Purification of Mary/Presentation of
Our Lord
Lk
2:22-32
2/2/14
So I have to say, I am a little
jealous of James Peterson. For those of
you who haven’t heard, when James returned to Concordia, Nebraska after the
Christmas break he proposed to his girlfriend.
She accepted and it sounds like they will be getting married at
Christmas time next year. James is in
his junior year, so he will be getting married during his senior year in
college and will head off to the seminary as a married student.
I am a little jealous of James
because he really hasn’t had to wait to meet the woman he is going to
marry. Now understandably, finding a
spouse is a concern of most college age young people. However, if you are a pre-seminary student at
a Concordia like James is – and like I was – things are a little different. The
vocation of pastor is not exactly typical.
And to be honest if you already know that you are going to be a pastor,
it brings some unique factors into dating.
It’s not every woman who wants to marry a guy who is going to be a
pastor. And honestly, not every woman is
going to be a good fit for a guy who is to be a pastor. The reality is that if you are pre-seminary
student, you have significantly narrowed the range of women who are a serious
possibility.
This becomes a big deal as the end
of college approaches, because you know that you are about to go to a school where
there are no women. The setting of a dormitory for single students on the
seminary campus is like the combination of a monastery and a frat house. It is filled with guys who have limited
opportunities to meet women. And it is
filled with guys are who are quite seriously concerned about meeting a woman
because the worst case scenario is go out single to your first call. After all, who is going to want to make out
with a pastor?
James isn’t going to have to worry
about any of that. He’s not going to
find himself waiting to meet the right one as call day and installation in a
parish approaches ever closer. He’s not
going to find himself waiting and beginning to wonder if he going to meet “the
one.”
Today in our Gospel lesson for the
Feast of the Purification of Mary and the Presentation of the Our Lord, we
learn that Simeon had been waiting. We
are told that he was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and that it had
been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had
seen the Lord’s Christ. He was waiting, not knowing when and how this would
happen. And then one day, Mary and
Joseph showed up and presented Jesus to the Lord at the temple.
In our text this morning we hear
about how Mary and Joseph are doing two different things at the same time as
they come to the temple. The first is
the ritual purification of Mary. The
Torah directed that forty days after giving birth, a sacrifice needed to be
offered in order to cleanse the mother of ritual uncleanness. Several kinds of animals could be used for
this depending on how well off you were.
We hear in our text about “a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons,”
and these were the sacrifices that were permissible for those who were poor.
The other thing that is happening is
the redemption of the first born son. At
the Passover in Egypt, God spared Israel while killing the first born son of
the Egyptians. God commanded the
Israelites to redeem their own first born son. This was to be a constant
reminder to Israel about how God had acted in a dramatic way in order to rescue
them from slavery. Later in the book of
Numbers, God set the price of this redemption at five shekels that were used in
the tabernacle and then temple.
Our Gospel lesson sets before us a
picture in which Mary and Joseph are being faithful Israelites. They are
carefully following the instructions of the Torah – the Law – just had God had
commanded. We learn that everything about this child was being done in
accordance with God’s revelation in the Old Testament.
However, in the midst of all this,
there is something interesting. Luke
doesn’t actually mention the five shekels that were paid. Instead, he says that they came “to present
him to the Lord.” The thing is that the
Torah never specifically commands this.
It is something that is over and above what was normally done. It is something that is unique, and at the
same time it follows the pattern of another child born in unusual circumstances
who was brought to the place of worship.
In our Old Testament lesson we hear
about how Hannah brought Samuel to the tabernacle and presented him for service
to the Lord there. As you recall, Hannah
had not been able to have any children.
She prayed to the Lord for a child, and promised that she would dedicate
this one to God’s service. God answered her prayer, and when Samuel was weaned,
she presented the boy to live at the tabernacle. She presented the one who would be God’s
unique servant – the last of the judges and the first of the prophets.
