In the Fullness of Time | Prophets

I want to start this morning by just wondering out loud

if you've ever thought about what I'm about to share.

In fact, if you were raised in a believing family,

you were raised on the truth of the Bible,

it might be something that you've never

really considered before.

But think about this, the creator of all things,

the eternal God of the universe,

the infinite being who exists outside of time and space,

and the sovereign over all of human history,

has uniquely revealed himself in a collection of writings

bound together in one single book.

All of that infinite eternal ontology

divinely transmitted to us in just one book.

Now the world is full of books,

and we have a lot of choices out there,

what we can read, and there's a lot of good reading

out there, but there is only one special revelation

of who God is and what his plan is for the world

and for our lives, only one.

And in the first 70, 75% of that one book,

what we call the Old Testament,

God has given us a series of breadcrumbs

that help us see how in time and space

he plans to consummate all things

and to redeem a people for himself.

And amazingly, that divine revelation was granted

to a relatively small ancient near east people called Israel.

And in it was a series of prophecies built into the text,

all of which point to a unique individual

who will someday come to earth and fulfill

the creator's plan to ransom our sins

and give us eternal life in his kingdom.

Now, step back for a moment and think,

that is a remarkable story.

That is a wild story, is it not?

Again, if we grow up in the church,

sometimes we just take all that for granted.

That is a remarkable story.

And once you recognize how remarkable that story is,

the most important follow-up question is this,

and you should be asking this question in Christmas week.

Is it true?

Is the story true?

When we started this Advent series three weeks ago,

I purposely began with the historical context

of the Christmas story.

And again, the reason I wanted to start there

is because we are so familiar with the Christmas story

that we often overlook it.

Or worse, we're so familiar with it

that we start to view it as some type

of quaint little fable or allegory.

And if the Christmas story is just a heartwarming fable,

then we can all choose to believe it or not,

like Santa, right?

We can choose to believe it or not.

It's a completely subjective decision,

totally up to you, but not binding in any way, shape,

or form.

But if the opposite is true,

if the Christmas story is historically accurate

and the child in that manger is who the Bible says he is,

that is the biggest game changer in the history of mankind.

Isn't that true?

It's the biggest game changer of all time.

And it makes a binding demand on your life.

Now you have to believe it or reject it.

There is no middle ground option.

And your eternal destiny hangs in the balance.

So this Christmas week, we should ask the question,

is the story true?

Is the witness to Jesus' birth and life reliable?

Let me share with you an amazing historical fact.

And you may have heard some form of this in the past,

but again, maybe not really considered it.

In the ancient world, and we look at the New Testament,

we're talking about the ancient world.

In the ancient world, written biographies were very rare.

Written biographies, incredibly rare.

On occasion, a historical figure would be so full

of himself that he would tap somebody,

a biographer to go with him and to write down

all of his exploits, or sometimes a particular person

would rise up in a population and decide

that he was gonna jot down accounts

of the events of his day.

But it was very rare.

And the reason that was rare was unlike today,

ancient people did not think that writing things down

was necessary.

We're a very written culture.

We want every single detail put down in black and white.

That was not the ancient world.

In most parts of the ancient world,

the oral transmission of historical accounts

was the norm, that was accepted.

People passed down stories and historical facts

from generation to generation, and they kept them

in families and communities and even nations.

That's why some of our most famous historical figures

have very little written about them.

And again, maybe you haven't considered this before.

Alexander the Great, one of the most influential men

in human history, one of the greatest conquerors

of all time, five sources for his life.

And that's a high number in the ancient world, five.

Attila the Hun, two sources for his life.

Pieced together, cobbled together.

Take a contemporary figure from the time of Christ,

Julius Caesar, only four sources for his life.

This is the man who transformed the Roman Republic

into the Roman Empire, the greatest empire

the world has ever seen.

Four people decided they would sit down

and write about his life.

Now those men are great kings and great conquerors,

men who changed the world, right?

If they had only a few biographers or a handful

of biographers, how many sources would you expect

to write down the history of a wandering Jewish rabbi

from Galilee?

You'd expect absolutely zero.

Zero people to ever write down a biography

about a man like Jesus, zero.

And yet, 2,000 years later, the biographies we have

of Jesus sitting in your lap right now or on your phone

are the most widely read biographies

of any man in human history.

And how do you explain that?

How do you explain that, that four guys said,

we'll talk about Julius Caesar, but more than four

decided to write down the life of this rabbi

from Galilee.

Now I sometimes hear critics say or write,

well we can't know for sure that the biographers

wrote accurate history about Jesus.

And my response is, okay, can we know that Plutarch

was writing accurate history or Cassius Dio

or Suetonius, can we know that?

