Join for our live streamed Sunday School (9:30am) and Worship Service (10:30am). You can view them HERE.

Mary, Anna & Jesus

Luke’s Nativity

Jan 3, 2021


by: Jack Lash Series: Luke’s Nativity | Category: Advent | Scripture: Luke 2:34–38

I. Introduction
A. This is the final sermon on Luke’s Nativity. I hope it’s been a blessing to you. It sure has to me.
B. Setting: 40th day, to the temple, old Simeon comes up
C. Luke 2:34–38 And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, “Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed 35 (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.” 36 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 seven years from when she was a virgin, 37 and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day. 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.
II. The waiting ones
A. Today we are talking about Simeon and Mary and Anna. They – along with Zechariah, Elizabeth, and Joseph were a part of a community of those who were anxiously waiting for the coming of the promised messiah and His kingdom.
B. This is an important part of the background for the story of Christ’s birth.
C. Luke mentions this community when he says of Anna in v.38 that “she began to...speak of Him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem.”
D. This is also how he characterized Simeon in Luke 2:25: “looking for the consolation of Israel.”
E. Remember Joseph of Arimathea, the pharisee and member of the Sanhedrin in whose tomb Jesus was buried? Well, later on, Luke tells us that he was in this group as well, referring to him as “a man...who was waiting for the kingdom of God.” (Luke 23:50-51, Cf. Mark 15:43)
F. These people weren’t just believers, they were expectant, waiting believers.
G. What caused this community to rise up at this time of history, just in time for Christ to be born? Why was there such heightened messianic expectation just before Christ’s birth?
1. The Messiah was promised way back in the garden of Eden.
2. The promises reach a crescendo in the prophets, especially during the time of the kingdom and the exile in Babylon. There were a number of prophecies promising that Israel would return and be restored, many which included the coming of the Messiah and the giving of the Spirit.
3. However, when the exiles actually returned to the land of Israel, it became obvious that this couldn’t be the final restoration the prophets had predicted.
a. The temple was not so glorious.
b. The Kingdom was never restored... The son of David was never put back onto the throne to reign forever. The Messiah did not come.
c. The problems remained. The people of Israel kept falling back into sin. Israel never got out from under the rule of foreign rulers.
d. The prophets of the restoration – the final prophets of the OT: Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi – all began talking about another day in the future to look forward to as the day of restoration.
4. And then there was the prophecy of Daniel 2:31ff. re: the giant statue of gold, silver, bronze, iron and clay – representing 4 kingdoms: Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome.
a. In this vision, it says that “A stone was cut out without hands, and it struck the statue on its feet of iron & clay (the Rome part of the statue) and crushed them. Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver and the gold were crushed all at the same time and became like chaff from the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away so that not a trace of them was found. But the stone that struck the statue became a great mountain & filled the whole earth.” (2:34-35, cf.2:45)
b. And this is explained in Dan.2:44, “In the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed...it will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure forever.”
c. The four kingdoms
(1) Babylonian began around 626BC
(2) Medo-Persian began around 539BC
(3) And then there is silence for 400 years.
(4) During the silence, the Greek empire began around 330BC.
(5) And finally the Roman empire began around 31BC (lasting to the 5th century AD).
(6) And once this fourth kingdom is established, it sets off a flurry of messianic expectation, because it was during this fourth kingdom when the stone cut without hands was to come.
5. Believers put their hope in these promises, and lived for the day when they would be fulfilled.
III. What Simeon said about Jesus – v.34-35. Simeon says three things about Jesus:
A. “this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel”
1. What does this mean? Jesus Himself makes it clear what this means. In Mat.21:33-45, at the end of the parable of the vineyard, He quotes Ps.118:22: “The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.” And then Jesus adds: “And he who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces.” Jesus Himself, of course, is the stone.
2. So, here you have it. People being raised up and people falling on account of Jesus.
3. Those who receive Jesus are raised up as a glorious temple built on the Him as the cornerstone; those who reject Him stumble and fall over the same stone and are broken to pieces.
4. Peter elaborates on this theme in 1Pet. 2:4-8: As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, 5 you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house... 6 For it stands in Scripture: “Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.” 7 So the honor is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone,” 8 and “A stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense.” They stumble because they disobey the word.
