Anna and Simeon—god’s Promises Are Fulfilled

I want to invite you to turn to Luke, Chapter 2. There is a passage here that I want to share with you: the presentation of Jesus in the temple. I have wanted to set aside for a moment this sermon series that I have titled “Complex Faith,” and now, as we draw closer to Christmas, I also want to honor the Christmas theme. So, for a moment, I am going to stop making your minds more complicated and calm them down a little with a more tender Christmas message. Then I will go back to making life difficult for you; in a couple more Sundays, we will continue this series, which I hope will be a blessing and an edification to you. But today we are going to talk about this event in the life and ministry of Jesus, very close to His birth.

All the accounts in Scripture concerning the birth of Jesus, His childhood, the beginning of His ministry—in fact, His entire life—have something to do with the person of Jesus and the gospel message, and they project and present some aspect, some spiritual truth, that we must remember. And we must integrate it into our lives.

This passage is no different. It points to a special moment at the beginning of Jesus’ earthly journey. Let us read it. And there are two people whom I want us to reflect on a little and learn from: Anna and Simeon. It says here, Luke 2:21.

“…When the eight days were completed for the circumcision of the child…”—a Hebrew custom was that, at eight days old, the child was presented to the Lord and was, in a sense, integrated more formally into the human community and presented before God to receive a spiritual blessing. Jesus and His parents submitted to that custom, and when He was eight days old, they went to the temple to circumcise the child and consecrate Him to the Lord.

Circumcision was that simple surgical procedure that marked the male as belonging to the Lord and as a member of the community of Israel.

“…And they named Him Jesus, the name given Him by the angel before He was conceived. And when the days of their purification were completed”—the parents’ purification—“according to the law of Moses, they brought Him to Jerusalem to present Him to the Lord…”

How God managed to present Himself to Himself, I do not know, but He can do that. God was presenting Himself to Himself. What do you think of that? Those are the mysteries of the Trinity and the Incarnation. The man, God, presents Himself before the Father. And it says:

“…as it is written in the law of the Lord, every male who opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord…”

That is what was in the law. That is, the firstborn. You know that in Israel every firstborn belonged to the Lord: the first male, the first part of the harvest, the first animals—the best belonged to the Lord and were consecrated to the Lord. That is why the Bible speaks of the firstfruits, of bringing the firstfruits to the Lord. And every firstborn who opened the womb, that is, who was the woman’s first fruit, was considered set apart for the Lord’s service and purposes. They all were, but that firstborn male in particular was very, very important. And once again, the Lord submits to that. Who more than the Lord, who was conceived precisely to fulfill the Father’s purposes?

“…And they also came to the temple to offer, according to what is stated in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons…”

Some believe that Mary and Joseph presented a simple sacrifice to the Lord because they could not offer much more than that. They belonged to the poorest class, and therefore their sacrifice, their offering to the Lord at that time, was something simple: two turtledoves, two young pigeons. They were not members of the ruling caste by any means.

“…and behold, there was in Jerusalem”—and here we enter our account—“…and behold, there was in Jerusalem a man named Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout…”

I want you to think about those two words because we will address them later.

“…righteous and devout, he was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him…”

Very important. There are several things there: he was righteous and devout, he was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.

“…and it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit”—notice the ministry of the Holy Spirit throughout this entire account—“…it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Anointed One, the Messiah. And moved by the Spirit”—once again, the presence of the Spirit—“…moved by the Spirit, he came into the temple. And when the parents of the child Jesus brought Him into the temple to do for Him according to the custom of the law, he, Simeon, took Him in his arms and blessed God, saying, ‘Now, Lord, You are dismissing Your servant in peace, according to Your word, because my eyes have seen Your salvation, which You have prepared in the presence of all peoples: a light for revelation to the Gentiles and the glory of Your people Israel.’ And Joseph and His mother marveled…”

Imagine this—I cannot help pausing the narrative for a moment. Joseph and Mary have this mysterious being whose birth was accompanied by an angel’s announcement and by mysterious things whose full meaning they, humble and simple people who were not very learned or intellectually developed, do not understand. They have not studied theology. I do not know whether perhaps they even knew who the Messiah was, that this had been prescribed and prophesied by the prophets. I believe these people, Joseph and Mary, probably did not know how to read or write, brothers and sisters.

Nevertheless, they see this. They bring their son for what they think will be an ordinary ceremony, like baptizing a child or something similar, presenting him in church. And suddenly this mysterious elderly man comes along and, full of emotion, speaks about Him and says, “Lord, now I can go; now I can die. You are dismissing me in peace now because You have prepared it.” Imagine if that were said about your son: in the presence of all peoples, he is a light for revelation to all the nations of the world, the Gentiles, and he is the glory of Your people. That is, Your people are glorified and honored in Him. How would you react? Because sometimes we think, well, if the angel announced it to Mary and if He was born through the Immaculate Conception, as our Catholic brothers and sisters say, then what more questions could there be? You already know that this is an extraterrestrial being and something marvelous. But they are still learning who the being is who has been born among them and from them.

