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| (Simeon nimmt Christus in seine Arme, Quelle: www.heiligenlexikon.de) |
God of the covenant, looking graciously upon their faith, you brought Abraham joy and Sarah laughter in the birth of their child and in the beginning s of a family countless as the stars of heaven. With Simeon and Anna, with Mary and Joseph, our eyes have seen your salvation, and we hold it in our hands. Fill us with wisdom to trust your promises, and let your gracious favor rest on this family you have gathered.
From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year B, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.
Some Thoughts on Luke 2:22-40
"Notice, Simeon wasn't looking 'in the church' for the Savior; he was looking 'on the street.' Where am I looking for the face of my Savior today? Do I look with expectation upon the crowd outside the church; examining every face for the Christ within? Am I poised like Simeon caught up in doing acts of kindness and justice? If I am, the face of Salvation is still among the nameless crowd who shuffles past our churches in every city in the world. He is still there; am I poised to find him?"
"The Consolation of Israel," Jerry Goebel, One Family Outreach. "Focus on scripture from a justice perspective." Exegesis, study, and teen study and activities.
"The Consolation of Israel," Jerry Goebel, One Family Outreach. "Focus on scripture from a justice perspective." Exegesis, study, and teen study and activities.
"Jesus will be the cause of many rising and falling in Israel -- he will be both the stone upon which some stumble and the stone of salvation (Romans 9:33; 1 Peter 2:6-8). In any case, Luke's account certainly gives credence to Paul's claim. The dedication of Jesus to God at the temple sets Jesus on the way to his work of redemption."
Commentary, Luke 2:22-40, Stephen Hultgren, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2014.This day brings our holiday season to an end. The bravest of all will come out on Sunday, January 1st, to celebrate the new year in church. Perhaps this will be a double low church whammy. It is both the Sunday after Christmas and it is also New Years Day.
In contrast to Mary in the Gospel written by Luke, we have Simeon who is a faithful, righteous, and patient man. A pious man he had been promised by the Holy Spirit that he would see the Messiah before he died.
Mary and Joseph bring their son to the Temple for circumcision as per their custom.
It is in the midst of this familial tradition that we see another revelation of who Jesus is and is to be.
At this moment Jesus is the Messiah for Simeon. He proclaims him so. Going on to reveal that he is the one he has been waiting for, but that he is also the savior of Israel and of all the peoples of the earth.
In the back of our minds, we must be aware of how Luke tells the story. At once we know he is to be rejected in this first volume; while accepted in Acts. Likewise, within the Gospel narrative, we see that some people will accept and welcome him others will reject him. (Luke Timothy Johnson, Luke, 57)
Simeon and Anna are people who welcome the savior.
One week has passed. A season is over and a new one is beginning. As we make our way through the Christmas lessons and then the Epiphany lessons I believe that we have an opportunity to refocus ourselves on living out the Gospel.
On this day perhaps it would be good for us to consider how we are welcoming God into our midst. How are we welcoming God into the midst of our lives? Are we making room for him? How are we welcoming others into our communities? Are we making room to see the face of Christ in others? Are we doing this in the church and on the streets? I love Goebel's quote above; a very good internalization of this morning's Gospel:
"Notice, Simeon wasn't looking 'in the church' for the Savior; he was looking 'on the street.' Where am I looking for the face of my Savior today? Do I look with expectation upon the crowd outside the church; examining every face for the Christ within? Am I poised like Simeon caught up in doing acts of kindness and justice? If I am, the face of Salvation is still among the nameless crowd who shuffles past our churches in every city in the world. He is still there; am I poised to find him?"On a day when we begin our New Year's resolution, it is a good time for us to rethink our work as individuals who make room for Jesus Christ in our lives and in our communities. What would happen if we as clergy made a resolution for our selves. What would happen if we encouraged others to do so? What if our church's made resolutions? What would they be? To be more like Simeon, Anna, the faithful family? To write a rule of life? To launch an intentional ministry of welcoming? To redouble our study and engagement with the bible?
In such rules of life, and resolutions, perhaps we will in the end find some liberation - some freedom. In living a life that proclaims and lives out the promise of Jesus as Messiah perhaps in fact the whole world might experience what it means to come within the reach of his saving embrace. Just maybe if we were to keep our resolutions, just maybe, people around us might have the same experience as Simeon.
Some Thoughts on Galatians 4:4-7
"So insidious is Sin that even the good gifts of God, like the Law (Galatians 3:21) or even the gospel, can be easily misused."
