The Prophecy
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Good morning, church. Hope you’re doing well today. I know there’s a lot of sickness going around, so protect yourselves from that. But we are continuing today, this Sunday morning in our series entitled Christmas According to Luke. So that’s what we’ll be today.
If you want to go ahead and turn to the book of Luke, chapter two, we’ll be in verses 25 through 35. And I’ll be reading from the ESV version. Simeon is is going to be discussed in this sermon. And Simeon is a man who prophesies a pretty miraculous thing about the child. Jesus, Mary and Joseph go to the temple, and he prophesies in front of them about Israel and about the Gentiles and about God’s salvation.
And so we’ve entitled this sermon the Prophecy. And so we’ll see in today’s text that Simeon is waiting. He is longing for the appearing of the Messiah, this promised Savior who will deliver his people. He’s longing for him. And my guess is each and every one of us are longing for something.
Maybe it’s something you’re longing for in the new Year. You got the New Year, new me crowd kind of going on. Sometimes during this time of year, the I’m going to get fit. I’m longing for something. Maybe it’s a validation from someone or something healing from trouble.
Maybe a resolution that you have made. Relationships, I’m going to finally find that person or comfort. I’ll finally have this ease or recognition from a boss, a spouse, someone else longing for something. But what I find is we tend to long for things we believe will console us, will bring us comfortable. And what I’ve found, and what perhaps you’ve found is the things we long for that are temporary never satisfy that relationship never satisfies that new job.
That promotion doesn’t satisfy all these things we long for. But what if we longed for something greater? What if we longed for something more? What if we longed for Jesus? What if we were like Simeon?
We chase for what we think will console us. But God has prepared Jesus. He has prepared him. He has revealed him. And it will be glorious for us when we recognize God’s salvation through Jesus Christ.
And like Simeon, we’re longing for something. So let’s see what God has done. In the Gospel of Luke, Simeon rejoiced when he saw God’s salvation in Jesus Christ. And we can see God’s salvation in Jesus Christ. Well, how can we?
The text is going to give us three truths to recognize God’s salvation through Jesus Christ. And so if you’re not a believer. If you are a believer, I guarantee there is a word that God has spoken, and it is for all who are present. And we’ll see that in today’s text. So Luke 2:25,35, if you will join me in reading now.
There was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon. And this man was righteous 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. 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 up in his arms and 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 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.
This is God’s word. Three truths to recognize God’s salvation through Jesus Christ. The first for us is Jesus is God’s plan for his creation. Jesus is God’s plan for his creation. But let’s first look at the text first.
We have Simeon, whose name, ironically means hearkening. He’s about to say something. And just like Mary and Joseph, it would do us well to listen in to what he heralding. And he’s called righteous and devout. We know no one is righteous in and of themselves, but Simeon is righteous.
Why? Because he trusts God. He trusts his character, he trusts his promises, and he trusts his plan. And we’ll see that as the text continues. And he’s devout, meaning he is careful.
He is paying close attention to obey the commands of God, to align himself, to orient himself to what is pleasing to God. Simeon is righteous and devout, and our text says he was waiting in verse 25. He’s waiting for something, the consolation of Israel. And waiting here doesn’t mean, you know, just a bystander, doesn’t mean waiting on the sidelines, doesn’t mean putting your hands beneath your legs and just like, all right, it’s waiting with an expectation. And we see his waiting as an Idol.
Why? Because he’s righteous and devout. He’s about something in anticipation for something. He’s waiting. He heard the word of the Lord and he trusted that God would do it.
And he’s waiting for the consolation of Israel. What is this? In summary? It’s what affords comfort or refreshment for the Israelites. It was the.
The Messianic salvation. This is what they’re anticipating. This is what they’re waiting for. Many of them are. It’s why rabbis would call the Messiah the counselor or the comforter.
So he’s waiting. He’s waiting. He longed for the Messiah who would bring comfort. What are you longing for? What do you believe will bring you comfort?
What do I believe will bring myself comfort? Long for Jesus. God’s plan for his creation. In verse 25, it says that the Holy Spirit was upon Simeon, and he’s filled with the Holy Spirit. As we’ve been going through Luke, we’ve seen the Holy Spirit working in pretty crazy ways, all bunched up in this one little time, as we saw in Elizabeth earlier.
And what has the Holy Spirit revealed to him? It has been revealed to him that he would not see death before he would see the Lord’s Christ. That’s pretty awesome. That’s pretty incredible. A pretty awesome guarantee from the Holy Spirit.
Hey, you’re not going to physically die before you see with your own eyes the Christ. And Simeon believed God. And he waited and he waited. And when did this happen? It happened when the parents of Jesus, Mary and Joseph, brought Jesus to the temple according to the custom of the law.
And so Jesus was circumcised on the eighth day. And then what’s this time of purification? Why did they have to wait to bring him to the temple? Well, if we were to go back to Leviticus, chapter 12, what we see is Mary and Joseph are being obedient to the law. And there’s a time period where she couldn’t go to the temple after giving birth.
And so they’re being obedient to the law. And I want to remind you that Luke is writing this to an audience, like we’re reading the Gospel of Luke. And his audience is a man named Theophilus. And he’s writing this so that he can have confidence in what he has been taught about Jesus. And so these details aren’t useless.
These details are meant to establish a confidence that God’s plan is unfolding just like it’s meant to. And so we see this. Mary and Joseph are faithful. And so because they are faithful, to obey the commands of God. We get this amazing story, and our faith can be established in confidence.
And what happens? Simeon takes the child Jesus into his arms and he blesses God. Like, imagine being the parents. Like someone just scoops up your kid and all of a sudden they start prophesying and blessing God. This would be pretty alarming and pretty incredible.
As we’ll see Mary and Joseph’s reaction. And he blesses God. Simeon even says he could depart in peace now because he’s seen the Lord’s salvation. Simeon just said, lord, I could die now and I would go in peace because your word’s been fulfilled. I’ve seen the Christ.
I’ve seen your salvation. And it’s embodied in this child, this child Jesus. He says, my eyes, I’ve seen your salvation. The. The one who embodies his salvation, the one whose salvation will be accomplished through this, is the Christ, the Son of God, Jesus, salvation to us and for us.
He is the plan. He is the embodiment of God’s salvation. It has only ever been and only ever will be through faith in Christ. There is no other name by which we are saved. There is no other name, I say, which will find comfort.
And this is where we get to our first truth. If we look into verse 31, here’s our first truth. That which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples. What does this mean? God has prepared Christ in the presence of all peoples.
And prepared means to make ready. It’s actually a term used as a metaphor often. It’s kind of like making way for a king. You’re preparing the streets, you’re preparing the roads for this coming king. And that the people could respond well to this coming king.
And so God has made the way for King Jesus so that all people would respond rightly to his appearance. God has done this in the presence of all peoples. And so how did God do this, especially back then? This may have not been known to all people. It was revealed to Israel, right?
Not to the world. No. Christ is for all. How did God do this? God has revealed his plan of salvation through his promises, through his prophets, through his apostles, and through the scriptures.
