BY JUAN PRESTOL

The following was a devotional presented during the year-end meeting of the North American Division in Silver Spring, Maryland, in November 2002. The majority of those in the audience were church leaders-hence the thrust of the article-but there are important implications for all members of the church. --Editors.

HAVE A DAUGHTER WHO'S A TEACHER, and she has a little book entitled Children's Letters to God. Here are one or two examples of the letters:

"Dear God, I read the Bible. What does 'begat' mean? Nobody will tell me." "Dear God, are You really invisible? Or is that just a trick?"

"Dear God, is it true my father will not get in heaven if he uses his bowling words in the house?"

And then I found this one: "Dear God, is Reverend Coe a friend of Yours, or do You just know him through business?"

Come with me to the first chapter of Luke. It's a strange story, one some would think probably belongs better in the Old Testament. It's the story of a priest, an old man near retirement, "well stricken in years" [verse7, KJV]. His name is Zacharias.

He was chosen by lot to offer the incense; and this is not a small matter, because in the days when you had so many priests (actually 24 divisions of priests), each division would come to the Temple and serve for one week. In so doing, they would distribute among themselves the responsibilities for the worship activities. For a regular priest the most important responsibility was to offer the incense at the time of the regular prayer, either the morning or the evening. Luke 1:9 says that "according to the custom of the priesthood" the "lot fell [on Zacharias] to burn incense."* This seems to indicate that Zacharias had never done that before. For a person who is born a priest, it's probably the highest moment of his life.

At the time when he goes in to offer the incense, it says that "the whole multitude of the people was praying outside." This seems to indicate that it was during the evening sacrifice that the angel appears to him. His duty was to offer the incense, to offer the intercessory prayer, to sprinkle the blood before the veil, and finally, to come out and pronounce a blessing on the people. But when he is in there, he sees an angel. Verse 11 says that "an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing on the right side of the altar of incense."

We're not used to seeing heavenly beings, at least not this way. When Zacharias saw him, "fear fell upon him," an overwhelming sense of dread.

As humans we're fearful of divine appearances. But the angel had a good message. It was the same angel who brought the prophecy of the 2300 days and the 70 weeks, and the time was nearing. The Lord wanted to be sure that things were going to happen right, and the angel was there to announce that Zacharias's prayer was heard.

Ellen White tells us that Zacharias had been praying for the coming of the Messiah. What happened after this is something strange. The angel says, "Don't fear, I have brought you a good message." Then he delivers the message. And if you hear the message that is delivered to him, you realize that this man has been chosen by the Lord for a very special task. I don't know how many of you have received a message in which an angel has come to you and told you that your son or your daughter is not going to be a drug addict or a killer or some crazy person-he's going to be filled with the Holy Spirit! He's going to prepare the way for the coming of the Messiah. What a wonderful message!

"We Have a Problem"
Something happened that we do not understand. And it just reminds me of the time when I came to the U.S.-I think in 1971. It was my first time on U.S. soil, and it was the time when the Apollo 13 mission got in trouble. I didn't speak a whole lot of English in those days, but I remember the famous words: "Houston, we have a problem." I think what happened here in the story before us was just about the same message. Standing there, Gabriel hears Zacharias's question, "How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is well advanced in years" (verse 18). I would like to believe that the angel looked up to heaven and said, "Lord, we have a problem here. This is not going according to plan."

It was not a matter of cleverness or wit. We love the smart, the handsome, the athletic, the clever, the witty, the strong, the daring, the hero, the fast-talking, the slick. And all of those are really not assured to make the cut of leadership. What happened here to make this man respond as if he doesn't know, as if he doesn't remember, what happened to Abraham? What's the reason this man who, in verses 5 and 6, is identified (with his wife) as being "righteous before God" and "walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless"-why is it that this man just can't bring himself to accept what the Lord is delivering? It's really a contrast with the attitude of Mary (see verses 26-38). Mary asked basically the same question, but the angel took no issue with her. She had faith-he didn't.

Was Zacharias living a shallow faith, just going through the motions (like the eldest son of the parable of Luke 15, when he said, "I never transgressed your commandment any time"? And why does Luke begin his letter with this failure?

Role Confusion
Obviously Zacharias did not understand the part. His identity was all mixed up. He didn't remember what he had been praying for, and his priorities were all confused. Ellen White says about this man that he and his wife were a godly pair. They lived quiet and holy lives, prayed for the Messiah to come. They both well knew that Abraham had been given a child because he believed in Him who is faithful.

In this whole drama between him and the angel and God, Zacharias was to be the best supporting actor. But he thought he was the leading actor. When the angel appeared, Ellen White says, Zacharias had been filled with fear and self-condemnation. She says the reason the angel acted the way he did with Zacharias was to teach him the lesson that we are incapable of doing any good thing, but that what we cannot do will be wrought by the power of God in every believing (underline the word believing) and submissive soul.

The angel says, "You will be mute and not able to speak until the day these things take place, because you did not believe my words" (verse 20).

Now, this is the paradox. How could you be faithful and obedient to all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord, blameless, and at the same time when the angel of God comes to answer your prayer, you do not believe? Isn't that a strange situation?

That's why I say that this passage probably really belongs in the Old Testament. In the New Testament these things are not supposed to happen. The God of the Old Testament is the one that fits better with this kind of drama. Ananias and Sapphira, the same thing, you know. How could it be? Is it to tell us, perhaps, that God has never changed?

