Women of the Bible Video Series: Elizabeth
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WELCOME
Welcome to the Women of the Bible video series: Elizabeth. Each video in this 6 week series lasts 15 minutes and covers one woman of the Bible to whom we can relate today. Below is a transcription of the video. Enjoy!
Women of the Bible Video Series: Elizabeth
Rachel Wojo: Thank you so much for joining us again, my name is Rachel Wojo, and this is my friend Jennifer Jackson, my cohort in Bible study. I’m just thrilled to have her teaching the word today. We’re going to dive into another woman after the Bible who simply came to Jesus. And I am thrilled to have you talking today. You’re woman of the hour , I mean, 15 minutes. That’s awesome. And so I’ll give it over to you in an insert a comment as necessary. That would be very helpful.
Elizabeth’s Wisdom and Experience
JenniferJackson: So here we go. I’m really excited about Elizabeth. She is in the New Testament and we see her in the gospel of Luke. She’s in Luke 1:24. If you want to get that ready. Um, what do we know about Elizabeth? Well, one thing we know is that she was older but she was wiser and that your age matters. You know, God’s never late. It’s never a if you’ve never been too far behind. And so here we see Elizabeth, it says she’s getting along in years and it says that she’s devout. So we know that she’s married to a priest. She’s devout, she’s getting along in years and that she’s been barren her entire life, and I think about the disappointment that that must have been to Elizabeth, that she’d made it her entire life in, in, in their day and age especially would have been a social disgrace.
Living with Disappointment
JenniferJackson: It would’ve just been a real hardship. And so she’s living with this disappointment, but it says that she was devout and I think if we had a modern day word for devout, it would be committed. So, you know, we could ask ourselves, are we committed to God? Are we committed to what he’s asked us to do? She was, she was extremely committed and I love that about Elizabeth. The other fun thing we’re going to see when we read the scripture is she was the first person that walked the earth to welcome Jesus into the world, but it was all in the womb. So I think that’s kind of cool. She welcomed him into her home and the babies are sleeping. So we have John the Baptist and Jesus leaping in the womb together and it’s just a beautiful story. So let’s look together at Luke one and um, if we see Luke 1:24, it says after this, his wife Elizabeth became pregnant and for five months remained in seclusion.
Dealing with Whirlwinds
JenniferJackson: “The Lord has done this for me. She said, in these days he has shown his favor and he has taken away my disgrace from among the people.” I think about this. If you look at, at her husband Zachariah, he finds out that they’re going to have a baby and that his name’s going to be John. But the Lord takes us voice away. So imagine this, her husband has no voice and now she’s in seclusion for five months pregnant. What? I mean, what’s going on? I can’t even imagine what the household was like. Is She, is she thanking and praising God? She’s so excited. Or is she nauseous and she’s so sick because she’s, she’s not a spring chicken. What? You know, what’s going on? I mean her husband can’t even talk to her about any of this. And this is the time I’m seeing when mother Mary gets pregnant and decides to show up.
Elizabeth and Mary
JenniferJackson: So Elizabeth had five months of quiet time and now we have Mary showing up on our doorstep and it seems to me like when God gives us an assignment or an appointment, sometimes the timing of it all is a little hectic and a little crazy. And this was pretty crazy. But yet she said yes and she, she said, you know, she said Yes to marry into that assignment, into welcoming Mary into her home. And my favorite part, let’s keep reading. Um, if you, if you look at Luke [inaudible], I just get so excited about this. It says even Elizabeth, your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. At that time, Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea where she entered Zachariah’s home and greeted Elizabeth.
JenniferJackson: When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit in a loud voice. She exclaimed, “Blessed are you among women. And blessed is this child you will bear. Why am I so favored that the mother of my Lord should come to me? And as soon as the sound of this greeting reached my ears, the baby and my womb leaped for joy. Blessed is she who has believed that the Lord would fulfill his promises to her.” Isn’t that beautiful? And it says, as soon as this baby leaps, she’s filled with the Holy Spirit, and that’s just how Jesus as he comes into our life and wow, and here’s the Holy Spirit, right with him, fills her life. And I think about all the disappointments at that point that were, were wiped away, that joy and they get to share this together. I think of how they had fellowship and many times in our life, you know, here she is lonely, secluded, and God brings her someone into her life that they can share this with. And it seems to me, God, at least always. We’ll give you one person if you ask him, you know, to share the joys and sorrows and south. Great. Yeah,
Rachel Wojo: I do remember a time in my life when I really felt at a low point and just prayed for a friend. I just actually prayed for a friend. I felt like I was in that time of seclusion where I didn’t have a lot of good strong connections and God gave me a friend and it was such a blessing and we’re still friends today. Not as close as we were during that time frame, but it’s just cool to see how God answered that prayer. And I love that he does for us. That’s how personal he is.
