In 'The Calling of John The Baptist', Peter Allison discusses Zachariah's prophecy concerning his son John, highlighting the shift from the grand narrative of salvation to John's specific calling as a prophet. John the Baptist is described as a pivotal figure who bridges the Old and New Covenants, breaking a 400-year silence as God's mouthpiece. His role was to prepare the way for Jesus, the 'son of the highest', by preaching a gospel message centered on repentance and the remission of sins through God's mercy. The sermon emphasizes the gravity of God's wrath against sin and the redemption offered through Christ, who bore this wrath on the cross. John's message brings light to those in darkness, guiding them towards peace and ultimately glorifying God. The transformation from sitting in darkness under God's wrath to living in the light of Christ's glory is a central theme, encouraging believers to desire Christ and partake in His eternal glory.

Luke chapter 1. Beginning at verse... Well, let's read all of Zachariah's prophecy, his song. We'll be looking particularly today at the second part of it. Beginning at verse 67, Now His father Zacharias was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied saying, Blessed is the Lord God of Israel, for He has visited and redeemed His people, and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of His servant David, as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets who have been since the world began, that we should be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us, to perform the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, the oath which He swore to our father Abraham, to grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies, might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our life.

And you, child, will be called the prophet of the highest, for you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people by the remission of their sins, through the tender mercy of our God, with which the day springed from on high has visited us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death to guide our feet into the way of peace. So the child grew and became strong in spirit and was in the deserts until the day of His manifestation to Israel. Thus ends the reading of God's Word. Heavenly Father, please seal your words to our heart this morning. Please sanctify these sinful lips as they speak your word.

Please bless Father the hearing and the preaching of your word. We Lord want to know you. We want to hear your voice this morning. We want to see you as You are revealed to us in the scriptures We ask that you would do all this through Jesus Christ amen Last week we looked at the first part of Zacharias' psalm. It's a psalm that speaks in grand terms, a psalm or a song that speaks in very grand and broad terms.

It's actually, the verbs in the first part of this are all in a Greek tense that is often translated in the past tense, so you see many of those sentences are in the past tense, but it's really a tense that looks very broadly. It's as if you are in a helicopter, in a plane, flying over and looking down upon an event upon the earth. You see the grand perspective. You see it in its totality. And that is what Zacharias has done in the first part of his prophecy, he gave to us something of the grand totality of God's plan of salvation, this promise of Jehovah's salvation, which we saw was from the very beginning that God has never left us without his prophets.

We saw, he speaks of the fullness of this salvation, that we would be saved from all of our enemies. He speaks of this grand purpose, this overarching purpose from 50, 000 foot level, this purpose of God's salvation, that God would be glorified through us, that we could serve Him in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our life. And then there's a shift right here as in this second part. There's a shift in the tenths of the verbs that are being used. And he shifts from this grand overview of Jehovah's salvation and how it's been promised from the beginning of the world and what God has promised to do and his purpose, his reason for it to talking specifically now about his son's calling, Zacharias' son's calling.

In other words, John's calling And his role in this grand plan of God's Jehovah's redemption. He gives John the Baptist, he tells us what his calling is. He speaks of his preparation. Zacharias tells us what John's role is to prepare the way of the Lord. His calling is a prophet of the highest.

His role is in preparing the way of the Lord. He tells us something of his message And he also tells us something of the fruit of that message that John would bring But he begins in verse 76 with a new child and You child this eight-day old son that is just been circumcised who has just been named John and You child he says will be called the prophet of the highest That's Very similar words to what Gabriel told Mary when he made the announcement of Jesus coming to her. He said that Jesus, her son, would be called the son of the highest the son of the highest Zacharias says that his child John is a prophet of the highest A prophet is someone who speaks the word of God. A son is someone who is the master of the home itself. And so right here, right from the beginning, John is subordinated to Jesus Christ, the one whom he's coming to announce John Jesus is the son of the highest John is the prophet of the highest now a prophet then is someone who speaks the Word of God, a messenger of God.

A prophet is a mouthpiece of God. Prophets spoke the Word that God put in their mouth, And that's all they were to speak. They were to speak everything that God put in their mouth and nothing more than what God put in their mouth. Jehovah told Jeremiah, I have put my words in your mouth. And God commissioned Ezekiel the same way, saying, you must speak my words to those whom I am sending you.

In fact, many books or messages of the prophets begin with the word of the Lord to so-and-so. This is the word of the Lord to the rubble. The word of the Lord, the burden about so and so. The prophets always came, authenticated themselves as messengers from God himself, who brought not their words, not their ideas, not their guesses, not their sanctified guesses. They brought the very word of God to God's people.

