Mysteries Revealed
Reveal Your Beauty
Isaiah 61:10-62:2, Luke 2:22-45 Ps 148, Gal. 4:4-7
I am not sure what your mental picture is of the temple in Jerusalem where Joseph
and Mary took Jesus to fulfill the Law of Moses. Many bibles have a drawing of
the temple layout with its various courts. What was in the innermost court only the
high priest ever saw and that only on very special days of the year. The outermost
court was open to everyone and that is likely the area where Jesus created a scene
with a whip and called it a den of thieves. It was a market place where you could
buy animals and birds. Jewish worshippers would take them as an offering into the
next court and a priest would kill and burn it on the altar. That is what Joseph and
Mary were doing within eight days of the birth of their son, Jesus.
Given our modern day sensibilities, I am not sure any one of us would want to visit
that temple. It is much easier to think about the Temple that Solomon built with its
gold and precious metals, stone and cedar, from the description in 1Kings, 4-5.
But even in that place I will let you imagine the smell and the noise of animal
sacrifices.
But Anna, 84 years old, spent day and night serving God by praying and fasting in
the temple. A quick calculation suggests that she could have been doing that for
over 50 years. We don’t know how old Simeon was but his words; now I can die
in peace suggest that he too was a very old man.
So what did they see that day in the temple? The very same scene would have
been repeated over and over again. Anna would have witnessed it countless times
over years that she had faithfully served in the temple. What was different this
time? Or more importantly, what did Simeon and Anna see that the throng of
people going through the temple that did not even notice? And, how come?
This past week, Fran and I visited with Jim and Marion Perry. As many of you
know, Jim lives with a significant vision problem. Nevertherless, he continues to
produce beautiful wall hangings in needlepoint and even pettipoint. He has a large
hanging in a stairway in the entrance foyer to his home, of a bouquet of roses. The
frame is black matting and brass and matches beautifully with the colours and
woodwork. The frame recedes behind the picture as though holding it forward for
all to see. His daughters have both admired the hanging and have their eyes on it
in what they hope is a distant future. But to ensure peace in the family he
reproduced the needlepoint hanging and invited me to come to a guest bedroom
where it hangs above the bed.
I had to look twice to realize that I was looking at the same picture. The bed had a
white spread and was mounded with soft coloured pillows. The appointments in
the room were all white or soft off white colours. The hanging was framed with a
white wooden frame with gold tracings. It was a deep frame, as though out in front
protecting the picture from prying eyes.
But it was the same bouquet of roses.
As I was preparing this sermon and I asked the question, how come, why is it that
what Simeon and Anna saw was so different that what the throngs of other people
in the temple saw that day, those two pictures flashed through my mind. I knew, in
that moment, that I had an illustration for this morning’s sermon.
The difference for those two wall hangings is the context in which they are
presented. Context includes the room in the house where they are displayed, an
open inviting foyer and a closed private bedroom. It involves the other
appointments in the room, colour, woodwork, lighting, accompanying decorations.
And context includes the frame. One invites affirmation of the beauty and
expressiveness of the picture, the other invites silent reflection on the peaceful
beauty.
Think with me now about the context for those who attended the temple on that
day that Luke records for us.
Were some of them there because this is what they had to do and get it over with?
“Out of my way Joseph and Mary from Nazareth, it’s my turn” thinks one of the
impatient worshippers. “Next,” the busy priest who is on duty that month calls out
from behind the altar. I don’t think you had to take a number like you do in a busy
mall store this week. “The price for pigeons has sure gone up this year” is sure to
be a complaint from somewhere.
A carpenter with a teenage wife and a son, aren’t worth a second look, just more of
the same.
That is not a context in which anyone is likely to see beauty.
But that same picture, a carpenter with a teenage wife and a son, was enough for
Anna to praise God and remember the hope of all Jerusalem to be set free. It was
enough for Simeon know that God had kept a promise. “With my own eyes I have
Theirs was the context of expectation and faith. They expected to see how God
would go about saving the people of Israel and how God would bring light for all
people.
God, reveal your beauty. But beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And the eye of
the beholder sees out of a specific context. If you are anxious to get home to
prepare dinner for visiting family, this worship service is getting too long. If you
were in a mad rush to get your shopping done last week, you could easily have
walked right past a neighbour without seeing him or her. If we come to worship
out of duty or habit the experience is profoundly different than if we have come
expecting to see and hear God bless you, with words of forgiveness and love.
God has revealed his beauty. Do we see it like Simeon and Anna did or do we
walk past it as unaware of the drama as the crowds in the temple were.
Every child born has the potential to be son or daughter of God. Every person
living bears the image of God. Is that what we expect to see or is that what we
look for. We will see what we want to see.
In a dirty temple or an ugly world, it is very easy to look past the beauty that walks
right in front of us. But when any of our experiences are framed in a context of
faith, in the context of knowing a God who comes into our world, is present to us
in every circumstance, we can find peace, strength and beauty.