Key Points

• Zechariah spoke God’s Word announcing that John would give people knowledge of salvation in the forgiveness of sins. God speaks through His Holy Word to give me knowledge of salvation and forgiveness through Jesus, His Son.
• Law: God wants me to listen and obey Him, following His ways.
• Gospel: God looks at me through the obedience of Christ and is pleased.

Discussion Questions

1. Have you ever been told that you have to learn to forgive yourself when you feel guilty about something? As a Christian, what is the problem with that statement? Read Psalm 51:1–5. What might David tell us to say instead of “You have to learn to forgive yourself”?
2. In the ancient world, names carried much more meaning than they do in our culture. We say in the Lord’s Prayer that God’s name is holy by saying “Hallowed be Thy name.” Last week, we learned that Jesus’ name is significant because it means “the Lord saves,” and Jesus was born to save His people from their sins. Luke 1:13 says that Gabriel instructed Zechariah to name his son John, which means, “The Lord is gracious and moved to pity.” We see in Luke 1:59 that the neighbors and family of Zechariah and Elizabeth expected the boy to be named after his father. How was the name John appropriate for his mission? What is the significance of having the name of God placed upon us in Baptism? See Matthew 28:19.
3. When would you hear the word covenant used today outside of biblical usage? Read Luke 1:68, 72–73. When these verses are connected, they show Zechariah saying, “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for He has visited and redeemed His people . . . to show the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember His holy covenant, the oath that He swore to our father Abraham.” God made many covenants with His people and always swore to be faithful to them. The central thought of Zechariah’s prophecy is that God remembers His covenants. The covenant referred to here is the one God made with Abram (Abraham) in Genesis 15; the oath is found in Genesis 22:15–18. All of the covenants God made with Israel were fulfilled in the Messiah, Jesus. Read Jeremiah 31:31–34. What did God promise to do here? Read Luke 22:20. How does Jesus show that we live under the new covenant?
4. The Old Testament prophets had many roles. They encouraged the people to rely on the Lord’s strength and not their own. They called on the people to remember God’s covenants with them. They proclaimed the Lord’s faithfulness based on the saving acts He had performed in the past. And they prophesied what the Lord would do for His people in the future. All of these prophetic functions are included in Zechariah’s prophecy in Luke 1:68–79. He was filled with the Holy Spirit, who allowed Him to prophesy (Luke 1:67). What would his son, John, do as a prophet (Luke 1:76–77)? Whom would John prophesy about (Luke 1:78–79)? Who else had prophesied concerning John (Luke 3:4)? Who was the last and greatest of the prophets (Luke 4:24)?
5. Psalm 51 shows us that sin is what separates us from God. “Against You, You only, have I sinned and done what is evil in Your sight” (Psalm 51:4). The forgiveness of sins is emphasized in Luke and in the Bible in general. Luke tells us that salvation is found in the forgiveness of sins (Luke 1:77). John the Baptist identifies Jesus as “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). How would John the Baptist deliver forgiveness to people (Luke 3:3)? What does Jesus identify as the essential message of the Christian Church (Luke 24:47)? What is the basis for that message (Luke 24:46)? Why is this message so important?
6. A word closely related to the forgiveness of sins is righteousness. Zechariah says in Luke 1:74–75 that the Lord granted His people to “serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all our days.” Read Romans 4:1–9 and Luke 18:9–14. What does the word justify mean? What does it mean that God “justifies the ungodly” (Romans 4:5)? In Luke 1:6 and 2:25, Zechariah, Elizabeth, and Simeon are described as “righteous.” Why are they called righteous? How are people justified?
7. People are insultingly called “holier than thou” when they flaunt their piety and good works before others and condemn behaviors they consider unholy. The temperance movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was a holiness movement intended to make the production and use of alcohol illegal. Holiness churches require their members to abstain from things they consider unholy, such as alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, and so on. What understanding of the word holy do we get based on the examples above? Read Luke 1:49, 70, 72, 75; 3:16. What do we learn about holiness from these passages? List as many things as you can that go on in Lutheran churches that we call holy. What makes these things holy?
8. What is mercy? See Luke 1:50, 54, 58, 72, 77–78; 6:36; 10:37. What do we learn about God’s mercy from these verses? What do we learn about the mercy we are to show to others?
9. What is your idea of perfect peace? Luke 1:79 says that Jesus will “guide our feet into the way of peace.” In 2:14, we are told that Jesus’ birth has brought “on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased!” Read Luke 2:29–30. How was peace brought to Simeon? Read Luke 24:36–39. How does Jesus show His disciples true peace?
10. In Luke 1:57–66, we see the neighbors and relatives of Zechariah and Elizabeth playing an important role in the circumcision and naming of John. Close relationships with extended families and tight connections with the community were the norm at this time. Many people never traveled more than a couple days’ journey from where they grew up. This is hard for us to understand. While we can be thankful for the blessings of increased mobility in our times, we also should recognize the consequences, such as the disconnection of most of our lives from extended family and neighbors. Many people feel isolated and that their lives are fragmented and chaotic with no solid foundations anywhere. Since Christian congregations are made up of sons and daughters of God who are brothers and sisters in Christ, what responsibilities and opportunities are presented to the Church by our cultural climate?

