Luke 2:21-40
Please turn in your copy of the
Word of God to the Gospel of Luke to chapter 2. Our reading
today is Luke chapter 2, verses 21 through 40. We are making
our way through Luke’s gospel and we have. seen the promises
of Jesus being born, the promises of what he will do. And now we
get into his early life, very early life. In fact, his eighth
day and his 40th day. But we catch a good glimpse of
who Jesus is. And so we want to give our attention
to God’s holy and inspired word as we hear from Luke’s gospel
beginning in chapter two, verse 21. And it says, And at the end
of the eighth day, when Jesus was circumcised, he was called
Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived
in the womb. And when the time came for their
purification, according to the law of Moses, they brought him
up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord, as it is written
in the law of the Lord, every male who first opens the womb
shall be called holy to the Lord, and to offer a sacrifice according
to what is said in the law of the Lord. pair of turtle doves
or two young pigeons. Now there was a man in Jerusalem
whose name was Simeon and this man was righteous and devout.
He was waiting for the consolation of Israel and the Holy Spirit
was upon him and it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit
that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ.
And he came in the spirit into the temple. And when the parents
brought in the child Jesus to do for him, according to the
custom of the law, he took him in his arms and he blessed God
and said, Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace
according to your word. For my eyes have seen your salvation
that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples. A light
for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people,
Israel. And his father and his mother
marveled at what was said about him. And Simeon blessed them
and said to Mary, his mother, behold, this child is appointed
for the fall and for the rising of many in Israel and for a sign
that is opposed and a sword will pierce through your own soul
also so that the thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.
And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel of the
tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having
lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin
and then as a widow until she was 84. She did not depart from
the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day. And
coming up at that very hour, she began to give thanks to God
and to speak of him to all who are waiting for the redemption
of Jerusalem. Amen. This is God’s holy and
inspired word. May he bless it to our hearts
and minds. Pray with me. Lord, be gracious
to us. Let us have eyes that see. Let
us have ears that hear. Let us have hearts that understand.
And importantly, let us have hands and feet. Let us have wills
that go and do what you ask of us. Lord, we are weak. We are helpless. We are prone
to wander. We would rather do what we would
want to do instead of what you’d have us do. But in our minds,
we know what is good, right and true. So help us to see it, believe
it and to do it by your grace, with your spirit’s help and all
for your glory. And we pray it in Jesus name.
Amen. The other day I stumbled on a
article from a church newsletter and this article was several
years old and the article went something like this. Dear church
family, you know that from about every Wednesday, don’t you? Dear
church family, it is fall and the leaves are coming out of
the trees. How poetic, right? And it said from there, it is
time for you to let go of some of the beliefs you have about
Jesus and to pick up some new ones. My jaw lowered very quickly. We call that jaw dropping, right?
It was a little bit of a shock. And then it went on to say, you
may have heard things about Jesus in your childhood, even from
the Bible, and you need to shed them as the autumn trees do their
leaves. And you need to pick up some
new views about Jesus. Well, friends, that’s the world we
live in. The world we live in says the Jesus of the Bible is
not the Jesus we ought to know, believe and teach. That’s old
fashioned. That’s old ways. That’s not something
that we need in our lives. any longer. We need to form new
views about Jesus. We need to be more open. I mean,
for goodness sake, it is twenty eighteen. Let’s not live in first
century Judaism and Christianity. But, you know, you have to think
in your mind, well, then, from where would you get these new
views about Jesus? Would they drop out of the sky?
