Grace, mercy and peace to each of you in the name of the Triune God…Holy parent, offspring Jesus and Holy Spirit.
Thank you for the opportunity to humbly speak God’s holy Words once again with you, friends, and to work and walk alongside you, Pr Lyndon and you, Ben. Hopefully, the first of many opportunities like this to come.
I hope everyone who was present in person or online last week was able to see the beauty and the joy that this parish gave and is giving to a group of mostly younger folks who are facing daily struggles, let’s not kid ourselves, out in the wider community.
To know how wide our doors are open here at LCC on their behalf is so heartwarming.
But, I also would be remiss not to follow up on Jashan’s bold and courageous challenge to us all at the end of his good message from here a week ago.
What have each of us done this week to advance or promote the good news of Christ Jesus to those in need?
It might seem very small and insignificant to us but if we all persevered and kept pushing for something good to happen, the multiplier effect can actually be quite amazing, especially if we apply two of God’s greater gifts to the situation, hope and patience!!
A bit of extra historical context to our Gospel story this morning might help to see how clearly it speaks to us today in our current life situation. Yesterday was February 1. The tariffs…
There are many themes that one could apply here to the classic Simeon and Anna story but the one I feel called to focus on today has to do with…patience…and hope!
First of all, the character Simeon is not someone who most of us have a base, working knowledge of his life story. He is not a Moses, a Noah, Mary or Martha, a doubting Thomas or any of the disciples.
He is described as an ‘older’ man by the time the baby Jesus is brought to the temple by his parents. His life has been shaped and impacted by the violent and aggressive takeover of his home city Jerusalem by the Holy Roman Empire some 63 years before the birth of Jesus. So he has lived well over six decades watching and I’m sure living out the horrors of an evil, power hungry and authoritative ruler. We’ve had only just a few weeks so far south of us…sorry, I digress.
What we can be more certain of than his actual age is that Simeon is clearly described by Luke as being “righteous and devout, looking forward to the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit rested on him.” Not a lightweight in terms of his reputation both with the temple worshippers and his fellow Jews, but also with God.
Simeon’s poetic blessing to God might sound familiar to those of you especially a decade or two older than me. “Lord, let your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation…ringing any bells yet???
Our old green ELW’s had this blessing in it, it was called the Nunc Dimittus. That is Latin for let us depart (or be dismissed) in peace now and was often said by our pastors at the end of worship…
For Simeon, these words he cried out upon seeing the baby Jesus were an eschatological expression of his joy in recognizing this baby as the living fulfillment of God’s earlier promise to him that he would actually see proof of the promised Saviour in his lifetime.
Imagine, as a devout religious person, well in tune with God’s working throughout history and in his lifetime how cool that realization actually was! I’m sure there were many times where he figured God had forgotten about this promise.
I used the word eschatological earlier. Basically it is one several fancy theological terms they love to use in seminaries, Ben and Boston (who is next door today as he is starting a field placement at St, Luke’s) can relate, and Lyndon as well.
Other big Greek words include: soteriology (salvation) and ecclesiology (church), pneumatology (Holy Spirit) and the study of Jesus, obviously called Christology.
Eschatology means anything prophetic or leading to end times. The Greek sense of its use back then was very much with an ever-present, currency to it.
Now, for us, 2000 years later, this can be a bit problematic. Many thought the end of the Age as they knew it would be fulfilled in Jesus’ earthly life. They were very linear and narrow in thinking this, but it was a common issue in Jesus’ day.
A prevailing thought was that Jesus was sent by God to help the Jews overcome this horribly repressive Roman Empire and all the violence enacted upon them since 63 BC. No jails, for instance, only the Cross, so not just those charged with murder but even the poorest of poor caught stealing a small loaf of bread usually met the same fate. And no regard for citizenship. Hmmm, starting to sound familiar again…
And so this new child, born in a lowly stable and not with much fanfare, was to usher in a new kingdom here on earth, free of emperors and crosses, free of oppressive laws restricting religious freedoms and practices of customs and worshipping of any gods other than Roman ones.
Denouncing a sermon based on grace and humility, on asking for mercy on those marginalized and not falling within the emperor’s narrow views of what gender is, what pure love for a fellow human being ought to look like while accepting public sermons praising military power and assuming that one group of people are actually more favored by God than others would have been common place back in Simeon and Anna’s day.
Does history repeat itself? Are we perhaps witnessing some similar emotions today??
Stop for a moment, breathe, and imagine if you, my age or even a decade older, or much younger, but can you see in Simeon here with us today and how powerful that experience must have been to know that a new saviour was humbly in your presence as a relatively helpless, 40-day old child? And, Anna, we know was a bit younger than Simeon at 84. So put yourself in her shoes, if you can, at more her age/stage in life to see the connection here.
