Luke 1:7

‘And they had no child, because that Elisabeth was barren, and they both were now well stricken in years.'

But there was one respect in which they were not seen as the salt of the earth. For Elizabeth was barren, and they had grown old together childless. This would have seemed to many a contradiction to what they were, for to be childless would be seen by many as a reproach on her, and a hint of something lacking in her response to God. It would certainly be to her a deep sadness of heart, and she must often have wondered what she had done to deserve this fate. It is almost impossible for us now to conceive quite what a grief of heart it was, or to recognise the stigma that this lack brought on this godly couple. People would look at them both and shake their heads. The Rabbis would silently condemn them. To them a childless couple were under God's heavy disapproval. But in her ‘reproach' little did she know what God had planned for her. She was to bear a son, and he would be the greatest of all the prophets, the preparer of the way for the Messiah, the expected deliverer of Israel.

When we become discouraged in our service for God, or when we seek to pass judgment on what God is doing in the short term, we would do well to remember Elisabeth. She waited long for her vindication, but when it came, what a vindication!