Sermons, Articles, and Other Things

The third vision that Zechariah was given was that of a man with a measuring line who was on his way to measure Jerusalem. Obviously, the next question would concern why he was going to that. As with the previous visions, Zechariah is accompanied by an angel who guides him through the vision’s details.   The background to the vision is the unfinished state of the city of Jerusalem. Sixteen or so years before the vision was given, Cyrus had permitted the Jews to return to their country from exile and he allowed them to rebuild their city. Progress had stalled however for most of that period, although now through the preaching of Haggai and Zechariah work had resumed, with the people of Judah now showing enthusiasm for the project. We could say that a kind of spiritual revival had taken place.   I suppose we could liken the man with the measuring line to a modern-day city planner who wants to know the facts about the city and what its future prospects are, so that he is ...

We can see from the previous chapter and from the subsequent passage that Jesus is teaching in the temple area on a variety of topics. This incident comes in-between his warning the people of the scribes (20:45-47) and his comments to his disciples about the future (21:5ff). At the very least, we can see that Jesus in his teaching was flexible and focussed on matters that were relevant to the situation. There were thirteen metal receptacles located within the court of the women in the temple area into which worshippers could put their contribution for the upkeep of the temple. Given the numbers that would have been giving offerings it is likely that a queue would exist at each box. Therefore, it was possible for individuals to draw attention to themselves when their turn came to put their offering in the box. How much did the widow give? It is not possible to give an exact figure for this, but we would be close if we said it would have the value of 50 pence or less. We can eas...

Luke in this section describes various incidents that followed the birth of Jesus. First, he mentions the circumcision of Jesus which happened eight days after his birth, probably in Bethlehem. Then he describes two incidents in the temple just over a month later involving Mary and Joseph and the infant Saviour when two individuals called Simeon and Anna responded to their being there. Why were they there? Mary and Joseph had come to the temple that day with a double purpose in view. The religious rituals in place at that time in Israel required that she as a mother had to offer a sacrifice for her purification (a reminder that sin affected even the happiest of blessings, giving birth to a son) forty days after the birth of her child. Usually the offerer had to give a lamb and a pigeon. Mary and Joseph were too poor to procure a lamb and offered two pigeons instead (Lev. 12:6-8), which is an indication that the visit of the wise men had not yet occurred, otherwise Mary and Josep...