Simeon and Anna are the closest thing Jesus has to grandparents, and what grandparents!  Both are at the Temple.  Though it was my parents who first took me to church, it was my maternal grandfather who made sure that continued as I was growing up.  Faith mattered to my grandparents, and I knew it.  That had its effect upon me.

          We hear that Simeon was “righteous and devout” (2:25).  That’s high praise, in the Bible.  Would that our children and our grandchildren would remember us that way, remember us to their own children and grandchildren by those words: righteous and devout.  Simeon is righteous and devout in the best sense of those good words: loving God, which means he loves his neighbor genuinely, warmly, in deed as well as word.  Simeon really is devout: his highest joy and fullest satisfaction are in God.  Simeon rejoices!  Every day, through the Spirit, he enjoys closeness with God, fellowship with the Creator, the Father.  Simeon’s joy overflows into all he does, how he does it, and why.  You could do worse, than to be a Simeon.

          None of this should be taken to suggest he’s perfect or just always so chipper—a righteous, devout man would be the first to tell you he’s not perfect.  The light of God’s love, God’s grace, however, puts all Simeon’s failures, limitations, and faults into the perspective of mercy; Simeon knows it and finds even more reason to praise and thank God.

          Like many in those days of sorrow—for Jesus was born into a place and time full of great sorrow—Simeon was looking for something from God: a promised sign, a promised gift, a hope, a prayer.  Luke calls it “the consolation of Israel” (2:25): solace, comfort, encouragement, good cheer.  Light in a season of darkness.  Yes in a time of No.  Hope in a year of despair.  We know.  We’ve felt it, lived it—how have we gotten through this depressing year of fear, restriction, isolation?  I hope that for you it’s been faith.  For Simeon, it was faith.  Faith gives us solace when the world all around seeks to take it away, when the powers at work in this broken world seek to strip us of comfort.

          The loneliness of waiting.  The discipline of waiting.  And the Spirit: “the Holy Spirit was on” Simeon (2:25).  Do we want safety?  The Spirit gives us eternal safety.  Do we want power?  The Spirit puts the power of God to work for us, in us.  Do we want freedom?  The Spirit sets us free; those set free by the Spirit are truly free.  Through the Spirit, God has a special gift for Simeon, because God knows and loves Simeon—all the Simeons here below.  Simeon will see “the Lord’s Messiah” (2:26).  Amazingly, Simeon gets to hold the Messiah in his own arms, to hug the Messiah to his heart!  If you ever need cheering up, see if someone will let you hold the baby for a minute.

          Holding the fulfilment of God’s promise, Simeon sings.  What is the song in your heart?  Simeon sings, “My eyes have seen Your salvation” (2:30).  To see, to hold, the completion of hope, the reward of faith.  This salvation, this gift, this child, is “a light for revelation” to you and me.  The fulfillment of God’s promise is our fulfillment: Jesus Christ opens wide the way for our fulfillment.  True fulfillment cannot be found in the imperial desires of the flesh: only ashes, mourning, and despair, there.  By the Spirit, Jesus fills us with the Father’s love.  We may feel incomplete, lacking, empty.  This year has drained us!  With what do you want to be filled?  Simeon wanted to be filled with God, with the love of God, with the light of the Holy Spirit.  Simeon wanted to be filled with salvation, the fullness of salvation, like holding a baby in complete, amazed wonder.

          Not everyone looks for salvation, though they may be awaiting a change, some sort of rescue, relief, something good, better, anyway, better than this, better times, blessing—they may not call it that.  It’s the Spirit that brings us to know what we really need is salvation.  What we truly need we learn we truly have in Jesus Christ.  Jesus is the fullness of our hope, the perfection of our peace, the brightness, the glory of our faith.  Some think what they really need is money, or time, or to be left alone, or to do whatever their fickle heart tells them is right.  But who tells the heart?  Only One can tell the heart what is right, and He is the one who offers salvation.

          My guess is that your children, your grandchildren, make you proud, even though they can also mystify, frustrate, even hurt you.  You glory in your children.  Simeon testifies that Jesus is “the glory” of God’s people (2:32).  The salvation is the glory, the fulfillment is the glory, Jesus is the glory: the cause and source of our great joy, our praise, our jubilant exaltation of God.  God sees our need, knows our sorrow, and does not turn away, does not leave us to wither, but comes to us, to be with us, to bring us to Him, to know His love, His mercy, His peace.  Jesus perfectly reflects God’s love; Jesus comes to call us, in him, to be mirrors of that same love.  We are called and claimed to be reflecting glasses of God’s glory.

