Take your copy of the scriptures now. In turn for our New Testament reading will be our sermon text this morning. Luke chapter 2, starting verse 21. And please, if anyone is able and it feels like they’re about to spontaneously combust, it gets kind of hard in here, hot in here, feel free to motion to somebody and turn that heat right off. I know I run a little hotter than most, but just by the way. Okay, Luke chapter 2.

Before we go to the Lord in prayer, I mean, hear his word read and preached, let’s ask his blessing upon that now in prayer. Let’s pray together. Gracious heavenly Father, we come once more to you, to hear from you, Lord, in faith. I pray that we would be attentive and active, Lord, and that we would indeed, that our tensions would be arrested and that you would put all those things that would distract us and harass us in this hour from hearing you and hearing the voice of our Savior, Jesus. And so, Lord, I do pray at this time that the words of my mouth and the meditation deed of all of our hearts be acceptable in your sight. our rock and our Redeemer. For we ask this all in the mighty name of Jesus, and all God’s people said together, Amen. Amen.

Luke chapter 2, starting verse 21, I believe. Luke chapter 2. With your full attention now, this is the word of our God. Yes. Dealing with the wind turbine up here, okay. Luke 2, 21. Hear now the word of our God. And at the end of the eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. And when the time had come, came for their purification according to the law of Moses, They brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord, as it is written in the law of the Lord. Every male who first opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord, and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtle doves or two young pigeons. Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous, 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 his 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 he 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, the rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed, a sword will pierce through your own soul also, so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed. And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband 70 years from when she was a virgin, and then as a widow until she was 84. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day, and coming up that very hour, she began to give thanks to God and to speak of Him to all who are waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem. The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Amen. You may be seated.

As we have been looking these past number of weeks at the heavenly top four in regard to songs, expressions of joy and singing, breaking out at the birth narratives, the advent, the incarnation passages about Jesus. And when we read these narratives, we see these glorious songs. We remember that before things like Handel’s Messiah, as glorious as that piece of work is, or any other glorious piece of music, indeed, before the church in response to this redemptive historical advancement, it rightly, following God’s word, engages in new covenant hymnody at the advancement of God’s working, the history of redemption. The Church sang scripture. They sang biblical songs. Before any of that, we remember that the Holy Spirit himself sang songs of the Son’s advent, the second person of the Trinity coming into his creation and taking the form of man. A glorious thing indeed to reflect upon. And so we follow this glorious, blessed model of our comforter, our helper, our paraclete, as it were, the Holy Spirit. The profusion of songs and hymns in Luke’s Infancy Gospels is not accidental. There is an abundance of singing in Luke 1 and Luke 2, and there is. Surely something remarkable is going on. Something incredible is happening. something incredible indeed. And so we see these outbursts of song. We see them in Luke 1, verse 46, and following with the Magnificat, right, where Mary sings, My soul magnifies the Lord, responding to Elizabeth’s pronouncement that she is blessed among women. Or we think of the Benedictus, as it is known in Latin, in Luke 1, 68, which says, Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, For he has accomplished redemption for his people. Luke 1, 68. He has visited and redeemed his people. Thirdly, we see and we looked at the Gloria in Excelsis Deo, right? From Luke, Gloria in Excelsis Deo. This is the shout of the angels, right? Glory to God in the highest. And then our text today, this fourth song known as the Nunc Dimittis, which just means now Lord, now Lord. As I mentioned in the past, this outpouring of songs in Luke’s opening chapters, they’re a poetic marker of a huge shift, a turning point in history and God’s working amongst his creation. And we must remember that these songs mark What? They mark something remarkable, something monumental, something amazing. Luke’s infancy hymns briefly stated in summary are hymns of fulfillment. Hymns of