Thoughts for the Day

Luke 1:56-66  Mary stayed with Elizabeth for about three months and then returned home.  When it was time for Elizabeth to have her baby, she gave birth to a son. Her neighbours and relatives heard that the Lord had shown her great mercy, and they shared her joy.  On the eighth day they came to circumcise the child, and they were going to name him after his father Zechariah, but his mother spoke up and said, “No! He is to be called John.”  They said to her, “There is no one among your relatives who has that name.”  Then they made signs to his father, to find out what he would like to name the child. He asked for a writing tablet, and to everyone’s astonishment he wrote, “His name is John.” Immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue set free, and he began to speak, praising God. All the neighbours were filled with awe, and throughout the hill country of Judea people were talking about all these things. Everyone who heard this wondered about it, asking, “What then is this child going to be?” For the Lord’s hand was with him.

For nine months Zechariah has been pondering the words of Gabriel, and for the last three Mary has been in his household, so he must have heard her story too.  Is he counting down the days until John is born and he can speak again?  But John is born, and still he cannot speak!  I gather that, as part of the ritual of circumcision at this time, a father would name his son and express his hopes for the boy’s future.  How interesting then to read how those who gathered initially seem to have ignored Zechariah.  Seemingly “Does he take sugar?” syndrome extends back into biblical times!  After Elizabeth’s insistence that the child “is to be called John” meets resistance, Zechariah writes “His Name is John”.  I love that little detail; Elizabeth may still be speaking of what is to be, if only in a few minutes time, but to Zechariah it is already fact.  Immediately his mouth is opened, and he speaks praising God.  Now comes the moment in the circumcision ritual for him to express his hopes for his son.  Outside the temple it was his silence that got the crowd’s attention; at this celebration his ability to talk again has the same impact as he declares John’s destiny.  Surely the occasion is the perfect timing, and it sets not just Zechariah but the whole neighbourhood talking.