Luke 1:76-80

Luke chapter 1, verses 67 through 80. Our focus is going to be on verses 76 through 80, but I’ll begin reading with verse 67. And his father, Zacharias, was filled with the Holy Ghost and prophesied, saying, Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he hath visited and redeemed his people, and hath raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David. As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began, that we should be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all that hate us, to perform the mercy promised to our fathers, and to remember his holy covenant, the oath which he swear to our Father Abel. him that he would grant unto us that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all the days of our life. And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the highest, for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways. to give knowledge of salvation unto his people by the remission of their sins, through the tender mercy of our God, whereby the day spring from on high hath visited us, to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace. And the child grew, waxed strong in spirit, and was in the desert still the day of his showing unto Israel. May God bless to us his sacred and holy word this morning. Ministers are to be like compasses in the sense that they’re always to point in the same direction, regardless of the weather conditions, or the position of the instrument. ministers are not to be like weather veins, letting the wind of popular opinion, blow them about whichever way the spirit of the times turns them. Our text here is part of Zacharias’s Song of Praise regarding two things. One, the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. and two, the forer of Christ, John the Baptist, his son. Having spoken of the coming Messiah in verses 68 through 75, Zacharias now speaks of his son as the one who will herald the coming of Christ, verses 76 through 80. What he says, concerning John, provides, I think, a good picture of what a faithful minister should be. And I’d like to look at the text from that point of view. Let me begin by the raising, talk about the raising up of a minister. Verse 76, and thou child shall be called the prophet of the highest, for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways. Now, you see here that you are prepared to be a prophet of the Lord. God’s calling to the ministry will be openly acknowledged by men, and thou shalt be called the prophet of the highest. Zacharias here, turning his eyes upon God’st be called the prophet of the highest. purpose for his infant son speaks of John’s office and work at this particular time. This was done for the sake of those who were present. It was a prophetic utterance, putting special emphasis on the importance of John’s role in regard to Christ. Thou shalt be called means that John will be considered here. He will be openly acknowledged as the prophet of the highest, or the prophet of the Lord. Scripture declares to us that there was a man sent from God, his name was John in John’s Gospel, Chapter 1, verse 6. That’s the divine side of things. God sent John. Here, we see the human side. Zacharias speaks of the people becoming aware of the fact that John has been sent by God, and he is the prophet of the highest. When God gifts a man to be a minister of Christ, people will recognize this man was sent by God. God’s people hear Christ voice speaking to them through such a minister. and they acknowledged that God has raised up this man and gifted this man to proclaim the word of God. It was a backwoods preacher. It was not very eloquent, but evidently he was a very faithful man in his ministry. His message was convicting. And even though he wasn’t well educated, people certainly realized he was called to preach. Now, on one occasion, he was able to listen and hear a young preacher who was fresh out of seminary. And the young man was well educated, very impressed with his own background and oratory skills. His sermon, while flowery and full of big words, lacked substance and failed to glorify the Savior. When the sermon was over and most of the people, had left, the backwoods preacher walked up to this young minister and said this, young man, were you sent? Or did you just went? Sadly, many ministers just went into the ministry, and they weren’t sent by God. When a man is sent by God, God’s people will acknowledge that God has gifted this man to teach us and to help us. in the things of God. So God’s calling to the ministry will be openly acknowledged by men here. Notice that God demands you declare his revelation to men. To be a prophet. Now, a prophet usually is a man that proclaims God’s message to the people. He, there are false prophets, of course, but normally when the scripture speaks here of a good prophet, we’re talking about someone who is. reveals God’s truth. He’s a foreteller. A prophet, however, may be a foreteller also in the sense of being one who speaks of the future, such as John does with regard to the coming Messiah and the vengeance of God upon a wayward nation that he talks about in his ministry. But what is unique here is that God had not raised up a prophet for how many years? years, 400 years since Malachi. So this was something that would also grab attention. What John will say is not going to be much different than what the other prophets have foretold, except for John is now going to say the kingdom of heaven is at hand, and the Messiah is here. Now, the key duty of a prophet or a minister is to faithfully. declare what God has revealed. Here’s what God told the prophet Jeremiah in chapter 1, verse 7. Whatsoever I command thee, thou shalt speak. Now that’s really the command that’s given to the minister. Tell the people what I has said in my word. As he said later in Jeremiah chapter 23, verse 28, he that hath my word let him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat? death the Lord. What man says is chaff. What God says is wheat. What’s important