And it says that they were astonished as they listened to what this strange man, who did not know them and did not know the child, was saying. But then there had to be a connection: at that moment, they connected it with the shepherds who had come and with the wise men who had come from the East to bring gifts for a king, and they said, “Hey, what is it that we have in our family?”

And so they marveled at everything that was said about Him. And Simeon blessed them; he blessed Mary and Joseph and said to His mother, Mary, “Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel.”

This is what I say—I cannot leave this out. The thing is that Jesus—and this ties in with my sermons on complex faith—did not come merely to carry a little lamb, all humble and gentle. He also came to destroy, and He came to bring low, and He came to break, and He came to create division as well. He was not merely the humble little shepherd; He came to provoke conflict.

Behold, He is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that will be spoken against. In other words, He is going to cause controversy. Not everyone will believe in Him, and some will deny Him and condemn Him and deny that He is who He says He is.

“And a sword”—it is as though the Holy Spirit threw that in as a bonus, but look at what a bonus—“and a sword will pierce your own soul.”

When did that sword pierce Mary’s soul? When she saw her son crucified. For a mother to see her son, even though He was the Son of God, suffering the unspeakable—that sword pierced her soul at that moment. Notice how God, in His mercy or whatever it was—because frankly, I would rather not know that—but the Lord does absolutely whatever He pleases, and He chose to declare it there.

That is how revelations from God are, by the way, brothers and sisters. God’s revelations are sometimes sinister. God’s dealings with a person are sometimes strange things, and He does whatever He pleases, whenever He wants and however He wants. God is not here merely to do what we like Him to do.

It says, “…so that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.” What was hidden—all the rottenness, all the hypocrisy that existed in Israel and in its religious system and apparatus—Christ brought all of it to light: the thoughts of many hearts.

When Christ is in a place, brothers and sisters, the cockroaches begin to scurry as they do when the light is turned on. That is what happens when you are in the presence of God: an X-ray enters your life and reveals everything.

“So that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.” This is Simeon. It then says that Anna was also there, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher, very advanced in age, for she had lived with her husband for seven years from her virginity and had been a widow for eighty-four years. Do the math. Seven years married, eighty-four years a widow—how much is that? Ninety-one. And I imagine she did not marry when she was born; she was fourteen or fifteen years old, already a woman. In other words, this woman was approximately 104 to 106 years old, but she was still tough as a coconut, strong in the Lord, full of passion for God, full of the Spirit, strong in the Lord.

It says that she did not depart from the temple, serving night and day with fasting and prayers. There are people out there who work six hours a day and then can no longer fast, cannot pray, cannot go to church because they already have a headache. This woman was over a hundred years old, and she fasted and prayed. Glory to God for such passionate people. I would like to be one of them; I hope I am, and you too. We want to build a church of people filled with the Spirit of God.

She had been a widow for eighty-four years and did not depart from the temple. Coming in at that very hour—a divinely arranged appointment—she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were waiting for redemption in Jerusalem. Glory to the Lord.

What a beautiful passage. I think I could close right here because I have already preached half the sermon by interpreting it as I read it. The people who appear in this passage are exemplary. They are placed there for a purpose; they are there to point to something, exemplify something, embody a spiritual truth.

We must learn moral, ethical, and spiritual lessons from them. Simeon and Anna are like an embodiment of virtues from which we can learn, and that is why God chose them for this account at that moment.

Another point here by way of preparation: Luke is the writer whom I would call the writer of the Holy Spirit. You will remember that Luke wrote the book of Acts, which is the book that most powerfully expresses the miraculous work of the Holy Spirit in the life of His church. He also wrote the Gospel according to Saint Luke. And one of the distinctive attributes of the Gospel according to Saint Luke is its continual emphasis on the work of the Holy Spirit. If you explore Luke in light of what I am saying, you will discover that, of the four evangelists, he is the one who most strongly highlights the ministry of the Holy Spirit in the life and ministry of Jesus and in the ministry of the disciples.

So it is no coincidence that this passage we are reading points to two people filled with the Holy Spirit who are being guided by the Spirit toward a unique encounter with the Son of God. Luke emphasizes the role of the Spirit throughout Jesus’ entire ministry.

I also want to tell you something else: the Holy Spirit does not appear for the first time in the New Testament. You know that the Holy Spirit did not first appear at Azusa in 1906. The Holy Spirit has been present in Scripture, in human history, and in creation from the very beginning of eternity. He has no beginning, but He has been present at least from the beginning of creation. He is the eternal Spirit of God, always moving.

