Luke 1:5-12

5There was a man whose name was Zechariah. He lived when Herod was king of Judea. Zechariah was a priest and he belonged to a group of priests from the family of Abijah. He had a wife called Elizabeth. She also was from the family of the priest called Aaron.

6Zechariah and Elizabeth obeyed God's commands and rules. God saw that they were righteous people. They did not do wrong things.

7But they had no children. Elizabeth could not give birth and they were both getting old.

8One day, Zechariah's group of priests was working at the temple. He had a special job to do there.

9The priests chose one of their group to go into the holy place in the temple. This time they chose Zechariah. His job was to burn incense there.

10While Zechariah was burning incense in the special room, many men were outside in the yard. They were praying to God.

11The incense was burning on a special altar, when one of God's angels appeared to Zechariah. The angel was standing at the right hand side of the altar.

12When Zechariah saw the angel, he was very surprised and very afraid.