is that we proclaim the wheat, what God has said in his word. The Roman Catholic priests were quite upset with Martin Luther during the early days of the Reformation. Why were they angry with Luther? Simply put, he faithfully expounded the scripture. The key purpose of the Roman Catholic Church was to keep people in dark about what God had said. Now, if you may think, well, that, Jack, that’s an awful harsh criticism, then why was the Bible placed on the forbidden book list by the Catholics? They didn’t want people reading it. Here’s Luther, opening the scriptures, teaching people out of the Word of God. He doesn’t care what. what the counsels say. He doesn’t care about the traditions that have been passed down through the years. He’s saying, does say it the Lord. That made a difference in his day. And when that occurs, the Roman Catholic Church could not promote their errors that keep people in the dark. So they bitterly complained of Luther, and here’s their quote, spoiling their market. People weren’t buying their goods anymore. They weren’t believing the Catholic Church over this. They said, but for Luther, they might have persuaded the people of Germany to eat hay. Think about that. People may be satisfied with eating chaff until they eat wheat. Luther gave him the wheat. And the minister should be giving you the wheat, not the chaff. And when you have the wheat, you say, why do I want to eat chaff? I want the word of God. I want to hear what God has to say. Faithful ministers declare God. word. They’re not adding to it. They’re not taking away from it. They’re telling you what God says. God demand you to declare his revelation to man. As a minister, you are to serve Christ. He is to be the prophet of the highest. The highest here means the most high God. It’s a name usually given to Jehovah in the Old Testament. But here, it’s applied to Christ. Because you’ll notice the Lord that he mentions in the very next verse is speaking of Christ. Jesus Christ is the mighty God. Or as Paul writes in the book of Romans chapter 9, verse 5, that he is the God overall, blessed forever. Overall, he’s the God of the highest. He’s the highest. The son of the highest. Christ is called the Lord, as I said in the next clause here. Not the next verse, but the next clause indicating his deity that he was indeed God manifested in the flesh. So, he was, Here’s the minister’s duty. He is to be serving the Lord Jesus Christ, who is his king, who is his Lord, and who is his Savior. Christ may be recognized as the most high God who rules overall, and we are to have a submissive spirit to him. So you are to be a prophet of Christ or proclaim Christ. Notice something else. You are to prepare a people. for Christ’s coming. Verse 76 says, for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways. John prepares the way for the coming of Christ. Now, this little phrase here that he speaks about in verse 76 is a simplified version of really what we read in Isaiah. If you hold your place here and look at Isaiah Isaiah chapter 40, we see what he’s actually drawing upon, the text that he’s looking particularly to consider at this point. And that’s chapter 40 of Isaiah, verses 3 to 5. The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. every valley shall be exalted, every mountain and hills shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough place is plain, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it. When the mouth of the Lord has spoken it, it will come to pass. Now the language here is borrowed from that of kings who would come and visit a particular place. Maybe king and he might be an army commander or ahead of the command of an army at that point. And what they would do is they would send out engineers ahead of the king and ahead of the army to clear the way for them. In advance of a coming king and the main army, they would go out there with their shovels and their axes and their picks and so forth. Where the road was bad, they would make it smooth. They would repair it. If no road existed, they would make a road. They cut passages through the woods. They built bridges over streams and rivers. They filled in the low places. They leveled the hills. They made his way smooth and straight. Thus, John here was appointed to go before and prepare the way for the great king. the Lord Jesus Christ who is coming. It’s like the preparation you would as a human king. Only this is in a spiritual sense, he’s prepared the way. In addition, John would instruct the people in the truths concerning salvation and thus gather a people who would be ready for the coming Christ. When Christ came, John then would fade from the scene. and he has accomplished his purpose at that point. As he said about Christ, he must increase, but I must decrease. So I’ve done my job, and I am now finished with my task, and Christ should be exalted. So John prepares the way for the coming of Christ. I have to say that men still need to be prepared for the coming of Christ today. Not the first coming, because that’s already taken place, but for the second coming. Like John, the minister, warns people, to flee from the wrath to come. For Christ, the king is coming. In flaming fire to take vengeance on them that know not God and obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. The minister says, therefore, be also ready. In such an hour as you think not, the Son of Man cometh. That’s what the minister says. Be prepared. True ministers are preparing the bride, so to speak, for the coming bridegroom, Jesus Christ. The elect are brought to salvation before the returning of our Savior Jesus Christ. But you’re like one of the virgins with the lamp in hand, awaiting the coming of Christ in Matthew chapter 25. To be prepared, you have to have oil in your lamp. Now, sadly, there are those who don’t have oil on their lamp. In the visible church, all may profess to be devoted to Jesus Christ, to be part of the bride be a pure virgin-like with regard to outward behavior. But not all such