The opening of Luke’s narrative seems innocuous enough: “In the days of Herod, the king of Judea….” Historical fact. Herod the Great (the king to which Luke is referring) reigned from 37 to 4 B.C. So, whatever Luke is about to write is within that time span.
However, if Luke had only wanted to give us a calendrical setting, there would have been other ways to do it. Sure, the dates are narrowed down for us as to when everything is happening (and that, in itself, is important), but that is not all that Luke is accomplishing with his opening reference.
The gospel story is set in a time when the world is upside down and backwards. Things aren’t right. The fact that Herod is king of Judea, or king of Jews, is, for anyone familiar with God’s covenant, an anomaly.
Herod was a ruthless puppet-king of Rome, but that, in itself, wasn’t what tips us off to the things not being right in the world. Herod was an Idumean or Edomite, a son of Esau. A Jew or God-fearer (a Gentile believer who not been circumcised) reading this would know that Herod, the son of Esau, would not be some neutral historical figure, a mere calendrical marker. He was a rival to the true king, the descendent of Jacob. From the time Esau and Jacob were in the womb of their mother, Rachel, they were struggling with one another. God promised Rachel that the older–Esau–would serve the younger–Jacob. It was through Jacob (later Israel) that God would raise up his promised king who would be a true Adam and have dominion over the earth. But a son of Israel was not only not ruling the earth, a son of Israel wasn’t ruling Israel! Esau was ruling Israel.
The world is upside down. Things must change.
In this upside-down world God still had his faithful people. We meet two of them, Zechariah and Elizabeth, in Luke’s opening. They are Aaron’s children, and, thus, from the priestly family in Israel. They were “righteous, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and statutes of the Lord” (Lk 1.6). They were loyal to YHWH even when Herod was on the throne.
You might think that their God would reward them for their covenant loyalty. However, Zechariah and Elizabeth have no children because Elizabeth is barren. Now they are well past child-bearing years, so all hope for having a child and being freed from the shame of being childless was completely beyond their grasp.
Death reigns. The righteous are suffering while the wicked are exalted. The wombs of the righteous are dead while the wicked multiply. The world isn’t right.
Luke is setting us up for what is to come. He is not denying the world situation. He paints no rosy picture of what is happening. The gospel that Luke is proclaiming comes into a world that is broken, upside down, and inside-out.
But this is not unusual in history, and anyone familiar with the Scriptural story can see where this is headed. The wickedness of the world reaches its zenith, and God will have Noah build an ark and bring in a new world. Pharaoh is on the throne oppressing God’s people, but God will send Moses to deliver them from their bondage. God’s people are in exile with their Temple torn down and the walls of their city destroyed, but God will raise up Cyrus, Nehemiah, Ezra, and others to rebuild God’s house. Sarah’s, Rebekah’s, Rachel’s, and Hannah’s wombs are dead, but God will resurrect them, giving them sons who will carry out his covenant promises for his people. The world has been topsy-turvy many times in the past, and God has always been faithful to his promises.
He will do it again. The womb of Elizabeth will be resurrected to bear a son. A virgin womb will conceive the Son of the Most High. Through them the principalities and powers of the world will be cast down from their thrones (Lk 1.52). Sin and death itself, the world’s greatest tyrants, will be defeated. The world will be put right. God’s faithful Son and sons will rule the world, just as he intended and promised.
Even now, after Jesus has come, died, risen, and ascended to the right hand of the Father, we do not yet see all things subjected to him (Heb 2.8). Many things still aren’t right. The faithful suffer and the wicked are exalted. But we know the story and the Storyteller. This is not the way things will remain. The exalted Christ is working by his Spirit through the church to set things right in the world. Things may not look too promising right now, but you know is going to happen.
Keep the faith.
