Salvation: Love’s Ambition: Luke 1:67-79

Well sermon scripture reading comes from Luke chapter one, verses sixty-seven through seventy-nine this morning.

Luke one, sixty-seven through seventy-nine.

You find that page eight oh three in your uh cheer Bibles.

Here now the reading of God's holy word.

And his father, Zechariah, was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, saying, Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people, and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David, as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, that we should be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us, to show the mercy promised to our fathers, and to remember his holy covenant, the oath that he swore to our father Abraham, to grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies, might serve him without fear, and holiness and righteousness before him all our days.

And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people, and the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit from on high, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.

Let us pray.

Do not fear.

We thank you for the gift of being sons and daughters of the King.

And Lord, we praise you and we thank you for the gift of fresh bread that you nourish us with.

We thank you for the ways that you supply us with what we need.

And so Lord, we ask and we pray even this morning that you would nourish us, that you would fill us and feed us.

And Lord, that we would give voice of thanksgiving to your goodness in Jesus' name.

Amen.

So we come to uh the final song in our Advent series this morning, uh found in the book of the Gospel of Dr.

Luke.

And it's a song of Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist.

And um Zechariah, what we know of Zechariah is that he, like Mary, the song that we heard of last week, um, knew his scriptures.

He was a man who, being an older priest, knew how to fulfill his duties.

And we know that he was also without a child.

And so he knew something about the unfulfilled uh longings and something about waiting.

And on the night that his division was uh on duty, he was chosen amongst those serving to enter the temple of the Lord and to burn incense.

And so he enters into the temple and and he goes into the holy place, and you can imagine the fear that comes upon his face and comes over him as he enters in and he sees someone else in that place, and it was an angel.

And and the angel is standing right near the bowl of incense where he's about to conduct his responsibilities as priest.

And and and and yet you can also come to appreciate the relief that comes over him, the comfort that is brought to him when the angel speaks and says, Fear not.

Fear not.

And then the good news that he brings from then on, saying, Your prayer has been heard.

Your wife is pregnant, and you will be given a son, and he shall be called John.

And you will have joy, and you will have gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great before the Lord.

He will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared.

Wonderful news that he received at that time.

And so Zechariah, hearing this, uh, says and responds, Well, how will I know this?

I'm an old man, and so is my wife.

And the angel Gabriel, who's giving him this news, responds by saying, You'll be silent and unable to speak until that day, because you didn't believe my words which will be fulfilled in their time.

And so here's a man who was brought low in many respects, given this wonderful news, but also brought low for nine months, unable to speak.

But it's the words that come from his mouth after his tongue is loosened that are the focus for our celebration this morning.

I want to see into the heart of this priest and what the Spirit impressed upon him, so that we too might be given reason to sing this day.

And so the first point this morning is that a loosened tongue sings of blessing.

What brings us to sing?

Blessing.

Well, we see here, surprisingly, that the first words of Zecharias's loosened tongue are not, woe is me, for I have just gone through this.

But words of blessing.

I've got to imagine that Zecharias spent many a day taking seriously the connection that the angel made between promise and fulfillment.

Promise and fulfillment.

That when God makes a promise, he's serious about keeping it, and he can be relied upon to fulfill it.

That was the connection that was being made.

That was the point that the angel would drive home during those nine months.

And in that, and then in that light, we can see that this touch of intervention is actually a touch of love.

Humility is an interesting flower because it tends to spring up and bud in winter.

It's often found flourishing in the trials of our lives, in the unmet longings, in the weaknesses that we endure.

And rarely are we stronger than when we are made weak?

How many of us can speak to gripping a little more tightly to the promises of God in our weakness?

Whereas in summer the promises of God might be kept at arm's length, in winter we bring them in and we hold them close, and we're warmed by them.

Spurgeon said it well, it is not how much we have, but how much we enjoy that makes happiness.

It is not how much we have, but how much we enjoy that makes happiness.

We may know many promises, but it's how much they have of us that makes all the difference.

And so power for the Christian life comes as we press in right where God has spoken.

Until his promises work their way into us, and they begin to thaw our hearts, and and then our hearts begin to drip drops of love.

I remember having an old uh wooden fireplace in our house as a child, and there were many days that we would go out and we would play in the frost or in the snow, and then we would come inside and we would come back to this old wooden fireplace, and we would take off the gloves and the socks, and we would warm ourselves directly by the warmth of this fire.

The promises of God have that that same thawing effect on our hearts.

One Puritan writer spoke of this experience.

He said, No sooner does the soul begin to feel the life of a promise warming his heart, relieving, cherishing, supporting, delivering it from fear, entanglements, or troubles.

