The Goodness of the Lord in the Land of the Living: Christmas Daybook 6

Opening prayer: Heavenly Father, make me more like Jesus and more like the true self you’ve created as I savor your loving presence today. Please guide my thoughts and impressions by your Holy Spirit. Amen.

Look: Simeon with the Infant Jesus, Benjamin West - Source

Listen: Simeon’s Song, The Porter’s Gate - Spotify | YouTube | Lyrics & Score

Read: Psalm 20, 21; Psalm 23, 27 1 Kings 17:17-24; 3 John 1-15; John 4:46-54

Excerpts:

"May we shout for joy over your victory, and in the name of our God set up our banners. May the Lord fulfill all your petitions. Now I know that the Lord will help his anointed; he will answer him from his holy heaven with mighty victories by his right hand. Some take pride in chariots, and some in horses, but our pride is in the name of the Lord our God. They will collapse and fall but we shall rise and stand upright.

Give victory to the king, O Lord; answer us when we call.”

*

“In your strength the king rejoices, O Lord, and in your help how greatly he exults! You have given him his heart’s desire, and have not withheld the request of his lips.

Selah

For you meet him with rich blessings; you set a crown of fine gold on his head. He asked you for life; you gave it to him— length of days forever and ever. His glory is great through your help; splendor and majesty you bestow on him. You bestow on him blessings forever; you make him glad with the joy of your presence. For the king trusts in the Lord, and through the steadfast love of the Most High he shall not be moved.”

*

“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord my whole life long.”

*

“One thing I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: to live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple….

I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!”

*

“After this the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, became ill; his illness was so severe that there was no breath left in him. She then said to Elijah, “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance, and to cause the death of my son!” But he said to her, “Give me your son….

Then he stretched himself upon the child three times, and cried out to the Lord, “O Lord my God, let this child’s life come into him again.” The Lord listened to the voice of Elijah; the life of the child came into him again, and he revived. Elijah took the child, brought him down from the upper chamber into the house, and gave him to his mother; then Elijah said, “See, your son is alive.” So the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”

*

“I have no greater joy than this, to hear that my children are walking in the truth.

Beloved, you do faithfully whatever you do for the friends, even though they are strangers to you; they have testified to your love before the church. You will do well to send them on in a manner worthy of God; for they began their journey for the sake of Christ, accepting no support from non-believers. Therefore we ought to support such people, so that we may become co-workers with the truth.”

*

“Then he came again to Cana in Galilee where he had changed the water into wine. Now there was a royal official whose son lay ill in Capernaum. When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. Then Jesus said to him, “Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.” The official said to him, “Sir, come down before my little boy dies.” Jesus said to him, “Go; your son will live.” The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and started on his way…

…So he himself believed, along with his whole household.”

- Psalm 20:5-9 * Psalm 21:1-7 * Psalm 23:6 * Psalm 27:4, 13-14 * 1 Kings 17:17-19a, 21-24 * 3 John 4-8 * John 4:46-50, 53b (NRSV)

Pray: Nunc Dimittis (The Song of Simeon)

Lord, now let your servant depart in peace, according to your word. For my eyes have seen your salvation, * Which you have prepared before the face of all people; To be a light to lighten the Gentiles, and to be the glory of your people Israel. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

Do: Read this short devotional reflection I wrote about Anna, one of the greatest models of worship we have in the entire Bible. What are you waiting on God to see with your very own eyes, perhaps in the coming year?

Seeing Salvation

Her father Phanuel’s name means “face of God”, but he only ever saw exile. Her husband married her at the appropriate time, but only saw seven years of wedded life before facing an early death. After the mourning was over she resolved to wait for a sight that would not only sustain her for life, but would enliven her people. Anna waited, fasted, prayed, day and night, in the temple, almost a hundred years, waiting for the arrival of God's Promised One.

During those years, she saw generations born, grow into adulthood, marry, give birth, grieve, worship, celebrate, suffer illness, chafe under Roman rule, grow old, die. Perhaps Mary, the mother of Jesus, sat under Anna’s tutelage, as church women have done for the next generation through the ages. Anna must have noticed this young woman, pure of heart and full of faith. Maybe she was even called upon to pray a blessing over her betrothal to Joseph. Perhaps this act of noticing day and night the rhythms of her people’s worship life is what led her to the temple at the exact moment the Messiah’s parents presented him at the temple. Or perhaps she was led in the Spirit as her prophetic counterpart Simeon.

Either way, we know long years of praying, pleading, fasting, loving the God of Christ trained the seer’s eyes for the moment she at last saw the face of his son. She knew him when she saw him. Anna and Simeon, ‘Grace’ and ‘God-Receiver’, prayer bent their aging frames across the silent divide between an old covenant and the new. The old temple saints served witness, first-hand receiving the reward of long waiting, seeing the salvation of all peoples with their very own eyes.

Listen to my entire playlist on Spotify: God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen: Christmas 2021

** Sunday Scripture readings are taken from Year C of the Revised Common Lectionary. Daily Scripture readings are taken from the 1979 Book of Common Prayer and include both Morning and Evening Psalms (Year 2)