We can go all the way back to Genesis 3:15, where it says this. I will put enmity between you. This is the serpent and the woman. This is Eve. And between your offspring and her offspring, he shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel.
See, God had made everything good, and he called it good. But mankind rebelled and sinned against God. And so now Scripture says that we are born children of wrath. This is what we deserve. And so all the way in the beginning, God promises a redeemer.
He promises deliverance from the works of Satan. And notice this person, the seed of the woman, this offspring of the woman, foreshadowing the virgin birth. He will be bruised, his heel will be struck, but he will deal the final blow, bruising the head, crushing the head of the serpent, defeating the works of Satan. This is called the protoevangelium, and it’s often referred to as the first gospel. Genesis 3:15.
And so this is what Simeon waited for. He identified this Redeemer, this Messiah, this Christ promised all the way back in Genesis as a child, Jesus, who would save his people first Peter 1:1921 says this. It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. God chose him as your ransom long before the world began. But now, in these last days, he has been revealed for your sake.
Through Christ you have come to trust in God and you have placed your faith and hope in God because you raised Christ from the dead and gave him great glory. So before God even created the universe, guess who plan A was? Guess who the plan of redemption was? Jesus. That’s pretty incredible.
God didn’t have to course correct. There’s no such thing as a contingency plan. It’s always been, always will be through Jesus. This is it. From Genesis to Malachi.
We know this in the Old Testament and also here in First Peter, the scripture mentioned a hope. And I think it would do us well to remember that Jesus being God’s plan for his creation isn’t just a past reality like church. This is true. It is a past reality. It is a present reality.
And it is our future hope, real reality as well. Jesus is coming again. We wait for something. Simeon waited for the first coming. We’re waiting for the second coming of Christ.
And according to Titus 2, we have been empowered by the Holy Spirit to live godly lives until Jesus returns. So we wait as well. And because God planned, you can prepare. 2 Timothy 3, 14:15 says this. I love this passage.
But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how. From childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings that would be the Old Testament for Timothy, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. So the writings of the Old Testament were there to make the Israelites to make those who heeded the warning of the Old Testament wise for salvation. This is how God prepared the way so that when he showed up, they could believe in him. And we have the New Testament, which plainly reveals Jesus as the Savior.
God has prepared the way. Are you prepared to see the salvation? We prepare for plans. Many of you had plans for the holidays. Our family has plans going into the new year.
And we prepare for what we plan for. So when a plan is laid out, you do some work. If you’re meeting someone for coffee in the morning, you might prepare by setting an alarm. You schedule that, and depending on how early it is and the level of comfort you have with the person, you may or may not skip out on a shower. I advocate you do the other person a benefit.
But if it’s a friend, you might get away with it. But if it’s for a job interview, you might say, well, I should probably shower. And you make plans for that. You set the alarm earlier. Or what if you’re getting married, right?
Or you’re a part of the wedding party? Do you get a haircut the day before the wedding? I hope not. Hopefully you get it a while back, especially if you’re the bride and groom. You’re getting it way back.
But you want your hair to grow out a little. You don’t want that, like, fresh. Too fresh a cut. Look, you know what I’m talking about. It’ll look a little weird.
You’ll have one hair sticking out. You want time to look at it and be like, all right, this is right. He makes preparations. And so the more wonderful the plan, whether it’s coffee or you’re getting married, the more wonderful the plan, the more precious the preparation. Jesus is coming back.
This is the plan. Are we prepared? How precious is this preparation? What is our response to Jesus being God’s plan for his creation? And I would say, look at Simeon.
Notice the language surrounding Simeon. He’s righteous, he’s devout, and he’s waiting. We, too are waiting for the second Coming of Christ. So let us be righteous, devout and waiting. How can we be righteous?
Trust in God. Do you trust in God? Do you trust in his promises? He is your comfort. Do you trust that he promises that those who believe in Christ, in Jesus will be saved?
He promises that he is with us believers until the end of the age. We see that in the Great Commission that he’s a counselor, comfort. He’s our peace. Believe it if you have not. And remember that if you are following Jesus and you are feeling a little discouraged right now, he is your comfort.
He is your peace. The second way is be devout or orient your life by Devoting yourself to God’s word. Keep watch over yourself. Keep watch so that you don’t miss the plans of God. God is working.
God has promised things. Don’t become distracted of the world. Jesus is coming again. We wait for the glorification, for the adoption into the kingdom, the appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. We don’t know when, but.
But be devoted, be prepared as Simeon was. And lastly, be patient. I’ve done this. Maybe you’ve done this. You’ve uttered this phrase, when will Jesus just come back?
When will he just do away with all the wickedness? We see the news, we see all the things going on. We’re just Jesus, just come back. Be patient. Remember that God is working all things for his purposes.
And many times God’s promises take a little while to be fulfilled. You see that throughout all the scriptures. What are we called to be? We’re called to be patient and ready and faithful. In the meantime, praise God for Jesus, the plan for all creation.
The second truth to recognize is Jesus is God’s revelation for all nations. It rhymes, so it must be true. Jesus is God’s revelation for all nations. If we look in the text, look at the first part of verse 32, it says, he is a light for revelation to the Gentiles. A light for revelation.
This revelation means to lay bare, make naked. It is to disclose truth, like nothing is hidden. Some people think God has some kind of like secret thing going on in the background. It’s like, I’m not going to show anyone. God’s not hoarding the means of salvation.
It’s been revealed, it’s been disclosed. It’s open. Because Jesus has come. The plans of God, even the very character of God, have been made known to us. God was not discovered.
It wasn’t some dude in the cave. It wasn’t some mystical hat. It wasn’t, you know, genie in a bottle. God revealed himself to us. The disciples asked Jesus to show them the Father.
He says, anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. If you want to know God, he has revealed himself perfectly through Jesus. Look to Jesus. He is God’s revelation for all nations. And it says to the Gentiles.
So why do we say all nations? Well, if we look at the term here, gentiles, it’s a tribe, a nation, a people group in the Old Testament, a foreign nation not worshiping the true God. Pagans, Gentiles, if you are non Jewish, you me so ungodly, rebellious sinners who worship the creation rather than the Creator, who God has every right to destroy because of this rebellion. He offers hope. He grants us mercy so we have the opportunity to respond rightly to this Messiah.
This is not out of obligation. God owes us nothing. This is out of his great love. God has every right to do with us what he will because we’ve abandoned Him. And what he chooses to do with us is offer us hope.
If we believe in Jesus, this is pretty incredible. This is wonderful. We’re living 2,000 years after the ministry and work of Jesus Christ, so this can be a little lost on us sometimes. But if you’re not an Israelite, a physical descendant of Jacob, then maybe we take this for granted sometimes. We were the idolaters.
We were the ones worshiping all these false things. And yet God has showed us mercy and grace in Christ. How wonderful salvation is being revealed to even those outside the covenant people of Israel. Simeon, a righteous Jew, prophesies a light to the Gentiles. For the Jews, this was information they had.
They had the scriptures, they had the prophets, they had these things, the temple. But for the Gentiles, this was something new. For Gentiles, it was new altogether. They too, if they believed in the name of Jesus, would have full access to the throne room of God in prayer, spiritual blessings in the Holy Spirit, and a newfound purpose in life in light of Jesus Christ, their Savior. That’s good news.