Being Disciplined by God
JenniferJackson: So that’s really great. I was thinking too about when you think about how Elizabeth was barren for so long and that God would answer this prayer, but he answered it in a strange timing and why did he wait so long, but sometimes I’m, his timing is still perfect and so Jesus and John the Baptist got to be raised together and minister together and so he knew the perfect timing and sometimes we can just trust God and rely on his timing to be the right thing at the right time. Yes. So let’s see if I had some other things I thought about Zachariah in this story and how he was, he must have still been grateful even though he was silenced, because I think about the fear of the Lord that would come upon you if you know God shares this with you and you doubted.
Iron Sharpens Iron
JenniferJackson: And so God kind of disciplined them a little bit there. And, and yet I think he was still had a heart of gratitude that this was happening. And so sometimes even when God is kind of disciplining us or pushing back on in our life because we question him or we’re not even sure, can this really happen? Um, he, he’s still, there was still an excitement. There were still a gratitude there. And I think we could really learn from Zachariah along with the story. Um, Elizabeth is just, she’s a great example to me. I think of extending time, love and friendship to marry and wisdom. She passed along her wisdom, um, to marry. And God also wants us to have mentors in our life and to be a mentor. And so that’s a good thing to say, OK God, who are you wanting me to mentor or who is my mentor? So then we can keep learning and we can always keep growing with one another. Iron sharpens iron.
Rachel Wojo: I do like that they have that age gap. It’s kind of funny. I hadn’t thought about that, that they were going through their pregnancy stages together and yet there was an enormous age gap. And my oldest sister was pregnant with her first child when my mom was pregnant with her last child. So I kind of wish now that you mentioned that, it just triggered in my mind, I’m like, I wonder what that was like. I wish I could ask my mom, my mom’s in heaven so I can’t ask her about it. But that would be really cool to experience together, you know, just can’t be in two different stages and experience that together. Very cool.
God Satisfies
JenniferJackson: Well the last thing I had about Elizabeth is that her name means that God’s satisfies. Wow. And I love the beauty of what her name means. And I think how that he really fulfilled on in her life and he wants to fulfill our deepest longings. He, he does want to do that. He wants us to believe for those. He knows our heart. He, he cares about the details of our life and all these intimate things. This was very personal to her to have a child. And so we can ask him for that. We can. There’s nothing that can keep us from asking God to satisfy those longings of our heart and those places of disappointment in our life. So I thought, you know, maybe we should pray about that today.
Willing Hearts
JenniferJackson: He is the one who puts those longings and desires in us because he created us. Yeah, he did. So it’s kind of funny that we think, oh, maybe I shouldn’t ask God for that because that’s that. Maybe that’s my own way instead of his. But he puts those thoughts and ideas and concepts in our minds and in our hearts, he created us. So giving it back to him, just let him see that we’re willing and able and available that we’re making ourselves available and we’re yielding ourselves. Surrendering ourselves to his timing. So it’s hard. Yes, you being selfish, but it’s not now. It’s not that when we give it to him and surrender it to him and then he can do what he wants with her life. And like, Elizabeth, it’s never too late. Sometimes we believed a lie and it’s, “my days are over, my time has passed.
It’s Never Too Late
JenniferJackson: It’s just too late.’ I wish I could have whatever.” He can still fulfill those dreams. Amen. So good. So very good. So let’s say a quick prayer. God, I thank you. I thank you for the women, um, that are watching today. And Lord, we pray that you would, that you would satisfy these deep desires and longings of our heart. We want to be committed to you like Elizabeth. We want to be devout. Show us the Mary’s in our life. God. Show us who we can share your joy with, who we can talk to. Welcome in our home and minister to God. We thank you for all the people that you’ve brought into our lives, Lord. And that you have a job and a task for us. So we, we ask you, Lord, that we would see that nothing is impossible for you, and we pray that in Jesus name.
Rachel Wojo: Amen. So good. Thanks for being a part today and we’ll see you on the next video of this series!
I love to learn about the women of the Bible and how important they were in Jesus time. But also how important we are to Jesus today. As we walk in his ways and do his commands as we mentoring and give mentoring to others he’s saying to us, I’m satisfied. No matter our name , he has called us by name ..
thank you ladies for your time you brought into my morning to hear the word and to know how important my walk is and how I’m needed to be a friend to someone and to know I can always ask God for a friend.
So simple words he gives us, ask and you shall receive .