Have you ever thought about the different pictures some people have of God?
Some people think of God as an angry, vengeful God who must be appeased by continual adoration and good works—that if something has gone wrong in life they must have done something terribly bad for God to punish them so sharply.
Some people think of God as distant and far away, like a sleepy old man on a rocking chair far away up in heaven, disinterested in the world he made and oblivious to what goes on down here on earth. But perhaps if they show enough faith and dedication, then they will be able to rouse God and he will bless them.
Some people think of God like a personal genie—they will keep God at a distance, but when they really need something, then they’ll get the golden lamp out of the cupboard and polish it, trying to coerce God to pop up and grant them their wishes.
Today’s text shows us that God is not like any of these human ways of picturing him.
Mary and Joseph bring Jesus to the Temple 40 days after his birth to present him to the LORD. Why did they do this? In Exodus 13, God had commanded his people that the first-born son of every family was to be presented to the LORD as a dedication of service to him. When God’s people were in slavery in Egypt, the Egyptian first born sons were potential heirs to the throne of Pharoah, who was thought to be partly divine and therefore a rival to the true God. On the night God visited Egypt and brought judgment on Pharoah and the Egyptians, God struck down all the first born in the land to bring an end to Pharoah’s throne. But God spared the first born of the Israelite families who had trusted in his promise to pass over their homes marked with the blood of a sacrificed lamb.
The command in Exodus for Israelite families to dedicate their first-born sons to God was a memorial of God’s gracious rescue of his people in slavery to Pharoah in Egypt. It was a sign of God’s ongoing commitment to bring them blessing while at the same time being the means for the families to pledge their allegiance to God and faith in his promise to bring blessing throughout their lives.
Mary and Joseph bring the infant Jesus to the Temple 40 days after his birth, to present him to the LORD in accordance with his word. Before they are able to see the priest, Simeon approaches them. Simeon was a devout believer in Jerusalem, who had been waiting and longing for the consolation of Israel—that is, for God to reveal the salvation he had promised through the prophets of old. The Holy Spirit had revealed to Simeon that he would not die before seeing this himself and prompted Simeon to enter the Temple courts—right at the time Mary and Joseph arrive, holding Jesus. This was no co-incidence, but a divinely arranged meeting, in which Simeon takes the infant Jesus into his arms and says:
“Sovereign Lord, as you have promised,
you may now dismiss your servant in peace.
For my eyes have seen your salvation,
which you have prepared in the sight of all nations:
a light for revelation to the Gentiles,
and the glory of your people Israel.”
Inspired by the Holy Spirit, Simeon proclaims that the promised salvation from God he has waited so long to see is embodied in the infant Jesus. God has opened Simeon’s eyes to the salvation he has prepared for the world in the Person of Christ. He is a light of revelation to the Gentiles; the spotlight to show where God’s saving help for all peoples is found.
Speaking to Mary, Simeon prophesies about the destiny of the child. Many people will fall and rise as they meet Jesus because he will not be who they expected. People will reject his message of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, becoming entrenched in their pride. People will believe they are God’s favoured people because of their Abrahamic ancestry and religious performance. Jesus will expose where the hearts of people really are, and what they really trust in and treasure. Those whose hearts are set against God will be revealed. And yet those who recognise their unworthiness and who have no other hope will turn to him and be saved. And so Jesus is the stumbling block who will cause division in Israel, to the point of his own suffering and death—which is the ultimate means of God’s salvation for the world.
With Simeon’s divinely inspired words it would have soon become apparent to Joseph and Mary that they were dedicating their child to more than regular priestly duties in the service of God. I don’t think it is a coincidence that these words are spoken before a priest attends to Mary and Joseph and Jesus, or that a priest isn’t even mentioned in today’s text.
Jesus is the priest. He is the great heavenly High Priest, who would not make satisfaction for the people’s sins by offering animal sacrifices. He has paid the price for us to be at one with God and receive his favour, by taking away the sin of the world with his own precious blood. This is what the writer to the Hebrews means when he says in today’s reading:
“Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil—and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death…For this reason he had to be made like them, fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people.” (Hebrews 2:14-17).
