From the 8:15 and 9 services, text only. Pastor Luke preached on Isaiah 12:2-6 and Luke 1:57-66.

Here’s a lovely story we don’t often cover in the lectionary. Zechariah has been unable to speak. He and Elizabeth, his wife, have been unable to have children. Then one day the Angel Gabriel tells him that he was going to have a son.

“How can this be, for I am an old man and my wife is getting on in years?” he asks.

Gabriel must have been having a rough day, dealing with these mortals, not being in the angelic chorus, getting cut off in Jerusalem traffic. Gabriel gets snippy and says that Zechariah will be unable to speak until his child is born. It’s a strange tale found here in Luke, stranger still to have it read on the Sunday when the candle of Joy is lit.

There are sounds that accompany joy. Joy can be loud and joy can be quiet. Joy can be felt in laughter. Not like the chuckles you politely give me at my jokes, I mean the deep belly laughs of joy. The joy of your favorite song coming on and you can’t help but turn up the radio. Joy can be loud.

Yet joy can also be silent. The silence of a moment that takes your breath away. The silent joy that wells up when you just feel glad to be alive. The joy at viewing Niagara Falls or Whipp’s Ledges or another place in God’s grand creation.

Zechariah had a lot to think about in his time of silence. He couldn’t speak for at least nine months. I wondered what he did and how he spent that time. Being a priest, I could imagine he swam in words. He read the scriptures every day as well as commentaries on the scripture. He would preach, teach, pray, and give pastoral counseling. I bet he was asked to pray at family meals and community gatherings. His day would have been saturated with words, speaking them, hearing them, reading them.

Then the angel struck him mute. Silent. For 9 months.

Maybe he spent the first weeks reading over past sermons, longing to say those words again. Maybe he wrote out prayers for others to read. Yet that gave way to lament as the weeks turned into months. He started regretting words he had said. Mean words. Harsh words. Complaints. Unkind Facebook posts and negative reviews on YELP.

Then that made him reflect on words he regretting NOT saying. Not saying “I love you” to Elizabeth enough. Of being unable to speak to his son in her womb. Of not having the perfect words to say to someone in a particular situation that only came to him days later and when he was unable to speak.

Yet in the last few weeks of his silence, he found joy. The joy of listening to the world. Actually listening and not just waiting for his turn to speak. He tuned into the birds more. He took joy in recognizing their songs and seeing them fly from branch to branch. He took joy that the world was never really silent. Not really. There’s always noise going on. The sound of the wind. The settling of his house. The creak of his bones. The familiar footsteps of his loved ones, especially Elizabeth. Oh what a mother she was going to be.

He must of thought about what his son was going to be. Reflected on his hopes and fears for his child. Pondered at what he’d be like. Excited that he couldn’t wait to meet him. He listend to him in the womb. Felt the kicks. Other dads didn’t do this, but Zechariah did. He found great joy in it.

He was lost in his joy in that silence. He was noticing things at a deeper level. It’s why the crowd that had gathered at the birth of his son had to get his attention and motion for him. They were asking for his new child’s name. Oh, that was easy. In his silence, he realized God’s true nature.

Lots has been said about this God he followed. Some said that there could be no God. It was a delusion. Others used to believe, but decided the world was too cruel of a place, too much suffering, for a just God to be in charge of it. Others worshipped a God much too small and petty; looking after every misdeed, counting every action, weighing every thought and adding up to see if people would go to heaven or hell.

Zechariah had listened to each type, even preached a few sermons on who he thought God to be. It was in his silence that Zechariah knew the true nature of God.

He took the tablet and wrote, “His name is John.”

John. No relative had that name. That didn’t matter. Zechariah wasn’t naming his unexpected son after anyone, he was naming him after the source of life itself! John. John which means, “God has been gracious.”[1]

In all the noise of our world, we can lose sight. The noise of all the suffering. Both the suffering we have and the suffering of others. In the noise of the constant connection of social media and the 24-hour news cycle, the noise and static of daily living… sometimes silence helps us hear the deeper bass notes. Author and theologian Rob Bell states that we’re living in a world that’s all treble and no bass. Listen for the bass notes. All this noise comes because God has been gracious in creating this all.

So some might say there is no god. But saying that is like saying that a bomb went off in a junkyard and a fully functional 747 self-assembled. Some might doubt God, that’s fine; God can take it. Some might be so wrapped up in themselves or in the noise of what they are hearing that they miss the deeper bass note. God has been Gracious. God has given us life and made it possible for life to happen.

My hope is that you listen for the bass notes. My hope is that you hear joy both in the noise and in the silence. My hope is that you’ll be like Zechariah. After his silence, he is able to speak. What are his first words? They are ones of blessing. Zechariah sings a song that has become known in our tradition as the Benedictus or “The Blessing.” From Luke 1:68-79

“Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel,
because he has come to his people and redeemed them.
69 He has raised up a horn[^c] of salvation for us
in the house of his servant David
70 (as he said through his holy prophets of long ago),
71 salvation from our enemies
and from the hand of all who hate us—
72 to show mercy to our ancestors
and to remember his holy covenant,
73     the oath he swore to our father Abraham:
74 to rescue us from the hand of our enemies,
and to enable us to serve him without fear
75     in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.

76 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,
77 to give his people the knowledge of salvation
through the forgiveness of their sins,
78 because of the tender mercy of our God,
by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven
79 to shine on those living in darkness
and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the path of peace.”

My hope is that you find at least a few of that ways that God has been gracious to you and this leads to you sing a great song of blessing to guide our feet into the path of peace. Amen.

Works Cited

[1] R Alan Culpepper, The Gospel of Luke. The New Interpreter’s Bible IX. Page 58.