Feast
of the Presentation
Sunday,
February 2, 2014
Malachi 3:1-4
Hebrews 2:14-18
Luke 2:22-40
Psalm 84
As
one theologian puts it, Simeon and Anna from today’s Gospel are a welcoming
people of God; they are authentic people of God.
I
have long admired Simeon and Anna, but this description of them as the welcoming,
authentic people of God made me look again at their actions and what we know
about them. What causes them to be identified by the very label that I yearn to
share: the welcoming and authentic people of God?
Simeon
and Anna have been living their lives founded on a promise---the promise of
salvation and redemption provided by the Messiah—God’s Chosen and Anointed One.
Their
lives, lived in a vastly different cultural context than ours, are not so
different in the circumstances. Just
like us, they lived in a time of political upheaval. A time when just a few people held the bulk
of the riches while the majority struggled simply to put food on the table and
to keep a shelter over their heads. One
could make an argument that Simeon and Anna lived in a time when 1% enjoyed
luxurious riches while 99% simply strove to live.
Like
us, Simeon and Anna saw people around them die too young. They saw corruption and injustice. They were witnesses to natural and man-made
tragedy.
And
yet, through it all, Simeon and Anna maintain the light. The light of hope and faith that is born in
God’s promise of salvation. Scripture tells us that the Holy Spirit rested on
Simeon while Anna lived a life devoted to the praise and worship of God. Their lives were focused and guided. They
believed. They believed in their hearts,
and their belief extended to their actions.
Even though the world around them may have ignored the reality of God’s
Kingdom, they chose to live as citizens of that Kingdom. And by doing so, they were empowered to live with
hope-filled expectancy.
Expectancy,
not expectations. Expectations install
limits and boundaries. All too often our
prayers to God are filled with expectations---we tell God how our life should
unfold, what the answers to our problems look like, just exactly what it is
that God should be doing for us. We pray
with expectation instead of praying with expectancy---the expectancy that God
does desire to grant us the life that meets our deepest desires, a life that is
best for us. The expectancy that God
will indeed see to it that we get the very things we need instead of demanding,
through expectations, that God grant us what we want.
A
prayer of expectancy, on the other hand, sounds like this: God, may your will be done. And this, my friends, is a prayer that works
in any and every situation. It is a prayer that can free us from fear and doubt
and anxiety---if only we can learn to trust and believe in this prayer and its
certain answer.
From
Simeon and Anna we learn that if we soak up the Holy Spirit, if we become
vulnerable to the Spirit’s movement within us and around us, we too can live lives
with this hope-filled expectancy that God will provide, God will remain
steadfast, God will redeem every painful situation and suffering that life
hands us, God will forgive every downfall and error we make.
Simeon
and Anna live lives of devotion. They live lives of offering---offering
themselves to God to be shaped and formed---and thereby became the very
offering God desires of us---a pure heart.
Purity
in the Hebrew world means to be undivided.
Yes, it is about cleansing, but cleansing in the sense of restoring one
to the state of its original essence. Purity is about removing the
non-essential and restoring the essential---the essence of one’s being. A pure
heart is a heart with one loyalty and one focus: to worship God with one’s very
life.
To
have a pure heart requires that we know our essence--that we know, without a
doubt, that we are made in God’s image and we are God’s. Today’s feast day—the presentation of our Lord
at the temple---is the day which marks Mary and Joseph bringing their firstborn
son, 40 days after his birth, to the temple in order to “buy back” their son
from God. This ritual is about
recognizing that their child does not belong to them; this child—and every
child--belongs to God. This ritual
recognizes our essential truth: we belong to God. Not to our parents, our spouses, our family,
or our selves. We are God’s. God is our essence.
In
our collect today we pray that “we may be presented to [God] with pure and
clean hearts.” This means we must be
willing to remove from our hearts anything that is not of our essence---not of
God. Life has a way of encouraging us to
consume and accept nonessentials as essentials.
Life has a way of convincing us that more is better. Life shouts at us that we are better and
worthier if we are: more rich or more powerful or more beautiful or more
recognized or more titled or more degreed or more normal….whatever that is.
But,
if we devote more time and energy to focus and pay attention to our essence---when
we listen to God’s whispers---we learn that our core truth and value lie in how
we treat one another. How we stand in
solidarity with those in need; how we love God by loving others because we put
their needs in front of our wants, and how we seek the common good, not simply
our individual good. Our essence comes
down to those two great commandments: Love the Lord your God and Love your
neighbor. This is our essence; this is
who we are. Our purity comes from living
this command intentionally and deliberately.
Pure
hearts empower us to recognize God’s essence in the world around us---in
people, in Creation, in actions and thoughts and words. In justice and peace and equality and
equity. In worship and devotion. In community and individuals. And then, not only to recognize, but to do
whatever it takes to increase the volume of God’s essence within us and around
us---transforming the world’s Kingdom into God’s Kingdom. And all because we live and move from the
state of hopeful expectancy that God will indeed get what God desires and we
have a part to play in this redemption.
Today
we meet Simeon and Anna---from such as these Jesus calls together the many to
become the authentic people of God. The
welcoming people of God who don’t hold expectations of what God’s people look
and act like. People who don’t expect to
be able to discern the difference between those who are in and those who are
out—between the us and the them.
Instead, the authentic people of God recognize God working in their
midst—through the gifts of all people, for all people are gifted and loved by
God.
Authentic
and welcoming people of God recognize that we are all made of the same original
essence---the light of God burning within us---the love of God making up our
DNA---the very blood and flesh of God changing us from broken into whole.
Simeon
and Anna, like Mary before them, recognize the wider significance of Jesus to
the whole world---because that’s what the welcoming and authentic people of God
do---we recognize that God, that Christianity, isn’t something we own or dole out
to the worthy. God, and this way of life
that flows from God, belongs to all Creation in order that all Creation will be
restored to its original essence---made in God’s image, by God’s hands, for
God’s good pleasure.
Matthew
5:16 in the Message says it like this:
“Here’s another way to put
it: You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world. God is
not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a
hill. If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under
a bucket, do you? I’m putting you on a light stand. Now that I’ve put you there
on a hilltop, on a light stand—shine! Keep open house; be generous with your
lives. By opening up to others, you’ll prompt people to open up with God, this
generous Father in heaven.
God
created because God loves. God created
because God desires to be in relationship with the created. That, my friends, is Good News on which we
can build a life of hope-filled expectancy, a life of light. Light that cannot be overcome by the
darkness.