That is wonderful news. Being a light to all nations through his covenant people was always God’s plan for salvation. And going to look at a few passages From Isaiah, Isaiah 42, 9 says this, I am the Lord. I have called you in righteousness. I will take you by the hand and keep you.
I will give you as a covenant for the people, a light for the nations. So God’s intention for Israel was that they would be a light to the nations. Isaiah 49, 6 says, I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth. Israel was meant to show the salvation of the Lord. Did they do that very well?
Not really. But through Jesus, God fulfills his intentions. Who affords their enemies this much mercy? Who affords their enemies love? Our God does now in the person of Jesus, that light has shone forth to all nations.
And Isaiah 9:2, the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwell in the land of deep darkness, on them has light shone. There is hope for the one who is in deep darkness. That’s where we all started.
Some of you know, folks who are in that situation, there is hope Come and see what the light reveals. John 8:12. Jesus spoke to them, saying, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. So before we had portable electrical lights, flashlights and such, travelers would probably have a map.
But if it was nighttime, the map’s kind of useless unless you have a sufficient source of light, Whether it’s moonlight, it’s nice and bright, or a lamp. But without sufficient light, the map’s kind of useless. So maybe you’re a traveler at night, no sufficient light and you have a little guesswork. Well, let’s go right, let’s go left and try to guess your way. You have the information, but it’s of no use unless there’s a little light shone on it.
And so people do this. Humanity does this with a little guesswork on their morality. Well, I feel like this is right. I feel like that is right. A little guesswork on philosophy.
Whatever something is is in something. Whatever something is is in this meta something. That’s a little Plato, Aristotle stuff. You do a little guesswork on religion. Well, God is like snake God.
No, God is dirt God. No, God is rain God. No, there’s many gods. No, you can do the guesswork. It’s not going to go well without Christ.
Those truths remain unreadable, like the map. The problem is not that humanity lacks information. Here it is, they lack illumination. Life doesn’t make a whole lot of sense without Christ.
So what is our response to Jesus being God’s revelation for all nations? Well, for Eastgate Church is that we make disciples who have a heart for God, heart for each other, and a heart for our world. Why? Because that’s the kind of God we serve. We serve a God who wants to make disciples of folks who are not disciples.
Why? So they’ll be saved and they can become disciple makers. It’s continuous. Jesus called us to this. We’ve been called to this revelation ministry to reveal Christ to other people.
This message of reconciliation, that’s who we’re meant to be in Jesus. And here’s a quick shout out. We have a kids ministry right across the hall. And like children aren’t little saints, you, parents probably know way more than I do. One preacher said that babies are vipers and diapers.
You tell me like we have the opportunity. If you’re a member or longtime guest or visitor here at Eastgate, direct access to people who need to be shown. Jesus is the revelation of God. Jesus is the answer. They need a godly community.
They need Godly parents, they need godly teachers. They need to see this because as they get older, Pastor Jonathan and I were talking about this around 12, and for me included, that decision kind of becomes real. Is my faith my own, or am I banking off my parents? We have such an opportunity to show them a distinct difference between the worldly things and the godly things. And for me, that was a huge factor in me knowing Jesus.
There’s something about Jesus. There’s something better here. It was a light in the darkness. And so shameless plug like, get involved in kids ministry. What an opportunity in our own world.
Walls to share the gospel, no less. Friends, co workers, people who don’t know him outside the walls. And for those who find themselves in deep darkness and have not trusted in God’s revelation, the response is to believe in Jesus. He is the light. God is the light.
And when we bring our lives into the light, things will be revealed. Like, it’s not going to be always super pleasant. If Jesus is the light and you go into the light, you know nothing’s hidden. You try to hide something. You’re not in the light.
Who are you deceiving? God. Good luck. But when you find yourself in the light, in the light of Christ, you’ll find forgiveness, reconciliation, hope. You’ll have to change, but it’s worth it.
He’ll transform you. For believers in Jesus, part of our response is living in that light, continually confessing our sins, forgiving others, being reconciled, admitting to our weaknesses and our shortcomings, and letting our weakness be the grounds where God can display his awesome power. Put off the old self, put on the new self. Don’t walk in darkness. Walk in the light.
Walk like Christ.
He helps us. He saved us to become children of God. And he desires us not to long for the evil things, but to long for the things in the light. For him. Those are some ways to respond.
The third and final truth we’ll recognize today is Jesus is God’s glory for the faithful. Jesus is God’s glory for the faithful. So let’s take a look at the second half of verse 32. Now for glory to your people, Israel. All right, let’s talk about it.
What is glory? It is magnificence, excellence. It is grace. It is dignity. For this, for the splendor to your people, Israel.
And so this could be the physical descendants of Jacob, who was renamed Israel. But Also in Galatians 6, we learn that Christians are are the Israel of God. So this is not only for the physical descendants, but for those who God has appointed who God has chosen. These are the saved people. These are saved, so we’re included.
Romans 11:17. Paul recognizes this. He says this. But some of these branches from Abraham’s tree, this is Israel. Some of the people of Israel have been broken off.
And you Gentiles, who were branches from a wild olive tree have been grafted in.
So when we trust in Jesus, we are counted among the people of God. We are not secondary citizens of the kingdom. We are full fledged heirs of it. Full fledged. And his father and his mother marveled at what was being said.
They’re just in awe. And then Simeon continues. He says, this child is appointed in verse 34 for the fall and rising of many in Israel. What’s this about? God has appointed.
God has anointed Jesus for the fall and the rising of many in Israel. What does this mean? Well, for the fall, for the downfall, their pride, their ego, their desire to earn righteousness before God by their works, it will be their downfall. Jesus is a stumbling block. And for the rising of many, those will be exalted.
Those who will be exalted are those who humble themselves before the Lord and trust in his work, not their own. They lay it to rest. They’re resting from their works and they’re trusting in Jesus and what he’s accomplished. This is what Jesus has been appointed for. And then in verse 34, he says, he is a sign that is opposed.
A sign that is opposed. And we see this as we continue in the Gospels. The first few chapters of the Gospels always foreshadow. They set up what we’re doing. Going to see Israelites doing what we’re going to see the Jews doing.
They’re going to oppose him, speak against him. They’re going to call him demon possessed, a liar. They’re going to contradict him. They’re going to try to trick him.
Paul recognizes this disobedience in Israel and it breaks his heart and it ought to break our hearts. Romans 9:2 4 says this. I, Paul, have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen. According to the flesh, they’re Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship and the promises.
It belongs to them. And yet they’re rejecting Christ. They’re opposing Christ. It was for them, but they’ve rejected it. Can you imagine the looks on Mary and Joseph’s face?
He’s going to be opposed. And this is when Simeon says to Mary specifically, a sword will pierce through your own soul.
It will go through. It’ll pierce your soul. Mary, too, will experience the sorrow of her son’s mission being opposed greatly by Israel. Her own people. Her own people will oppose Jesus and ultimately will be opposed at his crucifixion.