professors are wise, virgin. Some are foolish. Don’t have. have oil on the lamp. Wise virgins have the inward graces of the spirit of God. Foolish ones do not. Only those with the grace is the spirit, the oil, so to speak, are prepared for Christ’s coming and enjoy the marriage feast and can enter into heavenly bliss. Those who are foolish virgins are shot out of the festivities. and enjoy nothing of the salvation found in Christ. You should be therefore watchful and examine yourself to see if you’re prepared for Christ’s coming. So it’s the minister’s task to do his best to teach you God’s word and prepare you for the day of Jesus Christ. So the raising up of a minister, you are to be a prophet of Christ, so to speak, and you are to prepare people for Christ’s coming. Secondly, the work the minister, verse of 77 to 79. One, you are the way God gives the knowledge of salvation to people. Notice verse 77, the first part of it. To give the knowledge, or to give knowledge of salvation onto his people. John would preach a message of salvation from sin through the coming Messiah. This salvation comes by the means of the knowledge of God’s truth. Now, this knowledge is not simply an understanding of the facts regarding salvation in Christ. But there’s a sense in which, as the scriptures tell us, it is written in the prophets and they shall all be taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard and learned of the Father, cometh unto me, John 645. As the minister preaches and he gives out the knowledge of God’s truth, there’s a sense in which the Holy Spirit teaches you inwardly and applies that truth to your heart so you really do have the knowledge of the truth. Not every hearer of the gospel is granted this divinely given knowledge, but in the preaching the gospel, we find it is through this means that the Holy Spirit opens people’s understanding and grants them a knowledge of the way of salvation in Jesus Christ. It’s the minister’s task to proclaim the truth and it’s the spirit’s task to apply the truth and make it effectual in the heart. The minister gives the outward call. the Holy Spirit gives the inward call. And so you’ll have a true knowledge of the gospel of Jesus Christ. I’ve read that in the reign of Queen Elizabeth there was a law passed that everybody had to go to the parish church which they had particular areas and had churches. Now depending on who was in power it could be Catholic, it could be Protestant, you know, it could be a in this case, Church of England. Many dedicated Catholics loved to go and hear Protestant doctrine. So through fear of persecution, they had to attend the parish church, go to the Church in England, but they took care to stuff their ears with cotton so that they would not hear any derogatory things said about the Roman Catholic Church. Man naturally is filled with a prejudice against the things of the Lord. Mean would stuff his ears. You know, put his hands over his ears, so to speak. If I could literally put it that way, not to hear the message of the gospel. Thankfully, though as one preaches the gospel, God works upon the sinner to unstop his ears and grant him a saving knowledge of the truth. So you are the way God gives the knowledge of salvation to people. as a minister, we proclaim God’s truth. It’s by the foolishness of preaching that God is pleased many times to save those who believe. So you were to proclaim a salvation also by remission of sins. The second part of verse 77, by the remission of their sins. Remember John’s famous proclamation. Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. An important part of the gospel message is that God forgives sin through the person and work of Jesus Christ. He takes away all the sin that would condemn you before the law of God so that you have remission of it. sins are debts, as the scripture says. forgiving them is a remitting of those debts, a freeing you of the obligation to pay them. in this case, to endure the penalty of the law. The Bible says in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins in Ephesians 1.7. So God doesn’t merely overlook your sin, but he actually takes your sin debt and has it. paid so that it can be remitted. And it’s paid by Christ. Christ satisfies the demands of divine justice. So that if Christ has died in your place, God is satisfied and can forgive your sins on that basis. I read about some first missionaries to Greenland who thought that the natives there were too debased and too primitive to understand the doctrine of the Atonement, and therefore they began to teach them solely about the existence of God and about his attributes. However, that didn’t produce any conversions. But in the process of translating the Bible into the language of the people there in Greenland, they came to John Chapter 3. And when the natives read John chapter 3, verse 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. A Greenlander said, is this true? And the missionary said, yes, it is true. And the natives said, why then didn’t you tell us this at first? For that is good news indeed. You can only benefit the sinner by telling the sinner, by telling the sinner. God’s remedy for his sin. And the remedy is through Christ. To you to proclaim a salvation by remission of sins. Thirdly, you are to speak of the tender mercy of God in salvation, verse 78A. Through the tender mercy of our God. Now, the minister must make it clear that God does not just forgive sin, nor does he forgive sin on the basis of the personal merit of the sinner that somehow rather he can earn. this forgiveness. We could never do enough works, good works to somehow balance out the evil that we’ve done. Pardon comes as a result of the tender mercy of God. That’s the message. It was mercy and compassion that move God to reach out, send his son, and save sinners. God, having chosen a people, in Christ, decreed the fall of mankind in Adam, provided a Savior for the elect in Jesus Christ. So that we read about Christ in the book of Ephesians under these words