If we apply a consistent historical method

to our research, yes we can.

We can start by looking at the manuscripts

that have survived to this day.

Look at the volume of them, look at the dating of them,

look at how they were passed down.

We can then cross check them against one another.

We can look at the details of those accounts,

look at names and places and cultural references.

And then we can put a shovel into the ground

and see if archeology bears out those accounts or not.

We can do that, and we have done that in human history.

It's not hard if, if, and that's a big if, right,

you're willing to actually look at the evidence.

And so those accounts of Alexander and Attila and Caesar

written down, listen, hundreds of years,

in some cases more than a thousand years

after the events they describe.

Compare that now with the synoptic gospels, including Luke,

written 20 to 25 years after the life of Christ.

The epistles of Paul, which also bear witness to his life,

written down between 16 and 30 years after his death.

And what about the manuscript evidence?

For those great men of history,

the surviving manuscripts that we have

that have been cobbled together by historians

are not even ancient at all.

Take for example, the works of the Roman historian Tacitus,

great historian.

He's a contemporary of the apostles,

and he writes about the first century,

but the earliest manuscript we have of his writings

is 11th century.

And with more time, they become less reliable

because there's time for errors and variants

and additions to be made.

In addition to the time gap, the number,

the sheer number of surviving manuscripts we have

for some of these well-known historical figures

are very few, seven documents here, 12 documents there.

Scan evidence for lives that every one of us was taught

was absolutely verified.

Does anyone really doubt today

that Alexander conquered the Persian Empire

in spite of the number of manuscripts we have?

Does anybody doubt that Julius Caesar conquered Rome

then marched on Rome and became the dictator there

in the city of Rome?

No, in spite of the fact that we have very few

surviving manuscripts.

Now, with the New Testament,

we have not 10th century or 11th century manuscripts,

we have second century, third century.

We have entire codices of the New Testament

from the fourth century on.

It's remarkable.

And catch this, between the time of Christ

and the invention of the printing press,

scholars have collected not seven copies

or eight copies or 12 copies,

but close to 6,000 New Testament manuscripts

in the Greek language.

And many more thousand in other ancient languages

like Coptic or Syriac.

Guys, the New Testament is the most documented collection

of writings ever, and it's not even close.

Now, do the internal details hold up?

That's a key question.

Names, places, cultural references.

Well, let's look at the Christmas story

as a good model for us.

Caesar Augustus ruling at the time, check.

Herod the Great, king of the Jews, ruling at that time,

check.

Quirinius, the governor of Syria at that time,

check.

Roman census for the purpose of taxation, check.

Nazareth, a little town in Galilee, check.

Bethlehem, a little town in Judea, check.

Bethlehem, the city of David's birth, check.

Shepherds watching over their sheep in that region, check.

Feeding troughs found in places where animals are kept,

check.

And this morning we're gonna see three important ceremonies

that are ingrained in Judaism,

which lend even more cultural credibility to the text.

So all of the historical and cultural indicators

in the Christmas story check out.

Now, has archeology borne it out?

All across the board, yes, it has.

Every time we put a spade into the ground in Israel,

we dig up more biblical evidence.

It is amazing.

So by every measurable historical standard,

there's absolutely no reason to doubt

that Jesus, son of Mary, was born in Bethlehem

between four and six BC, as Luke reports.

And there's no reason to doubt that he was exactly

who the prophets said he would be

and who the eyewitnesses to his life testified he was.

Jesus of Nazareth is, as his biographers identify him,

the son of the Most High,

the eternal heir to the Davidic throne,

Israel's Messiah, and Lord over all.

And if you're gonna toss that out,

there's not a single shred of ancient history

that you can believe this morning.

Grab your Bibles.

We're going to Luke chapter two.

Luke chapter two, we're gonna start today at verse 21.

And so this actually is after the birth of Christ.

We're gonna look at the days following the birth of Christ

as we wrap up our Advent series this morning.

Luke two, verse 21.

And guys, the big idea of today's message

is to connect all of the dots concerning

the identity of this child, from Old Testament to New,

so that as you go off to celebrate Christmas this week,

you can have full confidence

that your trust in him is well-placed.

That's important, isn't it?

Especially as we're communicating to our kids

about the story to be able to have that confidence

that we trust in the veracity of this story.

Now, before we dive into the text,

I want you to consider another interesting thought.

As a historian, which Luke is,

there are many things that he could have chosen

to report to us about this infancy period of Jesus' life.

So he chooses just a couple of important milestones

in this text, and that makes them very significant.

So we should search to find out,

okay, why did Luke think these were so significant,

and what was his purpose for relating these things to us,

which I'll give you my theory about later on.

