the Word should have been able to see Christ for who He was. He was the Word made flesh to tabernacle among us. He was the manna in the wilderness when the Israelites tabernacled on their way to the Promised Land.

 

Part 3 of this article will follow soon. Stay tuned……………