Set alongside the main story of the birth of Jesus, we see in the Bible the story of another significant birth — that of John the Baptist, born to Zechariah and Elizabeth. [1]
Elizabeth and Mary (the mother of Jesus) were relatives.[2]
Zechariah and Elizabeth were both advanced in years, and had no children.
Zechariah was a priest. One day, whilst Zechariah was serving in the temple of God, he had an unexpected visitor. The passage in the Bible reads:
“Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. But the angel said to him: “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John. He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even before he is born. He will bring back many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the parents to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous — to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.”” (Luke 1:11–17).
The appearance of the angel was for a special purpose. The angel had been sent by a higher authority (God) to foretell the extraordinary birth of a man who would be a forerunner of the Lord (referring to Jesus Christ).
Although the Bible says Zechariah was a righteous man, his response to the message of the angel was one of unbelief: “How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.” This reply earned a rebuke from the angel who said, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their appointed time.” Zechariah would return home to Elizabeth dumb and mute (!) but they would have a baby together in their old age.
[This was not the first time we read of such a miracle in the Bible — 2000 years prior, Abraham and Sarah had a son in their old age, based on a promise of God.][3]
The story above serves as a preamble to the story of the birth of Jesus. The Bible introduces the Christmas story thus: “In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary.”[4]
The angel who appeared to Mary was Gabriel, the same angel who had appeared to Zechariah. Although the Bible shows many instances of angelic visitations, such visitations were by no means commonplace or expected. The Bible indicates that people who encountered angels were usually terrified.
The angel said to Mary: “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”[5]
Amazed, Mary asked the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?” One might notice the parallel of Mary’s question with that of Zechariah to the angel’s announcements. Whilst Zechariah’s question signaled unbelief, Mary’s question was a perfectly logical one as she was a virgin. The angel answered: “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.”
Further assuring Mary, the angel continued: “Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.” This may be seen as another interesting parallel, or contrast. Elizabeth, an old married woman who had been barren was now pregnant, and Mary, a yet to be married young lady, was to conceive as a virgin. Mary’s response to the angel was one of submission and belief: “I am the Lord’s servant. May your word to me be fulfilled.”
Mary then went to visit Elizabeth.[6] The Bible says that when Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby in her womb leaped, and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, exclaimed to Mary, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! But why am I so favoured, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed is she who has believed that the Lord would fulfil his promises to her!” It appears that the unborn John recognized the unborn Jesus as both their mothers met!
Zechariah meanwhile remained dumb and mute (and perhaps deaf too, for the Bible says that people communicated with him by making signs). After Elizabeth had given birth, Zechariah, still unable to speak, when asked to name his son, wrote on a writing tablet: “His name is John.” Immediately after this, Zechariah’s tongue was loosened and he was able to speak again.
The Bible says that Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and sang a song that prophesied about both Jesus and John.[7]
Concerning Jesus (who was yet to be born), Zechariah’s song prophesied: “Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come to his people and redeemed them. He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David (as he said through his holy prophets of long ago), salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us — to show mercy to our ancestors and to remember his holy covenant, the oath he swore to our father Abraham: to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.”
Concerning his newborn John, Zechariah’s song prophesied: “And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him, to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.”
The intertwining of the stories of Zechariah and Elizabeth with Mary and Joseph, and of John the Baptist and Jesus of Nazareth, shows that God relates to humanity and this world in a very personal way. They show that God contends with the faithlessness and failings of humanity to bring forth faith and the fulfilment of divine promises. We can see that the birth of Jesus Christ is not an abstract truth but is a miraculous event that took place in time and space in human history.
This has been a ‘side-story’ to the story of Christmas. I wrote a little more about Christmas here: https://yaptatyeen.medium.com/christmas-2021-75f4192a029f
Merry Christmas 2022.
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Footnotes
[1] The story is found in the first chapter of the book of Luke in the New Testament.
[2] See Luke 1:36.
[3] Abraham’s story is found in Genesis 17:17–21, 18:10–15, 21:1–7.
[4] The story of the angelic announcement to Mary is told in Luke 1:26–38.
[5] Jesus would be born in the line of David. King David lived 1000 years before Jesus was born, and was Israel’s greatest king.
[6] The full story is found in Luke 1:39–56.
[7] The song is found in Luke 1:68–79.