Key Points

• Just as Jonah was swallowed up in the belly of the fish for three days, so Jesus, in His crucifixion, was baptized into the sea of death, drowned in our depravities, devoured by the grave, and spewed forth alive again after three days and nights that He might save us, the Assyrians, the Ninevites, and Jonah.
• Law: In my sin, I judge and condemn others. I am unforgiving because I am blind to my own sin and guilt.
• Gospel: God, who sees my sin, is rich in mercy and forgives me for Jesus’ sake.

Context

The Assyrians were the forerunners of the world’s Hitlers, Mussolinis, and their ilk. Icyblooded, tyrannical people were they, infamous for such crimes as impaling conquered peoples on tall poles. And, as if to boast to their posterity, they chiseled stones with pictures of such brutality! They were easy to hate, in other words. Jonah’s lack of love for them would have been shared by very many of his countrymen. Nineveh’s repentance and faith following Jonah’s preaching would not last forever. About a century later (around 650 BC), Nahum lambasted Nineveh for its evil ways, but his message went unheeded. This led to the city’s destruction by God, through the Babylonians, in 612 BC.

Discussion Questions

1. Why did the interpretation of Jonah and the account of the creation of the world (Genesis 1–2) become controversial in twentieth-century Christian history? What does Jesus say about Jonah and the creation in Matthew 12:39–41 and 19:3–6?
2. Why would Jonah have been reluctant to go to the Assyrians, in particular, with a message of repentance? See God’s description of Assyria in Isaiah 10:5 and Assyria’s threats in Isaiah 36:12, 18.
3. Why should Jonah have known better than to try to flee God’s presence (1:2–3)? See Genesis 3:7–10 and Psalm 139:7–12.
4. What is ironic about Jonah’s sleeping while each mariner “cried out to his god” (1:5)? What other ironies appear in 1:9–17? How did Jesus’ actions in Luke 8:22–25 prove that “something greater than Jonah is here” (Matthew 12:41)?
5. What part of the Bible does Jonah’s prayer in chapter 2 sound like? Where would he have learned to pray in this way? What is the overall theme of his prayer? What signals the Lord’s answer to his prayer (v. 9)?
6. What does chapter 3 of Jonah teach about the power of God’s Word? Compare with Isaiah 55:10– 11. What was the evidence that His Word had done its work in Nineveh? How does His Word impact us?
7. Jonah should have been overjoyed at the outcome of his preaching, but he lamented God’s kindness toward the city because he would have preferred disaster to strike Israel’s enemy (4:1–4). He wanted the Gospel only to apply to Israel, not any Gentiles, especially Assyria. What did Jonah have in common with the Pharisees? See Luke 15:1–2. What does Jesus say about attitudes like Jonah’s in Luke 6:35– 36?
8. What is the point of the story about Jonah’s plant (4:5–11)? Compare with Matthew 20:1–16.
9. Why might Jonah have ended his story so abruptly?
10. Though the Lord has drawn us in with the question “And should I not pity Nineveh?” (Jonah 4:11), we find that we have not reached out to others with the Gospel as well as we should have. How does the One “greater than Jonah” (Matthew 12:41) answer the question perfectly in our place? See John 12:23–24, 31–33.
11. What would happen if Christian pastors had Jonah’s attitude and weaknesses?

