why is that weird old guy following us around the temple?

in the song "rudolph the red-nosed reindeer", it starts "you know dasher and dancer and prancer and vixen, comet and cupid and donder and blitzen".  in the true CHRISTmas story, we can begin it the same way, "you know mary and joseph and caesar and herod, the wise men, elizabeth, the angels and shepherds."  however, just like in "rudolph", there are two commonly overlooked characters in the CHRISTmas story.  some will say that they came into the story a month after Jesus was born, so technically they aren't part of the CHRISTmas story, but yet they feel it acceptable to include the magi, arriving some two years after CHRIST's birth, in their nativity scenes.  by comparison, these two belong more in the CHRISTmas story than the magi or herod.  so the person that i will focus on first is a man named simeon. 

simeon, according to ancient history, was one of the 70 elders commissioned by the Egyption pharoah ptolemy II philadelphus to translate the holy scriptures into greek to be included in the great library of alexandria.  according to tradition, during this task that simeon was assigned the book of isaiah to translate, and when he came to the passage, "behold, a virgin shall conceive and bring forth a Son", he felt that it should be translated "young woman" instead of "virgin".  it was at that point that an angel intervened and revealed to him that a pure and spotless virgin would indeed conceive and give birth to the Lord's CHRIST, and furthermore, it was revealed that simeon would not see death until he had seen the Lord's CHRIST with his own eyes.  now granted, this is what tradition says, and did not make it into the Bible, so we cannot place much authority on the accuracy of what transpired (after all, according to tradition, simeon was 376 years old when he died).  however, we can learn a very valuable lesson from this seemingly minor character of the CHRISTmas story. 

what we do have in the Bible, is that simeon was a devout and righteous man, and that it was indeed revealed to him that he would not see death until he had seen the Lord's CHRIST.  we also know that the Holy Spirit was upon him, and that he was led by the Spirit into the temple on the very day that mary and joseph brought the infant Jesus in to be presented to the Lord, along with a sacrifice of two turtle doves (this is where the gift of the second day of CHRISTmas comes from), as was required by jewish law.  while there, we can imagine the young mary and joseph, already frazzled from the journey to jerusalem from bethlehem with an infant, wondering about this old man that was following them around the temple.  you can also imagine their surprise and apprehension when the old man came over and was probably overcome with joy and emotion as he took the infant CHRIST from His mother's arms and began praising God and saying, "Lord, let your servant depart in peace, according to Your Word, for my eyes have seen Your Salvation, which you have prepared before all people; a light to lighten the gentiles, and the glory of my people israel!"  the Bible wraps it up nice and neat and says that mary and joseph "marvelled" at what he said, which is probably better translated, "either this guy is a few shekels short of a denari or God keeps making this weirder and weirder for us!"  we know that he also spoke to mary, telling her that Jesus was to bring about the fall and rising again of many in israel, and for a sign which shall be spoken against, and that a sword would pierce through her soul as well.  keep in mind that mary and joseph knew that Jesus was special, and that He was sent from God, but even they did not know what fate awaited him in 33 years, nor the extent of His impact on the world.

so how, knowing what we know about simeon, does that translate to us today?  what does one promise made to a very old man 2000 years ago mean for us? 

first, we can see that God keeps His promises.  there are different levels of promises for us.  there are general promises, that apply to all people.  there are specific promises, that apply to certain groups of people. and there are personal promises that God makes to us individually either through His Word, or through His speaking to our hearts.  if you ever want to be encouraged, start studying the promises in Scripture that we can hold on to for hope.  just as God kept His promise to simeon (perhaps he did live to be 376, making that promise all the more true), He keeps His promises to us.  perhaps God has promised something to you, and right now, it just doesn't seem probable that God is coming through on His end.  we need to remember that God's timing is not ours, and in our microwave-fast food society of getting what we want when we want it, that can be difficult.  remember that it took over 400 years for the prophecy of isaiah to come to pass, so God will hold true to His Word, just on His time, not ours. 

finally, we see simeon's faithfulness.  if he had not been faithful to the prompting of the Holy Spirit, he would have missed seeing the Lord's CHRIST.  had he not been righteous and devout, he might not have heard the Spirit's prompting.  the Bible tells us that God speaks to us through His Holy Spirit, and that we can muffle the Spirit's voice by allowing sin in our lives.  this year, perhaps the Spirit is telling you to do something in particular.  i spoke with a fellow chaplain earlier that is serving meals this year at a soup kitchen on CHRISTmas because he felt that was what the Holy Spirit was leading him and his wife to do.  if the Holy Spirit is speaking to you, can you hear Him?  or are your spiritual ears deafened by the loudness of life or clogged by unrepentant sin?  maybe you do hear Him, but are choosing to either ignore Him or blatantly disobey Him?  have you decided that something else in your life is more important than what He is calling you to do?  if so, you may just miss the blessing of a lifetime.  don't believe me?  if you could ask simeon, i'm sure he would tell you the same!