+ 1st Sunday of Christmas – December 26th, 2021 +
Series C: Exodus 13:1-3, 11-15; Colossians 3:12-17; Luke 2:22-40
Beautiful Savior Lutheran
Milton, WA
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
There are two kinds of Christmas. One begins the day after Thanks giving and ends December 25th. You know how it goes. The radio stations have stopped playing Christmas music. The tree, lights, and decorations come down and the New Year’s signs go up. The other Christmas, the true Christmas, began yesterday and lasts not 1, not 3, not even 7, but 12 days. From Christmas day until Epiphany.
That’s how significant our Lord’s birth to save is. Here in the Lord’s house, it is always Christmas.
Today we celebrate Christmas with Anna and Simeon. Luke’s gospel fast forwards us from Jesus’ birth to 40 days later in Jerusalem. This is the first of many appearances Jesus would make in the temple, culminating with Holy Week. This first one is filled with prophetic fulfillment and significance. By Luke’s counting, it’s been 490 days since the angel Gabriel appeared to Zechariah the priest to announce that he and his wife Elizabeth were going to conceive a son in their old age and name him John. 490 days later, Jesus makes His first appearance in the same temple. 70 weeks.
The prophetess Anna also speaks of fulfillment in the numbers of her life. Married a brief seven years. Seven. And now she is eighty four, seven times twelve. These may appear to be coincidences, but they are not. There is a strong undercurrent of fulfillment that runs with this episode in Jesus’ infancy. The entire OT had come to its focal point in this little Child. He is the One!
The prophet Malachi had written: “Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to His temple, the messenger of the covenant whom you desire will come,” says the Lord Almighty. I don’t think anyone expected the Lord to be carried to the temple by His parents, but then no one expected God to become Man either. And so the mystery of the manger continues in the temple, as the infant Priest of humanity makes His first appearance. Humbly, hiddenly. God in the Flesh had come to His temple.
The temple was the place of sacrifice. Lambs brought as atonement for sin. Here God’s tender Lamb appears, promised from eternal years, 40 days old to be redeemed as the first born in accordance with the law of Moses. They came to offer the prescribed sacrifice – a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons – the poor man’s sacrifice of redemption. “Every male who first opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord.” Every first born son anticipated God’s Son. And now God’s Son fulfills the sacrifice. The Redeemer is redeemed by the blood of two turtledoves under the Law.
Here we see Christ’s work for our redemption. He is the Substitute, the Sin-bearer, the Sacrifice. Though He is sinless, yet for our sakes, He became our sin. He is the Sinner in place of sinful humanity. He shares our flesh, blood, and bone, but also took up our burden under the Law. And so it is fitting and proper, that Jesus be redeemed at the temple and His mother purified. He is the sinless Sinner, the One who takes our place in perfection under the Law. The Redeemer is redeemed.
Simeon and Anna are waiting to greet him. Together they represent the OT prophet and priest waiting for fulfillment. Simeon was very old, and had been told that he would not die until he had seen Lord’s Anointed One, the Christ, with his own eyes. Imagine that. The Redeemer of mankind, whose blood cleanses us from our sins, is Himself redeemed by the blood of two pigeons. Such sublime and deep humility! The Lord of all becomes the Servant of all. And His servants – Anna and Simeon – rejoice.
You can only imagine what it was like for old Simeon to walk about the temple day after day, wondering if this was the day, waiting and watching. He’s embodies the OT in one old man, watching for the fulfillment of Israel. How his heart must have skipped a beat that day Mary and Joseph came to the temple carrying their 40-day old son, and the Holy Spirit whispered to his spirit, “this is the One you are waiting for.” And Simeon gather the little Child into his old, tired arms, and lifts His eyes to heaven, and sings out this song: Lord, now you let your servant depart in peace.
His time of service had come to an end. You can almost hear the relief in his voice. His tired old eyes had seen the Lord’s salvation. His arms had embrace Him and lifted Him up. This tiny Child was the redemption of Israel and the salvation of the Gentiles – the world’s redeemer. Only faith could perceive this, faith worked by the Spirit through the Word. Only faith could see through the humility, the weakness, the poverty and gaze upon the face of God.
We sing Simeon’s hymn too, at the close of the liturgy of the Lord’s Supper. The traditional place for this hymn is at the close of each day. It’s the Christian’s “Now I lay be down to sleep” prayer. Since the Reformation Lutherans have sung this hymn as we depart from Communion. We’ve beheld the salvation of our Lord. We’ve tasted and seen that the Lord is good. We’ve heard His words addressed to us personally – my Body given for you; my Blood shed for you. The body and blood born of Mary, laid in a manger, nailed to a cross, raised from the dead, glorified at the right hand of God. This is our food and drink, and we, like Simeon sing our song of release, of freedom. We can depart in peace.
Think about what that means. Simeon is saying he’s free to die. Not leave the temple, die. This was Simeon’s death song, and a joyous one. He was released from his life’s sentence and free to die. And so are we. We’ve worshipped the Child of the manger, the Man of the cross. We’ve beheld His glory, hidden beneath word and water, bread and wine. We too depart in peace, according to God’s Word.
Simeon tells Mary, “Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed.” There is no neutral position with respect to Jesus. We either trust Him with our life and salvation or we do not. We can’t reshape Him, or reinvent Him, or revision Him. We can only receive Him as He is for you – your Savior, your Lord, your Christ, your Redeemer.
Mary too would feel the bitter pangs of the cross. “A sword will pierce through your own soul also.” She would see her Son crucified. What sorrow and anguish that must have been. No parent wants to witness the death of a child. What a burden, to stand at the foot of His cross and watch.
It’s easy at Christmas time to dwell only on the cute and glorious and glittery. The manger, the swaddled newborn, the adoring shepherds, the bright angels. We’re reminded very quickly in Luke’s gospel, however, that the work of redemption is always bloody work. On the eighth day (our New Year’s Day), Jesus was circumcised under the Law and given the name Jesus. On the fortieth day He was redeemed by blood in the temple. He takes our place under the Law, and by His blood He frees us from our slavery to sin, to death, to the power of the law to condemn.
Christmas joy inevitably gives way to the reality of the new year. The wrapped presents have now disclosed their mysteries. Perhaps there are a few left for the next nine days. The lights will grow dim. The trees will dry out, at least the real ones. We will go back to the realities of our vocations with all the ambiguities, uncertainties, griefs, sins. We will feel the burden of our sins and the sins of others.
But like old Anna and Simeon in the temple, we are, by God’s grace, given to embrace this Child of Bethlehem in Word and Sacrament. And having embraced Him in the open, empty, receiving arms of faith, we too are prepared to depart in peace.
A blessed second day of Christmas to each of you…
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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