          I hope to you that sounds appealing, like the best thing one could possibly be.  Simeon tells us that, in Jesus, “the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed” (2:35).  If you want to know a lot about a person, ask that person what he or she thinks of Jesus.  We know what Simeon thinks.

          We also know what Anna thinks.  Perhaps she heard Simeon, perhaps felt the power of the call of the Holy Spirit; she draws near, elated, joyful.  Amazing, how much joy Jesus brings people!  Is Jesus bringing you joy?  Yes?  No?  Not sure?  Tell me; let me know.  Let’s talk.

          Anna is a pious woman: her faith matters to her, defines, animates her, gives her joy and purpose, hope, strength, and peace.  O, for faith like that!  Ask those familiar with her what they know about Anna: the first thing they’ll all say is that she loves God.  That’s not a bad reputation.  What’s yours?

          We’re told Anna is about 84; most of those years she had lived as a widow (2:36-37).  What that almost certainly means is that she was poor, very poor; there was no one to help support her.  It means she was isolated, alone.  No wonder God tells us to have special compassion for widows.  We may pity the poor, or not; let us be poor in spirit, like Anna.

          “She never left the Temple but worshiped night and day, fasting and praying” (2:37).  Well, that doesn’t sound like much of a life, does it?  You might hear that and think you couldn’t live that way and wouldn’t want to.  Maybe it seems dry, deprived, hard, unpleasant.  I tell you she was blessed.  She knows she is; people around her understand she is.  How?  Fasting and praying?  Blessed. Her heart is not with food or any other of the imperial desires of the flesh.  Her heart is turned toward God in prayer.  Her living is praying.  What if our lives were prayers?  What, then, does our praying look like: what is its quality, its depth, its love?

          Anna’s heart is with the Lord, and His heart is with her.  That is blessed!  She seeks God, to be near Him, listen to Him, love Him—all the love she was unable to offer a husband, to children or grandchildren, she offered to God.  Our love needs an outlet!  We need to pour it somewhere, into something, onto someone.  It matters where we do, into what, and onto whom.  There is a way that leads us into increasing light; there is a way that leads into increasing darkness.

          Anna sought God; it was God who found her.  Isn’t that the way?  When I wasn’t actively looking or living for God, God came to me, found me.  I wasn’t the one who wanted God most.  God wanted me.  Simeon and Anna understand this, and they understand, in a way not even Mary and Joseph yet do, that, in Jesus, God finds us.  To be found is to be blessed; to know that God loves you, wants you enough to come looking for you, to break through the obstacles and debris, the barricades and walls, to pour His light into the darkness of our prison—to know God who does this is to know His love, and that is life changing, life-giving.

          A dry life, holiness, righteousness?  A bore, to be devout?  Hardly!  The fullness of light, joy, peace, compassion, purpose.  Anna and Simeon don’t wander through life, sad and confused, aimless and unhappy.  Anna the widow is not lonely.  Simeon and Anna don’t wonder where to find a true friend; they don’t wonder where or if they’ll ever find love that lasts.  They are blessed, and they bless.  They speak, speak out: Anna “spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem” (2:38).  Anna and Simeon are like the first evangelists, before John, before the apostles.  It’s not so hard, really: all that’s needed is love for God, joy in Jesus, and the desire to share that love and that joy, to be a way for others to feel it, to know it, and to want to praise the Giver together with you.

          If Jesus truly is the reason for the season, there’s never been a better time to start speaking out about him.  Will everyone listen?  No, we know that.  Some will.  Will all those who listen receive Jesus, will they come and worship with us and grow in Christ alongside us?  Some may.  I urge you; I beg you; I pray that each of us set our mind and heart and praying on one person, or couple, or family.  If we each set ourselves and start praying about cultivating a conversation about Jesus with that person or couple or family over the year God is about to give us, we may end up with two, three, five, ten people walking alongside us, by year’s end, rejoicing with us, singing with us, praying with us, being Church together.

          Simeon and Anna had the Spirit.  The Church grows by the Spirit; the Spirit is an empowering Spirit, a proclaiming Spirit, as we hear through the Spirit-blessed mouths and lives of Simeon and Anna.

          O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!  How unsearchable are God’s judgments and how inscrutable God’s ways!  For from God and through God and to God are all things.  To God be glory forever!