In our Gospel lesson today, Mary and
Joseph present Jesus. Like Samuel, his
conception and birth had taken place under unusual circumstances. Like Samuel, he would be God’s unique
servant. Like Samuel he would be a
prophet. But he would be more than just
a prophet. He would be the “prophet
like Moses” whom God promised. In Deuteronomy Moses report that Yahweh had
said, “I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers.
And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I
command him. And whoever will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my
name, I myself will require it of him.”
This One presented at the temple is the fulfillment of all of God’s
promises to Israel.
The fulfillment of Yahweh’s promises
is the thing for which Simeon was waiting. Simeon was cut from same cloth as
Mary and Joseph who were faithfully obeying God’s word. We learn in our text, “ Now there was a man in
Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout,
waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. And it
had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before
he had seen the Lord's Christ.”
Simeon was waiting faithfully. However, often, you don’t find that to be so
easy. Oh, the waiting part you have to
do. It’s the faithfully part where the
struggle comes in. You find it difficult
to wait while trusting in God for the outcome.
You don’t want to wait. You don’t
want to wait to see what direction your education or career is going to
take. You don’t want to wait to see
whether the treatment will be successful.
You don’t want to wait, when waiting means simply coping with the
limitations imposed by illness or age.
Instead, you know how you want things to be and you know when you want
them. You want them now. And so you doubt God and his timing. You doubt whether God really is at work. God ceases to be One you fear, love and trust
in above all things.
Simeon waited.
We don’t know what he was expecting.
But through the work of the Spirit he came into the temple when Mary and
Joseph arrived to carry out faithfully the directions of the Torah. We hear in our text that he took the baby
Jesus up in his arms and blessed God and said, “Lord, now you are letting your
servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your
salvation that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for
revelation to the Gentiles,
and for glory to your
people Israel.”
Simeon held the baby in his arms and
said that now he was ready to depart – he was ready to die. He could do this in peace because God had
kept his word. He knew that as he looked
at this infant, he was looking at God’s salvation. He was looking at God’s
light for revealing himself to the Gentiles and for revealing his glory to
Israel.
Of course, he was also only looking
at a baby. Frankly, there wasn’t much there to see when compared to what
his words declared. If this was God’s
salvation; a light for revelation to the Gentiles and glory for his people
Israel, then it sure was hidden.
And that word describes the ministry
that Jesus Christ carried out. It was
powerful and glorious, but it was a hidden power and glory. Yes, Jesus did miracles that revealed that he
was the Christ, the Son of God. And yet
multitudes were able to see the miracles and not recognize who Jesus was.
That’s how it was when Jesus won
salvation for you. Tortured and humanly
speaking, helpless, he hung on a cross for you. He took your sins and by his
bitter suffering and death he redeemed you – he freed you from the slavery of
sin. He won forgiveness for all of the
times you don’t wait faithfully.
And then, on the third day, he gave
you something brand new for which you can expectantly wait. On Easter he
rose from the dead with a body transformed so that it can never die again. And because you have shared in his death
through baptism, you know that you will also share in this resurrection. You will share in it when he returns in glory
on the Last Day.
Redeemed and forgiven, you are
waiting for this. You are waiting for
the coming of the Lord in glory. And
while you wait our Lord continues to come to you. You of course know the words at end of the
Gospel lesson from the Nunc Dimittis in the Service of the Sacrament. You sing these words after you have received
the true body and blood of Christ. And when
you do, they are just as true for you as they were for Simeon.
Simeon held a mere baby in his arms.
And yet he was able to say, “Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in
peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation.” At the Sacrament you have seen and have
partaken of mere bread and wine. And yet like Simeon you are able to sing these
words too. Simeon could say them because
the baby in his arms was more than just a baby. He was the incarnate One – true God and true
man – who had entered into the world to fulfill all that God had promised in
the Old Testament. You can sing them because the bread and wine is more than
just bread and wine. It is the
located means by which Christ gives you his true body and blood for the
forgiveness of your sins and the strengthening of faith.
And because this is so, you can
depart in peace. You can depart as the forgiven child of God. You can depart, strengthened to wait in faith
no matter what is going on in your life. You can depart as we look forward to
saying one final time, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”
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