fulfillment, God’s promises are being accomplished in this child Jesus that is attended with song and joy from heaven. There are creation promises. There are covenant promises. There are Exodus promises. There are Davidic promises. And now in him, this child, a new creation, a new covenant, a new Exodus, a new David. There are wedding promises. And now in him, a heavenly wedding banquet is prepared. The amazing thing happening, according to Luke’s infancy hymns, is that God’s Son has come to incarnate not only human flesh, but he’s come to incarnate those promises given long ago. And in the span of his life, all the promises of the former ages are lived, embodied, and incarnated, right? The line speaks truth and says it well, the old hymn that says, the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight, are met in this child, the Christ child. He has come, the advent is here. The incarnation of the history of God’s promises, right? The incarnation of the person of God’s son is that very thing. It’s the incarnation of the history of those promises of God. And as this child’s fulfillment of those promises means they are once and for all accomplished for us, right? A glorious thing indeed. And the promises of God are yes and amen in this child. They are indeed yes and amen in us who belong to this child, are united to him. And so Luke is writing to us in songs, songs of fulfillment of God’s promises through his infant son, Jesus Christ. Glorious. And so as you sing these songs, and as we will at the end of service sing the Nunc Dominitus, as was our practice, quite regularly, as I’ve been here, at least, since 2016. As you do, you sing about this amazing shift, this shift from promise to fulfillment, promise to fulfillment. And as we sing them, you must remember that this shift, this promise and the fulfillment belong to you and Jesus Christ, you who named the name of Christ, who had given faith and exercised that faith. and are united to Jesus, indeed. And so Mary’s words, we have to remember, are your song, even as Zechariah’s words are your song, and the angel’s words that we saw last week are your song. And so in Christ, you now sing the hymns of your infant Lord. But what of Simeon? What of old Simeon? Patient, long-suffering Simeon, What of him and his song? What of this nunc diminutus of Simeon? He sings his song 40 days, we’re told, after the birth of the Christ he holds in his arms. And what’s he saying? What does he sing? Well, he sings this. He says, now, now we can leave. What we all came here for is done. We can go in peace. We can depart in peace, just like it was supposed to be. And why is that? It’s just for our eyes have seen Jesus. Our eyes have seen salvation, which is what Jesus means. And that the Lord in heaven has brought that salvation down to earth at this very moment in an appointed way. And we have seen the glory of God’s people. The gospel promises them, that promise itself manifested in time and space and history. Salvation has been fulfilled. Blessed be the Lord God Almighty for he has come and accomplished redemption for his people, right, Luke 168. And so this song that Simeon sings, named after, again, it’s a Latin translation of the text there, the nunc diminutis, which just means now, Lord, Now, Lord. And all these songs, of course, have Latin names, as I said, or ancient Italian, as I like to refer to it as. They do so because they were historically part of the liturgy of the church, right? They’re part of the liturgy of that church. And in the church’s liturgy, historically, they would sing this song, Simeon’s song, after the gospel was read to close the service. And that is to say, now we’ve seen it. It’s calm. The service has reached its climax. The gospel of salvation is here. And it also was read and sung at Christian funerals, right? Which makes sense if you think about it, right? After Christians, the believers lay to rest in the grave, right? The song comes and the sentiment, now I may go, I may depart in peace. And this is because Simeon, we assume, it’s usually presumed, presented, was an elderly man. Even earlier, I referred to him, not deliberately, as old Simeon, right? He’s waited his whole life to see this Messiah, to see the Lord’s Christ. In the Spirit-filled song, these songs are a fitting close, an end to the nativity of Luke. Finally, it’s done. Nothing will ever be the same. Now there’s this sense of fulfillment. And that’s so central in this song. The world has changed. It has changed. It will never be the same. Of course, in Simeon’s context, as we’ve kind of unfolded the last number of weeks, he was living in the mid 700s BC of the Roman Empire. And we in the world, of course, now number the calendar starting here with the coming of Christ, Anno AD, right? Which means Anno Domini, which means the year of our Lord, the year of his Christ, right? And so I hope you will join me and agree, none of this common era stuff, none of this CE, have you seen this designation of the secular world and attempt to un-Christianized time, as