So John is then a prophet. He is the prophet who stands, as it were, with one foot in the old covenant and one foot in the new. He is the prophet who breaks 400 years of silence. God had not spoken in 400 years since Malachi. And now God is once again going to speak.

Zechariah tells us, through John, his prophet. Prophets were held to a very high standard. If any word that a prophet spoke did not come to pass, then they were declared a false prophet, and were to be executed for presuming to speak in God's name. Because if anybody ever said anything that turned out to be false or incorrect, then that was not a prophet that God had sent. If somebody came saying, I am coming in God's name, When they weren't coming in God's name and they presumed to speak And claimed to speak in God's name and they weren't speaking in God's name.

They were counterfeiting God And God says that they were to be executed, put to death, for presuming to speak in God's name when God had not sent them. Sent them. Now if that sounds rather harsh, by historical standards it really isn't. One of the very first pieces of legislation that this Congress under the current Constitution passed was the Mint Act which made it a capital offense to counterfeit the coins of the United States. To make a coin and put the imprint of the United States seal upon it and make the claim that it was one dollar of gold when in fact it wasn't.

If anyone dared to put the imprint and the seal of the United States on a coin that wasn't truly what it's said to be, they were to be put to death. It was a capital offense in our country. How much more than if somebody comes presuming to speak a word in the name of God when God had not sent them, should be put to death for counterfeiting the Word of God. It's to make an assault upon God Himself. It's to make God a liar, to be saying something that isn't true, to come in God's name and say this is the Word of God and then to speak something that isn't God's word.

Now how were people to know who was sent by God and who wasn't? Well, they simply had to listen to their message. And if anything, if anything that they said did not come to pass, if one word fell to the ground, then they were not a true prophet. That's a, that's a, you might say a high calling. That John had as a prophet of the highest.

What he was to speak was to be the Word of God and only the Word of God. Being a mouthpiece of God is also a very dangerous calling. It brings the wrath of men who don't want to hear the word of God. And Stephen rhetorically asked the Jews, as they were enraged at him and about to put him to death, he asked them rhetorically, He said to them, you stiff-necked and uncircumcised and hardened ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit as your fathers did. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute?

Meaning, there were none of them. They killed those who foretold the coming of the just one. Being a prophet was a dangerous business. Jesus said that on this generation of Israelites would come the blood of all the righteous prophets that had been shed from the time of Abel, the first prophet, to the time of Zechariah, son of Barakiah, who was killed in the temple, bringing God's word to God's people when they didn't want to hear it. Being a prophet was a dangerous calling.

And John dedicated himself to that role of being a prophet. He it says was in the desert. He grew, The child grew, he became strong in spirit, and he was in the desert until the day of his manifestation, until the day he was lifted up and presented to Israel. Remember, he was not to drink wine or a strong drink. He was not a soft man, Jesus said to his disciples.

What did you expect to see? John was a man who lived in the desert, he ate locusts and wild honey and he dressed in camel skins. He didn't sit in ivory towers and drink from gold goblets. His role as a prophet of the highest was to prepare the way of the Lord. And Yutcha will be called the prophet of the highest, for you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways." He's called a messenger in Malachi.

God said he would send a messenger to prepare the way before him. And he used to go before the face of God to prepare God's way. God will visit his people with salvation. It is Jehovah's salvation. And he accomplishes it through his anointed one, his Christ, his Messiah, whose name is Jesus, which means Jehovah saves.

God's redemption comes in the person of his son, Jesus. And John was sent to prepare that way. His role is described in Isaiah 40 as salvation is compared to a highway. Comfort ye, my people, says your God, speak comfort to Jerusalem, and cry out to her that her warfare is ended, her iniquity is pardoned, for she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, there's John the Baptist, he is in the wilderness, Luke says that he was in the desert till the day of his manifestation.

The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted. That's what you have to do when you make a road, if you make a good highway, if you ever drive down the interstates and you pay attention to the terrain as you are zooming by you will see that this is exactly what they do. Every valley is lifted up, the low places are filled in, and every mountain, every hill is brought down, a path is cut through them. Every valley shall be exalted, every mountain and hill brought low.

The crooked places are made straight, the rough places smooth. The glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together for the mouth of the Lord Has spoken and the voice said cry out and he said what shall I cry? This is what you are to cry, all flesh is grass, and its loveliness like the flower of the field, the grass withers and the flower fades because the breath of the Lord blows upon it. Surely the people are grass. Grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God shall stand forever.