in Ephesians 523. Christ is the head of the church first. Secondly, he is the Savior of the body. He’s the head of the church because you’re chosen in Christ first. And then after the fall, he becomes the Savior of the body. as well. Those two things are connected together. God was determined to show his tender mercy in the plan of salvation. Mercy in sending his son in the fullness of time. Mercy and providing Christ as a sacrifice for sin as the Lamb of God for a burnt offering. Mercy and accepting the sacrifice of Christ in the place of the sinner and mercy in forgiving all the sins of his people. so that it’s not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to his mercy, he saved us. Titus 3.5. So you’re to speak of the tender mercy of God and salvation. You are to proclaim the message concerning Christ whereby the day spring. from on high hath visited us, the last part of verse 78, and then 79, to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death to guide our feet in the way of peace. Now, the day spring speaks about the dawning of the day. We usually don’t call it the day spring today. We call it sunrise. The rising of the sun. Christ in scripture in the book of Malachi is called the son of righteousness which arises with healing in his wings in the book of Malachi chapter 4 verse 2. He visits the earth. The incarnation of Christ allows Christ to come into view like the sun rising. And he’s seen then, according to verse 79, as the light of the world. He comes from all. on high, for he comes down from heaven. He was equal with the father, as the Bible indicates, but he comes to earth as the God man to give light, to give spiritual illumination to those, his elect, who presently sit in spiritual darkness. You know, when the sun isn’t up, you’re in the dark. And so when the sun arises, there’s light. And so when the sun arises, there’s light. for those in darkness. God’s people were in spiritual ignorance and blindness. But Christ comes, and those who resided in the shadow of death, with eternal death and hellfire hanging over them, so to speak, are delivered. If you ever walked on a sunny day and you have the suny sun, behind you, it casts a shadow before you. And that shadow passes before you actually get where you’re walking. Now, if you’re under the shadow of death, that means death isn’t far behind. It’s coming. And with death coming, God’s people were in the shadow. That’s how close it was. The idea is that death is on its way. It’s cast a shadow over God’s people. And they need the sun to come up. They need to be delivered from that. You didn’t know the way of peace with God. You were alienated from him. You were his enemy. Christ didn’t come merely to teach you the way of peace, but to make peace by the way of his cross. And by his spirit and by his word to lead you into the true way of enjoying spiritual peace. peace and eternal peace in the world to come. We have peace on earth now, and we’ll have peace eternally in the world to come. The focus of the true minister’s message then is always, behold, the Lamb of God. True peace and happiness is to be found in Christ alone. There is no salvation any other. Thirdly, that was the work of the ministry. Thirdly, we see the preparation of the ministry. Thirdly, we see the preparation. of the minister, verse 80, and the child grew and waxed strong in spirit, and was in the deserts till the day of his showing unto Israel. John grew up from a child into a man and increased in knowledge and wisdom. But the key point is he waxed strong and spirit, and I take this not to mean that he’s just a strong-willed person, but I think what is being spoken of here that he was part. powerfully guided and controlled by the spirit of God, who you recall was in him from birth, or from the womb, actually. So we see that he was filled with the spirit in the womb in the womb. In the womb in chapter 1, verse 15. So John didn’t dwell in any of the cities or the larger towns growing up. He was in remote areas, deserts. areas, kept away, the hustle and bustle, and the corruption, the cities, and so forth, isolated in many ways. God was preparing him for the gravity of the work he was going to do and the austerity of his life. He was going to have to eat locusts and wild honey and so forth. He was not brought up in any of the schools of the prophets. He didn’t sit under the… the direction of any rabbis or theologically elite people in Israel. He was never corrupted by the thought of their false doctrine in any way. So God isolated him so he wouldn’t be corrupted. And we see he remained in this obscurity till the time of his public ministry, all the while being strengthened. by the Spirit of God, being prepared for the task of hand. Let me make these observations. The best preparation for the ministry is not theological training in a seminary is helpful and as good as that can be, but be made spiritually strong by the Spirit of God. It’s one thing to be taught of men, it’s another thing to be taught of God. A man taught by God is much superior to any religious training by human beings. God is a way of training men, sometimes in obscurity, before they enter into public office. It’s odd that this is the way God often works, but he does this. And the man who faithfully serves God in an obscure place is then ready. to serve God in a more public manner. If you serve God faithfully in the little things, in obscurity, then you may be raised up to do something more public and more open before men. And so we see these kinds of things coming out here in this text. Well, ministers should be like the needle of the compass, always pointing one direction toward the country. truth, regardless of circumstances. This passage about John the Baptist does give us some hints, I think, about the minister of the gospel. We see the raising up of a minister. We see the proclamation of the minister, and we see the preparation of the minister here and his background in this text as well. Well, let us close with the word of prayer.