Have you ever been labeled? Maybe you can’t shake something from your past. Perhaps a current situation holds you back. And no matter how hard you’ve tried, the less-than-favorable description sticks. The label burdens your present and will mark your future. Unless… Unless God miraculously removes it.
Elizabeth had a label. It was “barren.”
Elizabeth and Zechariah had been married for a very long time, but she had never been able to conceive. This stigma was far worse in the first century than it even is today. The neighbors thought that surely she had done something wrong – that she somehow deserved to be childless. Her situation not only brought shame and sorrow, but she and Zechariah also feared for their future. Who would care for them in their old age?
But God intervened. His supernatural power collided with the physical world. Elizabeth’s dead womb was opened. A son would be born. A son would be born to a woman who may have even been in her 60’s! (See Luke 1:7.)
And this son would not simply be another Jewish boy. This son would be a prophet of the Most High God. This son would herald the coming of the Messiah. (To read Zechariah’s side of the story, read “Weary Faith Revived.”)
When the angel Gabriel later visited Mary, he told her about the miraculous work God was doing in Elizabeth’s life.
“Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be barren is in her sixth month. For nothing is impossible with God.”
Luke 1:36-37
Do you think Elizabeth’s neighbors still called her “barren” behind her back? Imagine how they responded to the protruding belly of this senior citizen. Elizabeth’s label did not simply fall away. God ripped it off with divine flair!
Did you take note of Gabriel’s words? “Nothing is impossible with God.” Nothing. That includes everything and anything in your life. Your past does not have to dictate your present or your future. God is able.
How has your past defined your present? What label do you need God to remove today?
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