Sermon Tone Analysis

Waiting for Christmas

Luke 2:21-40

Open your Bible to the second chapter of Luke’s gospel.

I want to share some actual letters that children wrote to Santa:

Dear Santa Claus,

When you come to my house there will be cookies for you.

But if you are real hungry you can use our phone and order a pizza to go.

Dear Santa,

I want a Puppy.

I want a playhouse.

Thank you.

I’ve been good most of the time.

Sometimes I’m wild.

Dear Santa, (From a 4-year-old)

I’ll take anything because I haven’t been that good.

Dear Santa,

I’m not going to ask for a lot.

Here’s my list: The Etch-A-Sketch animator, 2 packs of #2 pencils, Crayola fat markers and the big gift...my own TV!

Well, maybe you could drop the pencils; I don’t want to be really selfish.

Kids (and some adults) have a hard time waiting for Christmas.

Christmas is all about waiting.

Once Thanksgiving is over, the wait begins.

Well, actually the wait begins earlier and earlier every year.

It seems like it starts around Halloween these days when the stores start putting their Christmas decorations out.

We make our lists.

We check them twice.

We star trying to be nice even though we haven’t been most of the year.

We cross our fingers and hope for the best come Christmas morning.

And then we wait.

I know that when I was young, I would deliberate over my Christmas list.

I’d sit down with the Sears or JC Penney catalog and go through the toy section, trying to decide which of the Star Wars toys that I wanted the most.

I mean, the truth is that I wanted them all but you learn pretty quickly that Santa can’t get everything that you want so you have to learn to prioritize.

But you would try to go to sleep on Christmas Eve.

I would lay there looking out the window, trying to spot a red light that just might be Rudolph’s nose.

Christmas was the one day of the year that I wouldn’t need anybody to get me of bed.

Me and my sister would take turns through the night to sneak out of bed and see if there were any presents under the tree.

What is it that you are waiting for Christmas?

Is there something that you are longing for?

Is it pencils or markers or maybe a TV?

What is it that you’re expecting to get this year?

Are you waiting for something special?

Over the last several weeks, we have seen how God was coming to us in the person of His Son.

We’ve unwrapped the gifts that were given to Mary and Joseph.

He revealed His plan to Mary and she responded with, “let it be to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38).

Joseph struggled to figure out his part in God’s drama, but eventually “…did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife” (Matthew 1:24).

And last week, we saw how the greatest gift ever is the gift of Jesus.

Here in the second chapter of Luke’s gospel we come across two characters that make their appearance in the final acts of the Christmas drama.

One is a man named Simeon and the other is a woman named Anna.

You won’t find them represented in any of the nativity scenes or on a Christmas card but both of them played important roles in the Christmas narrative.

See, this man and woman were both waiting for something that Christmas – actually, they were waiting for someone.

We see their anticipation, their expectation, and their hope for the coming of the Messiah, of the Christ, the savior.

So, let’s pray before we read our text for this morning and unwrap the gifts that Simeon and Anna received that first Christmas.

Pray!

The first thing that we are going to discover is that Simeon was waiting for comfort.

Waiting for Comfort

Look at how we are introduced to Simeon:

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 (consolation is another word for comfort), and the Holy Spirit was upon him.

Simeon was righteous and devout in his relationship with God.

Now remember, things weren’t going really well for the nation of Israel.

They hadn’t heard from God for a very long time and they were under Roman rule.

They had lost their political independence and were living in fear of the cruel King Herod, and many people were wondering when or if the Messiah would ever come.

But Simeon had good reason for his hope and anticipation:

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.

Simeon was waiting for something that Christmas season.

He was waiting for the consolation, the comfort of Israel.

Simeon’s expectation focused on the comfort that Christ would bring.

Among Jews of Simeon’s day one of the popular titles of the Messiah was Comforter.

They were longing for the Messiah to come and bring His comfort to them.

But the desire to be comforted is a universal human need.

We all struggle with loneliness, emptiness, insecurity, depression, and even desperation.

We all want to be comforted.

So, the Holy Spirit encouraged Simeon to go to the temple courts at just the right time on just the right day that Joseph and Mary were bringing their baby boy to the Temple.

When Simeon looked at the baby Jesus, now almost 6 weeks old, he knew that God’s promise had been kept.

Here was Immanuel, “God with us.”

Verse 28 tells us that Simeon reached down and took Jesus out of Mary’s arms and began to praise God.

Let’s stop for just a minute here.

Imagine you’re a parent and some old guy that you had never seen before in your life, just comes up to you, takes your baby out of your arms and starts praising God?

I bet it was a little disturbing to say the least for Mary and Joseph.

But I guess not a lot of what happened with Jesus’s birth went the same way it did for other children.

Maybe Simeon didn’t look that dangerous, maybe he just appeared to be a harmless old man.

And as he broke out into praise, he recognized that God had not only fulfilled His individual promise to him (that he would see the Messiah) but also all the promises of the prophets to send the anointed one to comfort both Jews and Gentiles.

Simeon was waiting for comfort and Anna was waiting for forgiveness.

Waiting for Forgiveness

The other Christmas character waiting with anticipation was Anna.

After her husband had died, she had dedicated herself to fasting and praying in the temple.

In fact, she never left the temple ­ but worshipped day and night.

She was always at church, every service and every day.

She was looking forward to the same person as Simeon was, but with a different expectation.

Instead of looking for comfort, Anna was looking for forgiveness.

And as Simeon is speaking with Mary and Joseph, Anna:

38 And coming up at that very hour she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem.

The word redemption is related to the idea of captivity.

The Old Testament Passover and the release of Israel from Egyptian slavery stood in Anna’s day as the ultimate redemption and the symbol of God’s power to release those held captive.

Ultimately, the Passover pointed ahead to that day when God would provide deliverance from the bondage of sin.

When Anna saw Jesus, she gave thanks to God and spoke of Him to all who were waiting for redemption.

Here, at last, (finally!) was the One who would save His people from their sins.

Anna and Simeon believed when few others truly believed in Christ’s coming.

They never gave up but kept trusting and looking.

Simeon and Anna represented everyone who saw that their only hope was in the mercy and grace of God.

Along with the poor carpenter and his wife and the outcast shepherds, they were flesh-and-blood examples of those to whom Christ comes.