Verse 21, and when eight days had passed,

eight days since Jesus' birth, before a circumcision,

his name was then called Jesus,

the name given by the angel

before he was conceived in the womb.

So they obediently, as the angel said,

instructed them, named him Jesus.

So let's start this morning

by just clearing up the whole name issue,

because this comes up every, at least for me,

it comes up on my Twitter feed every single year.

There's some yahoo who has no understanding

of the biblical languages who says,

I don't understand why his name sounds so English.

Like that doesn't make any sense.

Okay, so here we go.

So his name, his birth name in Hebrew

would have been Yehoshua, or Yeshua for short,

and that translated into the New Testament Greek

becomes what, Yeh-sus, and then transliterated

from the Greek to English becomes Jesus.

So he's not British, he's not American, okay, he's Hebrew,

but it gets transliterated down the line.

Are we good on that?

By the way, does that mean we always have to pray

in the name of Yehoshua?

No, we can pray in English,

and God knows exactly who we're talking about.

Okay, we good on that?

All right, let's talk about the three ceremonies

that we're gonna see in this passage,

because again, they lend cultural credibility

to Luke's account.

Look back at verse 21.

By the way, if you're one of those people

that likes to mark up their Bible, and I love that,

whether it's on your phone or it's with the pen on your lap,

highlight or underline the word circumcision in verse 21.

That is the first requirement, circumcision.

Of course, we know this given to Abraham in Genesis 17,

later commanded in the law of Moses in Leviticus 12,

every male child was to be circumcised on the eighth day

after his birth.

And by the way, this would have taken place

wherever the child was,

so Jesus would have been circumcised according to the laws

somewhere in the Bethlehem region.

And then there's a time gap and a change of location

between verse 21 and verse 22.

Says verse 22, and when the days for their purification

according to the law of Moses were completed,

they brought Jesus up to Jerusalem

to present him to the Lord.

As it is written in the law of the Lord,

every firstborn male that opens the womb

shall be called holy to the Lord.

So this is the second requirement, purification.

Underline that word purification in verse 22.

In Leviticus 12, we're told that a woman

was considered unclean for seven days

after she gave birth to a child,

and then it says she must quote,

continue in the blood of her purification

for 33 more days before she can come into the sanctuary.

So Jesus is eight days old in verse 21.

By the time we get to verse 22,

he is approaching six weeks old.

And on that day, Mary and Joseph bring him to Jerusalem.

They had been in Bethlehem,

which again is only five or six miles away.

They come up to Jerusalem and they bring him to the temple.

And this is the third requirement,

underline the words present him in your Bibles.

This is the presentation of the firstborn son.

And this is given to us in Exodus 13,

and it's given as a reminder of that final plague in Egypt.

Remember when the firstborn sons of Israel

were spared by the angel of death

because of the blood of the Passover lamb?

Tons of symbolism in that.

They were spared because the firstborn sons of Israel

were spared, the Lord said to them,

they belong to me, set them apart for my service.

So this is what Mary and Joseph are doing here.

Now, not every child was brought to the temple for this,

but Mary and Joseph, knowing who their child was,

brought him to Jerusalem.

And it's almost as if they're coming to say,

look, we recognize that this child really isn't ours,

and they bring him to the temple,

to the house of his truest father to present him.

And you see then in verse 24 that a sacrifice was required

at the time of this purification, an offering for sin,

which yes, we can remind our Roman Catholic friends,

an offering for sin that was required of Mary.

Yes, Mary was a sinner.

We can say that out loud, okay?

Verse 24, to offer a sacrifice

according to what was said in the law of the Lord,

a pair of turtle doves.

Isn't there a Christmas song about that?

Turtle doves.

Turtle doves or two young pigeons.

Again, another interesting cultural note here

that lines up with history.

Normally a lamb was required for this purification,

but there is in the law in Leviticus 12,

this offering of the poor.

If you could not afford a lamb,

you could bring two birds like this.

So this tells you something about Mary and Joseph

and how poor they really were.

So stepping back, now why would Luke talk

about these ceremonies?

Why is he bringing all this up?

Well, two reasons, I think.

First of all, he's showing us that yes,

Joseph and Mary were indeed devout and obedient Jews.

Serious about their walk with Yahweh,

seeking to do everything required of them by the law.

And that's important for the story.

I'll explain why later.

And second, Luke wants to remind us

that Jesus was born a Jew.

He was born under the law.

And even in his infancy, he fulfills every aspect

of the law that had to be done.

And so Luke gives us those details

to just solidify that truth, but also to say,

look, this is a historical, cultural, accurate story.