Commentary, Galatians 4:4-7, Erik Heen, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2014.
"The Spirit that God pours into all our hearts is a Spirit of compassion. It is a Spirit that embraces us and makes us a part of a family defined by God's love. It is that compassion that gives us our meaning and purpose in this life."
"Love Came Down," Alan Brehm, The Waking Dreamer.
The theologian Robert Farrar Capon in his book on parables (Kingdom, Grace, Judgement, 2002) offers that God in Christ comes to us in the incarnation as both our savior and judge. But his act of redemption and reconciliation is one of grace, forgiveness, and mercy. He judges with love and so we are presented to God through the eyes of our beloved Jesus. It is the eyes of his heart that redeem us.
The theologian Robert Farrar Capon in his book on parables (Kingdom, Grace, Judgement, 2002) offers that God in Christ comes to us in the incarnation as both our savior and judge. But his act of redemption and reconciliation is one of grace, forgiveness, and mercy. He judges with love and so we are presented to God through the eyes of our beloved Jesus. It is the eyes of his heart that redeem us.
Capon though also says that it is our renunciation and rejection of this coming which judges us guilty. It is our rejection of the spirit of God in our hearts, it is our rejection of our forgiveness, and the rejection of Jesus AND our focus upon the law which in the end finds us guilty.
Paul in Galatians is offering a vision of God who comes and blesses and redeems us. Jesus undoes the power of the law over us. Jesus enables us to be God's children. We are no longer slaves to the law. This is our new reality.
However, the truth is the longer we live focusing upon the law and our own failure and the failure of others - the longer we struggle outside the family. Our message is clear God loves. God forgives. God invites us. In this season of incarnation may we offer a message that does the same and enables us to live in the grace which has come into the world.
Our deliverance is real. May we live it.
Some Thoughts on Isaiah 61:10-62:3
Commentary, Isaiah 61:10 - 62:3, Michael J. Chan, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2014.
"In other words, the people as a whole will be entrusted with the former monarchical function of administering God's justice and righteousness in the world."
Commentary, Isaiah 61:10 - 62:3, J. Clinton McCann, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2008.
"The messages from both Isaiah and Luke have some points in common. As well as the overwhelming joy in the coming of the lord to his people, both have an ethical note to them."
The Old Testament Readings: Isaiah 61:10 - 62:3. Weekly Comments on the Revised Common Lectionary, Howard Wallace Audrey Schindler, Morag Logan, Paul Tonson, Lorraine Parkinson, Theological Hall of the Uniting Church, Melbourne, Australia.
"This "righteousness" stands, likewise, in parallel position to the "salvation" of the previous clause. There, again, the salvation to be achieved by the Messiah is metaphorically portrayed as "garments" (bigdhey-yesha^Ñ [BDB, 447]) with which He has simply "clothed" us [BDB, 527). The hiphil perfect of lbshis, here likewise, employed with the force of a present perfect explaining the basis of the future joy of the church."
"Christmas 1b - Exegetical Notes on Isaiah 61:10 - 62:3," Douglas MacCallum Lindsay Judisch, Concordia Theological Seminary (LCMS - Indiana).
"I will greatly rejoice in the Lord..." sings out the prophet. The people are to be delivered and have been changed through their estrangement, captivity, and enslavement in Babylon. The prophet sings out in joy in receiving the God who abhors injustice. The mixed images of wedding garments and the continued eschatological imagination of Isaiah play on the joy and heighten the joy. The prophet "is completely absorbed in his intense expectancy, and it is clear that he will continue to speak until the dawn of the day of salvation." (See the comments by Australian exegetes on this passage here.) The passage is about the present and future joy of the people at God's deliverance.
I suggest the passage is a character of prophetic joy.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks reminds us that the Greeks and the Romans believed in fate. He gives this example:
This was a major difference between ancient Israel and ancient Greece. The Greeks believed in fate, moira, even blind fate, ananke. When the Delphic oracle told Laius that he would have a son who would kill him, he took every precaution to make sure it did not happen. When the child was born, Laius nailed him by his feet to a rock and left him to die. A passing shepherd found and saved him, and he was eventually raised by the king and queen of Corinth. Because his feet were permanently misshapen, he came to be known as Oedipus (the “swollen-footed”).There is a present fatalism in our society too. Superhero movies and comics promise a Greek ethic of fate.