Yes, Zacharias, blameless and obedient. The real question is whether he really knew the Lord. Here is the case of a religious man who lost his identity. Jeremiah 9 says, "Let him who glories glory in this, that he understands and knows Me." Acts 17:28 says, "In Him we live and move and have our being." Deep inside, perhaps Zacharias may have been just a secular man, skeptical and atheistic, away from the world of faith.

In 2 Peter the apostle says that we are to add to our faith virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, kindness, and love. It's a progressive way of knowing God. Knowing God is accepting the way He reveals Himself to us, being open to Him. Away from God, we lose our identity. We are off center, with mixed-up priorities.

Leadership is about thinking right, doing right, at the right time, for the right reasons. When our preaching abilities, our administrative flair, our knowledge of issues far exceeds our commitment or surrender or knowledge of God; when our prayer life is poor and our study life is nonexistent; when our communion is weak, and we find excuses for our foibles; and when we allow ourselves to just go along with the flow, we are deceiving ourselves. Lukewarm leaders are not leaders at all. They are found wanting in troubling times. They are not really friends of God-they're just business acquaintances.

Integrity is compromised when leaders move away from the moral and spiritual center. There's a drifting away from core values. There is a loss of the simple mind.

To Be the Fool
There's a piece of work, a very interesting story written by the Nobel laureate Isaak Bashevis Singer, a Jewish author who writes stories about people living in Eastern Europe and emigrating to the United States. One of them, perhaps the best-known story of this writer, is the one entitled "Gimpel the Fool." It was written originally in Yiddish under the title "Gimpel Tam." The word tam in Yiddish means "the simple, the plain, the uncomplicated." The story defines integrity as being whole, unbroken, undivided.

This is the case of a man who is gullible, who is easy to tease, easy to play tricks on, a man with a very simple mind, who believes everything. He's a baker, and people would come to his store and tell him that the Messiah had come, that the Messiah was in his house, to please rush to his house, that the Messiah was there. And he would leave the store open and go there, just to find that people were laughing at him as he would return to his bakery. This is a man whom the town leaders convinced to marry a very morally doubtful person, a woman who is probably pregnant at the time he decides to marry her. She has a child, and finally convinces him that it's his child, when the child isn't really his. One day he goes to the rabbi and says, "Why am I so gullible? Why am I this way? Why am I a fool?"

And in the story the rabbi says to him, "You are not a fool. They are, because they are forfeiting their place in heaven."

Finally, at the end of the story, when he is about to die, he realizes in a dream that all the people that have fooled him have really left their place in heaven. They are not eligible. He is the only one.

Rabbi Kushner speaks about this as the quest for integrity, the quest for oneness with God. When a person seeks to integrate the will of God into their conscience, that's when the individual becomes simple-minded.

In his book Defining Moments, Badaracco describes such moments as events that come to our lives to test us, to reveal who we are, to shape us. For Zacharias this was a wake-up call. Was God too tough with him? Well, was God too tough with David when He said, "You will not build My Temple"? Was God too tough with Moses when He said, "You will not enter"? Yes, the truth is that heaven needed a different Zacharias, one filled with the Holy Spirit.

And if you jump to the conclusion of the story (verse 67), you find that after nine months of silence, "Zacharias was filled with the Holy Spirit, and prophesied." Quite a change!

Henri Matisse, the painter and sculptor, used to say that there are two suns. One is shining out there, and the other one shines in here. And what was happening in this man, this old leader, ready for retirement, is that he had no sun shining in here. God couldn't actually deliver this child into his hands so that he would grow to be this great preacher, preparing the way for the Messiah, unless Zacharias changed. So what is the story today? True Christian leaders have surrendered to the will of God, to God's demands, at times a bit unwelcome. They hear the voice, and they obey the voice. And when the struggle is over, God's voice becomes their voice. There is no inconsistency.

Our problem is that there is a big difference sometimes between what we say and what we do.

When We're for Real
There's a story written by Bruno Zirato, the secretary to the great singer Enrico Caruso. He speaks about the day when Caruso sang with the most convincing voice at Royal Albert Hall in London. He had sung this opera, I Pagliacci ("The Clowns"), many times. The story is that this man discovers that his wife has been unfaithful at a time when he cannot take care of the problem-he's already dressed as a clown, so he has to go onstage and get with the play. And that's the aria, the title of the aria, "Vesti la giubba" ("On With the Play"). He can't stop and fix the problem-he has to go on and pretend that he's happy and joyful when he's actually torn inside.

Caruso had sung that aria many times, always successfully. But the day when he moved his audience to tears was the day when his father died and his first wife abandoned him. That day, when Caruso put on his robe and covered his face with white powder and went on to sing, he didn't have to pretend that he was the clown. He was the clown.

I will conclude now. Luke, the warm and compassionate doctor, is telling his readers, the "most excellent Theophilus," and us, that sincere Christians and Christian leaders know God. That knowing God is essential. That lukewarm leaders are unable to stand up in tough and troubling times and fulfill their calling.

May we welcome the leading of the Holy Spirit. May we become Christians and Christian leaders, with that kind of knowledge of God.

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* Unless otherwise noted, Bible references in this article are from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1979, 1980, 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Juan Prestol is treasurer of the North American Division of Seventh-day Adventists.