Sermon for MHBC (24 December 2021; Christmas Eve). You can watch and listen on Facebook, YouTube, Vimeo, or our website. Live at 5:30pm. Also available as a podcast here or by searching “Monument Heights Baptist Church” in your favorite podcast app.
Tom Petty has a famous song about waiting. Here’s the chorus:
The waiting is the hardest part
Every day you see one more card
You take it on faith, you take it to the heart
The waiting is the hardest part[1]
Now Tom wasn’t talking about Advent or Christmas, but the words strike the right note in any case.
In this passage, we meet a man named Simeon, presumably a priest, who had been waiting. That’s precisely how Luke describes him in 2:25: 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. He was waiting or anticipating when Israel would be comforted or consoled.
We grasp this anticipation at Christmas don’t we? Children are more aware of it perhaps than adults, but I’m not sure it ever leaves. Remember that classic Christmas song:
And so, I’m offering this simple phrase,
To kids from one to ninety-two.
Although it’s been said, many times, many ways,
Merry Christmas to you.
Christmas brings up this childish anticipation in all of us. When I say childish, I don’t mean that as a bad thing. I mean that as an immensely good thing, because it is children, after all, who sometimes see deeper truths that adults fail to see. Jesus himself said one must become like a child to grasp the movement of God’s kingdom. Children can see more purely than adults who have been rattled, shaken, shell-shocked, by a troubling world. Whereas adults often grow cynical, children are hopeful and full of wonder. That is the reason so much of progress in spirituality is linked to the idea of childishness. To paraphrase C. S. Lewis, it is not that we are to be children in our heads (the NT explicitly addresses that), but we are to be children in our dispositions. As Jesus puts it: “Innocent as doves but as wise as serpents.”
What Simeon is anticipating and what Simeon sees requires the childlike eyes of faith. As Calvin noted, Simeon saw with spiritual eyes. Notice once more how he is described in v. 25: the Holy Spirit was upon him. And then in v. 26: 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. This is anticipation. It is the child eagerly counting down the days till Christmas. It is the child who wakes up at an unreasonable hour ready to celebrate Christmas. It is a man attuned to God’s Spirit.
Verses 27–28 go on to tell us about the day he’s been waiting for: 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. What Simeon is about to see and say is spiritual. It is not natural. He sees through the childlike eyes of faith and the power of the Holy Spirit. Christmas has arrived. The lights are being lit and the whole world is about to see.
One of my favorite things to do as a child was ride with my parents looking at Christmas lights. I still love it and now I do it with my kids. Something is stirred in my soul, and as I was reflecting on this text and also preaching through Advent, I kept being struck by these themes of darkness and light. There may be no more appropriate decoration for the meaning of Christmas than lights. Just days before Christmas, those of us in the Northern Hemisphere experience the darkest day of the year. On the 21st or 22nd of December, the winter solstice gives us the shortest day of the year—the day when darkness lasts the longest.
Before our modern period, such days were loaded with significance, though not always from a Christian perspective. Nevertheless, it is worth noting that just days before we celebrate the Christmas season, we have experienced the darkest day of the year. And in the middle of all that darkness what do we do? We light candles and string lights and decorate shimmering trees. Some people even go to the extreme. A couple of nights ago after I left church, I saw a struck decorated with Christmas lights. Others decorate their houses so elaborately that people travel to watch the lights.
And we understand the metaphor even in a secular society. Do you remember the trend last year in response to COVID? People were hanging Christmas lights outside of the Christmas season in order to spread hope and cheer. What we so desperately need is light in the darkness.
I don’t want to strike too sour of a note, but we must mention it. Christmas isn’t always an easy time of year. Some of you are experiencing your first holiday without a loved one. That is so painful and I’m sorry that you have to experience that. Others just feel the same pain every year because while time brings healing, the damage and the scars are still there. And others are just feeling fear. There’s the ongoing pandemic. There’s political unrest. There’s economic uncertainty. In short, we are experiencing what humans have long known—there are monsters in this dark world.
But perhaps Simeon’s song can offer us some perspective, some hope. Look at v. 29 with me: Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word. Remember Simeon believed the Lord had made a promise to him. The moment of fulfillment has come. So what does Simeon say? He says I’m ready. I’m ready to depart, which is nice way of saying he’s ready to die. Simeon is facing the final battle—that enemy that has plagued every human in the history of the world—death. And yet, look at how he speaks of it. It is a grace, a gift from the Lord. The Lord is releasing him, he says. And he’s departing in peace. This is trust. The Bible says a little about the next stage after death, but it is impossible for us to grasp fully. But Simeon does not seem to feel any fear about that. Why?
The answer is in v. 30: for my eyes have seen your salvation. He can die in peace because he realizes that the Lord has not abandoned His creation. He can die in peace because He knows the moment has come. And that moment, that salvation, that deliverance, is the child Jesus in front of him. And that child, who is God in the flesh, will forever change the world. That is what and whom Simeon’s eyes have seen. Jesus is the salvation of the Lord. After all, the name Jesus means Savior. That is exactly what the angel Gabriel tells Joseph in Matthew’s Gospel. He says, “You will name the child Jesus because he will save his people from their sins” (1:21).
And this isn’t just something Simeon will see. The whole world will see it. Verse 31: that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples. This isn’t just for Israel. This is for all peoples. The whole world will see it. Simeon’s song contains quotations from Isaiah 49. Isaiah 49 concludes with theses words: Then all flesh shall know that I am the Lord your Savior, and your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob. The whole earth will know. This is an earth-shattering, earth-altering event. History will never be the same. As C. S. Lewis put it, “Once in our world, a Stable had something in it that was bigger than our whole world.”
And that was, to use the words from John’s Gospel, the light of the world. Look with me at v. 32: a light for the revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel. The word translated revelation is where we get our word apocalypse. Its core meaning is an unveiling or an uncovering. It is a revealing moment. Simeon is telling us that the Gentiles are being let in on the mystery. Christ is the light of unveiling in a dark world. And for the people of Israel, Christ is their glory because it is through Israel that these promises come. In God’s good providence and grace, He chose Israel to be the vessel for the light of the world. This light will overcome the darkness. Though the darkness will fight, it will not prevail. The darkness cannot quench the light.
W. H. Auden has this line in a poem: “We who must die demand a miracle.” Here is the answer. The light has dawned. The mystery has been revealed. Christ Jesus is the miracle.
Simeon’s words have been used in Christian liturgy since at least the fourth century. Typically, they are used during the evening or nighttime prayers. Because they are used in the evening prayer, it seems to strike the note of rest and ultimately death. But the fearful nature of death is overcome by the dawning light of salvation. Just like the Christmas lights shining in the dark, the light of Christ is penetrating this dark world and the curse is being reversed. The peace of God will soon fill all creation. That’s why Simeon says, “I can depart in peace.”
I’ll close with Coleridge’s final stanza in his Christmas poem about Mary:
Then wisely is my soul elate,
That strife should vanish, battle cease:
I’m poor and of low estate,
The Mother of the Prince of Peace.
Joy rises in me, like a summer’s morn:
Peace, Peace on Earth! The Prince of Peace is born![2]
[1] Tom Petty, “The Waiting.”
[2] Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “A Christmas Carol.”