Now, the first challenge for us is that God has not promised any of us, in our lifetimes, a similar one as God did for Anna, let alone Simeon.
In our Gospel this morning, there is hope that, as verse 32 Luke 2 reminds us, “a light for revelation to the Gentiles” which we captured here earlier in the much-loved African American spiritual hymn of hope, This Little Light of Mine.
The huge spread of Christianity to numbers way, way beyond the total number of Jews living on earth at this time, proves that God can and does deliver on God’s promises. God’s humble little light can indeed and will give hope for the downtrodden and oppressed.
But, we are also called to not sit on our hands and act like certain birds, ostriches, who simply bury their heads in the earth when any danger is present.
Psalm 84 verse 3 reminds us today that birds have a certain place in the cycle of nature and it is not to be passive, cowardly in the face of danger…even smaller birds like sparrows have to work to find a home and swallows a nest to lay their young.
The image of swallows is of particular interest to Brita and me. We live in Esquimalt when spending half our time in Victoria, and our condo is in what is called Swallows Landing.
What is fascinating is that they are graceful fliers and very acrobatic, hard workers, they are designed with very aerodynamic bodies to dart and swoop through the air very numbly to catch their meals, mostly insects. They can fly over 300 kilometers a day. They are very transient, but also value the safety of a nest. And, their communication skills are off the charts; they have twittering, trilling calls that clearly express various emotions, including excitement, joy and yet also are very adept at warning other birds about impending danger.
(Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest where she may | lay her young,
by the side of your altars, O Lord of hosts, my king | and my God.)
Sparrows, meanwhile, have the added ability to adapt and to nest in common man-made structures, and have a very distinct chirping call that sounds hopeful most of the time and display vibrant colors which can make them stand out and easier prey yet also have amazing survival skills with diverse diets and quicker than normal breeding rates.
The Psalmist clearly chose these two species for a reason. It is not too far of a stretch to connect some of these traits to what Jesus is calling us to be in our faith journeys, nimble as we can be, valuing a home and a nest for safety, adaptable and filled with hope and finding true joy in fellowship with others.
Simeon knew right away. He had an eschatological view on life. Hope is a huge part of it. Not blind hope, but hope and trust that allows for patience. It is that combination that comes for parents, grandparents, even siblings anticipating the birth of a child. At his age, that was easier to do but I think this story can serve as a reminder to all of us at any age gathered here today, where can we find light and hope amidst our darkness?
(Pause)
Amidst what seems like such chaotic and unsettling times for us in Canada especially, who do we turn to? An Ostrich-type leader???
Are we going to stop believing, or is now the time to be bold and in hope like a sparrow, awareness of a swallow, and patient trust like Simeon and Anna?
We are not freed or saved by our own suffering, by our own marginalization. Painful as it can be. Jesus is not calling us to suffer in order to have a closer relationship with Him, with God. Our own actions will always fall short of the atoning sacrifice Jesus made for us one time on the Cross.
Martin Luther, in line 21 of his famous April 1518 Heidelburg Disputation, a public defense of his 95 Theses nailed on the wall at his employer at Wittenburg University, compares a theologian of glory, who calls evil good and good evil, to a theologian of the Cross, who sooner calls a spade a spade, telling us what we need to hear, not want we want to.
Our message today here at LCC is fairly clear as we as a parish continue to discern, pray about and seek God’s wisdom in acting out and upon the exciting but also dangerously intoxicating and perhaps even conflicting voices and needs with the rather large nest egg of the Luther House sale combined with the very gracious Eva Baird bequest. I was so impressed with how the parish approached last Saturday’s second session on how to disburse those funds, putting emphasis on programs such as the music expansion, refugees and continuing support for current and future seminarians, a sign of a very healthy congregation to put people and programs ahead of just bricks and mortar!
Listen to the voice of others, listen to the needs of the community and let God’s voice be heard. Its not the easy way, but deep down, the right one.
“But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?”
May we all ask ourselves that same question as the ancient prophet Malachi did in our First lesson today. May we be gathered together in unity and, refined by the purifier of silver, trust and have faith one who suffered, died and was raised on the third day. And we do so in the hope and patience that both Simeon and Anna showed us long ago.
In our upcoming moments of breaking and sharing bread and wine/juice in fellowship together, let the Cross remind us that God sent Jesus not to be served as a slave or waiter ought to do for their master, but rather as a courageous humble servant, emptying ourselves in our Saviour Jesus Christ did on the Cross, to discern, hear and act upon God’s will.
Amen.