If you go to the Old Testament, you see the Spirit of God working through the judges, the prophets, the anointed kings, and the great men and women of God. The great movements of God in history are always energized and made possible by the Holy Spirit.

We see it in creation itself. It says that the Spirit of God moved over the waters. The Spirit is active in all of God’s creative acts. It is God Himself moving in the midst of His creation, in power and in action. And brothers and sisters, do you know something? If you want to have a creative and powerful life, you need the moving of the Holy Spirit in your life. That is what this passage tells us.

Simeon and Anna are two people who move under the anointing and power of the Spirit of God, and we, too—just like the Son of God Himself—need our lives to be a continual pursuit of the Holy Spirit’s freshness.

Sometimes all the Spirit requires is simply a touch from us, a gentle call, and He is there, ready to refresh our waters again when we need it.

I believe this passage should serve as a reminder, a call to all of us: let your life be like the lives of Simeon and Anna; let your movements, your decisions, everything you do, be directed, governed, and coordinated by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is present in all of God’s creative acts. It is God moving in the midst of His creation in power and action.

I see the Holy Spirit as the executive element, the manifestation of the person of God who creates, who works, who moves, who energizes, who makes things possible, and that is why we, the children of God, cannot simply see the Holy Spirit as an implicit, generic presence in our religious life. No, we must focus on Him continually.

Many churches and many Christians simply make a casual mention of the Holy Spirit. And they treat Him as something that is there by process of elimination. But no, the key to a Spirit-filled life is when you see the Holy Spirit as a continual focus of your life. You are always wooing Him, calling upon Him, exalting Him, celebrating Him, asking for Him, swimming in Him, refreshing yourself, taking your spiritual temperature and blood pressure to see where you are in terms of the Spirit. And when you feel that it is declining, it is time to get back into the waters, time to ask, Lord, refresh me, because I no longer feel the same in prayer, worship no longer touches me as much, I now go to church and it seems like the same old thing, I pray now, but it is a routine, I read the Word now, but it does not excite me.

When you feel those things, when you do not feel that you are alive to the presence of God, get into the waters again and refresh your cultivation of the Spirit. It has to be that way throughout your life. Because that is what makes all creativity in your life possible. Nothing is truly, genuinely possible for the children of God if it is not motivated and energized by the action of the Holy Spirit. You can do many things in the flesh.

I can stand here, recite a sermon, and fool you with some semi-eloquent words, but do you know what? If the energy of the Holy Spirit is not embedded in my words, they will bounce off all of you and do absolutely nothing. Only when the Spirit is within those words and reaches the heart and explodes inside you, and becomes life, is there change and impact, and that is why, before standing here, I have to make sure that I have the approval, the seal, and the backing of the Holy Spirit to preach to you.

Because, frankly, I certainly cannot fool myself, I am not going to fool the devil, nor can I fool God; perhaps I can fool you, but sooner or later you will realize it and say, Lord, have mercy on the pastor; touch him somehow. Among the people of God, things have to be done in the Spirit.

A church can grow, it can prosper, it can have a great choir, it can have a lot of religious machinery and all those things, and people see it from the outside and say, wow, what a church! Look, but that does not mean that the Spirit of God is moving in that church, and my passion and my desire is: Lord, always move among our people.

And I do believe that God moves in this place. Some may think He does not, but God moves in this place. Wrinkles, imperfections, warts, sins and all, the Spirit of God is in this place. The Spirit of the Lord moves in this place. I believe it, because God is merciful—not because of us, but because He is merciful and because He knows that there is room for Him in this space.

And we have to be that way in our lives. Simeon and Anna exemplify that. The Lord Himself submitted, brothers and sisters, to that law that it is by the Spirit; it is not by sword, it is not by an army, it is by the Spirit. When the Lord, God, became incarnate as a man, He, as it were, relinquished His divine autonomy and submitted to human rules. And like every human being, He Himself needed the anointing of the Holy Spirit, and that is why He is presented in the temple and blessed. That is why He goes and is baptized by His cousin John, and that is why the Spirit of God descended upon His head in the form of a dove and filled Him and baptized Him.

And when He came out of those waters, which were spiritual and liquid, it says that the Holy Spirit impelled Him and moved Him and cast Him into the wilderness to have His first head-on encounter, which would equip Him to begin His public ministry. Because the first thing He had to do was confront the devil directly and defeat him judicially, submitting to having him throw the best pitches he could at Him, and He hit every one of them out of the park; and then, having defeated him legally—because he returned later, but what He dealt Satan in the wilderness was a judicial defeat.

Now, once it was clear that Satan had no part or lot in Him, then He goes out and enters His public ministry. You know that many times—and this is a little bonus from the sermon—for God to take you where He truly wants you, for God to fulfill His ultimate purpose for you, there are fights you first have to have with the devil. And do you know what? Unfortunately, none of us comes out unscathed like Jesus. I can show you some little marks I have here and there from my encounters with the devil. I wish I could tell you that I came out one hundred percent unscathed, but no.

