Of all the figures who came before the Lord, John the Baptist is the forerunner par excellence. None of the four Gospels omit John’s ministry as a preparation for Jesus’ own, and all of them quote Isaiah 40:3 to explain what he was doing (Matt 3:3, Mark 1:2-3, Luke 3:4-6, John 1:23).¹ In Acts, when they need to replace Judas Iscariot, if you joined Jesus’ movement after the baptism by John, you’ve not seen enough to be qualified to be an Apostle (Acts 1:21-22). John is an indispensable precursor to telling the story of Jesus.

The Hopes and Fears of all the Years

Advent is a special time of year for me, for lots of reasons, but the biggest is that I first came to faith at about this time of year. Looking back at that first December as a Christian, I remember loads of the Christmas carols I’d been singing for years just coming alive for the first time. And there’s one line, I remember, from O little town of Bethlehem that really jumped out at me then and still amazes me now:

“The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.”

I just remember finding that an absolutely staggering thought. The idea that all the centuries and centuries of human longing and desire, everything humanity had ever hoped for and worked towards, every desperate fear and anxious doubt of all the long years, comes to a head and finds an answer that one night in Bethlehem, in a little town, through a little baby. The scale of what Jesus means for us, for the whole world, blew my mind. It still does.

On Advent III this year, I preached on the Benedictus, Zechariah’s song given in answer to the question “Who will this child be?” (Luke 1:66).

But the odd thing about Zechariah’s song is that almost all of it is about what Jesus will do. And by Advent III, this song starts to make it apparent why Jesus is indeed the child in whom the hopes and fears of all the years are met in Bethlehem. Already the song mentions the covenant with Abraham and the words of the prophets, but there are two additional ways Jesus fulfils the hopes of Israel.

A Second Exodus

Verses 68-75 are dripping in references to the Exodus. Just the idea of him coming to his people to redeem them in the opening verse is a decent summary of what God did at the Exodus. But if you read the book of Exodus you’ll find that saving Israel from their enemies, remembering his covenant with Abraham and enabling them to worship him without fear are all major themes of what God did at the Exodus.

Because by Jesus’ day God’s people had got themselves into a terrible mess. The sky high hopes we might have entertained for them a couple of weeks ago when we looked at the covenant with Abraham have been cruelly dashed. The historical books of the Old Testament chart Israel’s tragic failure in its mission to be faithful to God and a light to the nations. And nearly 600 years before Zechariah’s song, Jerusalem was destroyed and the people carried off into exile. Though there had been some brighter moments, things had never been the same again. As Zechariah is delivering his prophecy, the Jews are the oppressed subjects of the Roman Empire – just the latest in a serious of empires to rule their land. It is hundreds of years since God last sent a prophet. There is a widespread sense that though many of the people have returned from Babylon, spiritually speaking the exile has never ended.

But Zechariah says that is all coming to an end. The Lord is going to redeem his people, give them true freedom from their enemies and to enable them to serve him without fear. In some ways, you’d have to tell the whole story of Luke’s Gospel to see how he does that, because the key to it is Jesus giving his life as the Passover lamb that frees his people from slavery to sin and the fear of death and judgement. But the key thing Zechariah brings out here is that this is all according to the promises God made to Abraham that we looked at in Advent I. Zechariah is saying that Jesus’ birth is the definitive proof that God’s promise of his people enjoying paradise together in his glorious presence is still happening. Despite all that has gone wrong in Israel’s history, God still remembers his promise and will overcome every obstacle in the way of its fulfilment.

I think that has really deep things to say to us at times when we feel far away from God. If you feel as though you can’t come into God’s presence because you’ve failed too badly, or that, while there might be hope for others, you are too far gone, or that the sins you battle with are just have too much of a hold on you to break away from them, remember that Jesus came to set his people free to worship God. He is in the business of redeeming people who are enslaved to sin. Even at the most desperate points in the life of his people, he never forgot his promise to save. He will bring you home if you come to him.