Okay, let's get into the meat of our text for this morning.

Look at verse 25 now.

This is where it gets really, really fun.

And there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon.

And this man was righteous and devout,

looking for the consolation of Israel.

So here's a man who comes to us seemingly out of nowhere.

We get just 11 verses of information about him.

And basically what we're told is this is an old man

with outstanding character and faith.

You have to love Simeon.

Outstanding character and faith.

He is called righteous by Luke,

meaning that he's walking in a right relationship

with Yahweh.

He's a true believer who's been marked out by God

and saved by God's mercy and grace.

And he's devout, meaning that he does have a love

for God's law.

He's concerned about the things of God.

He's devoted to Yahweh's honor and glory and service.

We would call him an authentic Jew in that day.

Because as Paul's gonna say later in the New Testament,

not all Israel is Israel, correct?

But this man truly knows God and walks with him by faith.

That's why he's described in this way.

And he's a man of hope.

He is patiently waiting and looking for what?

The consolation of his people Israel.

Now what does that mean?

He's looking for the Messiah.

He's looking for the Savior.

He's looking for the consoler, the comforter of Isaiah 40.

His eyes are attentive to watch for him.

He's watching for God to fulfill all the promises

that God has made to Israel through the prophets.

Promises of forgiveness of sin.

Promises of salvation.

Promises to restore the Davidic throne.

I have no doubt that Simeon believed in those things,

that he took God's words seriously,

that he studied the prophets.

And as he did that, it impacted his life.

His heart, his mind, and his actions.

And again, don't forget that at the time Christ comes,

Israel is in a distressed time.

Things are not good in Israel.

The Roman occupation of the land.

You've got a corrupt priesthood.

You've got Pharisees living in this external religiosity.

You have an apostate king ruling in Jerusalem.

And the hearts of the people are far from God.

And I think the worse that things got for Israel,

the more that Simeon's heart must have ached about it.

And the more he must have prayed,

Lord, now come, console your people Israel.

And so Simeon must have thought about

all the Old Testament prophecies during his life.

All the messianic prophecies.

Who would he be?

Who would, what would the Messiah do?

And there's this incredible litany of breadcrumbs

that God left about who the Messiah would be

and what he would come and do.

It's estimated that at least 300 statements

in the Old Testament point forward

to who the Messiah would be.

I'll give you just a few.

And they're remarkable.

His origins would be from eternity past.

That kind of limits it, doesn't it?

He'd be called holy.

He'll be called Lord.

He'll be called the Son of God.

He'll be called the Son of Man.

He'll be called Emmanuel.

He'll be called wonderful counselor and mighty God,

an everlasting father and Prince of Peace.

He'll be born of the seed of a woman,

be descended from Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah,

Jesse, and David.

Born of a virgin, born in the town of Bethlehem,

but he would come out of Galilee.

He would heal the blind, the deaf, and the lame.

He would bear the sins of men.

He would be pierced for our transgressions.

He'd be a lamb led to slaughter.

He would come in the name of the Lord,

be a light to the Gentiles,

be rejected and ridiculed by his own.

He would personify the stumbling stone in Israel.

He would humbly ride on a donkey,

be praised as a king,

suddenly appear at the temple,

and be angered that it's not being treated

as a house of prayer.

He'd be betrayed by a friend,

sold for 30 pieces of silver,

forsaken by his disciples,

accused by false witnesses,

beaten and spit upon, remain quiet before his accusers,

his hands and feet pierced,

his garments divided and lots cast for them,

gall and vinegar offered to him,

his bones not broken.

Buried in a rich man's tomb,

his body not subject to decay,

be highly exalted and sit at the right hand of the Father

and receive authority over all things.

Hmm, who could that be?

Did you hear, that was all from the Old Testament, folks.

Who could that be?

Think about that list.

Oh, and don't forget,

and I don't have time to work through all the details

on this, but Daniel's prophecy of the 70 weeks

in Daniel chapter nine absolutely historically

settles the case.

Look at it sometime.

If scripture is true,

if you do the math from that particular passage,

the Messiah had to die sometime in the first century

and obviously before the destruction of the temple

in AD 70.

Otherwise he can't fulfill those prophecies.

And my guess is Simeon knew this.

And so in so many ways he represents

the expectant Jews of that day,

the saved remnant who were trusting in Yahweh,

trusting in his promises,

trusting in those prophecies

and looking forward to the Messiah's arrival.

Because God has always kept this remnant

of true believers in Israel, true Israel.

And Simeon serves sort of as Luke's model

for that part of the Jewish population

in the first century.

Let's go back to the end of verse 25 now.

Luke adds this important statement.

He says, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.

