This year my A to Z challenge is about Christmas, a major festival in the Christian Church. Another major festival is Easter, which I wrote about for the A to Z Challenge in 2020.
My A to Z challenge began with Advent and angels one of whom appeared to Zechariah. Zechariah became the father of John the Baptist, who prepared the way for Jesus’ (Yeshua’s) ministry.
This Zechariah is not the same one as the prophet, whose name is given to the penultimate book in the Old Testament. The prophet Zechariah foresaw events which occurred in Jesus’ life. Zechariah 9:9-10 is one example. It predicts the events of Palm Sunday.
The New Testament Zechariah also appeared in my post for the letter Q. I rewrote Zechariah’s story in my own words for my A to Z challenge in 2017. Why not click through to read it there?
A Christmas carol which uses the letter Z is the Zither carol. Zither was my post for my A to Z about musical instruments. The link above to the Zither carol is a karaoke version. To listen to the carol being sung, please click here.
While this year’s A to Z badges by Anjela Curtis honour the late Jeremy Hawkins, I hope that my posts about Christmas honour Jesus Christ, ‘who was and is and is to come’. Revelation 1:4
I hope you have enjoyed looking at the Christmas story with me.
This year for the Blogging from A to Z in April Challenge I have chosen a single word for each letter of the alphabet. Each of these words is important in the Bible. I am including a story in each post. Links from biblical references go to Bible Gateway.
Zeal appears in the Bible fewer than 40 times depending on the translation searched. This includes zealous and Zealot. Zeal is defined in the Collins Scrabble Dictionary as great enthusiasm or eagerness. Zealot is a political enthusiast (in the New Testament it refers to a member of a particular political group). Zeal is a word connected both with God, whose zeal for justice and righteousness leads to anger, and with his enthusiastic (zealous) servants. It is perhaps worth mentioning that the word enthusiasm is derived from Greek words meaning inspired by or possessed by a god. In the case of believers in the God of the Bible, this is the Holy Spirit.
Two people, who stand out for their zeal have appeared previously in these posts for the A to Z challenge. Elijah, whose story is told in this post and the post for Letter Q and Paul, Letter E and Letter Y.
To jump to the story Elijah’s Zeal for the Lordclick here.
Phinehas, a priest who was the great-nephew of Moses, was zealous for God’s honour. Numbers 25:11 This led to a promise from God that his descendants would have a lasting priesthood. Numbers 25:13
In Deuteronomy 29, when the covenant was renewed, verse 20 states that God’s wrath and zeal will burn against anyone, who worships foreign gods (idols of wood, stone or metal). He will not forgive them.
King Saul’s zeal for eradicating the Gibeonites led to trouble, which King David had to deal with. 2 Samuel 21:1-14
Isaiah prophesied to King Hezekiah that the zeal of the Lord would accomplish the prophecies regarding Sennacherib’s fall.
The zeal of the Lord is a recurring theme in the books of Isaiah and Ezekiel.
Baruch zealously repaired a section of the wall of Jerusalem Nehemiah 3: 20
Psalm 69:9 was quoted in John 2:17 when Jesus cleared the temple because of zeal for God’s house.
Advice from Proverbs is to have zeal for the fear of the Lord. Proverbs 23:17 Fear is more like awe and respect in this context.
In the New Testament zeal is mentioned in the context of being zealous for a good reason (the fear of the Lord) or for bad motives.
Elijah’s zeal for the Lord
Elijah lived in the time of the wicked King Ahab of Israel, who served Baal, a foreign god worshipped by Ahab’s foreign wife, Jezebel.
Elijah, a prophet of the Lord, told Ahab that there would be no rain and no dew for the next few years except at Elijah’s word.
The Lord told Elijah what he must do next. Elijah obeyed, going to hide in the Kerith Ravine, where ravens brought him bread and meat twice a day and he drank from the brook.
When the brook dried up, because of the drought, The Lord spoke to Elijah again. Again Elijah obeyed, going to Zarephath of Sidon and staying with a widow, who had obeyed Elijah’s instructions, gaining a miraculous supply of food.
Some time later the widow’s son became ill and died. She was angry with Elijah, but he took her son, laid him on his own bed and prayed to the Lord that the boy would live. The Lord heard Elijah’s cry and restored the boy to life. Elijah restored him to his mother, who said, ‘Now I know that you are a man of God and that the word of God from your mouth is the truth.’ (Letter Y tells a similar story from the New Testament.)
After more than two years the Lord told Elijah to present himself to Ahab, and the Lord would send rain on the land.
Ahab’s wife Jezebel had been killing the prophets of the Lord, but Obadiah, who was in charge of the palace, had hidden one hundred of them in two groups of fifty in separate caves. He had supplied them with food and water.
Ahab had been sending people everywhere to look for Elijah in order to kill him.
Obadiah reluctantly took Elijah to Ahab. What happened next is a very well-known story involving a show of strength between one prophet of the Lord (Elijah) and 450 prophets of Baal. The people were convinced by what happened that Elijah’s God was Lord. Elijah had the prophets of Baal killed. The Lord sent rain as Elijah foretold.
Jezebel was furious that her prophets had been killed. She wanted Elijah dead.
Elijah had already very energetically run faster than Ahab’s chariot to avoid the rainstorm. Now he fled with a servant to Beersheba in Judah. Then he went on alone into the desert. He had lost the will to live, but an angel visited him twice with bread and water. After eating and drinking this he travelled for forty days and forty nights to Horeb, the mountain of God.
The Lord asked him, ‘What are you doing here Elisha?’
Elisha claimed to have been very zealous for the Lord. The Lord told Elijah to stand on the mountain, while the presence of the Lord passed by. Then there was a destructive wind, next an earthquake followed by a fire. The Lord was not in any of those. After the fire there was a gentle whisper. ‘What are you doing here Elisha?’
Elijah came to the mouth of the cave and again told the Lord how zealous he had been and how his life was in danger. The Lord commissioned him to go back to the Desert of Damascus and anoint a king of Israel, a king of Aram and Elisha as a prophet to succeed Elijah. Elijah felt that he was alone, but God had seven thousand in Israel, who had not worshipped Baal. The next part of the story can be found in Letter Q: Elijah and Elisha.
Image in sidebar or below post links to Theme reveal
Three members of Zebedee’s family are mentioned in the Easter story. One of them wrote a Gospel, telling the story as an eye-witness. (Letter G)
When Jesus chose his first twelve disciples four of them were fishermen. Matthew 4:18-22 There were two brothers, Andrew and Simon. Simon was later named Peter by Jesus (Letter P). The other two fishermen were brothers named James and John, the sons of Zebedee. John wrote the gospel with his name and two letters, which appear in the New Testament. There is some argument among scholars about whether he also wrote the final book in the Bible, the Revelation of St John the Divine. John was Jesus’ closest friend among his disciples. While Jesus was dying on the cross (Letter C and Letter D) he commended his mother to John’s care and John to his mother’s. John 19:25-27
The third person from Zebedee’s family, who played a part in the Easter story was Salome, the mother of James and John. She was one of the women, who went to the tomb on Resurrection Sunday to finish preparing the body for burial. (Letter A , Letter M and Letter R)
My Theme Reveal contains links to the Easter story in the New Testament.
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