But the angel said unto him, Fear not
Human life on earth known in heaven
From the speech of Gabriel it is clear that human life, in its beginning’, course, purpose, and destiny, is known in heaven before it is manifested on earth.
This is not the case with exceptional men only, but with all men. This should throw a joyous solemnity around life. Human life is intended to be the realization of a heavenly plan. Inquire what it is, accept it with all thankfulness or submission, as the case may be, and live in God. John was to be as conspicuous amongst men as a mountain is conspicuous amongst the lowlands. But did not God make the valleys as well as the hills? In great lives we only see the lines of Divine movement and purpose more clearly because of their apparent exaggeration; in humbler lives the lines are all there. This communication made by Gabriel suggests two inquiries.
1. Has every life a guardian angel?
2. Is every life reported in heaven by the angelic watcher? (Dr. Parker.)
Light will arise in due time
The barrenness necessitated the annunciation. The annunciation transfigured the barrenness. Is it not often exactly thus with trying and bitter and “reproach” bringing experiences of the believer? We are denied what we fain would have; we have what we would fain have been denied. We feel ourselves of those who “walk in the darkness,” and have “no light.” Well! do we “trust” in the Lord, and “stay ourselves upon God”? If only we do, sooner or later, I am satisfied increasingly, “light will arise.” It may not come when we wished it, nor as we wished it, but come it does. (A. B. Grosart, LL. D,)
Consider the exquisite connexion of the whole, the gradually-attained climax of the Divine message from the lips of the angel from before the throne. The messenger of joy begins with the mention of the accepted prayer, promises a son, gives him a high name, foretells for him a distinguished office. But the greatest tidings are yet to come: the longed-for coming of the Messiah, whose forerunner this child is to be. To quote Pfenninger: “How tenderly interwoven, how intimately connected, the Divine with the human story I It is one of the chief perfections of a drama that all its occurrences should essentially hang together; that none of them should appear extraneous or isolated; and where are these conditions better observed than in the Divine narratives of Holy Writ? The grandest, Divinest story in the world blended at its first most human commencement with the human heart-history of a childless wedded pair, who pray to God for a son.” This is certainly true, although the prayer here referred to can hardly have been confined to such a petition. The heavenly message, however, retrospectively includes former prayers, and has three separate clauses--first, the birth of a son to Zacharias; last, the coming of the Lord Himself; and as connecting link between the two, the announcement that this son shall make ready the way of this very Lord. (Rudolph Stier)
The “Fear-nots” of the Bible
The “Fear-nots” of the Bible provide an all-sufficient vade-necum for the timid and distressed. There is no apprehension possible to man which has not its complementary reassuring promise in God’s Word. (Anon.)
Long-offered prayers
The prayer of Zacharias was most probably an old prayer, going back many years, ere Elisabeth was old. But apparently unanswered prayers are not disregarded prayers. Old, very old prayers often and often bring down blessings unexpected. (A. B. Grosart, LL. D.)
The Bible abounds in assurances that all faithful earnest prayer will be heard, cannot but be heard. And Christian experience proves the truth of the Divine assurance. Let us rejoice
(1) That we are permitted to pray;
(2) That we are commanded to pray;
(3) That all true prayer is heard;
(4) That with God to hear is to answer and help.
Disappointed and weary suppliant, fear not, thy prayer is heard. And to know that it is heard is to know that in God’s good way and time it shall be answered. (Anon.)
Prayer heard though not immediately answered
I can stand in the rooms of my office in New York, and communicate with the men in the fifth story. If I want to speak to the foreman of the printing office, I go and blow the whistle, and talk through the tube. And I know that the message has got up there and that he heard it. I do not see him, and he does not answer back; but I have no doubt that, having received the message, he will attend to my wants. Soft seems to me that sometimes we speak to God in heaven, as it were through an invisible medium. He does not answer immediately, but, nevertheless, we know that He is there, and that, even if we do not conceive of Him, He conceives of us; and we send our thought or prayer up, and let it alone, and do not fret or worry about it. (H. W.Beecher.)
Unanswered prayer accepted
Prayers which are not answered at once, nor, perhaps, for a long time afterwards, may nevertheless be accepted. God’s people are apt to forget this; and that it is with prayer, to borrow an illustration from commercial transactions, as with a bill, which, though accepted, is often not paid till months or years have elapsed. Our heavenly Father knows best what to give; and also how, and where, and when to give it. Were its answer always to follow prayer, as the peal roars upon the flash, I suspect that we would be as ready in spiritual as we are in earthly matters to look only to secondary causes, and forget God’s hand--coming to look upon our prayers as being the cause of the answer, as much as we are in the habit of regarding the flash of lightning, without any reference to God, as the cause of the peal of thunder. (T. Guthrie, D. D.)