it says, B.C.E. and C.E. None of that. I would encourage you. I’m saying this. I’m not binding your conscience, but be consistent with your Christian worldview. It’s the year of our Lord. And at the end of the day, what is the common era? Well, it’s the year of our Lord, right? It’s after Christ. It’s lame indeed. But what did Simeon see in that ordinary 40-days-old baby? What did he see? This baby that came into the temple. Well, he saw and he experienced the following. He saw the fulfillment of the law, right? The law’s fulfillment. He also saw the giving of the Spirit that was promised. And third, he saw the incarnation, the very incarnation of salvation, right? The Word made flesh. God’s saving sinners in a little baby, a seemingly weak, vulnerable, powerless baby. But first he saw the fulfillment of the law, right? And so here Luke repeats in our passage the phrase, the law of Moses or the law of the Lord. And he does so five times, right? says it over and over, verses 22, 23, 24, 27, 39, right? The law of the Lord, or the law of Moses. And Luke is telling us that Mary and Joseph were, what? What did we learn by this? That they were faithful, pious Israelites at that time. They’re doing everything required of them. They’re trying to follow God’s word faithfully. But he tells us much more in the words that he uses, as he tells us, of these pious, faithful Israelites. The word there that’s used to mark time commonly in Greek, the language that the Bible was written, is not super apparent to us in our English Bibles. This is one of the liabilities, of course, of languages and translations. But the Greek meaning is a little bit different. In verse 21, which says, at the end, right at this temporal indicator, at the end of eight days, what it says literally, is, and eight days having been fulfilled, right, or having been completed. This is the way that the original says that. And so you can see this kind of, right, you can see that it’s not, it doesn’t come through as well. Or in the next verse, in verse 22, we read, and when the time came, right, what that says again literally is, and when the time of purification had been fulfilled, had been completed. So there’s this linguistic connection that’s a little bit lost, but it’s very important, it’s very deliberate that we see it. And so Luke, at this closing of his nativity, He’s setting this tone of fulfillment, of completion, right? Not just that something had come, but that it’s completion, the fulfillment of something. And this is not new, right? This is not new when we see this kind of language or this emphasis being made, because throughout this whole section here in chapter 1 and chapter 2, we read over and over and over this same verb used with different nuance. For instance, we see John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit. That’s the same root word. Zechariah, his time of service, is fulfilled. The days are fulfilled, it says. Luke 1 57 it says now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth and she bore a son right to John the Baptist Zechariah is filled with the Holy Spirit when he sings his song in 2 6 Luke 2 6 this says and while they were there the time came for her to give birth right it was completed it was fulfilled for this to take place and in this final verse It’s a different but even more emphatic word, emphasizing this very thing in Luke 2, 39, where Luke says this. He said, And when they had performed everything according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee to their own town of Nazareth. Right? And they performed everything, they completed everything according to the law of the Lord. They return, and so it’s a different word in Greek, and it means perfected, completed, finished, right? It’s a word that indicates goal and end. So Luke is telling us that Jesus is what in regards to the law? He’s the fulfillment of the law. He’s the fulfillment, and as the Redeemer, he has to be born under that law, right? And so Luke, of course, was, who was Luke? He was a companion of Paul. And remember, Paul preached to the Galatians, and he wrote this. It’s familiar to us, a very common verse, when the fullness of time had come, right, when the fullness of time had come. Same verb, and it goes on, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to do what? To redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive our adoption as sons, as sons. And here’s another instance where, you know, modernism and egalitarianism and all those isms like would want us to, you know, adopt it as sons and daughters, right? which is not a good translation, because that’s not what it says. What it’s saying is that, as it says elsewhere in Galatians, there’s equality at the foot of the cross, right? And every single one that is united to Jesus, that is his, that has been given faith and exercised that faith, receives the status of adoption as sons, right? whom would inherit everything, right? And so there’s an indication of this as well, the status of the son. And so you sons and you daughters