Saint John the Forerunner and Baptist was the Forerunner of Christ who baptized Jesus in the Jordan. What does a man do with a word from God he cannot yet hold in his heart, and how does the desert forge a prophet out of a hunted child?
The preparation of the Forerunner began in a Temple incense cloud with the trembling hands of an old priest who had stopped hoping. This volume traces the miraculous origins of the last prophet of the Old Covenant, following Zacharias as he carries an angelic word in imposed silence to the hill country. It tracks Elizabeth as she flees into the wilderness with her infant to escape a king seeking the Christ child, finding refuge in a mountain that opens to receive them. The narrative dwells in the decades of desert asceticism, examining the garment of camel hair and the diet of locusts and wild honey that shaped the saint. The volume leaves the reader at the threshold of the Jordan, watching a man forged by years of solitude step forward to announce the coming of the Lord.
- The imposed silence: how Zacharias carried the angelic announcement in his body as a womb for faith.
- Miracle of shelter: the flight of Elizabeth into the wilderness and the mountain that opened to protect the infant from royal soldiers.
- Decades of asceticism: the long seasons of prayer, fasting, and a diet of locusts and wild honey that formed the culmination of the prophets of Israel.
Book One of The Voice That Ran Before: A Life of Saint John the Forerunner. Behold the Lamb details his public preaching at the Jordan, his baptism of Christ, and his ultimate martyrdom under Herod, while More Than a Prophet examines his lasting spiritual influence and his ongoing call to repentance within the Church.
Readers seeking the story of Saint John the Forerunner, the angelic visitation in the Temple, and his decades of desert asceticism, who also want the details of his miraculous conception and the flight of Elizabeth into the mountains.
