Read: Luke 1:5-23
The first person we meet in Lukeâs Christmas story is Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist. We meet Zechariah when he is an old man and learn that he and his wife Elizabeth are unable to have children. On the day that he is serving in the temple, however, he gets a message from God that his wife is pregnant with a son.
Whoa â what is his response?
Maybe a, âwow!â Or âno way!â Or âThank you God!â
Nope. Check out his reaction âhow can I be sure this will happen?â Not very enthusiastic. In modern English, it would be something like, âWait, what? Yeah, thatâs not gonna work.â
What Zechariah doesnât get is that heâs talking to God and God seems to like working in situations that seem impossible. He has this thing for something called âfaithâ â trusting in Him even though you canât see how it works in the end.
Instead of âwow,â Zechariah is stuck on the âhow?â
How is that going to work?
Zechariah doesnât need reminding about how babies are made. That would be weird. Heâs not really asking âhow?â Heâs making a statement about how it canât work (which is the opposite of faith).
Sound familiar?
- How will I get enough hours to afford Christmas?
- Thanksgiving was a mess; how will everyone get along at Christmas?
Itâs okay to question how God is going to do something, but we have to make sure it is a question. Too often âhow?â becomes a statement of disbelief rather than trust. Remember yesterdayâs word: abiding. Donât get caught up in the how, all you and I need to do is be obedient to what we know right now.