of the Lord receive this same exalted or elevated, rather, status as the sons of God. And so, you know, we see in this as well that before faith came, Paul told the Galatians they were what? Held captive under the law. The law was her guardian, we read, until Christ came. And this is why Simeon was looking for the consolation of Israel. He had his hopes set on comfort, the Christ, the God’s salvation, Yeshua, Jesus, would bring the comfort, the consolation that he would bring. And so he knew what those parents were doing in the temple, because he hung out there. And eight days after the birth, according to the law, Jesus submitted to what? The right of circumcision. The covenant sign that they knew and practiced for so long, and now 40 days after his birth. He’s in the temple again, right? Here’s Jesus and the parents back in the temple. And this is a summarized account that we read here. But there are possibly three different legal obligations that are taking place that had to be done that Joseph and Mary are, again, faithful, pious Israelites that they’re fulfilling here. The first is the purification of Mary, right? We read back in the Old Testament, the Levitical codes. As a mother, this was a time of uncleanness for her in the eyes of the ceremonial law, right? Not unclean sanitarily necessary, but unclean in regards to worship, right? And her status and her ability to come before the people, to come with the people before the Lord in worship. And so at the end of the 40 days, she had to be purified, right? So this is something that’s going on there as well. Then there is this idea of dedication to the Lord’s service, dedication. Like Hannah, remember old, the text of Hannah. She wasn’t old necessarily in the text that we read. But Hannah dedicated her son, right, Samuel, to the Lord. And then Mary’s song echoes some of the language here of Hannah and reminds us of that very dedication. of Samuel. And so Jesus, who’s been given to his parents, has been prophesied as a great prophet and as a great servant after the pattern of Samuel, right? And so it’s good for us to be familiar with our Bibles, and we indeed see the Christ-centered nature and the Christ, the goal, the Christotelic reality of Scripture. And then finally, we read about it in Exodus 13. And there’s this redemption of the firstborn, right? And we see this principle in the redemption from Egypt, right, in the Exodus. And remember that in Exodus, this very principle, because of the sin of the human heart, the human race, all the firstborn belong to the Lord. And when Pharaoh says, you will be my slaves, Yahweh says something different, right? Yahweh, the Lord says, no, they will be my servants in worship. I will take my people out, and if you don’t let them go, I will send my angel, my destroyer to kill every one of your firstborn. Because all of you, representatively, actually belong to me anyway. I’m your maker. I’m the creator. And let’s not forget that the Israelites also would have had their eldest son die in the 10th plague that we read about there in the Old Testament, except for the blood of the lamb, right? That’s what spared them, was the blood of the lamb. And for by the blood of the lamb, the angel would know You remember this there in the Exodus. They would know that these ones had been redeemed. They had been delivered from sin and death by blood, the blood of that lamb. And so every Israelite always, for all time, redeemed their firstborn. When you’d have your first child, you would make a trip to the temple and you’d go there and you’d give a lamb as a sacrifice the same representative lamb. And so imagine your firstborn child. I only get to keep this child because of the lamb. Your firstborn child, that’s why I can keep him, that’s why he can still be mine, because of the blood of that lamb. Just like Abraham kept Isaac, recall, his beloved and only child he’s referred to as. In Hebrews, his one and only, his unique son, Because that goat was provided by the Lord that was caught in the thicket, you remember. And the angel stayed his hand, and the sacrifice was provided from God. And so Jesus, the Lamb of God, takes away the sin of the world, stands in our place as sinners, since he is sinless, he’s able to do so. And this Lamb, two turtle doves that his parents give is a substitute for the people who aren’t able to afford a lamb, right? And so we see here it’s a mercy of God’s law, a provision for those unable. This lamb was not for Jesus. This purification ceremony was not for Mary, right? They are for us, right? They’re there for us. He removes our sin by being born under the law, by becoming sin himself, even in this sacrifice. And he redeems us from the curse of the law. We will never again, therefore, need the blood of a lamb after Christ’s sacrificial offering of himself, right? The lamb of God. So Simeon says, now, now I’ve seen God’s salvation. He’s here, he’s here. All those things pointed towards and prefigured, typified, that one is here, finally. He’s fulfilling the law for me even