That's interesting, isn't it?

It's so interesting to note how many times

in the opening chapters of Luke's gospel

he talks about the Holy Spirit before Pentecost.

Right?

John the Baptist, while still in the womb,

is said to be filled with the Spirit.

Why?

So later on he will speak divine words

as the forerunner of the Messiah.

Elizabeth is filled with the Spirit

and she declares God's message to Mary.

She says, blessed among women are you Mary

and blessed is the fruit of your womb.

Zacharias, her husband, is also filled with the Spirit

and he prophesies the song of Zacharias

in Luke chapter one.

In each of these cases, what we see are examples

of a unique and special work of the Spirit

empowering certain chosen servants to speak God's word

and to confirm the coming of the Messiah.

And now Simeon is added to that list.

The Holy Spirit is upon him

and he's gonna say some amazing things here.

Verse 26 says, and it had been revealed to Simeon

by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death

before he had seen the Lord's Christ.

Now that's a cool gift, isn't it?

I mean, that would be a,

could you imagine getting that promise by the way?

You're not gonna die until Jesus returns.

How cool would that be?

Simeon, it's like God said,

Simeon, I see your love for me.

I see your devotion to my glory,

so I have chosen you for this very unique role

to confirm that the fullness of the time

has come and that the Messiah has arrived.

And so here's my promise to you,

you will see him before you pass away.

Now practically imagine how that plays out in your life.

I mean, you're sick on your,

you're so sick you're on your deathbed,

you're like, I don't have to worry,

Messiah's not arrived yet.

I'm not gonna die, I'm really sick, I'm not gonna die.

Because I haven't seen him yet.

Or you know, you go out and do some really risky,

dangerous thing, I don't have to worry about it.

Messiah hasn't come yet.

Messiah hasn't come yet.

This is the way my little pea brain works,

so excuse me, right?

But seriously, to know that you were living

in Messianic times, that after so many generations

of Jewish anticipation that he was going to arrive

in your lifetime, would that not fill you

with tremendous excitement?

And make you constantly expectant, watching,

to see how God would fulfill that hope

that you have held onto all of these years.

And in the next verse, verse 27,

we're told that the Spirit then directs Simeon

to go to the temple on this very same day

that here come Mary and Joseph with their baby,

to the temple.

Verse 27, and he came in the Spirit into the temple.

Now remember, they're there to do what?

To present Jesus to the Lord and to make this sin offering.

So Mary and Joseph would have come

into the courtyard of the temple,

which is a huge place, by the way,

filled with lots of people,

but the Spirit is gonna orchestrate a meeting

to take place here.

Remember, Joseph and Mary don't know anything about Simeon.

And Simeon has no idea as he comes to the temple that day

that this is the day where he will see the Savior.

He's prompted to go, but he doesn't know

that this is the day.

So they're not expecting to meet each other,

and I sort of picture God in the heavens looking down

and going, oh, here they come, here comes Simeon,

and he makes sure that they're gonna cross paths.

How cool is that?

Now we're not told how the conversation started.

How cool would that be to know,

like how they greeted each other or how this came about?

This is what we're told, back to verse 27.

And when the parents brought in the child Jesus

to carry out for him the custom of the law,

then Simeon took him into his arms.

Can you imagine how he felt in that moment?

When the Spirit said to him,

when the Spirit said to him, Simeon, today's the day,

and that is the one.

Can you imagine the joy as he scooped that baby

out of Mary's arms and held him to his chest?

And as we sing the song, kiss the face of God.

Can you imagine the joy that must have flooded his heart?

This, for Simeon, is the thrill of an old man's life.

A life lived well to the glory of God,

and it's all for this moment.

The consolation of Israel has arrived.

The verse goes on, Simeon blessed God and said,

now, Lord, you are releasing your bond servant

to depart in peace according to your word.

For my eyes have seen your salvation,

which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples.

And the language there is so cool, this releasing.

The better way to look at it is being dismissed.

It's the picture of a sentry who has been standing

on the city walls all night long, watching out,

and then the sun comes up,

and he's relieved of his duty.

You can go home.

All is well.

You can go home.

So for Simeon, this baby was God's sunrise,

and now he can die in peace

and enter into the full joy of his salvation.

God has done what he promised to do, and I can go home.

Man.

But before he finishes,

Simeon has a few more prophecies to drop.

First, he refers to the impact

that this child will make on the world in two ways.

So again, he's prophesying.

This is the spirit now speaking through him as a prophet.

Verse 32, a light of revelation to the Gentiles

and the glory of your people Israel.

And his father and mother were amazed at the things

which were being said about him.

I don't know how many times Mary and Joseph

had to be amazed, right?

