2. History

ADVENT MEDITATIONS No.2

2. Truth based in History

Luke 1:5 In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron.

There are some people who have some funny ideas about Christianity and there are some people who just have funny ideas. The ‘funny ideas about Christianity’ people often think Christianity was just some fairytale set of ideas dreamt up by some mystics some where along the way in history. The people who just have ‘funny ideas’ often are people who are led by mystical ‘funny people’ who have just dreamt up some strange ideas somewhere along the way in history.

Now the truth of Christianity is far from either of these two groups of weird and wonderful believers. Christianity is rooted in down to earth, time-space history. Things happened and those things were recorded. Yesterday we started these meditations by considering Doctor Luke who wrote what we call ‘Luke’s Gospel’. He had gone to some trouble to make sure he had checked things out very carefully. Today’s verse is steeped in history. It identifies the time as that in history when King Herod ruled in Judea. It speaks of Jewish culture and life at that time, of the practice of Jewish priests coming from the tribe of Levi and specifically from the descendants of the family of Aaron in that tribe.

This says that all that we are about to read follows in the flow of history, and much of the culture and background is because of what has gone before. We are never simply isolated figures in history; we come into history, into a world that has been shaped by all that has gone before.

Later on, Luke was to write about the coming of a forerunner to Jesus Christ and described it as follows: In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar–when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, Herod tetrarch of Galilee, his brother Philip tetrarch of Iturea and Traconitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene – during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the desert. (Lk 3:1,2). Those two verses are packed full of historical information defining the exact point in history when all this occurred. This is a writer who wants us to realize that this is all happening at a specific point of history in a specific geographical location, with a specific culture. You can’t be more down-to-earth than this!

In a day when political correctness or post modern rhetoric tends sometimes to spew out notions based upon emotion and little else, coming to the Bible and its concrete foundations may produce a sense of culture shock in some. There is nothing vague about the New Testament history; it is clear and concise, sometimes almost too much so. However, if we wish to use the Christmas story as recorded in the New Testament as a basis of our mediations, we would do well to face up to these things early on in the day.

What we are about to read is rooted in time-space history. Having read it verse by verse, word by word, for many years now, I am going to treat it as the accurate history that it is. If you have a problem with that, either stop reading these meditations now, or risk seeing how different they might be from the vagaries of unbelieving theologies. You might be pleasantly surprised! Risk it, stay with us!