THE
CONNECTION FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT TO THE NEW TESTAMENT
LUKE
1:5- 42.9
Charles
e Whisnant, May 20 2012
Luke begins the story with the birth
of John the Baptist, who we know is the forerunner to the Messiah. One who
would come before Jesus Christ.
Let me point out why it is important that Luke started with
the birth of John the Baptist.
REASON
NUMBER ONE:
The Birth of John the Baptist
connects the Old Testament with the New Testament. At verse 5 we are still in the Old Testament
times per say. I know 400 years have
passed since the last book in the canon has been written, but the New Testament
times begins with the birth of John the Baptist.
The OT and the NT do not suggest
that there are two different religions.
That is there is not a religion of Judaism and the religion of
Christianity. What we have in the Old and
New is one revelation from God with continuity telling the story of redemption.
This is called Redemptive-Historical. That is the Bible is really to be viewed
as one continue story of the salvation of mankind.
There has only been one faith, and
that is faith in the true and living God which involves His Son, Jesus
Christ. The Bible is one complete
revelation from God. And we need both
the Old and the New in order to have the whole story complete.
Now this story begins with a little bit
of history.
“IN
THE DAYS OF KING HEROD OF JUDEA.”
THERE WAS A CERTAIN
PRIEST NAMED ZACHARIAS.”.
1A ZACHARIAH PERSONAL RIGHTEOUSNESS:
While the Jews were
under Rome rule, they were allowed to have their freedom in worship. They could
practice their religion freely so the priesthood was in full force all 18,000.
The Priesthood
In first century Palestine there was no separation between
church and state. The priests at the temple in Jerusalem not only officiated
over the religious life of the Jews, they were also rulers and
judges.
THE NATION OF ISRAEL was first
established as A THEOCRATIC KINGDOM THAT
IS RULED BY GOD.
And God
mediated that rule for the officers of the kingdom who were priests. And all
the priests were sons of Aaron.
Aaron represented the priestly functions
of his tribe, becoming the first High Priest of the Israelites.
While Moses was receiving his education at the Egyptian royal court, and during
his exile among the Midianites, Aaron and his sister Miriam remained with
their kinsmen
in the eastern border-land of Egypt (Goshen).
There, Aaron gained a name for eloquent and persuasive speech, so that when the
time came for the demand upon the Pharaoh to release Israel from captivity, Aaron became his
brother’s nabi, or spokesman, to his own people (Exodus 7:1) and, after
their unwillingness to hear, to the Pharaoh himself (Exodus 7:9). Various dates for his life have been
proposed, ranging from approximately 1600 to 1200 BC.To
be a priest then was to be honored. It was to be a representative of God. It
was to be a son of Aaron, if you will. It was to be a descendant of the one who
was the originally high priest who was to be set apart by God for holy service,
it was to be able to go...to go into the temple and offer sacrifice on behalf
of the people. It was a very noble and respected position. They were
pronouncers of blessing also.
1
They were servants of the temple.
2
It was the priests who were the
butchers who actually did all of the sacrificing of the animals for the people.
3
It was the priests who interpreted
the Scriptures.
4
It was the priests who taught the Scriptures
and who counseled people out in their villages where they lived. Zachariah was
one of them...his name can be with an H or an S, either way.
And
now in 04 B.C. there were many of these,
about 18 thousand. In fact there were so many of them throughout all of the
history of Israel that they had to be divided into 24 orders.
Back
in 1 Chronicles 24, David before the
kingdom even divided into the northern and southern kingdom, in the reign of
David he divided the priesthood into 24 orders because Eleazar and Ithamar, two
of Aaron's sons, combined had 24 sons so they just made those sons, all 24 of
them, the head of an order of priests and their sons and their sons and their
sons and all the way down the line would belong to those orders.
There were 24 orders of priests.
The eighth order, by the way, was named for the eighth son of Eleazar, Abijah.
And it happened that that was the division it says
there, in which Zacharias did his priestly service.
"And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of
priests, and an holy nation." – Exodus 19.6.
OF
THE DIVISION OF ABIJAH
It's also
interesting to note that it says Zacharias was of the division of Abijah. Just
a note about that. It doesn't mean that he was a descendant of Abijah, and I'll
tell you why. There were 24 orders of the priests until a great event occurred
and that was the Babylonian captivity in 586 B.C. Up to that point those 24
orders, you know, basically were made up of the descendants of whoever the
order was named for. They were all the sons of those 24 sons of Aaron.
But what
happened in the Babylonian captivity was all of Israel was taken captive in
three deportments, 605, 597, and 586 B.C. they're all carried into Babylon.
Seventy years later they straggled back, you remember, they straggled back.
Only four of those orders of priests came back and Abijah wasn't one of the
four that came back. Only four of the 24 came back under Zerubbabel, and that's
in the second chapter of Ezra.
Now why
was it divided down into 24 orders? Because there were so many priests they
couldn't all serve in the temple all the time and they had to be divided down.
And they were divided down and here's how it worked...any priest would serve in
the temple two different weeks a year...two separate weeks a year. That was it.
During the whole year you would only serve one week at one time of the year and
another week at another time of the year, and that was how you were brought
into temple service. Because there were so many you only were able to serve two
different weeks a year in the temple.
Now
all the priests came to the temple for Passover. It
wasn't uncommon to slaughter as many as a quarter of a million lambs, a quarter
of a million animals at Passover. If 18 thousand priests went about to
slaughter a quarter of a million lambs just in a week's period, that would be a
pretty great undertaking. And remember, they were butchers. They were covered
with blood to the top of their head all the way to the toe of their feet. They
were butchers, they slaughtered all day long. That's what they did when they
were there. But in the normal course of things they served in the temple just
two different weeks a year. And that's where we find Zacharias at this
particular time. (MacArthur)