now. I can go in peace, says Simeon. I’ve seen salvation’s dawn. And there’s some questions that come up when we’re reading this text here. Like, why was Jesus given the sign of circumcision that we read about in verse 21? Many people ask this. It’s kind of a natural question. Verse 21, of course, says, now on the eighth day, he was, speaking of Jesus, circumcised. Why did he need to be purified with his mother, presented to the Lord, and redeemed from the destroying angel? Right, why is that? This is significant to us. We see it whenever we have a baptism here. We’ve had many gloriously baptisms at Providence Presbyterian Church, right? We see it and we see the waters of baptism and hear the promises. We see the significance and we hear the significance of those promises. And Paul tells us in Romans 4 that circumcision was what? It was a sign of the righteousness that came by faith. It was a sign and seal of this very thing. And Abraham received the sign of circumcision, it says, and he believed after he was already righteous by virtue of the Lord’s doing. But it sealed it to him. It confirmed him. And so it reminded him of what God had done, what he had already done by faith alone. Now, children or younger, folk, you younger people. Remember this circumcision, like your baptism, it does two things, right? Circumcision operates in two ways. It marks you out as a Christian. You belong to the Lord. You’re not of the world. Belong to the Lord God Almighty. It says you aren’t like everyone else in the world. You belong to another. You belong to Jesus. Not Satan, and not all the self-worshipping and other corruptions of the world. You belong to Jesus. That’s who you are. It sets God’s people apart. It marks them as his. These are mine. What was symbolized in circumcision is the cutting away, the removal of flesh, the removal of sin. That’s why the language that’s used in the Old Testament is to cut a covenant. To cut, that’s the mechanism. Cut a covenant. And so why would Jesus Christ, the sinless one, why would he be circumcised? It’s a logical question if you’re a thinking individual. He was sinless. No covenant needed to be cut with him. It cuts with him. So what’s in this principle in which Paul preaches and that Luke teaches? What is it? that he was fulfilling the law on our behalf, right? Paul says this in Colossians. He says when the sinless one is cut for our sins, right? Colossians 2. When he was cut for our sins, he was circumcised in the flesh, in his body, on the cross. To what? To take away our sin. To take away our body of death. That old covenant sign of circumcision symbolizes the same promise. Righteousness comes by faith alone, right? And so this doctrine, this teaching, this biblical instruction of justification by faith isn’t simply a New Testament invention that Paul was sitting around and goes, I have this idea. It’s not novel. It’s not an invention. It’s an Old Testament promise all along, and a sign for a child isn’t a sign that this child has professed faith. It’s a sign of God’s faithful promise to that child and to his covenant people. It’s a sign of the promise made to every single child that we’ve seen gloriously been baptized here over the years that I’ve been here, that God saves believers who confess they need saving. Yes, praise God. And children, If you believe that you need to be saved, God saves you as well. As you exercise the faith given to you. And adults, if you believe that you need to be saved, God will save you as well. God saves sinners who confess their sins and go to Christ in faith. And so that’s the message always of every Christian church and every Christian message, right? Go to Jesus, flee to him for life. If you’ve not, I commend you again, go to him. Come to Jesus, have life, have life. So the circumcision was a sign to Christ himself that he would come, that he would die on the cross, and that he would take away the sins of God’s people. And this promise doesn’t change. We talked for some time this morning about the immutability of God, his unchanging nature. He’s not a man that he should lie. Not capricious. He doesn’t learn. He doesn’t change. He’s not sorry for what he does, right? And so in the New Testament, God saves sinners. And so we pray and we teach and we rear our children to profess this faith as their own, right, to appropriate for themselves that which was promised in the waters of baptism for themselves to believe with their own hearts in this Redeemer who saves them from their sins. But we know that they are heirs of this promise. because of the principle, like, their heirs because of the principle of, like, solidarity in the household. All throughout the Old Testament, the Lord works with families. And so Peter proclaims this very thing in his Pentecost sermon, you remember. Early on in the book of Acts, that this promise is what? It’s for you and for your children after you. As many as the Lord would call to himself. as he quotes the Old Testament, right? And so it’s very important, so not just optional, that the children