They’ll put him to death. And it’s going to cause great pain, great sorrow for Mary. With the prophecy, there are great truths to recognize, but also a promise of suffering and sorrow. And though it would be temporary, it’s still very real in the moment. In a way, this is true for us as well.
The cross of Christ can still cause a sense of sorrow. The sufferings we bring onto ourselves because we follow Christ, because the world hates him, it will hate us. It can still cause a sense of sorrow. But Christ has overcome the grave. That is our hope.
That is our joy.
And it says, the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed. Verse 35. So the thoughts here, what are the thoughts here? The thoughts are those kind of inward conversations you have with yourself when you think no one’s watching. You might mumble something, and you look and you’re like, someone just heard me.
That’s weird. These inward thoughts, the things you only say to yourself, the things you only know in yourself. And it says of your heart. Does that mean your physical heart? No, the inner being, the center of your spiritual life.
The things you say to yourself, the part that God knows, the part that maybe you don’t even fully understand. The thoughts of many hearts may be revealed. Have you noticed revealing is a reoccurring theme in this passage? A lot of things are being revealed. I think what this is saying to us is there’s no such thing as neutral ground when it comes to Jesus.
No such thing. He will reveal our hearts. This is what he’s been appointed to be, to do. Where do you stand with him? There’s no neutral ground.
Your heart will be revealed. Jesus is the glory of God now revealed to us. John 1:14 says this. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we have seen his glory.
Glory as of the only Son, from the Father, full of grace and truth. And this glory has come to us now through Jesus, through the cross. Hebrews 2:10 says this. For it was fitting that he for whom, and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, or being brought to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering.
This glory, this glory, how do you get it? How do we get this glory? In the Old Testament, we see that the glory of the Lord fills the tabernacle. And the glory of the Lord is with the people of Israel. Why?
Because of their military strength. Sometimes they thought so, and it didn’t go so well for them. Because of their cultural enrichment? Nope. Because they’re so numerous?
Nope. Their glory came from the presence of God with them amongst them. And when the presence left, it got really bad for Israel again and again and again. It was never in who they were, it was always in who God was and if he was present with them. Israel’s glory was never in what they had, but in who was with them.
Jesus is the final and fullest expression of that glory. God no longer dwells in a tent, but in a person. And if you are in him, if you are in Christ, if you’ve believed in him, you. You too are promised this ultimate glory, covered in his glory and church. Because we have Christ, because we have Jesus.
Jesus has become our glory through his crucifixion and resurrection. And he’s now sent His Holy Spirit, which seals us, guarantees us salvation.
There’s no revoking this. The Holy Spirit is a personal presence of God’s glory in. In the life of the believer. Some days you might not feel so glorious, right? But remember, I have trusted in Christ.
The Spirit dwells within my body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. Remember the promises that come along with that. Remember the guarantees, the blessings that come along with that. You can read about them in Ephesians.
The glory of the Lord which once filled the temple of old now fills the believer who is the temple of the Holy Spirit. So what’s our response? Stop chasing the world’s kind of glory. Stop chasing it. You’ve received Christ.
Indeed. The world offers glory that fades, but Christ give glory, but Christ gives glory that remains. So be faithful to Christ in everything. Faithful in marriage, even when the culture applauds selfishness. Faithfulness at work, when your integrity costs advancement, when it costs ease, faithfulness and suffering, even when obedience doesn’t remove pain.
We’re not promised a carefree, easy go, lucky, happy sunshine, rainbow time. Faithfulness even in suffering. If Christ is your glory, then losing the world’s approval is not a great tragedy. Oftentimes it’s confirmation that your allegiance is real, that you’re truly following Jesus.
I think sometimes we dog a little too much on Christians. It’s easy to do. Even amongst the church, it’s like, yeah, we all know the those who profess Christ and always seem to not be doing the things that they ought to be doing. But I want to flip that on its head real quick. The glory of Christ is shown in his people.
It truly is. It’s because of faithful believers that I see the grace of God at work, day to day. Why? Because they’re so great? Nope.
Nope. The believers I know, they’re people just like me. And the more I know them, the more I know all work in progress. But the greatness, the glory, that splendor that I find so alluring is often just Christ in them, whether it be a pastor, my parents, my brother, my family, my friends, whoever y’. All.
It’s like, if I get to know y’ all enough, I guarantee there are things I won’t like. If you get to know me enough, it won’t take long. There are things you won’t like. But if I see Christ in you, if you see Christ in me, we’re like, this is glorious. This is awesome.
This is great. Christ is our glory. Not because we’re so great, but because he is so great, because he is so praiseworthy. I think that’s glorious. And I think the church has learned, unfortunately, not to talk about that enough.
Christ in you. What a glorious thing. So, as we close, will ask one more. What are you longing for? Is it something in the new year?
A relationship? Success? A goal? A better life? New year, new me?
Could God’s salvation be something better to long for? He planned it before the world began. How wonderful. He’s revealed it to all nations. How gracious.
And he’s promised a future glory to the faithful that believe in Christ Jesus. What a comfort. Will you recognize God’s salvation through Jesus Christ by believing that Jesus is God’s plan for his creation? Past, present, future. Jesus is God’s revelation to all nations.
And Jesus is God’s glory for the faithful. Will you believe that? Let’s pray.
Father, I want to thank you for this word. I truly believe sometimes the simple truths of Scripture can become the most powerful ones. They’re the things we need to remind ourselves of again and again and again. And, Lord, I pray that they never grow old. As we transition into 2026, I think most of us are probably tired of a start of something new.
Lord, I just pray for us that what we have heard from your Word would just be true for us today and forevermore. That we would recognize Jesus for who he truly is. And that in that, like Simeon, we can say, I can depart in peace. Lord, thank you. Thank you so much for such a comforter.
For such a savior. Thank you for loving us so that we might love you. And in Jesus name I pray, amen.
Read transcript
Good morning. Good morning. Merry Christmas, y’. All. I hear we got some new faces in the crowd.
If you’re new, this is your first week. I’m not the normal pastor. Pastor Gary is off on a study break. He’s with the other pastors. So if I don’t do a good job, come back next week, give it another go.
Somebody that’s way more experienced. Way, way more experience. Way more experienced than I am. That’s my shot at calling him old. Hopefully he’s watching.
Hello. If you’re watching on the stream, any of y’ all that are checking us out online, and I would say, welcome my gathering place people, but y’ all got forced to be in here with the loud music. So. Da, da, da, da, da, da.
In case you can’t tell, I am a little under the weather. So if it sounds weird, it’s not the microphone’s problem. It’s the source that’s the problem. So I just threw that out there. Just.
Just so you know, I’m probably gonna dip at the end of the service, and I won’t be out in the room out there to meet anybody. I want. I want to try to stay away from the crowd as best as I can. And so if you’re in the front row, get your Gallagher tarps ready or whatever. Who we got here?
Oh, y’ all don’t know who Gallagher is? Y’ all never heard of Gallagher? Y’ all know who Gallagher is, But, yeah, I’m not trying to avoid anybody if you’re looking for me. I’m just trying to try to keep everybody as safe as possible. So I am blessed to be a part of the preaching team.