O Zion, you who bring good tidings, get up into the mountains. O Jerusalem, you who bring good tidings, lift up your voice with strength. Say to the cities of Judah, Behold your God. Behold the Lord God, Jehovah God, shall come with a strong hand, and his arms shall rule for him. His reward is with him, his work before him.

He will feed his flock like a shepherd. He will gather his lambs with his arms. He will carry them in his bosom and gently lead those who are with young." This is John's role. He was the voice, crying from the wilderness, to prepare the way for the Lord, to make the highway, lifting up the low spots, cutting down the high spots, making the crooked straight and the rough smooth. John was to bring this gospel message to the people of God.

And This Gospel message, Zechariah summarizes with two statements, two parts. This Gospel message giving the knowledge of salvation is first the remission of their sins and secondly through the tender mercy of God. These two parts are very closely related because the remission of sins is through the tender mercy of God. But this simple gospel message is exactly how Paul summarizes the gospel As he opens his letter to the Romans in Romans chapter 1, he says, I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God, the salvation to everyone who believes. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness.

This righteousness of God is revealed from heaven because the wrath of God is revealed from heaven. And this is this this this twofold this two-part message is what Zechariah gives here. You will be called of the prophet of the highest, for you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways, to give the knowledge of the salvation to his people, by the remission of their sins through the tender mercy of our God." The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness. That is part one of the Gospel message. John came as that last Old Testament prophet, the one last messenger, warning the breakers of God's covenant of the wrath that was to come.

The wrath of God is a terrifying thing. It's the holy revulsion of God's very being against the transgressions of His law. God's wrath is absolutely terrifying and it's completely personal. It's not just a vague, general, non-specific thing, but it's a very specific wrath against specific people. Against all people individually who have transgressed the commandments of God.

Just contemplating, facing the wrath of God, Jesus' soul was in agony. Luke describes later on how his sweat became great drops of blood falling to the ground as Jesus was preparing to face the wrath of God. Jesus himself was in agony. How much more terrifying would it be to any mere mortal? When Jesus was suffering the wrath of God, He cried out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

He didn't cry out because of the severity of the pain that he faced, although that was certainly exceptionally acute. He cried out in the anguish of his soul because God had turned his back upon him. God had forsaken him in pouring out of this wrath. The wrath of God that John the Baptist preached wasn't just an especially severe form of the chastisement that the Lord inflicts on those he loves. That is for our good.

That is because God loves us that he sends these things for our good. This wrath of God is something altogether different. Its purpose is to take vengeance, to break, to destroy, to punish with an everlasting fury. The wrath of God encompasses a fury that is personal and vengeful. Because God is a God of vengeance, he says.

It was to bear the wrath of God that Christ hung upon the cross, that He was bound and beaten, that he was bruised and bleeding, that he was naked and mocked, that he was pierced and gasping for a breath, that his bones were out of joint, his flesh was flayed with whips and in excruciating pain, his heart was melted like wax before the heat of God's wrath, and above all, he was abandoned by his father. The cross was the cruelest, most barbaric, and shameful method of death that a depraved Roman mind could conceive. To bring the most terror into the heart of anyone who would ever witness such an execution so that they would never ever be tempted to do anything to incur the wrath of their Roman government. As I said before, John was no soft man, this messenger of God. He lived in the desert, he ate locusts, dressed in camel skins, and he came with a very sobering and powerful message.

He preached a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins, warning people of the wrath to come and calling them to repent and be baptized for the remission of sins. Isaiah 63 gives us a picture of this wrath of God that is upon all who have transgressed his commandments. Isaiah 63, who is this who comes from Edom with dyed garments from Basra? This one who is glorious in his apparel, traveling in the greatness of his strength. I who speak in righteousness, mighty to save.

Why is your apparel red, and your garments like one who treads in the winepress. I have trod in the winepress alone, and from the peoples no one was with me. For I have trod in them in my anger, and trampled them in my fury. Their blood is sprinkled upon my garments, and I have stained all my robes. For the day of vengeance is in my heart and the year of my redeemed has come I looked and there was no one to Help and I wondered and there was no one to Uphold there for my own arm brought salvation for me in my own fury It sustained me I have trodden down the people's in my anger made them drunk in my fury and brought down their strength to the earth It goes on he goes on to give a picture of Of God's redemption, but there there's a picture of God's wrath trampling the people as if He's trampling out grapes, so that their blood is splattered on his garments.

That's the righteous and just wrath of an almighty God. That's the first part of the message that John preached. But there was also a message of the remission of sins, the expiation of sins, the removing of the guilt of our sins by the tender mercy of our God. So the second part of that gospel message is, as Paul summarizes, it is that the righteousness of God is revealed from heaven through faith in Christ. Christ is the righteousness of God.

