Sermon - Candlemas 2020 - Luke 2:22-32

Today we don’t really get the concept of holiness and purity. In a way, we even look down on those who desire to be holy, we call them puritans or prudish, we call them bible thumpers or holier than thou pharisees. Rather we prefer to be a little rough around the edges, we romanticize the badboy like Mad Max, we celebrate the wildwest cowboy or pirate who drinks too much, shoots people, and is always running from the law. As a result of that we end up with supposed pastors melting down purity rings into erotic statues. This is what our culture has devolved into, in which we despise purity and rejoice in unholiness. 

But I think we still at least a little bit understand the value of purity. For instance, if I were to bake you a batch of cookies and after you’ve eaten a couple I tell you that they’re a little impure, not a lot but just a little bit, you would be a little concerned, right? What if I told you that they’re 99% flour, sugar, butter, eggs, baking soda, and chocolate chips, but I added just a teaspoon of cat poop? Obviously, we value purity when it comes to our food, and we should learn that the same thing applies to us.

Just like that batch of cookies with only a small amount of cat poop in them, it only takes a little bit to ruin the whole batch, so a little bit of impurity in us ruins the whole thing. St. Paul says: “I know that nothing good dwells in my flesh.” Because of this little bit of unholiness, Jesus warns us: “You will die in your sin.” So just as this little bit of “sin came into the world through one man, Adam, and death through sin, so death spread to all men because all sinned.”

It is for that reason that Jesus entered into the temple 40 days after His birth. Jesus’ conception and birth were holy and perfect. He had no need to be purified from anything. Thus, Jesus came into the temple to purify the unholiness of our lives, as the light which enlightens our dark hearts. So just as by one man, Adam, are all made sinners, “so by the one man’s, Jesus’, obedience the many will be made righteous.”

In the Old Testament according to the Law of Moses people regularly had to visit the temple in order to make sacrifices to purify them from their unholiness. So when a mother gave birth to her first born son, the law required that the mother and son be purified either by offering up a lamb if they were wealthy or a pair of turtledoves if they were poor, in order to cleanse them of their impurity. 

In a way that is exactly what happened when Jesus entered into the temple that day. Except instead of offering up a lamb on His behalf, He was the sacrificial Lamb offered up by Simeon the priest who fulfilled all of the sacrifices which purified every mother and first born son. Every lamb, every pair of turtledoves, merely foreshadowed Jesus and His sacrifice. It is just as Malachi said: “The Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to His temple...He will sit as a refiner and purifier… Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord.”

Just as every sacrifice slain in the Old Testament was fulfilled in Jesus, the true First Born, so is every conception, pregnancy, and birth made holy today through Jesus. Every mother and her child, every one of our lives, is sanctified and made precious in God’s sight only on account of Christ who was born for us.

Likewise baptism, just as the sacrifices of old were made efficacious through the sacrifice of Christ, so are our baptisms today made efficacious through Jesus’ baptism. When Jesus was baptized He sanctified all of our baptisms, so that you are made holy and purified in your baptism on account of Christ who was baptized for you. 

So all of your impurity and unholiness is taken away from you, not because of your actions, nor because of your purity rings, but because of Christ who makes you holy. So that day, Jesus was presented in the temple both as our great high priest who offers up a sacrifice, and He was Himself the sacrifice offered up for us! Thus Simeon didn’t offer up Jesus as the sacrifice that day, because the true high priest had come in Jesus. It wasn’t for another 30 years or so until Christ would ascend the sacrificial mount outside of Jerusalem to offer Himself up as the final sacrifice for our sins. In the blood Jesus shed, all of us are declared righteous and holy, just as Jesus is righteous and holy. In Him alone we are purified from the sins which so thoroughly corrupt us. 

And so the beginning of our service today gives us a visible reminder that Jesus comes as the light of the world. Just as we began in dim light, so is our world and our lives filled with the darkness and impurity of sin. Yet the candles in our sanctuaries are reminders to us that Jesus comes to open our eyes to His salvation, since He is “a light for revelation.” So by the light of Christ, He dispels all sin and darkness from within us. Just as the light spread from one candle to the many, so does Christ’s holiness spread from Him to many as He comes into His temple.

In a way, very little has changed from the practice of the Old Testament upto today. Just as the people regularly visited the temple in order to be purified by a sacrifice, so must we regularly visit this new temple, the church which is the body of Christ, in order to be purified by the sacrifice of Christ. Just as they came to the temple to purify their children, so must we return and have our children purified in the waters of baptism. 

Yet in a way, things are drastically different from the Old Testament. Previously they lived in the dark, making sacrifices and performing various rituals, but not fully knowing their significance. Today we have the fuller and greater thing, living in the light, in which we see that all of our worship is made holy not by animals and rituals, but by the blood of Christ, the Lamb of God who is also the Son of God. 

Here in our sanctuary Christ is lifted up before us and placed not in our arms but upon our tongues. Here we may not see Jesus with our physical eyes, but more importantly we see Him with the eyes of faith which knows He’s present in the Word, the water, and the bread and wine. So after Christ is placed upon our tongues, we join with old Simeon who was prepared for death, since we too are prepared for our deaths, when we sing the words of the Nunc Dimittis. 

“Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace,

according to your word;

for my eyes have seen your salvation

that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples,

a light for revelation to the Gentiles,

and for glory to your people Israel.”