Would they come out of a science book? Would they come to us from
some television show or some professor at some prestigious
university with letters after his name and these new ecstatic
visions of who Jesus must be to us now? Who is Jesus? Who is Jesus and where can information
about him be found? Well, for we who are Christians,
we who profess faith in Jesus and affirm that the Bible is
true and that the word of God is the only rule that informs
us of what we are to believe and how we are to live the Christian
life. We can go to no other place than the word of God to find
our view of Jesus and our view of Jesus as we read the Bible
may be old. But you also may discover new
things that you may have never seen before, though you have
held a copy of God’s word in your lap for many years. So let
us go to the scriptures and see who is this Jesus. And as we do so, remember the
early chapters, the early verses of Luke’s gospel. Luke, the physician,
I believe in chapter one, verse four, as he’s writing to theophilus,
the intended audience of this letter and the letter or the
book of Acts, he says, I write this orderly account to you so
that you may have confidence in the things which you have
believed. And so, dear brothers and sisters,
Let us have confidence in who Jesus is as we look at who he
is from the pages of God’s holy word. Now, as we look at this
portion of scripture today, as we look at chapter two, as we
look at verses 21 through 40, and yes, I do realize I did not
read verses 39 and 40. You can read them and. Be blessed
by them and we will talk about them. But some of you are probably
scratching your heads, what’s wrong with him today? I did forget
to read those two verses. But as we look at chapter two,
verses 21 through 40, and ask the question, who is Jesus? We
bump into some minor characters. We bump into Mary and Joseph.
We bump into this older gentleman named Simeon, and this older
prophetess, she is called, named Anna. And I want you to understand
that in the life of Jesus, his parents, and in the life of the
temple, Simeon and Anna were not your ordinary Sunday Christians,
we might call them. These were devout. These were
righteous. These were eyes wide open, kingdom
seeing people who long waited for the coming of the Messiah.
And they realized that in this eight day old baby, that he had
come and that he had come to fulfill our prophecy and to save
Israel, to save the church from their sins. And so who is Jesus? We find a glimpse of him in this
wonderful gospel account. Who is Jesus? The first thing
I want us to see in our passage today is that Jesus is a law
keeper. Jesus is a law keeper. Who is
Jesus? Someone ask you. Well, you can
say he was a law keeper. What’s the reason for the law
in the Bible? Why did God give to his people
a law, a law to be obeyed, a law to be followed, a law to be kept?
Why did he give that law to them? Well, there’s all kinds of reasons.
One was to reflect his character. Some of you have rules at your
house. I go to your houses, I visit.
I know at which houses I should wipe my feet. I know at which
houses I should be careful not to make it untidy. Because, for example, if you
keep a clean house, I should respect that. That’s who you
are. That’s your character. You keep a neat home. And I shouldn’t
come in there and dirty it because it would be an offense. to your
character. And in the same way, God gives
us a law so that we know what he is like. And as we keep his
law, we reflect what he is like as his image bears. And so the
reason for the law was to reflect the character of God. The reason
for the law is to keep us, a people of God, pure. If we do the right
things, If we keep the right days, we keep the right feast,
we keep ourselves ceremonially clean, God’s people understood,
then we will be pure, whereas the rest of the world is impure. And so God’s law had a great
purpose in the life of Israel. Now, in the life of Israel, we
understand they had three types of law. There were civil laws. Stop your donkey at all red lights,
right? Don’t kill. There were laws of
the land of Israel, and you kept those laws just as we do today.
There were ceremonial laws. When you come to church in ancient
Israel, this is the type of offering you bring. If you have sinned
in this way or acted in this way, this is the type of offering
you will bring before God. And then this is the way the
priest will handle it. And this is the way God will
accept your sacrifice. There were ceremonial laws, but
there were also moral laws. God gave to Moses on Mount Sinai,
the moral law, the Ten Commandments. Laws about worship, laws about
how we relate to God, laws about how we relate to one another.
