Today we celebrate
the great feast of the “Presentation of the Lord”. It has been forty days since
the birth of Jesus, Mary and Joseph are fulling their obligations under to Law
of Moses. Upon entering the Temple in Jerusalem to offer the required the
sacrifices, they encounter an old man named Simeon. We are told that he has
been promised by God that he would not see death until he sees the Messiah.
When Simeon meets the baby Jesus, he takes him in his arms and says this very
powerful words, “Now, Master, you may let your servant depart in peace,
according to your word, for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you
prepared in sight of all the peoples, a light for revelation to the
Gentiles, and glory for your people Israel.” (Luke 2:29-32) Simeon sees Jesus
as the one who is going to redeem and save God’s faithful people. He will to
lead them from the great exile of darkness and into the great light. Out of sin
and death and into new communion with the living God. Salvation means that we
have been rescued from whatever was stopping us from being God’s faithful
servants. We see this unfold during the Exodus. Israel is in slavery and
bondage to Egypt and cannot serve God. Therefore, he has to redeem them, in
order that they may serve him alone. As Jesus redeems those serving sin and reaping
death, that they may now instead serve him and one other. God can then be at
work in us by his Spirit, fully reaping Life over Death.
One thing that
makes Scripture so special, is that though it may stay the same, every time
that we approach it we are different. We are not the same person we were
before. Our lives have changed. Our challenges and difficulties are different.
But we should understand and be confident that when we allow God’s Word to live
in and work in us, this every changing encounter with scripture becomes one way
that God guides us along the plan that he has for our life. We can take this approach
to scripture daily and never exhaust its use and purpose for us.
I found myself in
a moment like this yesterday. I thought about the words of Simeon as I stood beside
the hospital bed of a dying friend. As I looked upon her, I prayed, “Now,
Master, you may let you servant depart in peace”. This really does sum up our
prayers when someone is about to move from life into death. In some ways it is
a very sad moment. We are indeed going to miss this person, her company and
love. The world itself will miss the things she did in the name of Jesus Christ,
by living the Gospel daily, by carrying he cross to the end. But where there is
weeping, there is also rejoicing. God is calling one of his faithful servant’s
home. Where she will share the fullness of the presence of the Living Good. Her
great dismissal is really her entrance into life itself. Into the new heavens
and the new earth, where we have the glory of the Lord before our very eyes.
The great movement of salvation is at last complete. Tears and death are no
more, but only the words of Jesus “I am the resurrection and the life; he who
believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and
believes in me shall never die.” (John 11:25-26)
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