The rest of the story is well known. Everything the oracle foresaw happened, and every act designed to avoid it actually helped bring it about. Once the oracle has been spoken and fate has been sealed, all attempts to avoid it are in vain. This cluster of ideas lies at the heart of one of the great Greek contributions to civilization: tragedy. (See Sack's article on prognosticating the future here.)
Against such fate, I suggest prophetic joy stands out. Sacks speaks about how joy is such an "unexpected" word used by the prophet Moses and I would add Isaiah. Not unlike the Israelites escape from Egypt and their wandering in the desert, the Babylonian captivity and the feelings of God's silence have been anything but categorically joyous. I offer that Isaiah like Moses reminds us that prophetic joy is what "the life of faith in the land of promise is about." No less than a return and commitment to an old Israel is Isaiah imagining. (See Sacks' article on Moses and collective joy here.) Rabbi Sacks reminds us of the ancient Deuteronomic instance of the idea of collective joy.
The central Sanctuary, initially Shilo: “There in the presence of the Lord your God you and your families shall eat and rejoice in everything you have put your hand to, because the Lord your God has blessed you” (Deut. 12:7).
Jerusalem and the Temple: “And there you shall rejoice before the Lord your God, you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levites from your towns” (Deut. 12:12).
Sacred food that may be eaten only in Jerusalem: “Eat them in the presence of the Lord your God at the place the Lord your God will choose – you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levites from your towns – and you are to rejoice before the Lord your God in everything you put your hand to” (Deut. 12:18).
The second tithe: “Use the silver to buy whatever you like: cattle, sheep, wine, or other fermented drink, or anything you wish. Then you and your household shall eat there in the presence of the Lord your God and rejoice” (Deut. 14:26).
The festival of Shavuot: “And rejoice before the Lord your God at the place He will choose as a dwelling for His name – you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, the Levites in your towns, and the strangers, the fatherless, and the widows living among you” (Deut. 16:11).
The festival of Succot: “Be joyful at your feast – you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levites, the strangers, the fatherless, and the widows who live in your towns” (Deut. 16:14).
Succot, again. “For seven days, celebrate the feast to the Lord your God at the place the Lord your God will bless you in all your harvest and in all the work of your hands, and your joy will be complete [vehayita ach same’ach]” (Deut. 16:15).
Sacks suggests that even given the journey that has been made by the people Moses emphasizes joy because he has a vision of the whole course of Jewish history unfolds before him. Sacks paraphrases this moment "It is easy to speak to God in tears. It is hard to serve God in joy. It is the warning he delivered as the people came within sight of their destination: the Promised Land. Once there, they were in danger of forgetting that the land was theirs only because of God’s promise to them, and only for as long as they remembered their promise to God." The point being made is that left to any one of us the promise and joy will be forgotten. This is then a collective act of joy. again Sacks writes, "What Moses is articulating for the first time is the idea of simcha as communal, social, and national rejoicing. The nation was to be brought together not just by crisis, catastrophe, or impending war, but by collective celebration in the presence of God. "
I want to pull from Sacks' work the idea of collective joy. Isaiah is offering a prophetic joy in that he is inviting the people to look up and see the horizon before them, and like Moses before he is suggesting that the work of joy is collective. I propose then that far from being a joy experienced by individuals, scriptural joy is prophetic and collective.
I want to pull from Sacks' work the idea of collective joy. Isaiah is offering a prophetic joy in that he is inviting the people to look up and see the horizon before them, and like Moses before he is suggesting that the work of joy is collective. I propose then that far from being a joy experienced by individuals, scriptural joy is prophetic and collective.
Then prophetic joy is collective. It is about what God has done and what God will do. Christ adds a new dimension to this collective prophetic joy by making it present in the world through the incarnation. It is true that the Old Testament (Indeed Moses and Isaiah, but we might add Hosea and Malachi too) offer a vision that the collectivity of joy means a sharing with the poor and hungry. Prophetic joy is a collective act not simply because the tribe comes together but because the family shares the goodness of the joyful table with others. “Be joyful at your feast – you, your sons and daughters, your menservants and maidservants, and the Levites, the strangers, the fatherless, and the widows who live in your towns” (Deut. 16:14). See also Hosea 9:4 and Malachi 2:3.
The prophetic joy of Christ and the incarnation is not a mere congregational event but one intended from the earliest days to not be mere individual deliverance or religious corporate observance. The prophetic joy of Christ is meant to look behind and look forward. But from the perspective of Scripture (old and new) it is to be collective in the moment of its reading. A prophetic joy that is transformed into a collective joy that includes the strangers, fatherless, motherless, widows, lost, and lonely.
