Dear Friends,

Zechariah, an old priest, with impeccable lineage married to Elizabeth, also a woman of impeccable lineage,  reads Scripture, keeps the commandments, prays, and serves God. Yet, when the Angel Gabriel shows up with a message from God of joy and gladness in answer to his prayer for a son, Zechariah asks, “How can I be sure this will happen? I am an old man now and my wife is also past her childbearing years” (Luke 1:18).

Gabriel rebukes Zechariah and silences him for the duration of Elizabeth’s pregnancy. God will do what God is going to do, in spite of  Zechariah, who will literally have nothing to say about it until he reaches an understanding of how God really works.

Mary, an unmarried teenage virgin is visited by Gabriel with a message from God that she will bear the son of the Most High God. She asks Gabriel, “But how can this happen? I am a virgin.” Gabriel tells her that the Holy Spirit will conceive the child in her. He tells her that her cousin Elizabeth is already in her sixth month of pregnancy though she was previously known to be barren. Gabriel says, “See, nothing is impossible with God.”

Two questions to God that are very similar, yet they draw very different responses. Why?

Luke doesn’t leave us guessing at what made the difference. Gabriel tells Zechariah, “You didn’t believe what I said” (Luke 1:20). But Elizabeth tells Mary, “You are blessed because you believed that the Lord would do what he said” (Luke 1:45). It comes down to Mary believing God and Zechariah not believing him.

If we placed their spiritual credentials side by side, Zechariah would appear to be the one most likely to succeed with God. But this is the maddening, but wonderful paradox of a God who says, “The last shall be first, and the first will be last” (Matt 20:16). A  religious resume burnished by service and human connections will never connect with God like the simple confession, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word” (Luke 1:38).

Poor Zechariah was a prisoner of human performance standards and expectations while Mary is liberated by her believing acceptance that, even though she is incapable, God can do anything and everything in her and through her.

“But, surely Kent, you are not telling me it is wrong to want to please God and do our best to serve him?” is the question I often get in response to my writing or speaking about grace.

I answer the question with a question–“Why do you want to please God and serve him? Is it because you know that God loves you and you are responding to his love? Or is it because you want to earn his approval and love? I leave the question hanging there. The question requires our best thinking, and our honest answers.

But there is only one answer that is true. “God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them” (1 John 4:16). ‘We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19). Love is who God is. Love is what God does. Love is what we do if we accept the life of God as our life. God will never love us less or love us more, so trying to earn his love is wasted effort, but a lot of voices try to tell us otherwise.

God loved Zechariah and Mary equally. He loves you and me the same as them, in fact God the Father loves us as much as he loves his only begotten Son, Jesus. That’s why he sent Jesus for us (John 3:16).

In any age, a religious person who thinks of infertility as a disgrace and a sign of God’s disfavor is challenged to accept God’s unconditional love. We can sense a kind of hopeless resignation in Zechariah’s self-identification, “I am an old man, and my wife is getting on in years” (Luke 1:18).

The Angel Gabriel tells Zechariah, “Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and will name him John (meaning “God is gracious”). You will have joy and gladness and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord” (Luke 1:13-15). Zechariah, like so many of us thought pure grace, wonderful grace, was too good to be true. So God gave Zechariah nine months to think about it.

It’s no surprise that the first words Zechariah spoke after his silence were praise to God, in fact he sang a marvelous song of praise (Luke 1:64, 67-79). Once grace settles into the thinking of a person, it will change their attitude.

Mary, was single and engaged. If what Gabriel was telling about conceiving and bearing a child was true, she would risk a broken engagement and a lifetime of disgrace.

Gabriel’s words of greeting to her tell us that Mary and God had a good relationship. He said, “Greetings favored one, the Lord is with you” (Luke 1:28). She was perplexed about what this might mean, so Gabriel reassured her, “Don’t be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God” (Luke 1:30).

Mary’s self-identifications, “I am a virgin,” and “I am the servant of the Lord” are hopeful, full of purity and promise (Luke 1:34,38). A person who knows she is loved by God is hopeful. Even more, a person who believes she is loved by God will take risks for God, not play it safe.

What we believe about God is more important than what we do for God because what we believe about God determines what we are willing to do for God.  This is a lesson to be learned in reflection on the experiences of Zechariah and Mary.

We are coming into the Advent season when our attention is drawn to Jesus coming to this world as one of us and for us. My prayer for you is that you know your God loves you and that you live strong and free in his love.

“O taste and see that the Lord is good. Happy are those who take refuge in him” (Psalm 34:8).
Under the mercy of Christ,

Kent

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Please note that the content and viewpoints of Mr. Hansen are his own and are not necessarily those of the C.S. Lewis Foundation. We have not edited his writing in any substantial way and have permission from him to post his content.

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Kent Hansen is a Christian attorney, author and speaker. He practices corporate law and is the managing attorney of the firm of Clayson, Mann, Yaeger & Hansen in Corona, California. Kent also serves as the general counsel of Loma Linda University and Medical Center in Loma Linda, California.

Finding God’s grace revealed in the ordinary experiences of life, spiritual renewal in Christ and prayer are Kent’s passions. He has written two books, Grace at 30,000 Feet and Other Unexpected Places published by Review & Herald in 2002 and Cleansing Fire, Healing Streams: Experiencing God’s Love Through Prayer, published by Pacific Press in spring 2007. Many of his stories and essays about God’s encompassing love have been published in magazines and journals. Kent is often found on the hiking trails of the southern California mountains, following major league baseball, playing the piano or writing his weekly email devotional, “A Word of Grace for Your Monday” that is read by men and women from Alaska to Zimbabwe.