5. It is the same stone in both cases. Some are stumbling over it and being broken to pieces. Others are building upon it and are being healed. The same stone breaks apart and puts together. The same stone lifts up and casts down. The issue that makes the difference is this: some have received the stone and others have rejected it.
B. “this child is appointed... for a sign that is opposed”
1. Not only would Jesus cause some to rise up and others to fall down, but Simeon also says He will be opposed.
2. This is very true. Jesus is opposed more than He is embraced. This was true when He was here. The people who saw Him in person put Him on a cross!
3. And it isn’t any different now. If they had power over Him today, they’d kill Him again.
4. He was opposed, and the same thing is true of His followers (John 15:18).
a. If popularity and human approval is what you’re about, then don’t follow Jesus.
b. The more Jesus rules your life, the more those who oppose Him will oppose you.
C. “so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.”
1. Why did they oppose Him so vehemently?
a. Jesus was the light, and light exposes darkness. And most people prefer darkness to light (Jn3:19).
b. He exposes ulterior motives. He exposes hypocrisy. He exposes prejudice. He exposes pride. He exposes idolatry. He exposes unbelief.
c. Jesus did some things people didn’t like. But Jesus also undid some things people liked.
d. Jesus brought change in areas some people didn’t want change.
e. He was not just a doer; He was also an undoer.
f. Obvious sins and idolatries didn’t need to be exposed. Jesus exposed secret sins – idolatries which were part of their belief system, sins they didn’t think were sins.
g. And some of them didn’t like that at all. And so they opposed Him. And so, the secret thoughts of many hearts were revealed.
2. You see, how you respond to Jesus reveals what is in your heart.
a. You can’t tell what’s in a person’s heart by what His political opinions are.
b. You can’t tell by what language he speaks.
c. You can’t tell by personality.
d. You can’t tell by whether they are introverts or extraverts.
e. But you can tell a person’s heart by how they respond to Jesus.
IV. What Simeon said about Mary – v.35 “a sword will pierce through your own soul also”
A. After saying that Jesus is a sign which was to be opposed, Simeon adds something about how this is going to affect Mary herself: “a sword will pierce through your own soul also.”
B. Ten months after Gabriel refers to her as favored and tells her that the Lord is with her (Luke 1:28), Mary is told by Simeon that a sword will pierce her soul. What does this mean?
C. Jesus will be so opposed as to be pierced on a cross. But Mary also will be pierced, not in body but in her soul. With her mother’s heart, she watched her precious Son – the best son any mother ever had – be mocked and hated, and then crucified in shame.
D. If God loved Mary so much, why didn’t He spare her this?
1. God didn’t spare Mary BECAUSE He loved her so much. (See John 11:5-6.)
E. And how foolish it would have been to try to stop the piercing – to attack the Roman guards or try to stir up a rescue party.
1. She would have been resisting her own salvation.
2. Fortunately for her and for us, Mary’s “May it be to me as you have said” extended even to her grief at the cross.
3. And how she was rewarded for this!! For His piercing was her salvation as it was ours: “For He was pierced for our transgressions; and crushed for our iniquities...and with his wounds we are healed.” – Is.53:5
F. This summarizes the servants of God. We are like Mary: highly-favored and deeply-pierced.
1. God has given us Jesus, but He also gives us suffering. And the two go hand-in-hand.
2. The story begins with good news of great joy. But all is not rosy. Many will reject Him. And even those who are closest to Him will be pierced in the deepest part of their soul.
3. Aslan is not a safe lion. But He’s good. And He loves His little ones.
G. Does the piercing sword diminish the gift of the Savior? Does the suffering tarnish the privilege of being favored? No, it polishes it. The fire purifies the gold, it makes it even more precious.
V. Anna’s strange contribution – v.36-38
A. The story of Christ’s birth has a rather strange ending. We’re told about an old woman named Anna, who was a prophetess. She spent all her time in the temple, worshiping and fasting and praying constantly. And she came up to Joseph and Mary and the baby Jesus and began to thank God. Then she went to tell the news to all who were waiting for the promised redemption.
B. So why is this in here? Why did God ordain this to happen and then include it in His word? What is God trying to tell us through it?
C. It is certainly a demonstration of Luke’s appreciation of women.
1. It may seem like Anna is an afterthought, but Luke chooses to give her the last word in the story.
2. And this fits into a pattern in Luke. At least 27 times he tells a story with a man and a woman.
a. When he tells a story about a farmer who plants a mustard seed in his garden, he follows it with a story about a woman who kneads yeast into her bread dough (Luke 13:18-21).
b. When he tells a story about a good shepherd who goes after his lost sheep, he follows it with a story about a woman searching for her lost coin (Luke 15:3-10).
c. And when he tells the story about a prophet who meets the baby Jesus in the temple, he follows it with a story about a prophetess who does the same.
3. He will not leave the women out of the story. He is intent to make clear that the women have an important role too, that Jesus came for both men and women.
4. And yet, Luke’s women often have to suffer.
a. Elizabeth was barren and reproached for it.
b. Mary was pierced by watching her Son be pierced.
c. And Anna spent most of her life as a widow, which means not only aloneness but poverty.
