Sermon – St Oswald’s 31st December 2023
‘Jesus is presented in the temple.’ Luke 2.22-40
What are you waiting for?
The word ‘wait’ appears over
245 times in the NIV version of the Bible.
It is an important word and
in Hebrew is linked to the word hope.
Two key Hebrew words are used
for hope – YAKHAL which means ‘to wait for’ and QAVAH.
QAV
means cord and when placed with AH has the sense of a cord being pulled
tight, a waiting in tense expectation.
These two words appear over
40 times in the Psalms.
Biblical hope is different
from optimism which is often placed on a change in circumstances. ‘I hope
things will get better.’
Rather Biblical hope is
placed on the nature and character of God.
More specifically on how God
has acted in the past.
Therefore, hope looks
backwards so that we can move forward in hope.
Holding
Onto Past Experience.
So, we might say, not so
much, what are you waiting for, but whom are you waiting for?
And the people of Israel are
a people who are QAVAH, waiting in tense expectation, for Yahweh to act as
promised by the prophets.
Listen to two people waking
from Jerusalem to Emmaus and talking to a stranger as recorded by Luke…
‘Our chief priests and rulers delivered Him up to the sentence of death, and they crucified Him. But we were hoping He was the One who would redeem Israel. And besides all this, it is the third day since these things took place. Furthermore, some of our women astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning and...
That the people of Israel
were waiting, hoping, longing for a ‘deliverer’ is writ large across the Psalms
and the Prophets. We could spend a long, long time reading them all. This is in
part what the Gospel stories tells us, asking us to sift and sort the evidence
that Jesus is such a one. Jesus, in Hebrew Yeshua, translated into English as
Joshua, which as Margaret noted last week, means ‘salvation,’ this Jesus is the
long awaited ‘deliverer.’
And Luke in his Gospel brings
into the picture two people who are waiting, hoping, and longing to God’s
promises of a saviour.
Simeon and Anna. We are told
Anna’s age, but not Simeon’s, although it is generally thought that he was of
an age.
And Simeon was waiting…
‘Now there was a man in
Jerusalem called Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the
consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was on him. ‘
Note the work of the Spirit
here, leading, guiding and directing Simeon in identifying Mary, Jospeh, and
Jesus. The Temple compound was a very busy place with thousands of people
coming and going.
Simeon takes the child and
burst into song, what has become known in Latin as the Nunc Dimittus,
song at Evensong and often used as a pray at the bedside of a dying person.
And in a few brief sentences
Simeon encapsulates the hope of Israel and the calling of Israel. Their calling
to be a light to the Gentiles.
To demonstrate how humans are
to live with each other and in relationship to God.
Jesus will grow up and will
charge the leaders of God’s chosen people with having failed in this God given
task.
And in doing so, speaks dark
words to Mary of what was to come, the pain and the anguish, the hope, and the
expectation, the thorn in the straw.
And we also have Anna. A
daughter of Phanuel of the tribe of Asher, one of the twelve foundational
tribes of Israel. What a model she sets for us with her dedication and
devotion.
These two would have the
Hebrews Scriptures buried deep in their hearts and readily on their lips, and
in both Simeon and Anna we hear the prophet Isaiah as he declares…
Burst into songs of joy
together,
you ruins of Jerusalem,
for the Lord has comforted
his people,
he has redeemed Jerusalem.
The Lord will lay bare his
holy arm
in the sight of all the nations,
and all the ends of the earth
will see
the salvation of our God. Isaiah
52.10
And note in passing the
breadth of characters Luke has brought onto the stage in his telling of the
birth narrative. Shepherds, angels, a young girl, and ordinary man, some
Eastern mystics, a tyrannical king, and now two older people waiting and
longing in tense expectation.
It may be fanciful, but could
we not see in Simeon and Anna a reflection of Abraham and Sarah. Both aged and
both bearing witness to a child of promise. The promise that through a ‘child’
the world would receive God’s blessings.
Last week we heard of
Joseph’s lineage that stretched back to Abraham. And we noted that it was
approximately 2,000 years. 2,000 years of waiting, longing, hoping, and getting
somethings right but getting a whole heap more terribly wrong.
And it was 400 years since
the prophet Malachi, the last book in our Old Testament, had written,
“See, I will send the prophet
Elijah to you before that great and dreadful day of the Lord comes. He will
turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the
children to their parents; or else I will come and strike the land with total
destruction.”