And John declared to the Jews that Christ was born and was in the midst of them. He pointed out Christ to them. He preached repentance and exhorted the people to believe in him. He administered that ordinance of baptism to all that repented. To all that repented.

And he also baptized Christ, by which he made known and introduced Christ to Israel. Christ's righteousness is revealed from heaven in the person of Jesus Christ. But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe, for there is no difference. For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, being justified by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God sent forth as a propitiation by his blood. God has sent forth his son, John came to proclaim this as well, that God has set forth his Son to be a propitiation by his blood.

To propitiate is to turn away the wrath of God, to appease the wrath of God. That wrath that is so graphically described in Isaiah 63 and elsewhere. Redemption that Jesus came to bring, that He brought, that He was, is explained here as being propitiation. God sent forth His Son Jesus to propitiate His wrath by His blood. Jesus hung on the cross, bound and beaten, bruised and bleeding, naked and mocked, pierced and gasping for breath, his bones out of joint, his flesh flayed by whips, and in excruciating pain so that we would not have to.

This is the tender mercy of our God and Father. John didn't prepare the way for Christ by asking people to invite Christ into their heart, but by calling them to come to Christ in faith and repentance and to become a part of Christ's body. Called for God's people, those in Israel, to come and be in Christ. Because Christ Himself is the message. Then John introduced Christ to Israel.

And the fruit of that message that Christ goes on to explain to us is that it's to give light to those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death and to guide our feet in the way of peace. Christ brings us. What he calls the day spring from on high who visits us. Christ brings us from darkness into light. He brings us from being under wrath and in the shadow of death into being at peace.

He's sitting in darkness. To those who sit in darkness, This is what the Bible means, or this is how the Bible describes being in a delusion of mind, being blind, having a blind heart and a blind mind, insensible to our sin. We are sitting under this wrath of God, and we're insensible to it. We're blind to it. We're oblivious to the danger that we are in.

To be under, to be sitting in darkness and to be sitting under the wrath of God is to be in a condition of real danger. Sitting in darkness is not only a delusion of mind, but it also refers to our depravity, to our hopelessness. We forget the sinfulness of our sin and the message of the cross. As Christ hung there bearing the wrath of God, the message of the cross lays bare our true condition before God. That we ourselves are filled with unrighteousness and wickedness and rebellion and lying and backbiting and envying.

We're disgusting, we're brutish, we're filthy, we're murderous, we're worthless for any good thing, we're boastful. But God, in His mercy, takes us from that condition and brings us, in bringing us into Christ, brings us into the light, out of the shadow of death. He gives light to those who sit in darkness. Light has reference to the knowledge of God, to the glory of God, and even to gladness. We are brought to Christ to share in His glory.

Paul said, We suffer with Him, but this happens so that we may also be glorified together with Him. Peter said that God has called us to His eternal glory in Christ. It's a mutual radiance. God is glorified in us and we are glorified in Him. Paul told the Thessalonians, The name of our Lord Jesus Christ will be glorified in you and you in Him.

And we will shine like the sun in the kingdom of our Father." Matthew said, God chose us as the first fruits of salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and through belief in the truth to which He called you through the Gospel so that you may obtain, that we, you and I may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. We have been given light because the righteousness of God has been revealed from heaven. We have been given light and our feet have been guided into the way of peace. This is the idea of that shalom to a person's total well-being as a result of being in Christ. Sometimes we want the fruits of that peace, of that being in Christ, and forget Christ.

Sometimes we want the fruits of that. We want the peace and the justification, the sanctification, and we forget that that comes from being in Christ. Being in Christ. We need to want Christ and to desire Christ Himself. God has chosen us that we might live by faith in Christ, that we might exercise the dominion of Christ until He comes, and that we might then know and enjoy the glory of Christ as fellow heirs with Him.

That is the fruit of the gospel that John came to proclaim. And it is indeed a beautiful and glorious message. The message of hope takes us from despair, having without hope, having no destination and no purpose other than the wrath of God to make us fellow heirs with Jesus Christ seated with Him in the heavenlies, participating in His rule and in His glory. Heavenly Father, thank you for such a wonderful and marvelous redemption. Lord, how often we need reminded of your love to us, of your beauty, of the wonder of your salvation, reminded of its hope, for we have been saved in this hope that our bodies will be raised incorruptible, will be united to You, will be given a crown of righteousness and share in the glory that is yours, Father, such is our inheritance in you.

We rejoice this morning, overwhelmed at your goodness and your mercy to us who are so in ourselves unworthy of any good thing. We praise you this morning, the Lord of glory and the God of grace, through Jesus Christ. Amen. Thanks for watching!