of believers receive the sign that identifies what they already are, the sign of the new covenant. It’s a badge of belonging to that community, and so it shows that we’re not trusting in them, but what are we doing? What are we trusting in? In God, who keeps his promises to save our children, to work his spirit in them by faith, and call them to live out of a genuine active adult faith. So Jesus felt the blade of circumcision, though he did not deserve it. Simeon sees his salvation in that child. The fulfillment of all those promises, the hopes and fears of all the years, he sees in this child, the Christ child. And so that’s the first main thing that Luke tells us that he wants us to see here. The law of God is fulfilled in this child in Jesus. And the next thing that we see this next the second experience if you will of simeon is when we look at this text is that we see what we see the giving of the holy spirit right and so look back at your story and this is an important point look back at your history your story your experience We don’t ground the things that we believe, and it doesn’t drive what we believe are subjective experiences. But they’re not unimportant. So think of yourself. Think of yourself, your story, and this is important. Simeon is a believer. How? Only by the power of the Holy Spirit. That’s how things work. He sees Jesus as his salvation, this ordinary, regular, weak baby. There might’ve been, you know, similar children in that temple complex that his parents bring them into. It may have been 20 parents and kids, you know, wandering around in the temple, but he sees that baby, that baby specifically as his salvation. Because why? Because he has Spirit-given faith. So he sees Christ out of the other individuals there. And that’s awesome. Isn’t that awesome? And, you know, so can you, on the same basis, by the same power, alone by the Holy Spirit, receive Christ as your own, like Simeon, like every believer. Simeon is the singer of our song, right? And he’s a spirit-filled singer, really, truly. He’s awaiting the consolation of Israel. He’s received a special promise. And this is where Simeon, of course, is different from us, right? We’re not Simeon. He received a revelation from the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he saw the Messiah Christ in The flesh. Notice verses 25, 26, and 27. And again, our author here uses repetition three times to mention the Holy Spirit. It says, the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit. He came in the Holy Spirit to the temple. So Simeon comes to see Jesus as his salvation that particular day, that particular place, in that particular way because of the guiding of the Holy Spirit. In the Old Testament, of course, the Holy Spirit was poured out, poured out at specific times on particular prophets for particular reasons. Hundreds of years have passed. Hundreds of years have passed since such an outpouring of the Spirit was seen, right? So between the last prophet, time-wise in our scripture, Malachi, and the coming of Christ, between these, with all these angelic outpourings of songs from heaven, And now because of Christ, because of the arrival of Christ, the spirit is beginning to pour out more and more. And it’s only by this remarkable thing itself, this remarkable outpouring of the spirit that Simeon sees that he receives this promise. So Simeon is like a prototype, right? He doesn’t know what a prototype is. He’s like an archetype of all of Israel, the one who waited a long time finally gets his promise, finally come. This is a very big deal in the scripture. The longing, the waiting, the waiting. It’s pictured in Simeon. Long suffering, long waiting, Simeon and finally. So Simeon is like Israel in miniature. Thousands of years of waiting for this child. Simeon wasn’t thousands of years old. But Israel, generation after generation after generation, the longing, the waiting, the yearning, the anticipation. And then in Simeon’s lifetime is the fulfillment. Comes. Think of all that silence for all that in-between time and interdisciplinary time. Dead air in regard to what had been taking place before. And then finally, this explosion of songs at the coming of Jesus, right? The fulfillment of all these things. And he says, now you can let me go, Lord. My eyes have seen your salvation. And it’s the Holy Spirit who gives Simeon, I fear I’ve been calling him Simon, so I apologize. Simeon, the Spirit gives him eyes of faith, this man. It’s his faith which lets him see Jesus, faith that was given to him. And we also know that believing gives us Isaiah’s faith as well. Believing gives us, right? We express that faith to see God’s hand in this world, to see his promises truly fulfilled. And they are, right? If you consider that, if you thought about that in your life, in the reality of the outworking of history that you’re a part of, And, you know, it’s true, right? There’s nothing stopping any of us, nothing stopping any one of you from seeing the salvation of the Lord today, right, today. You’re not