But it may, it ought, to know that the Holy Spirit is there, which will add to his joy and lead him into fellowship with him.

Do you know something of this warmth of God's promises?

The presence of the Holy Spirit.

Have you allowed yourself to be warned by the promises of Jesus?

That, behold, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age?

How many of us have been renewed by a promise like this to take courage to take a step into the present darkness?

How oftentimes has a promise like that made us and given us courage?

Or how many of us have had our fears driven away, being warned by his promise that all that the Father gives me will come to me?

And whoever comes to me, I will never drive away?

How many of us have had our fears driven away by such a promise?

Has the promise that I will come back and take you to be with me where I am, that you may be there also, taking the chill off our wandering affections.

How often has that brought us back to the presence of God, warming our affections toward Him?

Because we know that He will He will hold us as we sung over this morning, that He wants us to be with Him where He is.

You see, it's not enough just to be around the promises of God.

We need to get nice and close and warm ourselves by them.

Trusting that God never fails to keep His word.

That's the Holy Spirit bringing advent, comfort, and consolation.

The incarnation reminds us that we can sing because God is always sure to fulfill his promises.

His timing is always right.

And so a loosened tongue can speak of blessing.

A loosened tongue can also sing of visitation.

Not only does a loosened tongue sing of blessing, of promise, but of visitation.

We read that when the time had fully come, God sent forth his son.

And what's impressed upon Zechariah at this time is that he is in the midst of a grand story that is playing out.

He is part of something that God is at the center of.

And yes, he has a part to play, but it's just that.

It's just a part.

The story is much greater, much grander, much larger than himself.

And he was very aware of God doing a new thing.

God is the one sending angels.

God is the one who is raising up a child.

God is the one sending a son, the one fulfilling his promises.

And so the singing soul is conscious that God is active and that God is with us.

His presence and concern for his people.

In the person of Jesus Christ, God visited this earth in humble condescension.

Which means that he left the prerogatives of heaven, all the things that he had, and he came and putting them aside, he came and took on human flesh.

He faced the chill of night.

He experienced the suffering of this world.

He walked in our shoes, coming to us in the vulnerability of human flesh.

C.S.

Lewis speaks to this vulnerable love.

Perhaps you've heard him say, to love at all is to be vulnerable.

Love anything in your heart will be wrung and possibly broken.

If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give it to no one, not even to an animal.

Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries, avoid all entanglements, lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness.

But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, earless, it will change.

It will not be broken, it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.

Because to love is to be vulnerable.

And you see, the basis for the love that Lewis speaks of here is found in Jesus taking on the vulnerability of human flesh with all of that encompassed.

With all that he faced in doing so.

But here's the glory of his lowly vulnerability.

The purpose of his coming into this world and loving vulnerability then has everything to do with his ministry toward us today.

And I want us to see that connection as we await his second advent.

Because it means that his highly, his high priestly intercession for us today, being in heaven right now, at this very moment, is shaped by his feet walking on this soil of this earth, the tiredness, the aches, and the pains, and more than all of that, the heartache that he endured as a man of sorrows acquainted with much grief.

And so that means his ministry today is one of sympathy.

And so as he intercedes for us in heaven at this very moment, he does so recognizing the perils of darkness that weigh upon human hearts, like yours and mine.

That is the glory of his incarnation and now his high priestly intercession.

And so sympathy means not giving up and not giving in.

Not giving in on all the ways that he wants to prepare us for eternal joy, yet not giving up on us as we wait and persevere for his second advent.

Because he has walked in our shoes, he knows what it's like to face the things you're going through right now.

And because of that, he won't give up on you and he won't give in.

And so we sing of humble visitation.

Third, we sing of redemption.

The singing soul has reason to sing because of redemption.

Christmas is all about our inability to reach heaven by ourselves.

And in order for that to happen, God had to come to us.

Pastor Theologian Jonathan Edwards said this.

He said, the creation of the world was a very great thing, but not so great as the incarnation of Christ.

It was a great thing for God to make the creature, but not so great as for the Creator Himself to become a creature.

God becoming man was greater than all previous events in history.

The greatest person was born that ever was or ever will be.

And so, in order to redeem, Jesus needed to be without all the spoils of our shared sinful nature.

Although he came near, although he came walking in our shoes, he did so without any of the corruption that plagues the human race.

And that was essential in order for him to accomplish our salvation.

And he came to set our hearts free.

Because only love can truly cause us to trust and to and to love him.

Only love can relieve the fears that we have.

Only love would move us to cast ourselves into his hands or into the lap of his mercy.