Oh, the angels, the birth, the shepherds.

I mean, over and over again, they're just amazed at

what God has called them to do.

The redemption of the world in their hands, right?

It's amazing.

Now, neither of the two statements made in verse 32

are new.

Simeon is simply echoing statements

that have been made by the Old Testament prophets,

particularly Isaiah, Zechariah, and the Psalms.

We see these two things.

As the light of the world,

Jesus is going to reveal God not just to the Jews,

but to the entire world, to all the Gentile nations.

And to his people Israel,

Jesus is going to bring a particular type of glory.

Now, this is only his first coming.

He's not gonna bring the glory that fleshly Israel wanted,

which was the political overthrow of Rome,

power and might.

In his first coming, Jesus is gonna bring

to righteous Israel, true Israel,

the very things that Luke will tell us

later on in Luke chapter four

that Jesus will talk about as he reads the Isaiah scroll

in the synagogue of Nazareth.

This is what Jesus is gonna bring.

Here's what he talks about as he reads the Isaiah scroll.

To preach the gospel to the poor in spirit.

To proclaim release to those who are in captivity to sin.

To give sight to those who are spiritually blind.

And to set free all who are oppressed by wickedness.

That is the glory that is coming to Israel

in Jesus' first coming.

Now, there'd be more in his second coming, of course,

but that's what he was bringing.

For those in Israel who had eyes to see and ears to hear,

true Israel, that's what he was bringing.

Now, up to this point,

in actually the entire Christmas story,

everything that has been said about the Christ child

has been super positive, right?

Messiah, savior, Davidic king,

save his people from their sins, all positive.

But now, Simeon unveils the dark side to the story.

A dark side to the good news.

By the way, also not new.

These are things the Old Testament prophets had talked about.

Prophecies of rejection and suffering and death.

So he's just summarizing

what the prophets had already declared.

Verse 34 says this.

And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother,

behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rise

of many in Israel.

And for a sign to be opposed.

And a sword will pierce even your own soul.

Mary.

To the end that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.

Again, Simeon is aware of just how sinful Israel is

in his day, the corruption, right?

The sin in all across the nation.

And with the spirit upon him, he can foresee

that even the Messiah, even Israel's own Messiah

will not be welcomed.

And will face stiff opposition.

And he knew what the prophets of old had already said.

How Isaiah spoke of a stone to strike

and a rock to stumble over.

How God's servant would be despised and forsaken.

A man of sorrows acquainted with grief.

And see how Simeon speaks of many hearts being revealed

by this child and saying, look, because of who this child

will grow up to be, hearts are gonna be revealed

and many will fall and many will rise.

He will divide people.

By the way, he's still dividing people today, isn't he?

And it's so interesting then to see how this plays out

in the gospels.

Two thieves on crosses.

One believes, one blasphemes.

Great denials, Peter repents, Judas despairs

and hangs himself.

Some will rise and some will fall.

The humble and the poor in spirit will rise.

The self-righteous and the proud will fall.

Salvation for some, judgment for others,

all based on the person and works of that child

lying in Simeon's arms.

Amazing.

And then there's the warning to Mary and perhaps this came

because Simeon recognizes the amazement on the faces

of Mary and Joseph in that moment.

But with the spirit upon him,

Simeon turns to Mary in particular.

This is so interesting.

And he looks at this teenage mother who must turn to Mary

this teenage mother who must just be overwhelmed

by all of what's happening.

And with compassion and grief he says,

my dear girl,

because of this beautiful child,

a sword is going to pierce your soul.

Notice by the way he doesn't address Joseph.

And I can't say this for sure,

but maybe again by the spirit he understood

that Joseph was not gonna live long enough

to see Jesus' adult ministry to be a witness to his death.

But he does know that about Mary.

I think this much is clear.

God's word through Simeon was designed to prepare

Mary for the grief that she was gonna have to walk through.

So it wouldn't be a surprise to her later on.

She could look back at this and say,

oh, I remember that day in the temple courts.

The prophet told me.

The rejection of her son.

Imagine moms.

Moms, moms, imagine.

The rejection of your son.

The immense suffering he would endure

at the hands of the most wicked men.

The spectacle of his death,

having to watch him being nailed to a cross.

The agony of burying your child.

It was important for Mary to know

that mothering Messiah was not gonna be easy.

Not all sweetness and light.

A great privilege, yes,

but also a great burden.

And Simeon disappears from the record.

Now, let's look at the last few verses.

Look at verse 36.

And there was a prophetess, Anna,

the daughter of Fenuel, of the tribe of Asher.

Again, more little details that Luke gives us

to tell us this is a real human being in history.

