Sunday after Christmas + Luke 2:33-40 + December 31, 2017

The Sunday after Christmas
Luke 2:33-40
December 31, 2017

Grace and peace be unto you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

In the twelfth chapter of Leviticus Moses wrote that forty days after a woman gives birth to a son, she is to appear before the Lord. He writes, “When the days of her purification are fulfilled, whether for a son or a daughter, she shall bring to the priest a lamb of the first year as a burnt offering, and a young pigeon or a turtledove as a sin offering, to the door of the tabernacle of meeting” (Leviticus 12:6). Today’s Gospel lesson finds Mary and Joseph doing just that. After the days of Mary’s purification are complete, she and her husband, Joseph, are in the temple doing what the Lord has commanded them through Moses. They’re so poor that they can only afford to offer turtledoves, the cheapest of the assigned offerings. As they doing this an aged man, Simeon, approaches them. Simeon “was just and devout, 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” (Luke 2:25-26). Moved by the Holy Spirit, Simeon enters the temple, and though his eyes are weak from age, He clearly sees Israel’s redeemer in the arms of the Virgin Mary. He scoops up the child in his arms, blessed God and said, “Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word: For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people; A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel” (Luke 2:29-32). He could now die in peace, for with his very eyes he saw the God’s promised salvation.

Today’s appointed Gospel lesson picks up immediately after Simeon has finished his song. St. Luke writes, “And Joseph and His mother marveled at those things which were spoke of Him.” They marveled, not in unbelief, as so many did throughout the Gospels. Mary and Joseph marvel because Simeon’s words echo the words the angel told the Shepherds on the night of Christ’s birth: “Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people” (Luke 2:10). This is the amazement of faith, which hears God’s Word about this child and rejoices that God will do such great things for sinners through a humble and lowly child. Mary and Joseph marvel at Simeon’s words because the elderly man sees this baby as God’s salvation, that is, God’s answer to mankind’s greatest enemies: sin, death, and the devil. They are awestruck by the aged man’s words because not only is their child the salvation of Israel, but He is a light to lighten the Gentiles. The darkness of sin and death had covered all people like a pall. The Gentiles had sought God according to their own imaginations and the desires of their hearts. They had groped for God in their darkness and had not found Him. But in this child, God reveals Himself to all people, that for Jew and Gentile alike He is the consolation of all who will believe in Him and trust in the salvation He comes to bring. Mary and Joseph marveled at the things Simeon says of Jesus and so should we marvel at them as well. For God has entered the world in human flesh, in great humility and meekness, to lighten our darkness though we do not deserve this great light.

Simeon then speaks a blessing, which may strike us as the opposite of a blessing. He says, “Behold, this Child is destined for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign which will be spoken against (yes, a sword will pierce through your own soul also), that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.” We expect blessings to be filled with well-wishes and hopes for a good future. Simeon’s blessing, however, reveals the hard truth to Mary and Joseph, and to us who bear the name of Christian in the world. “Behold, this Child is destined for the fall and rising of many in Israel.” Although this child is God’s light to the Gentiles, and though He is the Consolation of Israel, He will be established for the fall of many in Israel. The child will be like a cornerstone that is set and many will stumble over him. Throughout the ministry of Christ in the four gospels we see Simeon’s prophecy playing out. Christ is rejected by countless numbers of His own people. Many hear Jesus’ words and are offended and vexed by His teaching so that they abandon Him. The Pharisees are scandalized by Christ’s preaching that their righteousness and their good works will not gain them everlasting life. A multitude five thousand strong are fed by Jesus in the wilderness, only to be terribly offended when He teaches that in order to have life they must eat His flesh and drink His blood. He was speaking of faith, which is the spiritual eating and drinking of Christ’s body and blood, not the oral eating of Christ’s true body and blood in the sacrament, yet the crowd is so offended at Jesus’ words that what started off a megachurch becomes a small parish of twelve disciples gathered around their Lord and His Word. The offense would become so great that the Jews would eventually murder Christ with a cross.