(1) And there is much which makes the later years of one’s life sad and uncomfortable. Your abilities decline. The old familiar faces begin to disappear. Your sense of aloneness deepens.
(a) And there’s some ambiguity in the Greek text as to how old she was.
(b) She was either 86 or she had been a widow for 86 years, making her probably around 105.
(2) In a worldly sense, she lived a lonely, pathetic life.
d. But in spite of their suffering, these women wait faithfully for the Lord. And, by doing so, they are a great blessing to us.
e. So, that’s one thing about why the story of Anna is here.
D. The next most obvious thing is that Anna is a new Hannah. You remember Hannah, the mother of Samuel, praying in the temple for a son, and being rewarded with answered prayer. The names Hannah and Anna are identical, but in Greek, the H sound is not a letter but a breath mark).
1. And so here’s Anna, also praying in the temple for a son to be born, and being rewarded with the answer to her prayers. There’s just too much parallel to ignore this connection.
E. But there’s also a lot of appeal to the theory that Anna represents all believers – believing women in particular.
1. She certainly fits into a series of old childless women who waited and prayed for a child – including Hannah.
2. Remember that the first promise of the Messiah was given in the garden of Eden, when God spoke of a seed of the woman who would come and crush the head of the serpent, though the serpent would bruise His heal. And ever since that promise, faithful women of God have been waiting for the fulfillment of this promise to their first mother.
3. The coming of Christ was the grand finale of a very old story: a story of great need, a story of promises, a story of long waiting.
4. Maybe Anna represents Eve herself, very, very old by now, still clinging to the promise that her child would come and crush the head of the serpent. And now He’s finally here.
5. Anna is a widow, for God has left her alone. She is wasting away without her Messiah.
6. But she still waits, she still prays, she still fasts. She still hangs around God’s house.
7. And now the day has come, now the child has arrived! But she’s not ready to die like Simeon – in spite of her age. She has something else she’d rather do, something else she needs to do.
a. There are others like her, others who wait in pain, others who are languishing in unfulfilled longing. She’s got to tell them that the time has finally come. She’s got to tell them that He is finally here, and that she has seen Him with her own eyes. Her longing has been fulfilled, and she is anxious that their longing be fulfilled as well. She has born the burden of waiting for a lifetime.
b. She knows how hard it is. She wants to relieve everyone else who bears that burden.
F. Friends, we have spoken recently about how we are weak as a church, and most of us weak as individuals, in reaching out to those who are without Christ. Well, maybe it’s deeper than remembering to pray. Maybe it’s deeper than trying harder to look for opportunities. Maybe it’s deeper than reading a book about how to talk to people about Christ.
1. Maybe we just don’t grasp the intensity of the emptiness of life without Christ.
2. Maybe we don’t grasp the vast distance between Christless living and Christ-filled living.
3. Maybe we’ve so isolated ourselves from those who languish without Christ that they are too far away for us to hear it.
4. Or maybe much of our happiness doesn’t really come from having Christ, but from earthly comfort and security and approval. Maybe when things happen which are designed to help us feel real desperation, we gobble down pain-killers so we don’t have to feel the misery – pain-killers like eating, or watching TV, or shopping, or alcohol or whatever.
5. My generation grew up having a lot of contact with those who went through The Great Depression. It impacted them for the rest of their lives. It’s still hard for me to not eat every bit of food on my plate because of my father’s influence from growing up during the depression. They were grateful for things their children would complain about.
6. When our house burned in 1990, it changed our perspective on things. And today, more than 30 years later, it still affects the way we view things.
7. The same thing is sure to happen to those who are going through this pandemic. It is going to change forever the way we think about some things, the way we relate to others, the way we view the future. And we’ll get frustrated with the young who missed this experience for how cavalier they are and how they take things for granted.
a. Probably a dozen times in my life there’s been news of an outbreak of some deadly disease somewhere in the world. But, like most people, I’ve never taken them seriously. But I will now.
8. Anna was who she was – in her faith & outreach – because of the suffering she had endured.
G. The final expression of 2:38 (“the redemption of Jerusalem”) is based on Isaiah 52:9 “Break forth together into singing, you waste places of Jerusalem, for the Lord has comforted his people; he has redeemed Jerusalem.”
1. “waste places of Jerusalem” This was Anna before she saw Jesus. Even though she lived in waste places, she knew there was a day of the Lord’s comfort and a day of joyful singing coming.
a. She had no future in life. But she knew from Scripture that the Christ was coming soon. Most of her friends had died before Jesus came.
2. But then that day in the temple she saw Jesus.
a. “How blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. Truly, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.” (Matthew 13:16-17 – See also 1Pet.1:10-12.)
b. May God give us grace to grasp how blessed we are – and to spread the word.