A miracle birth announcement that can change your life

Imagine leading a church service. You’re the pastor leading the sermon. Or the choir director. Or the deacon explaining a church program. Suddenly, an angel appears. You’re terrified. Heaven is for real-for real at that moment. No one else sees the angel, who tells you that God has answered your impossible prayer.

Medieval view of Gabriel: Source: Wikipedia -- Mestia Museum Georgia

Do you believe what the angel tells you? Do you believe more in the human obstacles you’re used to seeing? In other words, if the angel told you would bear a child, and you’ve had your AARP card for 20 years, would you believe? If the angel said that God had healed you, would you believe the heavenly message or your doctor’s prognosis?

Every day we wrestle with unbelief. It’s something that’s common to human beings. So we should feel the human tension in the story of Zecharias and Elizabeth described in Luke 1. The couple was elderly, childless, devout, and Zecharias served in a spiritual leadership role as a priest. According to BibleGateway.com, Zecharias would have been among about 18,000 priests. He served twice a year. Then, after being chosen by lot, he got a chance in a lifetime to serve in the holy place of the Temple. 

As crowds waited outside the temple, Zecharias, who was offering incense, saw Gabriel, who announced to the priest that his wife would bear a son. Gabriel announced a miracle of life and the destiny for a baby named John. God would fill John with the Holy Spirit while he was in the womb, and, one day, John would turn the hearts of Israel to the Lord.

Stunned, Zecharias reverted to unbelief. “How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years,” (verse 18). Is that an echo of pain and resignation in Zecharias's voice? What if his words reflected a longstanding prayer in his married life or the isolation he and Elizabeth felt?

Gabriel’s reply is telling:

“I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. And behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time” (Luke 1:19, 20).

If one word summed up Gabriel’s reply, it would be perspective. Gabriel saw things from heaven, not earth, where age and childlessness sought to trample Zecharias and Elizabeth’s faith. Gabriel also knew his name, which in Hebrew means “man of God” or “God is my strength.” The angel knew the Person who possessed the ability to perform miracles and knew His character.

Maybe we should tape Gabriel’s words to the bathroom mirror when our prayers of faith seem dry, lifeless, and useless. The Lord can surprise us and refresh our faith by supernaturally announcing that He has answered our "impossible" hopes. 
  

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