Luke 1:5 In the days of King Herod of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly order of Abijah. His wife was a descendant of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. 6 Both of them were righteous before God, living blamelessly according to all the commandments and regulations of the Lord. 7 But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were getting on in years.
Luke 1:8 Once when he was serving as priest before God and his section was on duty, 9 he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to enter the sanctuary of the Lord and offer incense. 10 Now at the time of the incense offering, the whole assembly of the people was praying outside. 11 Then there appeared to him an angel of the Lord, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. 12 When Zechariah saw him, he was terrified; and fear overwhelmed him. 13 But the angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John. 14 You will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, 15 for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He must never drink wine or strong drink; even before his birth he will be filled with the Holy Spirit. 16 He will turn many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. 17 With the spirit and power of Elijah he will go before him, to turn the hearts of parents to their children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” 18 Zechariah said to the angel, “How will I know that this is so? For I am an old man, and my wife is getting on in years.” 19 The angel replied, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. 20 But now, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur.”
Luke 1:21 Meanwhile the people were waiting for Zechariah, and wondered at his delay in the sanctuary. 22 When he did come out, he could not speak to them, and they realized that he had seen a vision in the sanctuary. He kept motioning to them and remained unable to speak. 23 When his time of service was ended, he went to his home.
Luke 1:24 After those days his wife Elizabeth conceived, and for five months she remained in seclusion. She said, 25 “This is what the Lord has done for me when he looked favorably on me and took away the disgrace I have endured among my people.”
This summer my family and I were going through stuff in our basement. As we were going along, Cynthia would run across a photo and say, “Oh look what I found! Do you remember when…” or a program or bulletin from a wedding or a dance or a graduation. Do you ever go rummaging around in your basement or your attic or your hard drive, and you find things or photos that bring back memories? How do we deal with our memories? How do we find peace with the difficult memories and still enjoy the best? Our passage today offers some surprising insights.
First, remember the story is always easier to tell from the end. Do you have some stories of the “Bad Old Days?” Usually they begin like this, “When I was a kid…” and then they go on to describe ridiculous things like walking through the blizzards to get to school and it being uphill both ways. As I read today’s story, I imagine Luke—Paul’s personal doctor—sitting down with Mary, Jesus’ mom, to get her tell the stories about Jesus being born. And she starts, “In the days of King Herod of Judea…” Now those were some bad old days! King Herod was known for his tremendous building projects—the Temple, His palace, Masada, the colossal seaport, Caesarea Maritima—and his tremendous cruelty. Though we don’t have historical evidence for the “Killing of the Innocents” when Herod put to death all the boys two years and younger in Bethlehem after the wisemen leave, we do know that Herod had his own sons killed, and also his wife and her parents because of his paranoia. And yet, looking back on those days, Luke knows Herod is not nearly as important as Zechariah and Elizabeth, who have no children, but who are given a promise. When you look back at your life, do you have turning points? Do they hinge on the political events of the day, or do they revolve around the simple, everyday promises made and kept? When we look back, maybe we can see more easily what really matters.
Second, we can find peace from our troubling memories. “In an article in Guideposts, Corrie ten Boom told of not being able to forget a wrong that had been done to her. She had forgiven the person, but she kept rehashing the incident and so, couldn’t sleep. Finally, Corrie cried out to God for help in putting the problem to rest. She writes: ‘His help came in the form of a kindly Lutheran pastor to whom I confessed my failure after two sleepless weeks. “Up in that church tower,” he said, nodding out the window, “is a bell which is rung by pulling on a rope. But you know what? After the sexton lets go of the rope the bell keeps on swinging. First ‘ding,’ then ‘dong.’ Slower and slower until there’s a final dong and it stops. I believe the same thing is true of forgiveness. When we forgive, we take our hand off the rope. But if we’ve been tugging at our grievances for a long time, we mustn’t be surprised if the old angry thoughts keep coming for a while. They’re just the ding-dongs of the old bell slowing down.” And so it proved to be. There were a few more midnight reverberations, a couple of dings when the subject came up in my conversations. But the force—which was my willingness in the matter—had gone out of them. They came less and less often and at last stopped altogether. And so I discovered another secret of forgiveness: we can trust God not only above emotions, but also above our thoughts.’” Through the years, Zechariah and Elizabeth had lots of sad, disappointing memories of trying to have children. The happiness of growing old together was overshadowed by this empty place in their lives. Is that why Zechariah has trouble believing the angel when it says Zechariah and Elizabeth are going to have a baby? Sometimes we are so busy hanging onto the bad memories, we find it hard to trust God’s promises and hear Good News. Forgiveness is one of the ways we take our hand off the rope and allow the troubling memories to lose their force…and allow God’s promises—that God is Present, that God cares, and that God is at work—to outweigh our troubling memories.
We all have basements or attics of memories. Some are happy and nurturing. Some are painful and troubling. One of the reasons I love Thanksgiving and Christmas is that these events are times when our memories seem closer to us. We tell family stories that make people laugh, like the time Zechariah was working in the Temple and didn’t believe an angel and couldn’t talk for months! I wonder if Elizabeth was thrilled with that! Maybe we remember hard times too, but maybe like Zechariah and Elizabeth, they get swallowed up by the love with which we approach our lives. Memories are not just about the past. When we have a tradition, it reminds us of another year when we were doing the same thing, and yet, we are also making new memories for the years to come. The meaning of memory lies not just in the past, because we can’t live in the past. No, the meaning of memory lies in us remembering how God has remembered us, remembered our needs, and come to us. As we look at the future, remembering how God has come in Jesus, remembering how God has always heard the cry of His people, remembering how God has moved with power helps us look forward in hope, and hope is the real meaning of memory.