EVENING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 2/17/2026
8:05 PM
My
Worship Time Intro to PT-2“God’s Revelation to Zacharias”
Bible
Reading & Meditation Reference:
“Luke
1:5-14, 18-25”
Message of the verses: “5 ¶
In the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah,
of the division of Abijah. And he had a wife from the daughters of Aaron, and
her name was Elizabeth. 6 And they were
both righteous before God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and
statutes of the Lord. 7 But they had no
child, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were advanced in years. 8 Now while he was serving as priest before God
when his division was on duty, 9
according to the custom of the priesthood, he was chosen by lot to enter
the temple of the Lord and burn incense. 10
And the whole multitude of the people were praying outside at the hour
of incense. 11 And there appeared to him
an angel of the Lord standing on the right side of the altar of incense.
12 And Zechariah was troubled when he
saw him, and fear fell upon him. 13 But
the angel said to him, "Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has
been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his
name John. 14 And you will have joy and
gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth,”
“18 And Zechariah said to the
angel, “How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in
years.” 19 And the angel answered him,
"I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I was sent to speak to
you and to bring you this good news. 20
And behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that
these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which will be
fulfilled in their time." 21 And
the people were waiting for Zechariah, and they were wondering at his delay in
the temple. 22 And when he came out, he
was unable to speak to them, and they realized that he had seen a vision in the
temple. And he kept making signs to them and remained mute. 23 And when his time of service was ended, he
went to his home. 24 After these days
his wife Elizabeth conceived, and for five months she kept herself hidden,
saying, 25 “Thus the Lord has done for
me in the days when he looked on me, to take away my reproach among people.’”
It is my desire to finish this introduction to verses
above which John MacArthur has entitled his second chapter in his commentary on
Luke “God’s Revelation to Zacharias.”
MacArthur continues: “Malachi’s prophecy had included God’s pledge
to send a ‘messenger’ (‘herald’ ‘forerunner’) before the coming of the
Messiah (3:1). The arrival of that
messenger would signal the breaking of God’s long silence toward His
people. His preaching would be a beacon
of light in Israel’s spiritual darkness; he would proclaim the long-awaited
news of ‘the true Light’ (John 1:9), Messiah’s imminent arrival (Matt.
3:3; Mark 1:2-3; Luke 3:4-6; John 1:23), and call the people to prepare their
hearts to receive Him (Mark 1:4; Luke 1:16-17; 76-77; cf. Isaiah 40:3; Mal.
3:1).” I think that I will have enough
space to quote these verses above in the order that they appear.
(Matt. 3:3; Mark 1:2-3; Luke 3:4-6; John 1:23)
“3 For this is he who was spoken of by the
prophet Isaiah when he said, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness:
‘Prepare the way of the Lord; make his paths straight.’”
“2 As it is written in Isaiah the prophet,
"Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way, 3
the voice of one crying in the
wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,’"
“4 As it is written in the book of the words of
Isaiah the prophet, "The voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare
the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. 5 Every valley shall be filled, and every
mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall become straight, and
the rough places shall become level ways, 6 and all flesh shall see the salvation of
God.’"
“2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without
him was not any thing made that was made. 4 In him was life, and the life was the light of
men.”
(Mark 1:4; Luke 1:16-17; 76-77; cf.
Isaiah 40:3; Mal. 3:1)
“4 John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and
proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.”
“16 And he will turn many of the children of
Israel to the Lord their God, 17 and he
will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the
fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make
ready for the Lord a people prepared.’”
“76 And you, child, will be called the prophet of
the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, 77 to give knowledge of salvation to his people
in the forgiveness of their sins,”
“3 ¶ A voice cries: "In the wilderness prepare
the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.”
“1 ¶ "Behold, I send my messenger, and he will
prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his
temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is
coming, says the LORD of hosts.”
“It was essential that Luke begin the saga of salvation
with the story of that forerunner, John the Baptist, for several reasons. First, doing so connected the Old and New
Testaments. They do not teach two different
religions or propose two different ways of salvation. Rather, they are one unified revelation from
God, offering the hope of redemption through faith in the true and living God
and His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
“Second, John the Baptist was the
fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies.
That fulfillment demonstrates the accuracy of those predictions, further
linking the Old and New Testaments, and placing the New Testament as Scripture
on a par with the Old.
“Third, as noted above, it was
through John the Baptist that God broke
His centuries-long silence. Gabriel’s
appearance was the first supernatural communication and John was the first
prophet in 400 years.
“Fourth, John’s birth was
miraculous, in that his parents (like Abraham and Sarah) were beyond
child-bearing age. That foreshadowed the
even more miraculous virgin birth of the Lord Jesus Christ.
“Finally, and most significantly,
the story of John the Baptist establishes that he was the divinely prophesied
forerunner of the Messiah. Therefore,
his testimony concerning Jesus (cf. John 1:29) verifies that Jesus was the
Messiah.”
John
1:29 “29 ¶ The next day he saw Jesus
coming toward him, and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the
sin of the world!”
“Like any competent historian, Luke knew the importance
of placing his narrative in its proper context.
Therefore, he began his account with a brief description of the
historical setting before relating the amazing story of Gabriel’s announcement
to Zacharias regarding John.”
As I was going through this
introduction and thinking about those dark spiritual years of 400 years it reminded
me of the prophecy in Daniel chapter nine, which speaks of 490 years, something
that I have written about in many earlier SD’s.
I have mentioned that this starts in Nehemiah chapter two, that is these
490 years, and it ends when the Lord Jesus Christ came into Jerusalem to offer
Himself and the Messiah, and was turned down with seven years left on that
prophecy. Now the point that I want to
make has to do with the 400 dark years that Israel experienced, and to do that
I have to look at Daniel chapter nine. Let
us look at Daniel 9:25 in the NASB “So you are to know and understand that from
the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem, until Messiah the
Prince, there will be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks; it will
be built again, with streets and moat, even in times of
distress.” The NASB makes it
easier to understand this verse as it is saying that this 490 year prophecy
will be divided up into different sections: “there will be seven
weeks and sixty-two weeks;” Ok the
seven weeks is 49 years, and my point is that from after that time period of 49
years the Old Testament will have been written and Israel would go spiritually
dark, then as mentioned the prophecy ends with 7 years on it when the Lord came
into Jerusalem as mentioned above.
2/17/2026
8:40 PM
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