Category: New Year

Purpose Fulfilled or Prayer Answered? Angelic Appearance to Zechariah

The story of the birth of Christ should be reflected upon this season with these thoughts entwined in the Christian mind…   If God is not sovereign in His purpose, what is the point of praying?

And there appeared to him an angel of the Lord standing on the right side of the altar of incense.  And Zechariah was troubled when he saw him, and fear fell upon him.  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.”

Lk. 1:11 – 13 ESV

It is a perennial question, often expressed as a puzzle; sometimes, a challenge to argue: If God is sovereign in His purpose, what is the point of praying?  For those untrained in theology, or without fundamental knowledge of the Scriptures, there seems to be no escape from the conundrum.  Let this episode of the appearance of the Angel Gabriel to Zechariah give the answer of simple faith.

Zechariah and Elizabeth are introduced in Luke’s Nativity narrative as “righteous in God’s sight” (1:6), but are childless.  As one may expect of the righteous, they make this a matter of prayer.  Zechariah is also a priest.  At a time for him to exercise his priestly function in the Holy Place of the temple, there appears to him the angel Gabriel.  He tells the astonished Zechariah a news that is just too much for the man to hear.  His wife Elizabeth will conceive and bear a son!  This son is, of course, the Gospels’ John the Baptist.  Peeling off, for the moment, many other lessons in this encounter, just focus on what the angel tells Zechariah.  This is happening, the angel explains, “for your prayer has been heard.”  Here are the two sides of the paradox clearly entwined with no sense of contradiction.

Is It God’s Purpose Fulfilled?

No doubt, it is.  For there are prophecies in the Old Testament concerning the coming of John the Baptist.  He fulfills Isaiah’s prophecy of “a voice cries in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord” (Isa 40:3).  Luke’s narrative cites this very prophecy as having been fulfilled (Lk 3:2 – 6).  This is corroborated by Mark 1:2 – 5 and John 1:23.  Besides this prophecy, the coming of Elijah is cited by no less than Jesus as being fulfilled in John the Baptist (Matt 17:11ff), a reference to the prophecy of Malachi 4:5, 6. 

We must conclude from this that the birth of John the Baptist is part of God’s redemptive plan.  Therefore it was conceived in eternity, and prophesied many generations before the event.  The purpose of God is fulfilled.  It reveals the sovereignty of God, and that His redemption plan is never going to fail – not in its preparation (from the Old Testament until John the Baptist), and not in its inauguration and consummation (the First Coming and the Second Coming of Christ). 

Is It Man’s Prayer Answered?

Without ambiguity from the Angel Gabriel, it is.  There can be no falsehood in those words, “for your prayer has been heard.”  Should we see contradiction?  That can only be the conclusion of one already prejudiced against the truth.  But for one who will follow as the Word of God leads, no matter where, will see the blessed paradox – two sides of the truth entwined.  The God who ordains the event is not slack in the arrangement of means – including the prayers of His people. 

It is important across the board in many areas of Christian duty.  Has God chosen those He will save?  There is no doubt, based on the Scriptures, that He has.  But He has also appointed the means – evangelism; intercession; etc.  One may not be irresponsible in the means and have any reason to expect that God will save the elect through him.  So with matters of prayer.  What we pray for, when according to the will of God, we may rest secure is heard and answered by God.  That answer is not a change in the mind of God, but the confirmation of His purpose.  Nothing comes to pass that is not according to His will (Eph 1:11).  But for the good of His people, we may also affirm that prayers are truly heard by God.  Praying is not a game of make-believe.  Things really happen in answer to prayers.  The story of the birth of Christ should be reflected upon this season with these thoughts entwined in the Christian mind.

Indeed, we may reverse the challenge with which we begin:  If God is not sovereign in His purpose, what is the point of praying?

Feng Shui or Providence for 2022?

The ‘forces and influences’ of life have malevolent forces of demonic powers behind them.  It is beyond foolish to imagine that any human can manipulate them by putting the door and the stairs on the right place!  Or make wood the lucky element!  No, we have a much-better and more assuring confidence than that.  It is to know that in this year 2022, the God on the throne who is the Sovereign now rules His people through the kingly reign of Jesus Christ.