I’m always excited anytime there’s an opening that I can fill and help out. I like saying yeah to stuff. So if you just. A quick sidebar. If you haven’t started in your life, just saying yeah to a lot of stuff, don’t say yeah to everything, but say yeah to more stuff.
Say yeah to stuff that maybe makes you a little uncomfortable and then just lean on the strength of God to get you through it. I don’t know who needed to hear that, but say yeah more. So we’re finishing up a series, Christmas, according to Luke, and so I get the privilege and the opportunity to back clean up. So I’m doing the fourth and final in the series. And to be honest, I think this is one of the more interesting sermons that I get to preach, mostly because it doesn’t really get talked about a whole lot in the Christmas Story.
And So I think it’s interesting that we’re ending on the prophecy. And I think that it’s interesting that the prophecy came before, but points to after. And you’ll see what I mean in a minute. But we’re going to follow a guy named.
Pardon me.
No idea what that would have sounded like on the big. It would have been ASMR nightmare, though.
So we’re following this guy Simeon, and he had an incredible prophecy for Mary and Joseph. Incredible prophecy. And so we’re going to look at the Christmas story through the eyes of his prophecy. But before we do that, I kind of want to start with Christmas. Did everybody have a good Christmas?
Everybody? Anybody have a really awful Christmas? Find somebody to pray with you. We got deacons here. That’s what they’re for.
Josh Rollins volunteers to pray for your family if you had a bad. If you had a bad Christmas. We tend to. I think Christmas is a really great microcosm for the way we approach the world now these days. And it sounds weird, but track with me for a minute.
So there’s this idea of anticipating, of waiting in anticipation, of waiting expectantly. And that’s what Simeon is doing here. He’s waiting expectantly. So this idea that we have where when the Christmas season starts, some of you start like before Halloween, some of you start at a time that makes some kind of sense. But we all kind of start at some point.
And then we start the build up. We start the build up. We start the build up, we, we start planning. And it’s all building up to this day. And maybe it’s Christmas day or maybe it’s the weekend before, or if you’re like my family, we have a whole festival of them.
We got like 18 Christmases, which is good, but it made me sick, apparently. I don’t know what I did to Santa Claus this year, but I didn’t even get cold. I just got sick. So we have this build up to Christmas and we’re preparing everything and we know it’s coming, we know the date that it’s coming, and we’re trying to get everything ready. And then the day it comes, everything goes crazy.
Something bad happens. The tree, the light stops working. Somebody brings a person that you don’t even know, and now you gotta figure out they don’t have a gift. So you gotta send somebody to the dollar tree. And then they don’t know who that person is, so they buy them something that they’re allergic to.
Nuts. You got peanuts and everything, right? And you got, you burn the chicken Nuggets. And now all the kids are gonna starve because they don’t eat anything else. Uncle.
Uncle. Whatever his name is. So. All right, so what just happened is I wrote down in my notes, uncle random name.
Because generally speaking, I can just come up with a word. But the problem is that I read it as rufambira, which is pronounced run domi, which I guess I could have said that, but it would have been so crazy. I guess me doing this whole exposition is actually less. More confusing than the other thing was. But the point is, we get to this day that we built up, and then everything was out of our control anyway.
We tried to control it all, and then everything fell apart and other people got. Some people got in a fight and one of them got mad and they left. And we kind of view it as a ruined day, maybe missed opportunity, not the way we wanted it to go. Or you might be more like my family. I’m fortunate to have all of the different Christmases.
All the people are awesome. And so we get to have kind of a seamless Christmas with a lot of awesome people that I really like. So that may be more your family. It may be. Goes off well.
And that nobody talks politics, nobody gets into fist fight. And the Mac and cheese comes out awesome. So the point is, shortly after that, there’s another holiday that was. We just kind of made up. And so then two weeks after that, no.
You don’t remember Christmas at all. It’s not a thought in our head. Halfway through January, we might be buying stuff for next Christmas, but all that preparation that we did and all that work that we did to make everything perfect three weeks later, it’s not a blip on our radar, which is unfortunate because hidden inside that one event is the birth of the savior of the world.
And so we live in expectation of worldly things. We live in expectation of. I’ve got a big seminar I gotta do. I gotta make sure I understand how Zoom works. I just.
I was set up on Skype and they just closed that down. So apparently I gotta learn a whole new interface or I’ve gotta do a presentation and working up the presentation. And then you get into the hotel and the WI fi is terrible and none of your videos work. And we got a cycle count coming up in the warehouse or in the retail. We got to do inventory or whatever it is.
We got this thing that’s happening and we’re chasing to try to make it all happen, but it’s all fleeting. It’s all temporary. It’s all Dust. And so we end up trying to spend our expectation on relationships or on our employee success or comfort. I want my house to be more comfortable.
And we forget that every single day, even in the middle of January, the Savior of the world was born. Every day that’s true every day that’s true for you. Every day that’s true for me.
And so this Simeon guy, that’s the Christmas he was waiting for. He was waiting. He knew it was going to happen. He was absolutely sure. God had told him and talked to him through the Holy Spirit, told him was going to happen.
And when Jesus walked through that gate, Simeon was standing right there where he was supposed to be. We’ll get into him a little more in a minute, but I just want to take a second to frame up how we anticipate things in our culture. We anticipate things that are coming, we plan for them the best we can, and we don’t have any control over it anyway. Simeon is anticipating, knowing for sure this event is going to happen. So let me help you.
This is the way I kind of framed it up in my mind as I was studying this.
I know for a fact that there is a day coming where I will be standing at the feet of God, the creator of the universe and the judge of good and evil.
I know that day is coming. And on that day, he will say, right or left.
That’s a day I know is coming.
Will I ever get a promotion at work? Probably not. I work under the boss’s daughter, so there’s not a lot of.
Unless she decides to go somewhere farther up in the company. But if I do, that’s fine, too. If I don’t, that’s fine. But none of that matters when I weigh it against that day that I know is coming.
So I anticipate with expectation. And what that allows me to do is it allows me to prepare. It allows me to figure out, all right, God, what do you want me to do? Where do you need me? I want to work for you.
I’m in your family. I’m saying yeah to everything. Just promise you’ll go with me when I say yeah to something goofy like moving out of the country for three years.
So that’s where I want to frame up this passage. So if you want to turn in your biblical device, Luke 2. 25, 35.
Now, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon. And this man was righteous 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 his 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 up in his arms and 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 of revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to the people. Israel. And his father and 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 rising of many in Israel and for a sign that is opposed to.
And a sword will pierce through your own soul also, so that thoughts of many hearts may be revealed. God bless the reading of his word. Amen. So as I read through this, I see that Simeon is rejoicing in God’s salvation through Jesus.
We can rejoice in God’s salvation through Jesus. He made it so simple.
How do we do that? Let’s check it out. We got three truths. Jesus is God’s plan for his creation. Jesus is God’s plan for his creation.
So Simeon, this guy, Simeon’s name, it means hearkening. It means listening for a sound that you know is coming, waiting in expectation. That’s what his name means. It’s kind of cool that he does what his name is. And Luke labels him as righteous and devout.
So he does this interesting thing where when he. There’s. There’s kind of a cool word here where he’s prophesying over this baby. I don’t know that. I think this is a little.