And that regret redemption came at great cost.

Not this morning, but we sing of it other times.

He breaks the power of canceled sin.

He sets the prisoner free.

His blood can make the foulest clean.

His blood availed for me.

His blood availed for me.

His blood availed for me.

You see how personal that is.

How smoothly the boat sailed along the water.

Tom enjoyed the warm sunshine, admiring the little boat that he had built.

Suddenly a strong current caught the boat.

Tom tried to pull it back to the shore, but the string broke.

The little boat raced downstream.

Tom ran along the sandy shore as fast as he could, but his little boat soon slipped out of his sight.

All afternoon he searched for the boat.

Finally, when it was too dark to look any longer, Tom sadly went home.

A few days later, on the way home from school, Tom spotted a boat just like his in a store window.

And when he got closer, he he could see, sure enough, it was his.

Tom hurried to the store manager.

Sir, that's my boat in your window.

And I made it.

Sorry, son, but someone else bought it in this morning.

If you want it, you have to buy it for a dollar.

Tom ran home and counted all his money, exactly one dollar.

When he reached the store, he rushed to the counter.

Here's the money for my boat.

As he left the store, he held the boat close to him, hugging it, and he was heard walking away singing, now you're twice mine.

First I made you, and now I bought you.

God's love is a love that made you.

It's also a love that bought you.

You and I are twice his.

You were twice as.

And yet it wasn't without the sacrifice of his life.

That's how extravagant his love is.

That's how wonderful his love is.

That's how deep and how wide and how how broad his love is.

That he was willing to go to such lengths to bring you and I near to him.

And so the singing soul has a reason to sing of redemption.

A heart set free.

And then one final reason a loosened tongue has reason to sing is the application of redemption to sinners.

John the Baptist would come as a forerunner to the Christ.

That was what was spoken of.

Empowered by the Holy Spirit, he would come and he would be led, empowered by the Holy Spirit to turn many toward God as a way of salvation and the forgiveness of sins.

And I think we would agree that one of the hardest trials in life, one of the things that grieves us most, is the heartache of not being able to dive deeply enough into the souls of those we love to bring about their salvation and their wholeness.

Isn't that one of the hardest heartaches that we?

Ever experience.

Jesus, more than any other, knew this heartache.

But Christmas reminds us that the love of Christ, being the love of God, is always effective and always fruitful.

Where our love meets a limit, his love is a love that goes further still and deeper with power.

John Owen, Puritan, spoke of this love and hope.

He said, A man may love another as his own soul, yet perhaps that love of his cannot help him.

He may thereby pity him in prison, but not relieve him.

Bemoan him in misery but not help him.

Suffer with him in trouble but not ease him.

We cannot love grace into a child, nor mercy into a friend.

We cannot love them into heaven, though it may be the great desire of our soul.

But now the love of Christ, being the love of God, is effectual and fruitful in producing all the good things which He wills unto His beloved.

He loves life, grace, and holiness into us.

He loves us also into covenant, loves us into heaven.

And what he's saying in all of this is that where our love finds a limit, God's love being the love of Christ, goes further and deeper still.

He will never give up, nor will he give in.

The joy of Christmas is that God doesn't delegate his love to anybody.

His loving heart has compassion toward the meek and the contrite, the timid, the fearful, the faint here below.

Those who have nothing to offer, nothing to give.

And he does so continuing to love life, grace, and holiness into us.

Loving us into covenant, loving us into heaven.

We often say seeing is believing, but God says believing is seeing.

And that means that you and I may know by promise today that when he returns, he will acquit us.

We may know by promise today that when he returns, he will not condemn us.

And in the face of the shadow of death, we may know for certain that we will awaken to a new and even brighter day.

In the presence of his glory, there is no limits to the wholeness that he brings.

And so the wonderful song that we just sang of earlier.

I'll sing again: born thy people to deliver, born a child and yet a king, born to reign in us forever, now thy gracious kingdom bring.

By thine own eternal spirit, rule in our hearts alone, by thine all-sufficient merit, raise us to thy glorious throne.

Amen.

Let's pray.

Oh great Father, we praise you and thank you for the songs that you put on our hearts.

We thank you for the song that you gave, Zechariah.

Father, we thank you that we are also participants of this song through the giving of your Son and of the sending of your Spirit.

Oh Lord, we praise you, we thank you for your wondrous love.

We thank you for the lengths that you have gone to to save us and to rescue us and to minister to us.

For the joy set before us, for the wholeness that we will one day receive, for the fullness of your glory that we will one day bask in.

Oh Lord, we praise you and we thank you.

Help us to wait while we pray.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.