Now, we understand that because of Christ coming into this world,
there is no more a ceremonial law. Christ was the end of the
ceremonial law. He was the great sacrificial
lamb who, when slain, paid for sins for all times. And so no
other lamb needed to be ever. put to death again. And so there
is no ceremonial law, though, when we read the Leviticus, as
exciting as it may be in our yearly Bible reading, we understand
we can learn about purity and holiness. But we also understand
that in Christ it has been put away and fulfilled. We also don’t
live in Israel. And so we are not under the theocracy
or the rules of law in Israel, though they can inform us how
we ought to behave in society. But dear brothers and sisters,
we are still obligated to the moral law. We are still obligated
to have no other gods before Yahweh. We are still obligated
to remember the Sabbath to keep it holy. We’re still obligated
not to kill our neighbor or to take our own lives. We’re still
obligated to bear the truth and not false witness. And on and
on you understand, we’re still under this law. Now, The moral
law, this gets a little tricky. This gets a little complicated,
but I think you know and understand this already. But I remind you
that the purpose of the law of God, the moral law of God, number
one is to drive us to Jesus. You can never, ever obey God’s
moral law. You can never, ever measure up
in his sight. But Jesus has. And so we see
the law and say, I am a lawbreaker. And as a lawbreaker, I stand
condemned before the judge of the law. But thanks be to God
that in Christ, when he justifies us, he sees us as if we’ve never
broken that law. And he sees us as if we have
always obeyed that law perfectly. And so the law drives us to Jesus,
the law keeper. The law drives us to Jesus and
to his feet. The law also restrains evil. How many people do you know who
don’t bow the knee to King Jesus? but you’re pretty sure they wouldn’t
kill their neighbor. You see the law of God, the moral
law of God is written on our hearts and it still restrains
much evil in our day. Here’s the important thing about
the moral law. The moral law in our life shows
us how a Christian, how a new creation in Jesus, how a child
of God ought to live. And so why is it that we want
to obey our parents or remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy
or why not kill? Or why not bear false witness?
We do so ultimately and hear this very clearly. We do so ultimately. We keep the law of God out of
gratitude for what Christ has done for us. He’s kept the law. He’s obeyed the law in his obedience.
His righteousness has been given to us by faith in him. And so out of love for Christ,
out of duty to Christ and out of really honor to the glory
of God and honor to our neighbors, we keep the moral law. And so
Jesus came as a law keeper. He came as a law keeper while
the civil and the ceremonial and yes, the moral laws were
still in effect. for the people of God in Israel. And we find something interesting
in the life of Jesus here. Remember there was a census and
it was ordered and Mary and Joseph made their way some 90 miles
to Bethlehem where Jesus was born in a stable. And on the
eighth day, our text tells us he goes to be circumcised. And then about the 40th day,
they go back up to Jerusalem and Jesus and his family go through
the ritual of purification necessary for after a childbirth. And so we see Jesus here as a
law keeper. Now we speak of Jesus and his
obedience in two ways. We speak of Jesus’ active obedience,
things he actively did as an adult to obey God and to fulfill
the law. But this is an example of Jesus’
passive obedience. We’re pretty sure, aren’t we,
that Jesus on the eighth day woke up and instead of crying
and saying, change my diaper, he said, by the way, today’s
circumcision day, take me to the temple, present me and call
me Jesus. No, it was done for him. It was done to him. And
we see in this story, we see in this gospel account that Jesus
passive obedience was completed in order that Jesus, the great
preacher of the law in Israel, would be the great keeper of
the law in Israel. His parents, who were devout,
who were obedient, who were fastidious to keeping the law of God, they
took him to the temple. And they circumcised him on the
eighth day and named him Jesus as was told them to do in the
prophecy of the angel Gabriel before he was conceived in the
womb. His name Jesus meant that he
would save his people from their sins on the 40th day because
of the law. You can read it in Leviticus
12 if you like. On the 40th day, Jesus, Mary and Joseph presented
themselves in the temple. What was this? 32 days after
his circumcision, they presented themselves in the temple for
the Purification rites. For after a birth, there were
rituals and sacrifices, and they gave the poor man’s sacrifice,
as it were, the birds, because they could not afford a lamb.
Jesus was presented in the temple, the firstborn was always offered,
the firstborn male, the firstborn son was always offered in service
to God and a redemption price was paid. And so they performed
their covenant obligations. They performed their covenant
obligations before God and before the people in order that Jesus
might be a law keeper. And now there’s something for
us in this. Yes, Jesus kept the law. We’re
law breakers. But there’s something in us about
the ordinances of Almighty God. And sometimes we become weary
with the ordinances of God. think we can pick and choose
which ones we can participate in, which ones we can withhold.