• The Word of God spoken by the prophet was in and with the water of the Jordan to restore the flesh of Naaman; the Word of God spoken by the pastor is in and with the water of the baptismal font to cleanse us of our sin and restore us as children of the heavenly Father.
• Law: Sin and its effects slowly kill me, both in body and soul.
• Gospel: Jesus saves me, both in body and in soul. He cleanses me from sin and at the resurrection will heal my body and make it perfect, so it will be like His.

Context

Elisha, successor to Elijah, lived in the mid-to-late ninth century BC. His ministry was concentrated mainly in the Northern Kingdom during the reigns of four Israelite kings: Jehoram, Jehu, Jehoahaz, and Jehoash. There was bad blood aplenty between Israel and Syria—Naaman’s home turf—dating back to Solomon’s day and beyond (e.g., 1 Kings 11:23–25). In fact, the king before whom Naaman appears, Jehoram, lost his own father, Ahab, to the Syrians just a few years before (1 Kings 22:29–40).

Note that some English translations render “Syria” as “Aram” (e.g., NIV), but both names refer to the same country, located north and east of Israel. The Hebrew word usually translated as “leprosy” actually encompassed a variety of skin disorders. So whether Naaman actually had what we call leprosy (technically known as Hansen’s disease) cannot be proven. Either way, his skin disease was serious enough to prompt him to undertake a long and potentially dangerous journey.

Discussion Questions

1. The Lord made Naaman a powerful man (2 Kings 5:1) but not powerful enough to cure his own leprosy. In Syria, this skin disease had not kept him from reaching high office, but would this have been possible in Israel? What had the Lord said about leprosy? See Leviticus 13:45–46 and Numbers 5:1–4. What could account for such a strict policy?
2. The little girl who had been taken by the Syrians in a raid told Naaman, the Syrian military commander, about Elisha (2 Kings 5:2–4). How is this similar to the Joseph narrative in Genesis, particularly 50:15–21?
3. When the king of Syria heard about Elisha, Naaman was sent on his way with a great deal of wealth (2 Kings 5:4–5). Why did the king send such an enormous amount? How is the king’s approach consistent with pagan religion? See Ephesians 2:8– 9.
4. Why did the king of Israel despair when he received the message from the king of Syria (2 Kings 5:6–7)? Consult 1 Samuel 2:6 and Deuteronomy 32:39. Why should the king not have lost hope (2 Kings 5:8)?
5. What message would Naaman’s horses, chariots, and gifts have sent to Elisha (2 Kings 5:9)? What two things caused Naaman to take offense at Elisha’s treatment (5:10–12)?
6. Cooler heads prevailed when Naaman’s servants convinced him to wash seven times in the Jordan “according to the word of the man of God” (2 Kings 5:13–14). What is significant about the number of times he was to wash? See Genesis 1:31–2:3. What sevenfold cleansing are we to perform? See Matthew 18:21–22.
7. What aspects of Jesus’ ministry did Elisha’s healing of Naaman point forward to? See Matthew 8:2–4, 14–17; Isaiah 53:4–6; and Luke 17:11–19.
8. In Israel, people often considered lepers cursed by God for some particular sin. What similar situation did Jesus deal with in John 9:1–7? What insight can we draw from this story? Compare with 2 Corinthians 12:7–10.
9. Naaman’s washing in the Jordan was not Christian Baptism, for Christ had not yet come. Nonetheless, what aspects of the story are similar to the Lord’s revelation of what Baptism, Absolution, and the Lord’s Supper mean for us? Include references to the teachings of the Small Catechism.
10. What can we learn from the example of the enslaved Israelite girl who told Naaman’s wife about Elisha? What similar conclusion is drawn from Mark 2:1–12?