A little extra biblical. That piece I just read, that’s what we get for Simeon. So we don’t have any context before. We don’t know who he was, we don’t know what happened to him after. Like, that’s it.
That’s his paragraph. That’s his block. So anything outside of that is just conjecture. We know that he was a faithful man, a righteous man. We know that he was powered by the Holy Spirit, that he was spoken of in the Holy Spirit, spoken to in the Holy Spirit.
And so that’s good enough for me. But it does still strike me as a little funny, the idea that it’s possible that Mary and Joseph had never seen us do before in their life. And they walk into the temple, and immediately he’s just like, give me that baby.
I have to Assume if that did happen, that God would have moved through their Holy Spirit to say, it’s okay, he’s one of mine. I got some kooky ones, but he’s one of the good ones. And he prophesies over this baby.
And he calls him. In the Greek, the word is paraklesis. Paraklesis. Sorry, I don’t do Greek. I spent yesterday listening to this Greek word, paraklis.
So that’s the word that he says that this is the bringer of comfort. Interestingly, the Holy spirit in John 14:16 uses a word that’s similar, but it’s paraklitas, the receiver of comfort. And so Simeon uses this very specific word that says, this guy’s got the Holy Spirit, but he’s the giver of comfort. He’s the comforter. And then we’re told we have the Holy Spirit, but we’re the comforted.
I think that’s pretty cool. I think about it like batteries. He’s like the positive charge. We’re like the negative charge, right? So if you put the negative and negative together, that’s like connecting you and electrical engineer back there just sending me hand signals.
I’m in deep water now. So it’s got to go one direction. If you put two backwards, it doesn’t work the way it’s intended to work. This same idea of I’m going to get into the Holy Spirit in a way that makes sense to me as a way that I can kind of wrap my head around what the Holy Spirit is in just a minute. But the idea here is that our Holy Spirit receives from his Holy Spirit, if that makes any sense, that our Holy Spirit is powered because we receive from Jesus.
And so it’s got to go that direction. And Jesus has enough juice to power us all. And so when Simeon is talking to him, he says, this is. This is the one. This is the one that God told me.
Then he does something that’s funny to me. When I was a kid, I didn’t really understand it because I was like, this dude is whack because he got to get out of jail free card because God said, you won’t die until you see Jesus. So all he’s got to do is just go somewhere else. Now he’s endless life.
Like he got it wrong. Turns out he got it right. Because a life without Jesus is empty. It’s not life. Life is through Jesus.
And so when he was told, you will not pass on until you see the salvation of mankind, he went looking for it. He knew where it was going to be. He was told by the Holy Spirit. I misspoke a little bit in the first sermon. I didn’t quite word the thing that I was trying to say correctly.
I don’t know. It doesn’t go into detail on what exactly that means. I don’t know if he was given a vision and he knew where he was going to be and at what time. I don’t know if he was given discernment when he was told this, and he knew that it would one day come to pass. And then he started hearing all these shepherds talking about this baby being born, and he did the math to figure out where the baby would be.
Because today is an interesting day. It’s a very specific day. This is. Mary and Joseph are bringing her to the temple for purification and to present Jesus to God to present their firstborn son. So this is a specific day.
It’s the 40th day after birth. And so it actually would give him some kind of, like, way to navigate. I don’t know if the Spirit spoke to him that way or if God was just like, be there on this day, or if he’s like, it’s going to happen. And it just sort of. He knew it was going to happen.
And then the minute he saw him, he was like, oh, snap. I was just here for temple stuff. But that’s the baby. And he just knew. I don’t know exactly.
All of them are cool, though. I think all of them are pretty awesome. The point is, he knew before and he did the work to get there and he received Jesus.
So there is a little sidebar that I wanted to do. I thought it was interesting. It’s not worth going into a ton, but I thought it was a little bit of context of the purification of Mary and the presentation of Jesus, the firstborn son. And so the purification of Mary, as with all Jewish law, there was a sacrifice involved. And so you could sacrifice a lamb and a pigeon or a turtle dove, or if you didn’t have enough money for a lamb, you could sacrifice two turtle doves.
We know that Mary sacrificed two birds. She sacrificed. They didn’t have a whole lot of money, and so she sacrificed the poor version of it. But what I find fascinating is that she also presented the lamb and that bringing him in, presenting the lamb to God. So she thought she was just doing what she could do.
But in truth, just following God. She did so much more than she ever understood.
God reveals his plan of salvation through his promises in Genesis 3, verse 15. I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring. He shall bruise your head, you shall bruise his heel. This is the protoegillium. This is the first pointing to the coming of Christ to the salvation of mankind.
This is right at the beginning of the book.
First Peter. It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. God chose him as your ransom long before the world began. But now, in these last days, he has been revealed for your sake. Through Christ you have come to trust in God and you have placed your faith and hope in God because He raised Christ from the dead and gave him great glory.
Jesus was plan A. There was no plan B. God knew how it all went down before he made it, before he made any of it. He already knew we were going to reject him. And so he gave us a lifeline.
He said, here’s how you get to me when you run away, come on back, I’ll be here. Here’s how you find me. Just follow the light. When you’re out in the darkness, follow the light.
Second Timothy.
God planned and he told us ahead of time so that we can prepare. He’s not going to spring it on us. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writing which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. The Old Testament points to the coming Messiah. We get a huge advantage because we just look at history to point to the arrived Messiah.
But that prophecy, the ability for the prophecy helps us to understand that means the prophecy that says he ain’t done and he’s coming back, that’s happening too. That’s gonna happen too. And so as we go through life, let’s go through life with waiting, expectation, knowing a day is gonna happen, Jesus is coming back. And so let’s spend that halfway through January, whatever day in May, whatever that day is, where you’re waiting on something worldly, temporary. Spend that day also knowing that there’s going to come a day when Jesus is going to reach out his hand, say he’s with me.
Amen.
So we know that Simeon was righteous and devout because for the Bible tells me so. It says it right there, that one’s not hard. We know he was righteous and devout. We know he was righteous and devout because he was not only able to receive the instructions from God, he was excited about the instructions from God, and he acted on the instructions from God. And that’s the definition of righteous and devout.
So let’s go through our lives the same way, righteous and devout.
The second truth, Jesus is God’s revelation for all nations.
Jesus is God’s revelation for all nations. A light for revelation in verse 32, revelation is just to reveal. So this idea, the light for revelation is to make everything plain, to reveal everything, to make everything. It’s this idea of when you walk into a dark room, close the door behind you, it’s dark, and you flip the light. It looks like it’s just bright all of a sudden.
But what actually happens is the light actually starts at that spot, and it goes way faster than we can see, but it goes all the way into all the different corners. It just obliterates the darkness. Like darkness. Light always overcomes darkness. It doesn’t push the darkness out into the hallway.
It just eradicates it. It just obliterates it. It can’t exist when there is light present. The truth doesn’t work the other direction. Darkness can never overcome light.
