11.06 | Déjà Vu
Luke 1:1-25
‘Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word.’
Luke 1:1-2
Sometimes, when you’ve been reading the Bible for a few years, you get a déjà vu. In fact, the more you read the Bible, the more this begins to happen. You realise that what you are reading has appeared in similar form somewhere else. That the events and ideas and metaphors and names and places seem to repeat themselves. And noticing these déjà vu moments can be so helpful for understanding what is being communicated.
Today, as we begin Luke’s Gospel, we have a déjà vu story.
The story begins in the temple—the great complex, built by Herod the Great, inspired by the temple built by Solomon. It was the place not just of worship, sacrifice, and prayer, but was viewed as the epicentre of God’s presence on the earth—the connection point between a bruised humanity and the purity and life of heaven. The temple was the intersection of the Venn diagram, heaven’s circle invading the circle of the world.
And in this temple story, we meet a priest called Zechariah. He and his wife have been praying for a child, and yet, now that they are both old, have assumed that this now will not happen for them. But, God interrupts: Zechariah is met by the angel Gabriel, who arrives to tell him that his wife will indeed bear a son, and that this son will be like the great prophet Elijah, turning the people back to God, and getting them ready. As the chapter goes on, we find songs of a God who confronts the corrupt and powerful and instead restores dignity and wellbeing to the forgotten poor. We read of a God who invades history with the promise of blessing and life. We read of Zechariah’s own months without words inverted into songs of praise—months where words of faithlessness were muted until they exploded into expressions of prophetic truth.
Déjà vu.
Because, around two millennia before this, God had also sent angels to an old and infertile couple, telling them that they would bear a son. They too had been skeptical—even amused—at the idea that they might have a child at their age. But the message was true, and it led to the unfolding of a salvation plan of life that would bring the wholeness of God to all humankind.1
And because, around one millennia before, another barren woman was found praying outside the house of God. She prayed earnestly, and vowed that, were God to answer her prayer, she would devote the child to the service of God.2 God too answered her prayer, and her son became the prophet who readied the people for the promised king David. She, too, burst into a song, where God was named as upholding the cause of the vulnerable and the poor.3
And because, around 900 years earlier, God had called another prophet—Elijah—to confront the corrupt power of kings and religion with the true power and purity of God’s own Kingdom, with supernatural power and radically countercultural truth.4
Déjà vu.
Luke is presenting us with something.
He wants us to see that all the stories of the ages are converging. He wants us to see that what God was doing in Abraham and Sarah and Hannah and David and Elijah and on and on and on are all converging now in this story. That the apex of the ages has come, and that all stories ultimately point to and emerge out of this one. Every story finds its origin and destination in the one that John will later herald as the true Messiah King of God’s people.
The Gospel story we’re entering into again is meant to do this for us to. For as we journey these pages, we realise that God is not inviting you to add Him to your story; rather, He is telling you how your story—in its hopes and longings, its hurts and challenges, its beauty and brilliance—finds its direction and meaning and fullness and hope all and only as it points towards Him.
Reflect:
The passage confronts us with the pain of unmet longings and the interruptive promises of God.
Where do you carry unmet longings today?
Bring them to the Father. And ask that He may align your life in the direction of His unfolding great story.
Because every story finds its fullness in Him.
Pray:
Father in heaven,
The people in these déjà vu stories,
All seemed to know a mixture
Of pain and of plenty.
And yet,
You were active in each of these things,
Leading them into a greater story that you were telling—
That their lives found their meaning and texture
In the weave of your narrative of endless redemption.
And so, Father,
Would you help me today,
To position myself,
In faith—that true ability to see—
And in faithfulness—that true quality of resilient loyalty;
And would you help me to know
That my story,
In the small and great details of my day,
Find their true direction only in the Story you are writing,
And that this life
May find its place and purpose
In You.
In Jesus’ Name,
Amen
Old Testament:
For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:
2 Kings 14-15 | Proverbs 16:16-19
You can read the story of Abraham and Sarah from Genesis 12 onwards.
The language of the story suggests the child (Samuel) was probably to live as a ‘Nazirite’, who demonstrated their stricter devotion to God through never cutting their hair, and through never drinking alcohol. See Numbers 6:1-21, and compare it with 1 Samuel 1:11, 15. John’s teetotal lifestyle may suggest a lifelong Nazirite vow.
The story of this lady (Hannah), is found at the beginning of the book of 1 Samuel. In the Greek translation of the Old Testament, which Luke used, these books are called 1-2 Kingdoms. He uses the Old Testament idea of a ‘kingdom’ story to launch into this message about the inbreaking Kingdom of God in the person and ministry of Jesus.
The stories of Elijah’s life begin in 1 Kings 17