Dear saints, you are no stranger to the idea that Christ’s teaching offends many in the world. As it was in Christ’s day, so it is in ours. Many are still offended by the preaching of repentance. Many, like the Pharisees, want to imagine themselves good people, even righteous people, whom God should be happy to have in heaven with Him. When they are told that all their works, if not done in faith in Christ, are worthless and damnable, they are offended and turn to a church will tells them that God loves them just the way they are and that there is no need to repent of sins. Many churches don’t want to offend sinners, so they never speak of sin, and therefore they never speak of the true Jesus who comes to take away the sins of the world. Their inoffensive “gospel” is one of self-help, self-improvement, and self-love.  In our post-Christian society we also see growing numbers of people who are offended by something as simple as creation. Many are offended when the Scriptures say that God created mankind as male and female, and so marriage can only exist between a man and a woman. This vexes our post-Christian society which thrives on tearing down what God has established as good. Many churches, sharing in the world’s offense at God’s Word, ignore or interpret God’s Word into meaninglessness. Still others teach that doctrine doesn’t matter, that the Christian faith is just a simmering stew of everyone’s personal interpretations, so that they gravely offended by mere suggestion that they might belong to a church which teaches things contrary to Jesus’ doctrine. They are equally offended at the suggestion to leave such a false-teaching church. As many were offended by Christ, so many are offended by His Church, and we should not marvel at this, for the Church is the body of Christ.

We read of the falling of many in the pages of the Scriptures. But Simeon’s prophecy isn’t entirely bleak. He says that “this Child is destined for the fall and rising of many in Israel.” Many will not believe the gospel. Many will “reject the will of God for themselves” (Luke 7:30). Many will fall over Christ and fail to rise. But this child is also established for the “rising of many in Israel.” This is the spiritual rising that happens through faith! Many will not believe. Many will be offended. Many will be vexed, “for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it” (Matthew 7:13). But there are those who will not be offended by the Gospel’s call to repent of their sins. These are the poor in spirit who acknowledge their sins and their sinful nature and want to be rid of it. There are many who will not be vexed by Christ’s insistence that they put their trust in His righteousness and His merits rather than their own imagined goodness and righteousness. There are many who will not trip and fall over this chief cornerstone, but who will instead cling to that solid rock of salvation, holding onto Christ and all His teachings, not the culturally approved ones. There are those who will not be offended at His Word, but will tremble before it and humbly accept it as truth, even though the world rants and rages against the idea that God’s Word is truth and there is only one truth, not many interpretations of it. There are many who will rise to new life through faith in Christ, who will humbly confess their sins and receive the forgiveness of all their sins by grace, through faith, for Christ’s sake.

Mary and Joseph are of this lot. They hear the words of Simeon about Christ and “marveled at those things which were spoken of Him.” They were not offended at the humility of Christ’s incarnation. They were not vexed by the situation that the Lord chose for Himself, being born to a virgin in abject poverty. They weren’t offended by the thought that God would save the world from its sins through a humble child. Instead they marveled. They were comforted by this doctrine. They took heart at the things which they heard about their son. They were undaunted by their sin, by the world, and by all the accusations of the devil because they heard and believed everything that was said about this child. Simeon and Anna both weren’t offended that the Lord God, the Consolation of Israel and the Redeemer of the world, would assume human flesh and be born of a virgin. They rejoiced in God’s Word said about the child so that nothing else mattered to them.

The Holy Spirit gives us this testimony of Simeon so that we are not discouraged when we see many being offended by Christ and His message of repentance and forgiveness of sins. Neither does God want us to become discouraged when we see people, even those claiming to be Christians, becoming vexed over the God’s Word and Christ’s Church, for Simeon tells us that this is simply how the world will react to Christ. The Holy Spirit gives us Simeon and Anna, along with Joseph and Mary, as examples of those who receive Christ in faith and are not offended by Him. God wants us to humble accept the testimony about Christ that He gives us in the Scriptures. He wants us to believe His Word and by believing, have life in His name, so that we are raised up to new life through the forgiveness of all of sins. To this end may God grant us grace, so that we may never be offended by Him. Amen.

May the peace of God which surpasses all human understanding guard your hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus. Amen.