And I want to encourage you this day to think about Mary and Joseph
as parents and as worshipers and how they put their son. Yes,
he was the Lord Jesus. Yes, he was the Messiah. But
how they put their son in the path of the church in order that
the promises of almighty God might be fulfilled in him. Something for us to think on
and to consider. But here we have Jesus, the teacher
of Israel, the savior of the world, keeping the law of God. Now, can you imagine? Can you
imagine if about 30 years later, here’s Jesus and the Pharisees
have done a little background check on him? I mean, think Judge
Kavanaugh here. They’ve looked at everything
he said, looked at everything and done and said, by the way,
Jesus, you weren’t circumcised on the eighth day. We’re not
having you as the teacher of Israel. Can’t you picture that
in your head? Or your parents didn’t offer the redemption offering
or your mother wasn’t purified after giving birth to you. You
weren’t offered and presented. before God in the temple. Can’t
you imagine? And so here we see the Lord God in his providence
and through his faithful parents saying Jesus, the Lamb of God,
who takes away the sins of the world, will be a law keeper. One of my favorite hymns that
we sing from time to time is one of Maybe the lesser known,
Newton hymns. We all know Amazing Grace. And
we’re beginning to learn, let us love and sing and wonder.
Let us love and sing and wonder. Let us praise the Savior’s name.
He has hushed the law’s loud thunder. He has quenched Mount
Sinai’s flame. And he has brought us near to
God. Dear friends, Jesus is a law keeper. Who is Jesus? He is a law keeper to us, to
we who are law breakers. Well, another who is Jesus question
is necessary. Who is Jesus? Well, this passage
teaches us that he’s a keeper of the law, but it also teaches
us that he is the hope of Israel. We see that Jesus is the hope
of Israel in this story of Simeon and the story of Anna. Now, can’t
you imagine that Simeon and Anna had a bucket list before there
were bucket lists? Now you know what a bucket list
is, right? It’s the list you want to, of things you want to
complete before you kick the bucket, right? What a wonderful
way to put death as a, I guess that’s a euphemism. Still haven’t
figured that one out. But on Simeon’s bucket list was
not necessarily to see the Grand Canyon or to go to New York City
or Paris, but it was to see Jesus. the promised Messiah. It was
to see the consolation of Israel. It was to see the one who would
usher in light into a world of darkness. Now we’re told that
the Holy Spirit had shown him that Jesus, the Messiah, would
be brought in the temple and presented as a baby, named as
a baby, and offerings made on his behalf. We’re told that the
Holy Spirit filled him in order that he might say the right things. both to the church and to the
mother of the Lord Jesus. But it was on his bucket list
to see the Messiah. In fact, when the choir just
a little bit ago sang Simeon’s song, it’s in Latin, called the
Nunc Dimittis, which is the first words of Latin, which is kind
of the bucket list word, before I die, before you dismiss me,
Lord, let me see Jesus. Let my eyes see The Messiah and
this Simeon, even this Anna, had been watching and praying.
They had been in the temple. It says of Anna, maybe in a hyperbolic
sense, she was in the temple day and night, hoping never to
miss the sight of the Lord Jesus. That says something to us, doesn’t
it? About our devotion. We can get
a little casual about church, another trip to the mountains,
another trip to the coast, another ball game, another family event. And before you know it in a 52
week year, we’ve missed a lot of Lord’s days, but not Anna. and not Simeon, and not because
they wanted to keep the law in order to say before God, look,
I’ve been to church every single Sunday. No, they saw it was for
their benefit. They saw it was for their own
good. And so day and night, they waited and prayed and watched
for the coming Messiah. And, you know, dear friends,
we’re promised a second coming. There’s a real sense where we’re
supposed to be watching the sky. and saying, is it today? Will
Jesus return today as he’s promised in the Bible? And guess what?
We’re busy. Our eyes are glued to our gadgets. Our eyes are
glued to the television. Our eyes are glued to things
of this world. And yes, they should be it. Sometimes we probably
shouldn’t be driving down the road, looking at the sunroof,
seeing if Jesus has come. You get the sense though, right?
We need eyes to see spiritually. Is it today that Jesus is coming?