seeing it. You can see it today. See it today, right? The Lord still does great miracles. The Lord still raises people from the dead. Do you believe that? Raises people from the dead. That sounds like, you know, you’re thinking, Pastor Tony, oh, you’re Reformed. Like, what are you? I know he raises people from the dead, because he raised you from the dead, and he raised me from the dead, and gave us life and a heart that beats rather than a heart of stone for him and lives for him. And yes, he’s obsessed, truly, worshipfully, Jesus, right, the one who saves you and gives you life. So it can happen today, it’s not gonna happen for you. And so Simeon acts in this nativity account as you should act, right? At the end of this scene, you should sing, now, I’ve seen the salvation of the Lord in this ordinary, recently wetted baby, right? Salvation of the Lord. And so this stranger’s words of promise spoken over him. And so the Holy Spirit is poured out. And did you notice in the text, as we look at it, how many times in these two chapters, Luke 1 and 2, that the Spirit has been mentioned? Theologians have referred to the Holy Spirit as the shy member of the Trinity. Have you heard that? Because it’s not the Spirit’s intention to draw It’s not his point to draw attention to himself, it’s a point to Christ, right? And to apply the salvation won by Christ, won by the Son, decreed by the Father to individual believers in time. So he’s referred to as the shy member of the Trinity. But notice how many times in these birth accounts, Luke 1 and 2, the Holy Spirit is mentioned, right? Ten times, ten times. There’s a spike in the occurrence, right? Significant. And remember that Luke also, in part two of Luke, Luke two, you might call it, we call it Acts, right? That’s Luke’s, Luke wrote Acts. Remember that there, Luke describes the Holy Spirit as very active. And the Spirit is active, and he is so at the beginning of his gospel, and also in the book of Acts, where the Holy Spirit is, remember, the birthday of the church, poured out over the church. poured out over the church. And there’s this correlation to the people of God, right? Remember in the Old Testament, after the Israelites committed adultery on their wedding night by worshiping this calf, right, remember? That most terrible thing that they had done. And 3,000 of them were slain because of that, you remember. Body of Christ in Acts, at the outpouring of the Spirit, in Acts we’re told what? 3,000 were added to the church that day. The outpouring of the Spirit over the church. And so it’s as if, as though Luke wants to tell us that the Spirit is active. He’s active, he’s doing something new. Redemptive historical advancement. Shift is taking place, it’s important. The spirit, that same spirit that hovered over creation is hovering here, active. Active and hovering in the coming of Christ and in the founding of the church. And so Simeon saw the law fulfilled with his own two eyes and experienced the giving of the Holy Spirit, which we, brothers and sisters, now experience through Christ our Lord. And then finally, he sees what? Simeon sees salvation. And it’s my earnest prayer, my genuine prayer, that as you depart this place, on this run up to Christmas that’s coming, culture recognizes and is a big deal, that as you depart from here and enter into your Christmas, that you leave at peace with God, leave at peace with God, leave resolved with certainty that you belong to this Jesus. You belong to this Jesus who was held and amazed over, this infant Jesus, the same one who would hang on a real cross and bleed real blood and be really dead and would really rise again. to save his people. It’s my prayer that you leave it that way and that you leave at peace with God by virtue of the Redeemer, Jesus, right? Having seen and heard and even touched, right? Though not by the waters of baptism this morning, but how? By those things which he’s given us in bread and in wine. by the salvation of our God, by the promises, by sign and seal, the ordinance which he’s given us, weak and needy Christians, feeble and forgetful, tethered to the physical, right? He’s given us something that we can understand for our good and for his glory. and seeing you have believed and believing you have seen. These are words to sing at the very end of our worship service. Indeed, which is why many did, but indeed it’s why Calvin insisted to conclude all of his services with the Song of Simeon. Now I can depart in peace, peace and shalom by virtue of the Lord. I have seen your salvation, my God. And so does that matter? Is that just something for in here? Does that matter outside in the world, in a dead and dying world, as a sinner in a world full of sinners with other sinners? Most certainly it does. Most certainly it matters. Oh, back out into the world. And dear Christian, it matters more than we can ever comprehend. We go through all the trials of this world and the weight of this life and the ups and downs all the failings of our own hearts, even internally, and the crushing