In this transition to the new year 2022, many will seek guidance from the Chinese Zodiac that identifies this year as the Year of the Tiger.  To be exact, the Yang-Water Tiger, which begins on February 1.  This is avidly followed by those who practice Feng Shui.  For them, it is the art that enables them to tap good energy to ensure the good life for the year.

One such Feng Shui expert advices:

Tiger mainly contains Yang-Wood, which is a tall tree. It also contains Yang-Fire and Yang-Earth. Yang-Fire is related to the sun and Yin-Earth is related to the mountain. Tiger is a tall tree on the mountain under the sun. Tiger is a symbol of power, prestigiousness, and loneliness. Tiger cannot get along with many animals. The Water of 2022 helps the tree of the Tiger grow taller and stronger. That means 2022 brings strong Wood energy to people. You will have good fortune if the Wood is your Lucky Element.1

The reality is that the mystery of Feng Shui is of the essence of its practice.  It keeps its advocates continue to be bound by a supersitition that they cannot understand.  The Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics explains:

Chinese dictionaries give no definition of what is to be understood by Feng-Shui. No native treatises expound it upon scientific lines. Feng is ‘wind,’ shui is ‘water.’ Wind is what cannot be seen, and water what cannot be grasped. ‘Wind and water’ is the term, therefore, for the occult powers which are always bearing down upon human life. Professors of Feng-Shui prefer that it should remain a mystery, and those who pay them for their services accept the position, declaring that it is not to be expected that common people should understand the unfathomable.2

Many self-proclaimed experts are paid handsome amounts to give their advice: how to design the house; arrangement of furniture; coloring of walls; etc.  This is all rooted in the futile belief that one could manipulate the unseen forces and influences of life.

How different is the Christian concept of the providence of God.  By providence, we point to the wise God as in control of events directing them to the fulfillment of His plan for humanity, especially for His people.  Christian theology sees the works of God in three major categories of Creation, Providence, and Redemption.  What we see of human and natural existence is the product of God’s purposeful fiat.  But He did not leave it to function like clock-work by itself.  He Himself is intimately involved in both natural events and human history – preserving and governing for His ends.  But because humanity is fallen in sin, God has set in motion His grace to redeem sinners.  This is the basic explanation of the ‘forces and influences’ of life.  Providence is  rightly placed in the middle of God’s creative design and His redemptive purpose.

The Heidelberg Catechism of 1563 gives the classic summary of the biblical teaching of divine providence:

Q. 27. What dost thou mean by the providence of God?

A. The almighty and everywhere present power of God; whereby, as it were by his hand, he upholds and governs heaven, earth, and all creatures; so that herbs and grass, rain and drought, fruitful and barren years, meat and drink, health and sickness, riches and poverty, yea, and all things come, not by chance, but by his fatherly hand.

Q. 28. What advantage is it to us to know that God has created, and by his providence does still uphold all things?

A. That we may be patient in adversity; thankful in prosperity; and that in all things, which may hereafter befall us, we place our firm trust in our faithful God and Father, that nothing shall separate us from his love; since all creatures are so in his hand, that without his will they cannot so much as move.

Nothing is too small for the providential involvement of God.  “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny?  And not one of them will fall to the ground without your Father” (Matthew 10:29).

The ‘forces and influences’ of life have malevolent forces of demonic powers behind them.  It is beyond foolish to imagine that any human can manipulate them by putting the door and the stairs on the right place!  Or make wood the lucky element!  No, we have a much-better and more assuring confidence than that.  It is to know that in this year 2022, the God on the throne who is the Sovereign now rules His people through the kingly reign of Jesus Christ.

With that confidence, it is not Christian to wish “Good luck!”  But I wish all, “A God-centered, and Christ-ruled New Year 2022.”

1 https://www.chinesefortunecalendar.com/2022/default.htm

2 Dukes, E. J. (1908–1926). FENG-SHUI. In J. Hastings, J. A. Selbie, & L. H. Gray (Eds.), Encyclopædia of Religion and Ethics (Vol. 5, p. 833). T. & T. Clark; Charles Scribner’s Sons.