Is it today that he may return? Well, Anna, the prophetess, Simeon,
this older saint, had on their bucket list to see salvation,
to see the Lord’s Christ, to see the light who would give
light to the Gentiles. You see, the gospel was about
to go out of Israel and into the entire world. The Gentiles
would be included. They were waiting to see the
glory that would bring Israel not back into its heyday before
Babylon had destroyed the temple in the city, but to bring Israel
back into its heyday that God had ordained before the beginning
of the world and that Adam and Eve ruined in the garden because
they were law breakers and not law keepers. These were people
who had known the whole story from Genesis all the way to the
the year that it was when the gospel was beginning to unfold
before their eyes. And they were aware that Jesus
was the hope of Israel. So who is Christ? He’s a law
keeper. Who is Christ? He is the hope
of Israel. He’s the eternal son of God,
obedient to the father, obedient to the law. And yes, in the arms
of his parents, in the arms of Simeon who hold him, he’s a cutie
pie. He’s a sweet little baby, but he is so much more. Dear
friends, what’s on your bucket list? And I’m sure it’s to go
places. I’m sure it’s to see things.
I’m sure it’s to do many wonderful things that will bless you and
bless others, but what’s on your spiritual? bucket list. I think of Psalm 71, verse 18
here. Here you have two older people
who basically say what Psalm 71, verse 18 says, Oh, Lord,
let me live another year to see yet another generation and to
tell that generation of who is God and what has he done for
his people? How about that? for a spiritual
bucket list. We see in this passage that Anna,
as soon as she lays eyes on Jesus, she’s a witness. She’s a evangelizer. She’s going around the temple
and telling everybody, do you know who that is? Do you know
who that is? He’s the hope of Israel. He’s the one who will
redeem Jerusalem. He’s the light to the Gentiles. He’s the glory
of Israel. Dear friends, there’s a important
verse. in our passage today. There’s
an important saying that Simeon speaks. He speaks it to Mary. And we find it in verse 34, Simeon
blessed Mary and Joseph. And he said to Mary, his mother,
behold, this child is appointed for the fall and for the rising
of many in Israel and for a sign that is opposed and a sword will
pierce through your own soul also. He says that to Mary. so
that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed. What is that
verse saying to us, brothers and sisters? It’s saying to us
that who Jesus is, is everything. Who Jesus is means whether you
will rise or whether you will fall. For Jesus is also the king
of the universe. He is the judge of the nations
and you will stand before him someday. And because of what
you believe about him, because of how you answer who is Jesus,
because of how you answer, you will either rise or fall. And
let me encourage you with everything I can to put your faith and your
hope and your trust in the one who is not a lawbreaker, but
a law keeper. And in your faith and hope and trust in the only
one, the only one. Yes, I said only. Our world tells
us there’s many ways. No, there is only one way. Jesus
will say later, I am the way and the truth and the life. No
one comes to the father except by me. It’s an exclusive. It’s
an exclusive statement. Will you rise because you have
put your faith in Jesus or will you fall? Will you stand before
Jesus someday and say, I made up my own religion? I let the
leaves fall. I let I let. Autumn of the religion
my parents taught me have its way and I no longer believe the
things I used to believe. I made up a Jesus in my own mind,
but apparently as I stand before you, that’s not the one of the
scriptures. Dear friends, which will it be? Who is Jesus? It matters much. Let us pray together. Our Lord
and God, we come before you today as your people. And we want to
bow our knee before you, before you, who is revealed to us in
the scripture as the creator and the redeemer, as the judge,
as the law keeper, as the law giver. We want to come before
you as the one who knows our every thoughts, our every heartbeats,
our every moments of every day. And we want to say, we are laid
bare before you. Take away our sin, take away
our shame, take away our law-breaking and put into our very lives the
law-keeping of Jesus. Let us have it by faith. And
let us as Christians transformed by the Holy Spirit be renewed
in our minds to be law-keepers and not breakers for your glory,
for the good of neighbor. And so that we can live in a
way that befits the children of almighty God. Lord, we do
thank you for Jesus. We thank you for every bit of
them, the things we don’t yet understand and things we have
begun to understand and let our minds not be tainted by the Jesus
of this world, but by the glories of the Jesus of scripture. We
thank you for this opportunity to consider your word and we
pray that it would dwell in us richly and we ask it in the name
of Jesus. Amen.