And thy wife Elisabeth … John
This promised son is added to a series whose birth has already been miraculously foretold. Isaac, Samson, Samuel. The significant names of both Zacharias [The Lord remembers] and Elisabeth [God of the oath, or covenant] are mentioned by the angel, to point out the rich fulfilment of their prophetic meaning, but the appointed name of this promised son transcends theirs. An era of new and fuller grace begins with him. Later, the name (=the grace of God) receives its special explanation, in that the stern preacher of repentance is found only to lead from grace to grace. John is the last but one of the seven names [Ishmael, Isaac, Solomon, Josiah, Cyrus, John, Jesus] given by God in Holy Scripture to those still unborn, and the seventh name is Jesus. (Rudolf Stier.)
Angelic solicitude
1. Observe how apprehensive this good angel was at Zachary’s surprising fear, and encourages him against it. The holy angels, though they do not express it in words, yet pity our frailties, and suggest comfort to us. The evil angels, if they might, would kill us with terror; the good angels labour together for our tranquility and cheerfulness.
2. The comfortable words spoken by the angel to Zacharias. God sometimes hears our prayers, and bestows His mercies, when we least expect; yea, when we have given over looking for what we asked. 3: The name which the angel directed Zachary to give his son: John, which signifies gracious; because he was to open the kingdom of grace, and to preach the grace of the gospel through Jesus Christ. The giving of significant names to children has been an ancient and pious practice; names which either carried a remembrance of duty or of mercy in them. (W. Burkitt, M. A,)
Acceptable prayer defined
Prayer is the offering of our sincere desires to God. It involves a sense of our unworthiness and necessities.
1. Penitence (Psalms 51:17).
2. Faith (Hebrews 11:6).
3. Sincerity (Jeremiah 29:13).
4. Fervency (James v 16).
5. Love (1 Timothy 2:8).
6. Delight in God (Isaiah 25:9).
7. Perseverance (Ephesians 6:18).
8. Humble submission to God’s will (Micah 7:7).
9. In the name of Christ (Ephesians 3:12).
10. With confession of our sins (1 John 1:9). Jewish prayers were chiefly praise and benedictions. Always answered, but in
God’s sovereign way. (W. H. Van Doren, D. D.)
The efficacy of prayer
“Then you have not been modified in any way as to the efficacy of prayer?” asked his visitor. Mr. Spurgeon laughed. “Only in my faith growing far stronger and firmer than ever. It is not a matter of faith with me, but of knowledge, and everyday experience. I am constantly witnessing the most unmistakable instances of answers to prayer. My whole life is made up of them. To me they are so familiar as to cease to excite my surprise; but to many they would seem marvellous, no doubt. Why, I could no more doubt the efficacy of prayer than I could disbelieve in the law of gravitation. The one is as much a fact as the other, constantly verified every day of my life. Elijah, by the brook Cherith, as he received his daily rations from the ravens, could hardly be a more likely subject for scepticism than
I. Look at my Orphanage. To keep it going entails an annual expenditure of about £10,000. Only £1400 is provided for by endowment. The remaining £8000 comes to me regularly in answer to prayer. I do not know where I shall get it from day to day. I ask God for it, and He sends it. Mr. Muller, of Bristol, does the same on a far larger scale, and his experience is the same as mine.” (Pall Mall Gazette.)
Prayers answered at last
During a long course of years, even to the closing fortnight of his life, in his last sickness, Dr. Judson lamented that all his efforts in behalf of the Jews had been a failure. He was departing from the world saddened with that thought. Then, at last, there came a gleam of light that thrilled his heart with grateful joy. Mrs. Judson was sitting by his side while he was in a state of great languor, with a copy of the Watchman and Reflector in her hand. She read to her husband one of Dr. Hague’s letters from Constantinople. That letter contained some items of information that filled him with wonder. At a meeting of missionaries at Constantinople, Mr. Schauffler stated that a little book had been published in Germany giving an account of Dr. Judson’s life and labours; that it had fallen into the hands of some Jews; and had been the means of their conversion; that a Jew had translated it for a community of Jews on the borders of the Euxine, and that a message had arrived in Constantinople asking that a teacher might be sent to show them the way of life. When Dr. Judson heard this his eyes were filled with tears, a look of almost unearthly solemnity came over him, and, clinging fast to his wife’s hand as if to assure himself of being really in the world, he said, “Love, this frightens me, I do not know what to make of it.” “To make of what? “ said Mrs. Judson. “Why, what you have just been reading, I never was deeply interested in any object, I never prayed sincerely and earnestly for anything, but it came; at some time--no matter how distant the day--somehow, in some shape, probably the last I should have devised, it came! “ What a testimony was that I It lingered on the lips of the dying Jud-son; it was enbalmed with grateful tears, and is worthy to be transmitted as a legacy to the coming generation. The desire of the righteous shall be granted. Pray and wait. The answer to all true prayer will come. In Judson’s case the news of the answer came before he died, but it was answered long before. So we may know of the results of prayers and toils even while we sojourn here; but if not, what sweet surprises shall await us in the great beyond! (North-Western Christian Advocate.)