Light always wins. And so this idea of light, of revelation for all nations, this is the really great news for me because I don’t know if you guys know this. I’m not Jewish, and so I needed a little extra sauce to get me into God’s family in a lot of different ways. But the idea that the Israelites are God’s chosen people, but then there’s all these other people. Simeon, right here in his prophecy, he doesn’t just prophesy that this is the Lord that was promised, he then prophesied, and he’s going to be the one to put light into all nations.
The Gentiles and the people, Israel, everybody. It’s intended for every single heart. It’s intended for every single human. It’s offered to every single soul. Simeon knows this.
40 days after Jesus, Jesus was born, Jesus is still a baby. This makes my noodle a little bit, because I know that Jesus was 100% man and 100% God, which already mathematically makes my brain melt. But they had an understanding of the world through man’s eyes and understanding of righteousness through God’s eyes. Oh, that’s pretty cool. But then I go, like.
But when he was a baby, did he have, like, all this extra knowledge? And he’s just like, man, I can’t wait till I get a neck. That’s going to be a great day.
So that’s how tiny Simeon, when he’s prophesying over this baby, that’s the baby. It’s the baby that’s still Doing this thing, you got to hold it with the fingers behind the head. Otherwise it’s like whip flash is the baby. That’s how little this thing. And he says, this is the coming Messiah.
This is the salvation for all people. He doesn’t say it explicitly, but I looked in the parentheticals and he says, including Adam Purvis in Wilson, North Carolina, you gotta look deep in the footnotes for that. And it’s gotta be a Bible that I pre prepared for you.
The light coming to all nations. Isaiah 42 prophesied this as well. I am the Lord. I have called you in righteousness. I will take you by the hand and keep you.
I will give you as a covenant for, for the people, a light for the nations, plural. Isaiah 49:6, I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.
Isaiah 9:2. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.
John 8:12. Jesus spoke to them, saying, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but they will have the light of life. So this idea. So if you think about traveling, back in the day, you had a map, you probably knew where you were going, because people didn’t.
But if you had to travel someplace you don’t know, you travel by day. So if you had to travel by night, you needed two guys, you needed a guy with a map, you needed a guy with a light. Because the map, even though it’s completely accurate, if you can’t see it, it’s not useful. The same thing is true in a lot of our daily lives. Without the light, all the tools that we have, they’re fleeting, they’re meaningless, they’re not usable.
My quirky humor, if I don’t use it to glorify God, doesn’t mean anything to you, doesn’t do anything for you.
I think of the Holy Spirit is a hard one for me to grasp. So I have an image in my head that helps me a little bit. It helps me to understand, I think the idea and that is that the Holy Spirit, your Holy Spirit, is a mirror and that it can’t generate light, but it can reflect light. And so the minute you connect with God, God’s light beams to your Holy Spirit. And now you have a tool to reflect God’s light back to talk to Him.
Now we have a two way communication system that without his talking to me first, without him doing the work to get to me. I can’t just stand out in the darkness and hold up a mirror. There’s nothing to reflect. I need that light coming in to be able to send that light back to him, to talk back to him. It also gives me an ability to reflect that light into the world, into the darkness.
And that can help me see how to navigate that. Can’t we see where I’m going? It can also help me spot people in trouble, people in distress who are looking at their mirror like mine don’t work. I’ve twisted my ankle so many times and I can say, oh, oh, here. And I shine God’s word to them.
They choose to accept their mirror and talk to God. Now they understand. They don’t need me to be there because God’s talking to them. Now. Their mirror is connected.
Does that make sense? It also gives me the ability to reflect it on myself in the darkness. I don’t know if I’m hurt, I don’t know if I’m dirty, I can’t see me, I don’t know what my hair looks like, all that stuff, I have no idea. But if I have God’s light, it gives me the opportunity to do a self assessment, like a real, actual self assessment and go, oh, I got some problems I need to work on. That’s where it’s coming from.
And then there’s this other little part of it that I think is interesting. It actually got pitched to me at the end of the first service. So I don’t take credit for this idea, but it’s a good idea, I think. I like it that the sin that we have is plaque on the mirror.
God’s light cleans that off and then it becomes a useful tool. But every sin that we create, let’s just call it like a little sharpie tick on the mirror. And the more we sin, and the more we sin, and the more we sin, the dimmer our light grows. And we think that’s because God’s forsaken us. But the truth is, it’s just we need to clean our mirror.
We need to ask God again. Sorry, God. Let me. Alright, let me shine that up. What were you saying?
I think that’s a, an interesting way to think about it. But this idea of light started at the beginning.
First thing God did was let there be light. He obliterated the darkness. That was the first thing he did. And then he started making all the cool people like me and giraffes.
Giraffes are pretty cool.
Where are you right now? In terms of your light.
Do you feel like you’re in darkness? Do you feel like you’re in dimness? Do you feel like there’s areas of your life that you’ve kind of squirreled away and put some barriers up to make sure the light doesn’t hit those bits? Maybe you’re just in complete darkness. You don’t even know the light that I’m talking about.
You haven’t even entertained it.
Wherever you are, God made a way out of the darkness for everybody. Every single person. Every single person. Not everybody collectively, everybody individually. That’s how much he loves you.
Before he created the universe, he knew you and he started shining that light into your life.
Will you accept that love?
The third truth. Jesus is God’s glory for the faithful. He is God’s glory for the faithful. This includes the people of Israel, but it also includes the people of Eastgate Community Church in Wilson, North Carolina, and Rocky Mountain. And everybody else.
Everybody else. Jesus is God’s glory for every single person.
Romans 11:17. But some of these branches from Abraham’s tree, some of the people of Israel have been broken off. And you Gentiles who were branches from a wild olive tree have been grafted in. This is a beautiful way to think about it. And it’s.
It’s a beautiful way to think about. Kind of a hard topic. And that is the idea that you were born in the lineage of Abraham points you to the coming Messiah through the Old Testament covenant. But the Old Testament covenant is actualized through the coming of the Messiah, Jesus and the New Testament covenant. And so just having a granddad who was a granddad who was a granddad who begat, begat, begat to you as a Jewish person, you still have to have a connection to God.
We’ve unfortunately, this world has done a pretty good job of dividing Israel into a couple of different words. And so everybody gets confused where it’s a culture and it’s a race and it’s a religion, and it’s a couple of different things. And so that gets a little confusing.
I’m fortunate to not be Jewish, so I don’t have to be confused about it. I just say Jesus equals Jesus is it. He’s all of it. And the metaphor that he uses here is that I’m grafted to. To this olive tree.
It’s not that I’m wrapped around the olive tree. It’s not that I’m tied to the olive tree. Well, I guess grafting it first you would tie it, but it eventually is just one tree. It’s just one tree. It’s not a whole bunch of different pieces.
And so there’s no. With me not being part of the Old covenant, the Abrahamic covenant, I don’t get a lesser share in God’s family. I’m still equal parts God’s family by this metaphor that he has. My cousin, he’s this crazy horticulturalist plant guy and so he does these crazy tree splicings and he’ll get like this little tree and this little tree and they’ll be two different colors or whatever. And when they get a certain, he’ll shave them and tie them and then he’ll twist them together.