And Anna and Simeon Yakhal
– they waited, hoped, and trusted.
What are you waiting for and
how are you waiting?
Let me remind you of two
stories of people waiting, one got it right and the other got it badly wrong,
and both were Kings of Israel.
The first king is Saul and
his battle against the Phillistine. (You can read the full story in 1 Samuel
13)
Saul was supposed to wait for
Samuel to make a sacrifice but…
Although Saul was not a
priest, he offered the burnt offering himself without waiting for Samuel. (His
army was getting nervous and deserting) Immediately after Saul finished the
offering, when the aroma of the sacrifice lingered over the land, Samuel
arrived, and Saul went out to greet him and to pay his respects. But Samuel
knew Saul had overstepped his bounds.
For this Samuel rebukes Saul
and declares that the kingdom will be taken from him and given to another.
That would be David and in
his early days he is also having a run in with the Philistines.
David had one successful
battle against the Jebusites and is about to go up once more against the
Philistines. However, David enquires of the Lord on what he should do, and the
Lords says,
‘… when you hear the sound of marching in the tops of the balsam trees, then rouse yourself, for then the LORD has gone out before you to strike down the army of the Philistines.'
David waited for that prompt before moving into action.
(You
can read that story in 2 Samuel 5)
Before the Christmass Festival
during Advent the theme of waiting is key. This waiting carries two foci. That
of waiting for the birth of Jesus as we enter once more into the story, and
then of Jesus’ return, or as sometimes called, the second coming.
On Jesus’ return I like the
message of the angels to those watching Jesus’ ascension as recorded by Luke in
Acts 1.
‘And as they were gazing
intently into the sky while He was going, behold, two men in white clothing
stood beside them. They also said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking
into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come
in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven.”
“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky?
Why indeed when there is a
work to be done.
And that work is framed
within the Biblical hope found in the strange Book of Revelation, and also in Paul’s
writings and other letters in the New Testament. They try to describe the
indescribable about where this is all heading.
That glorious depiction in
Revelation 21 and 22…
A new heaven and earth, no
more death or pain, no more suffering.
God and humans living in
perfect harmony with all of creation as so beautifully written about by Isaiah
in his vison of God’s holy mountain.
They will neither harm nor destroy
on all my holy mountain,
for the earth will be filled
with the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea. Isaiah
11. 9.
What are you waiting for?
Maybe we need to reflect on
what we are waiting for and see how it lines up with God’s plans and purposes. Asking,
how does what we are ‘waiting for’ help those plans and purposes be revealed in
the world, in our world, our community and circle of family and friends.
How can we demonstrate hope
in the waiting – Biblical hope built upon the character and nature of God, and
in Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection.
How can we in our waiting be
a light in the darkness.
Perhaps along with Julian of
Norwich, the 13th century Anchoress and Mystic, at one of the darkest times in
European history, and when she herself battled against severe illness and very
nearly died, she declared a hope that “All will be well and all will be well,
and every kind of thing shall be well.”
Some of you may have or will
be making New Years Resolutions.
I made a New Years Resolution
on the 1st January 1975 that had a profound impact on my life. I
made a New Years Resolution to become a Christian.
However, I would like to
invite you rather than make a New Years Resolution, instead to make a PACT with
God.
PACT standing for Prayer and
Action. Reminding us of the story and lessons learned from our study of
Nehemiah, who prayed and then acted.
And on prayer I find Pete
Grieg a great source of inspiration and I have slightly tweaked one of the
concluding prayers in the Lectio 365 App.
I would like to invite you to
stand if you are able and say this with me by way of dedicating ourselves to
God’s plans and purposes in the year ahead, offering Jesus as the one true hope
for the nations.
Father, help me to live the year
ahead to the full,
Being true to you, in every way.
Jesus, help me to give myself
away to others,
Being kind to everyone I meet.
Spirit, help me to love the
lost,
proclaiming Christ in all I do and say.
Amen.
Jesus, hope of the nations -
https://youtu.be/_ZfG2zC7sqU?si=LCwkCqkzKh1oI0tE
And the sermon in context....
https://www.youtube.com/live/FHSAgdFX5lU?si=rCYRu5VfB_5WeYpY