Human ideas of who God is and how he works will always fall well short of divine truth and reality. We need God to first reveal himself in the same way he did to Simeon—by the Spirit through the word. So how does our text give us a clear picture of what God is truly like?
God is not a far-away old man, disinterested in what happens down here on earth. God left his home in heaven and came down to earth in the person of Christ. As the writer to the Hebrews says, he became one of us. This happened from the moment of conception when God’s presence was in the infant in Mary’s womb. Jesus is the down to earth God, who has come to dwell with us. As Jesus was brought into the Temple by Joseph and Mary, Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament prophecy of Malachi: “Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to his temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come,” says the Lord Almighty.
Neither is God an angry, vengeful God who must be appeased by continual adoration and good works. Though he is all-powerful, he comes to earth not to obliterate, but to bless: as a frail embryo, born in squalor, wrapped in simple swaddling cloths. He is a suffering God. In the Person of Christ, God knows what hardship and betrayal, suffering and pain and even death are like. God does not punish us for our sins. Sometimes he lets us suffer the consequences of our sins, or sometimes the difficulties we face in life we would rather be rid of are ways God intervenes to prompt us to be more diligent in focusing on him and his priorities. But they are not punishments for sin, for the punishment for the sin of the whole world was completed by Christ on the Cross, who suffered the full wrath of the Father so that we would not have to. When Jesus gasped out “It is finished” that meant that no further punishment for the payment of sin was necessary.
Joseph and Mary presented the infant Jesus—giving him back to God, so to speak—in the Temple. We could say that Mary and Joseph recognized Jesus as a gift, not a possession. God is in control of all things, yet so often we are in the business of trying to manipulate or control God, by squeezing him to fit into our ideals, priorities and worldviews, going to him when it is convenient for us, avoiding him when it is convenient for us, praying “Thy will be done” only to later assert that “My will be done”. But our baptism means that God is not ours to possess or manipulate, but he has entered into our hearts and taken possession of us. Our lives belong to God, and, like Joseph and Mary, we have the privilege of passing Jesus on to others.
For God has come to us in Christ too, to give us the fulness of his divine favour, truth, grace and salvation. We receive all the benefits and blessings of Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross in the holy supper he invites you to. As the unseen host, he comes to serve you his true body and precious blood hidden in simple bread and wine. So as we commune with one another, we commune with the Holy One who makes us partakers of the new covenant—in which the blood of lambs is not painted over our doorposts for salvation, but the blood of the Lamb of God, Jesus, covers our hearts and washes away our sin. God passes over us in judgment. We are among those he has freed.
This is why Simeon’s song has traditionally featured after we have received Holy Communion. We join with Simeon in saying that we too can depart this life in peace, because with our own eyes we too have seen God’s salvation in Christ. We too have cradled the Christ child in our arms, as it were, as we made a cradle with our hands in which we held his body at the sanctuary step. There is one final thing to add. It is a beautiful reality revealed in the verses before today’s reading from Hebrews:
Both the one who makes people holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters. He says:
“I will declare your name to my brothers and sisters;
in the assembly I will sing your praises.”
And again he says, “Here am I, and the children God has given me.” (Hebrews 2:11-13b)
Jesus has made you holy to belong to his holy family, by revealing his Father’s name to us. He is present with us in this assembly, to sing the praises of his Father with us. On this Sunday of the Festival of the Presentation of Jesus, it is Jesus who presents you to the Lord. He says to his Father: “Here am I, and the children you have given me.”
The greatest offering that takes place each Sunday is not the collection in bowls. It is you, us; the congregation—who Jesus presents holy to God as priests for his service. He says to his Father: “Here am I, and the children you have given me.” Here they are, the people I have redeemed and washed by my blood. Here they are, the people to whom I have revealed your name.
The Festival of the Presentation of Jesus is a wonderful reminder that in Christ, God is with us as the Light that has come to dispel our darkness. It reminds us that no matter what the year ahead brings, we belong to him as his beloved children. He loves you so much that he came into this world to save you, and present you holy to God. That is what God is like. Amen.