She was advanced in years

and had lived with her husband seven years

after her marriage,

and then as a widow to the age of 84.

She never left the temple serving night and day

with fastings and with prayer.

One interesting person

that Luke introduces to us here.

One of only two people in the world

that were called prophetess earlier.

One of only a few women in all of scripture

who were called prophetess.

Only a few women in all of scripture

were called prophetess,

meaning she was uniquely chosen

at unique times in history

to declare a particular word of truth

from the Lord to people.

Not a teacher, not one with authority,

just one who delivers the word of the Lord

to God's people.

84 years old.

Very old in the ancient world, guys.

That's the story of that day.

And imagine all that she had seen in her lifetime.

If you do the math on her life,

she's born somewhere close to 90 BC,

which means that she had lived under the rule

of the final Hasmonean kings

when Israel was an independent kingdom.

When she was in her 20s

is when the Roman legions

would have marched into the land

slaughtering Jews and taking away their freedom.

Imagine all that.

Great trauma in her life.

How much devastation did she witness?

Did she have loved ones die in battle

defending Israel?

We don't know.

But most of her life was lived as a widow.

She only had seven years with her husband

before he was taken away.

So as a widow in that culture,

she lived a life of hardship and suffering.

And for some reason that is known to her

and to the Lord,

she chose not to remarry.

She chose not to seek after bearing children,

which was so highly valued in that culture.

And she could have grown bitter towards God

based on her circumstances.

She could have complained about all of it.

She could have said, Lord, I'm so lonely.

But instead, Anna took refuge under God's wing.

And she let her trials and her difficulties

drive her into deeper devotion to God,

not away from God.

And we can learn from that.

So she devoted herself to serving Yahweh

daily in the temple,

praying, fasting, praying some more,

always seeking the Lord's face,

living a life of constant self-denial

and self-sacrifice.

And like Simeon,

she must have been acutely aware

of how sinful Israel was at the time.

And she also was looking forward

to the hope of the Messiah.

And every day in the temple,

day after day after day,

which by the way sounds pretty boring

to modern people like me.

It's pretty boring to modern people like us

doing the same thing every day.

In fact, as I was thinking about this last night,

if we were to meet her today,

far too many Christians would say,

oh, she's wasting her life.

She's not very useful.

Far too many Christians would look at her

and go, ah, she's a bit odd.

Maybe too devoted to God for my taste.

My guess is the Sadducees

and the temple officials

thought she was a nuisance.

Ah, it's that woman again.

Every day just praying.

But what a role God has for her.

Now, come on, Luke.

We're not given details here.

Do you get frustrated by Luke sometimes?

Give me more.

I have questions.

We're not told about the encounter

that she has here

with Joseph and Mary and Jesus, right?

But it says in verse 38,

at that very moment,

meaning at the same time

that Simeon is holding the baby in his arms,

Anna comes up and began giving thanks to God

and continued to speak at him

to all those who were looking

for the redemption of Jerusalem.

That's all we get about this godly woman.

But the spirit prompts Anna,

again, she's already at the temple.

She's there every day.

But now the spirit directs her

to move towards this young couple

and their baby.

She doesn't know them.

It's likely she knew Simeon.

He would have been a regular

at the temple as well.

She moves towards them by the spirit

and she recognizes who the child is.

And she hears Simeon prophesy.

And in Luke's Just the Facts way,

simply right,

she began praising and thanking the Lord.

That's probably a great understatement,

by the way.

But she doesn't stop there.

Then she becomes a megaphone

for the good news, right?

She scurries all over the temple courts

looking for people like her,

true Israel,

those who are actually trusting

in God's word,

looking for the Messiah,

the redemption of Jerusalem

and telling them the good news.

Today, the Messiah has arrived.

What a moment.

Guys, imagine this decades

and decades and decades of prayer

asking the Lord to come

and rescue her people.

And like Simeon,

she has finally seen it

with her old tired eyes at 84.

A long life of trial

and suffering and devotion to God

worth it for this one moment.

And what a grace that the Lord

was pleased to use Anna

as a testimony to his son,

a woman of all things.

Because women in that culture

were not even allowed

to testify in court.

They weren't trustworthy.

They were not worthy of being,

the culture said.

But it turns out that Anna

is wiser and more godly

than any Pharisee,

any Sadducee,

any scribe in the temple that day.

Anna's story teaches us

so much about patience

and about hope

and the truth that no matter

how much we lose

down here on the earth,

seeing Christ is enough.

Do you believe that?

No matter how much

we lose during our days

on the earth,

having Christ is enough.

All right, I gotta wrap up.