mass and weight of our own sins. And we come and we hear the gospel, the salvation of our God in Christ, Jesus, the God man. And we see the gospel in the sacraments of water and baptism and bread and wine. and we’re reminded and we know again or even afresh. Now I can depart in peace. Now I can go in peace. Salvation has come and I’m a part of that. And once again, the way the sorrows, the fears have been released, they’ve been enlightened, they’ve been dealt with. I have peace, and I’m reminded of that peace that I have for certainty. Not because of my subjective concerns, but because of the objective reality outside of myself that Christ died for me, was raised for me. And once again, as we go through this, the weight and the sorrows and the fears that we have are gone, I have peace. I’m reminded of that peace, Lord’s day by Lord’s day. And so Paul says to the Corinthians, and we all with unveiled faces, beholding the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit, beholding the glory of our Lord. We all behold the glory of the Lord in his word and in his Christ. And the wonderful, glorious, remarkable thing, the beautiful thing is, brothers and sisters, we behold and we confess, sitting at the right hand of the Father, confess Christ, this one who is there. And scripture says what of us? That we are by faith, seated in the heavenly places with him. Now blow your mind. If the sight of Christ’s glory doesn’t bring our minds peace and our hearts peace, if it doesn’t joyfully prepare us for all the weight and the difficulties and the suffering and all of it of life, then we haven’t yet seen Christ with the eyes of faith. Or we’ve allowed ourselves to grow dim and to wander and to grow cold. John’s first letter begins this way. 1 John 1, that which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands concerning the word of life, the life was made manifest and we have seen it and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us. Now which we have seen and heard, we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us. And indeed, our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.” So when the apostle John writes these words, when he wrote these words, he’s likely, like what’s going on historically, he’s likely the last living apostle. He alone is left, one who leaned upon the breast of his Lord and seen his Lord and touched him. But he invites the church to what? To what she’s writing. He invites them into his seeing in order to manifest the light and life that God has shown to all the worlds. Salvation has been seen. And even come Monday, right? Even come Tomorrow, when all the presents are open, even after this day of giving and receiving and reflecting and praising, after that, gifts are given. And if you’re particularly disciplined, all the mess has been wrapped up and taken out, and the busyness and bluster of it all dies down. We are left as what? Back again as fallen people, fallen worlds, and all the sorrows remain. But dear believer, we must remember, because it’s true, all the promises have been fulfilled. The Holy Spirit has been outpoured with a guarantee for you of a home and glory. And God’s salvation The word made flesh, the incarnation of that Jesus, the Messiah has come and we see him. And more importantly, he sees us and never lives to pray for us. Is our great prophet, priest and king. So brothers and sisters, when we hear these words this time of year, all the singing of the Messiah This is the truth that comes in that Christ child. The king of this world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever. He is the king of kings and the Lord of lords. Hallelujah.

Let’s pray. Our great Father, we praise you for your tenderness with us. We praise you for your mercy and your goodness. We thank you, Lord, that you’re not a capricious God. We praise you that you saw fit, merely out of your good love, to make a way of escape from that ruin which the first Adam cast all men into. We praise you for our Savior, Jesus. Lord, help us to believe that which we have heard. Help us to continually, with a childlike faith, to entrust ourselves upon him. Through all the things that we go through in this life, Lord, you know each one. Lord, we feel, so often, so ill-equipped. Lord, we feel so often just a small taste of your love. Lord, if we’re honest, sometimes we would acknowledge that it’s overwhelming. Then we all have, to some extent, imposter syndrome, and we know that we don’t deserve it, but Lord, we praise you that you give nevertheless, as you’ve seen fit, as you’ve decreed, and as our Savior died, and as the Spirit in time historically applies that salvation to your people, to those whom you’ve decreed, Lord, we praise you that we are counted among them. Lord, we do pray, if there are any here whom you’re working on who have not yet given themselves to Christ, Lord, we pray do that today. Lord, we pray that you would be glorified in the giving of life. Be with us, we pray, as we continue in this service. We ask it in Jesus’ name, amen.