Zechariah gives us another angle when he says that Jesus is going to be a new David.

That’s in verse 69: He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David. David, who lived a little over a thousand years before Christ was the founder of Israel’s royal family and the greatest King Israel ever had. And God promised him that one day, one of his descendants would reign forever, bringing peace to God’s people and filling the world with the knowledge of God. And Zechariah says that God has raised up that king now. Horns in a lot of biblical poetry represent power, as I imagine anyone whose ever had a run in with a horned animal will be able to understand. So Zechariah is saying that God is raising up a mighty saviour, someone given divine power to lead and to save his people.

And again, if you’d looked at Israel’s circumstances, this can’t have seemed more improbable on the face of it. David’s descendants hadn’t been kings for centuries. In Zechariah’s day the Jews had no king. They were leaderless, rudderless. Like sheep without a shepherd. In fact, Jesus hasn’t even been born when Zechariah makes his prophecy – Mary is only about three months pregnant at this stage. But the fact he there, slowly growing in Mary’s womb, is the sign that God has sent the new and greater David.

I’m aware that that might sound a little bit quaint to lots of you. Nobody in modern Britain expects the King to solve all our national problems. Whether you’re for the monarchy or against it, that’s just not the role the King plays in British society. Isn’t there something a bit ‘knights of the round table-ish’ about David and his mighty men? A leftover from a bygone era.

In many ways, that’s an understandable sentiment. By and large, Kings, especially Kings given real power, have let us down. Most of Israel’s Kings in the Old Testament were more part of the nation’s problems than their solution. Even the best of them, even David, had terrible falls and costly failures. And a look around the world at the states where power is invested in one man show us that we are right to be wary of powerful Kings.

But the absence of good leaders doesn’t take away the need for good leadership. It’s painfully obvious, isn’t it, not only in this country, but across the world, that our leaders are just not up the problems the world faces. I don’t mean that as a party-political statement. I think it’s true on the right, on the left, in the centre, wherever you look. Our leaders are not powerful enough to prevent Russia invading Ukraine. They are not wise enough to find a just and achievable solution to the conflict in the Middle East. They are, by and large, not succeeding in arresting the continued degradation of the environment. And they are, all too often, not principled enough to really deserve our confidence. Many of them, I’m sure, do their best. I’m certainly not suggesting I could do any better.

But Jesus can. He is a man like no one else. If you read on in Luke’s Gospel you’ll find a man unlike any other King in history, one who goes out of his way to serve the poor and the outcast, who eats with tax collectors and sinners, who uses his power to serve, not be make others serve him. Whose triumph is his death.

Again, this is so important when we are tempted to worry about the state of the world. Things seem so out of control so much of the time. Who do we hope in to put the world right? I hope we’re not taken in by the hype of this or that politician. Some will be better, some will be worse, but they’ll never really be able to create the world we all want. But it would be just as big a mistake to give in to cynicism, anxiety or despair. God has raised up a mighty saviour for us. He is the one who will ensure that in due time the world will know peace and flourishing under his rule. We can trust in him.

You, Child, will be called the prophet of the Most High

So where does John the Baptist fit into all this? Well, Zechariah gets nine verses into his song before he begins to answer the question that provokes it. As all the Gospels do, he says John is there to prepare the way for Jesus’ coming. But I was surprised, to be honest, by how Zechariah says he does this. When I had originally put myself down to do this in the preaching schedule, I’d expected I would be talking about repentance. And that’s a huge part of what John does in his ministry. But here, Zechariah emphasises John preaching salvation, forgiveness, tender mercy, the rising sun, and a light to guide our way into the way of peace. He came proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. John preached Law and Gospel. The same prophet who said “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” also said “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.”

The Prayer Book associates John the Baptist’s mission of preparing people for the first coming with that of the ordained ministry in preparing people for the second. You can read my thoughts on that here.

1. Thanks to Niv for pointing this out for me.