So let me say this again,

Luke had many choices

on what to include

about the early days

of Jesus' life

and he chooses Simeon and Anna.

And it's so beautiful.

Listen, humanly speaking,

they're not impressive people.

Like Mary and like Joseph

and like the shepherds,

they're not people of position.

They're not people of power.

They're not the type of people

that historians usually choose

to lend credibility to an account.

But God sees them.

Let that be an encouragement

to you and I today.

God sees them.

He sees their devotion

and He sees their faithfulness.

He hears every prayer

and He takes note of the tears

in their eyes.

And in the kingdom to come,

their reward is great.

And let me come back

to what I see as Luke's purpose

in this part of the Christmas story.

Two things.

First of all,

Luke understood something

about the ancient world,

especially his Jewish audience.

And this is a biblical principle

that every fact has to be confirmed

by two or three witnesses.

He knew that.

And so he gives to us

Mary and Joseph

as one witness to the birth of Christ.

And then he adds to them

Simeon and Anna, three witnesses

to confirm every fact

about who this child is.

Now, obviously, we have this long list

of Old Testament prophecies

pointing forward to Christ.

But then Luke adds on top of it.

Okay, we've got all this,

but let me give you three more

who see the birth of this child

and say this is the Lord's Messiah.

And I think this is why it's so critical.

For us to recognize how godly

these four individuals are.

Mary, Joseph, Simeon, Anna.

They are the best of Israel.

As godly as you could be

in the land at that time.

They're credible sources.

And Luke says, look,

eyewitness accounts.

This is a true story.

And then the second observation,

I find it interesting.

And I could be off base here.

Adam will tell me later if I'm wrong.

I find it interesting

that Joseph and Mary are so young

and Simeon and Anna are described

as being so old.

And I don't think that's a coincidence.

I think the picture Luke is drawing for us is this.

With the arrival of Jesus at his first coming,

there's a transition taking place.

This ushers in a massive change to the world.

And especially in Israel.

The era of the law and the prophets

is passing away.

The old covenant is giving way

to the promised new covenant.

And this older generation of Simeon and Anna

are also passing away.

They're making room for a new generation in Israel

who will bear witness to the coming of the kingdom

and the person of Jesus Christ.

Now, I'm not saying that Jesus came

to abolish the law and the prophets.

He didn't.

But they find their fulfillment in him.

They all point to him.

So there's no doubt that a transition

was happening with the birth of Christ.

And all who are part of true Israel,

guess what?

They welcomed him and then they went off to glory.

Satisfied that Christ is enough.

I think that's part of the story

that Luke is telling us here.

So there you have it, friends.

All the evidence lies before you.

Luke writes reliable history.

This is a true account.

The manuscript evidence is overwhelming.

The names, the places, the cultural points are accurate.

Archaeology bears it out.

You have a huge list of prophetic statements

pointing to this one man.

Things so specific it cannot possibly mean any other person.

Even the timing can only apply to his coming.

And then you have the prophetic statements

declared over his birth.

Eyewitness accounts.

Every step of the way, the author of scripture

has given you a confirmed and verified account.

So who else are you looking for?

Who else?

If you don't know Christ this morning,

who are you waiting for?

What more evidence do you need?

Who else could it be?

So bow your knee today to Jesus of Nazareth,

son of Mary, son of God, Emmanuel, God with us,

God made flesh, Messiah, Christ, Savior and King.

Born for you and born for me,

crucified for the forgiveness of our sins

and raised to life so that we too might live forever.

That's why we say this morning, joy to the world

and glory to God in the highest, amen?

Amen.

Let's bow our heads.

Oh Lord, we are so grateful.

Grateful Lord that you not only have sent your son

in your eternal divine plan to consummate all things in him,

to send your son to take on flesh,

to condescend to this level for our sake, Lord,

to die on a cross, to be raised to life

so that you might be glorified in us and in our lives

and we might live with you forever.

What a story, Lord, but you've gone even further

to give us this amazing book,

this amazing collection of writings

over so many years written by so many people

but so tightly connected to one another

with all of the breadcrumbs, Lord,

pointing towards this one person,

this glorious divine person

and you've showed it to us, Lord,

and you have fulfilled the principle of two or three

witnesses, so many more witnesses, Lord.

And so this morning we say thank you for all of that,

that we can be in this place together today

and we can worship your name

and we can praise you for Jesus Christ,

born in that manger, born for us,

born to die so that we might live.

What a story, God, what a story.

What a story you have given us.

As we sing a few more songs this morning, God,

will you just seal those truths in our hearts and our minds

so that we just cannot help

but burst out in praise of your name.

Help us to do that this morning, Lord,

for your glory, we pray.

Amen.