And so like 15 years later, he’s got this crazy looking tree that’s got all these different flowers on it, but it’s all just one tree. You can’t separate one part from the other. You can’t break it back into halves. That’s what this is explaining is I’m grafted into the family.
I’m the same as anybody else.
That’s incredible. That’s what Simeon is pointing to, that this child is the salvation, the revelation to the Gentiles and glory for Israel, that Israel can celebrate the coming of the Messiah and Gentiles can accept the coming of the Messiah.
Then it gets a little, a little heavier.
A sign that is opposed in verse 34. A sign that is opposed to. Paul writes about this in Romans. But Simeon got it right before Paul got it right. He said, this child is the Promised One.
And not everybody’s going to like that. There’s going to be people that stand in his way. There’s going to be people that reject him. There’s going to be people that oppose him directly. There’s going to be people that just ignore him.
Paul writes in Romans 9. Maybe you’ve felt something like this before. I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen. According to the flesh, they are Israelites and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenant, the giving of the law, the worship and the promises.
He’s looking at all these Jewish people who had the promise and then they rejected it.
He’s saying, I wish I could. I wish I could die to get them to see it. Maybe Paul’s a little bit of a prophet too, because he does.
This part maybe rings true to you. I don’t know. Maybe if some of you guys are super, super, super blessed and you don’t have anybody around you that is lost, anybody around you that’s in darkness, anybody around you that’s in trouble. Congratulations, first. But second, you need to get to work, because if you don’t have some broken people around you, you’re not going anywhere.
You’re not walking where the broken people are. So I would bet that you are likely like me and, you know, a lot of broken people, and some of them mean a lot to you.
But Jesus can save them. I cannot. My job is to reflect that light wherever I can. Try to catch that mirror a little bit every now and then.
That’s all I can do. And so when I get approached with this question of, like, yeah, but what about good people? Don’t we have good people in your family or good friends that aren’t Christians? Yeah, I do. What about them?
And where I land is this on that day that I’m waiting for with expectation, that I hope you’re waiting for, with expectation, I will be standing at the feet of a loving God who knows what is right and wrong and is powerful to do all things.
And so the decision that I make, I want to be with that God. I also get the option to say, I don’t want to.
You are a sign that is opposed. I oppose you. I get that option. But the end result, the end solution, is that the perfect being to make this choice is making this choice. Because whoever it is that’s standing in front of him, he knows what’s right.
He’s perfect. He’s powerful to do his will, and he loves them way more than I’ll ever understand.
So it’s a hard burden to bear. And then he hits this part right at the end.
You guys, if you happen to have a prophecy like this for me, and you walk up to me and Mandy and you’ve got a prophecy about Kylie and the great things that she’s going to do. And it ends with you staring Mandy into her eyes and saying, and a soul. A sword will pierce your soul. Leave that part out. Just pull me aside and let me hear that part later.
And that’s gotta be hard to carry her whole life. But I do wonder if that’s what got her through standing at the foot of the cross watching her baby boy die, is that she was told when he was 40 days old, 6 weeks old, he was still this thing. It’s gonna hurt, but it’s gonna be okay. It’s part of the plan. Nothing’s gone wrong.
This was what the plan was all along.
John 1:14. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we have seen his glory. Glory as only the Son of the Father, full of grace and truth. Hebrews 2:10.
For it was fitting that he for whom, and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect. Through suffering. God ties salvation and suffering together. I think he does it for a lot of reasons. He’s a pretty smart guy.
I figured out. I figured out he’s a little smarter than me and he knows what he’s doing. I think he does this for a lot of reasons. I think that could be a whole nother sermon by itself. But what I want to leave you with is this.
The pain and the struggle in your life is okay. That’s part of the plan, too, that God, when he made his perfect plan, put at the center of it the struggle and pain and death of his own son. And that’s what he built the whole thing on. He understands what you’re going through.
We have glory because the Creator, God of the universe loved us enough to send Jesus.
So as you go forward, starting now, move forward like Simeon did, be intentional carrying that blessing, that gift, that radiance that God has given us, carrying it into the dark places, knowing that it’s going to be hard. But walk forward knowing, as Simeon did, the day’s coming, Jesus is coming back. And when he comes back, the suffering we’re struggling through, the pain, the anxiety, it’s going away like a room of darkness. And he’s not going to push it into the other areas of his creation. He’s just going to obliterate it.
Amen. Let’s pray. Father God, thank you for today.
Thank you for the opportunity you’ve given me to speak your word.
I know that you are the creator of all things, the power of all things.
I know that if I said something that you didn’t like, that you changed it in their ears before it even hit their ears. Father God, I know that your Word is true and pure like that. So thank you for giving me the opportunity to just reflect your word. If you’re hearing my voice right now, and you don’t know the light that I’m talking about, you don’t know the God that I’m talking about. You don’t know the way, Maker, the bridge.
You don’t know the incredible, powerful saving light of Jesus Christ and his sacrifice and resurrection. I have some incredible news for you. It was done for you specifically. All you got to do is accept it if you want it. Father God, I’m a sinner.
I’ve sinned against you. I’ve run away from you. I’ve done terrible things. You’ve seen into all my dark corners. I don’t know why you still love me.
But thank you for loving me enough to make that sacrifice. Thank you for being powerful enough to defeat death through the resurrection. I know Jesus was real. I know he was your son. And I know he was sent for me.
I want that sacrifice, Father God. I want that relationship be in me, that I can be in you. And give me the light to follow. If you pray that prayer, congratulations, welcome to the family. You still got a lot of work ahead of you and there’s still going to be some darkness, but you’re always going to have a source of light to shine into it, to guide you.
Maybe you said that prayer a long time ago and just life has kind of gotten in the way. You’re working three jobs and all those things that I was saying, you know, they’re not important. That big giant presentation that you gotta do is temporal. Well, yeah, but if I don’t do a good job at it, I’m fired. It gets easy to slide away from God that way.
So just take a second, still do a great job on that presentation. But pray something like this. Father God, I’ve run away from you.
I used to depend on you so much and then you gave me strength. And somewhere along the way I think I’ve started thinking it was my strength and I started trying to do it myself. And I’m finding out, God, I’m breaking. I need you back.
Help me to get back to you, God. Help me to live every Wednesday, Thursday. Help me to know before I do that presentation that I’m building that presentation for you, God, that I’m going to do every day of work that I have to your glory. That when somebody asks me, why do you work so hard? I can say, let me tell you a story.
Maybe you’re just hiding from a very specific call. Maybe you’re plugged into the church. You’re active, you’re willing. But there’s one thing that God’s been nagging you and you keep saying, ah, money doesn’t permit, or ah, maybe next year I got this cold, whatever it is, and you just kind of keep sweeping it to later. Or maybe you hope that he’ll forget.
Trust me, you don’t want to be there on the day that he forgets the thing he asks you to do.
So just give to somebody else if you’ve got something. Whatever that is. I don’t know what that is. Then pray. Maybe something like this.
Father God, I’m yours. Give me the giants. Give me the mountains. Here I am. God, send me.
Father God. I just ask that as we close in worship that you know that we worship you because we love you. We come together because we are loved by you. Thank you so much for being a God that is worthy of love and full of love. We love you.
Amen.
