Dec 5

Luke 1: 5-10

In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zachariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. Both of them were righteous in the sight of God, observing all the Lord’s commands and decrees blamelessly. But they were childless because Elizabeth was not able to conceive, and they were both very old.

Once when Zachariah’s division was on duty and he was serving as priest before God, he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to go into the temple of the Lord and burn incense.  And when the time for the burning of incense came, all the assembled worshipers were praying outside. 

In this passage we meet Zachariah and Elizabeth.  they are presented to us as a elderly couple, pillars of the community.  They come from a respected line and can trace their lineage through several generations back to Aaron. A respected priest and his wife, going about their every day business.  They weren't blessed with children, but they had been obedient to God. Israelites believed that if a woman was barren, it was because God was punishing the couple for sin committed by either the husband or the wife.

It may be that there was gossip and whisperings in the Jewish community that Zachariah and Elizabeth were maybe not as good and righteous as they seemed to be.

It was a great honour to burn incense in the temple. There were thousands of priests in Israel so it was likely that a priest was only given this honour once in his life, and many priests were never chosen at all. They were chosen by lots and this time the lot fell to Zachariah.  

When I have been chosen to do carry out a major task or been given an important role, I get really nervous, even if I am well prepared and perfectly capable of doing it.  There is always the fear that it will go wrong and I will be somehow shown up.   Zachariah must have felt something similar as he entered the Holy Place to burn the incense.  All priests naturally experienced the fear of the Lord as they entered. The were being faced by an Awesome and judgemental God and their very should would be open to Him. Zachariah was probably a little worried by the fact that his wife remained barren. If there was a sin which God was judging them for, and which Zachariah was unaware of, entering the Holy Place without having been cleansed of that sin would be a death sentence.

                                                        

And the members of the temple all gathered too and I'm sure some of them were waiting to see what would happen.  It would soon be obvious if Zachariah was as righteous and blameless as he appeared. God was going to provide the answer this day when Zachariah entered the Holy Place. (grace commentary)

We know how their lives are about to be changed beyond recognition in the next few verses.  But at this stage they are clueless. We always just accept this part of the nativity scene, but if you stop and think about it, this was a major event in the Jewish community.