But many times, for God to prepare you and complete what is needed so that you can begin your calling, you first have to go through those preparations. So that He may be acknowledged as righteous in His word and found pure in His judgment, says the Word of the Lord.

Now, the Lord is born by the Spirit, because He is incubated by the Lord; the holy being born of Mary is the result of the deposit of the Holy Spirit. When He comes of age, He is baptized by the Holy Spirit, and, impelled by the Holy Spirit, He enters that demonic trial. And once He emerges from that trial, His first public appearance, in a sense, as a new minister of God is when He goes to the synagogue and they hand Him the scroll of the Law to read, and by coincidence He pulls out the book of Isaiah and reads and says, the Spirit of God is upon Me and has anointed Me to proclaim freedom to the captives, sight to the blind, healing to the sick, to proclaim the good day of Jehovah’s salvation.

How wonderful, brothers and sisters. Jesus’ ministry is about seeking again and again. He moves by the anointing of the Holy Spirit, and we have to do the same in our lives. That is why I believe this passage is so important, because at the very beginning of Jesus’ ministry, these two people, Anna and Simeon, exemplify that fullness of the Holy Spirit.

Look at the first thing I see about Anna and Simeon: they are humble, poor people, nothing outstanding, ordinary people like you and me, and perhaps even less. You would have seen them there in the temple, among thousands of people in the Court of the Gentiles or the Court of the Women or the Court of the Men, and you would have walked right past them; there was nothing about them physically that would have drawn much attention. But do you know what? They were undercover superheroes; they were Superman and Wonder Woman in human clothing, but they were people filled with the Holy Spirit.

And that is what makes the difference in life. Perhaps they never went to seminary, perhaps they never preached a sermon, perhaps they never read a concordance; I do not think they even knew how to read or write, but they were people filled with the Holy Spirit.

And I always say that the Holy Spirit is the normalizer, the one who levels human inequalities in the church. You may not have much education, you may be a person of humble circumstances, but if you are filled with the Holy Spirit, you have everything you need to move forward.

Now, it is good for you to educate yourself, to grow in the Lord, to learn more, and to read and study, because all of that is firewood for the fire of God. Amen. But the foundation of everything is that powerful fuel which is the Spirit of God, and that is why we must seek that above all else; before a doctorate or four discipleship courses, seek the raw, bare energy of the Spirit of God in your life, and fill yourself with that first: prayer, fasting, the Word of God, consecration, surrender to the Lord, stripping yourself more each day and seeking the presence of God, desiring it with hunger and thirst, as the psalmist says.

As the servant pants for streams of water, so my soul cries out for You, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God, it says; when shall I come and appear before the house of God?

That is how you have to live your life. My soul thirsts for God, but not the God of religion, not the God of Sundays, but the living God, the God of power. And if you live that way, the Lord will visit you; the Lord will do things through your life. Anna and Simeon, although they were poor and of humble circumstances, were people filled with the Holy Spirit. And that is very important.

That is to say, although they were humble, God shows no partiality. The Bible says that the eyes of God range throughout the whole earth, seeking those whose hearts are perfect toward Him, to show His favor to them. All you need is a heart that longs for the glory of God, a heart that places the presence and the moving of God above everything else in your life, and God will touch you, God will deal with you and work in you. Ordinary people, but filled with the Spirit.

What other things do we also see here in these figures? Another thing I see is that they were faithful people. Say it with me: faithful. They were people who endured for the long haul. They were marathon runners; they were not merely hundred-yard runners, they were in it for the long term. Both were advanced in age. Anna was over one hundred years old; Simeon, I think, was right there following in her footsteps, but do you know what? They had preserved the faith; they had held on to what the Spirit had entrusted to them over many years.

How does Paul put it at the end? He says, I have kept the faith, something like that, I have run the race, I have fought the good fight, and now only the reward awaits me at the end of my life. Listen, I would like to finish my life and say what Paul said, and so would you. Hold on to what you have—to whom does He say that? To one of the churches in Revelation? Hold on to what has been entrusted to you.

What things has God spoken into your life, my brother, my sister? Perhaps one day God touched you and called you into His kingdom, and with tears you went to the altar and gave your life, and perhaps it was a time of difficulty and you threw yourself at the Lord’s feet, and God brought you up from the pit, from the miry clay, as it says, from the depths. And what happened? You went home blessed; you saw the hand of the Lord straighten your path, but normality returned and you forgot those first promises to the Lord; you forgot your first love.

God is speaking to someone this afternoon. And God tells you, hold on to what you have received; do not forget your beginnings, do not forget those first steps you took when you loved Me above all things, when you promised Me that you would be Mine, and you have forgotten that, and now you simply give Me a little. Return to your first love and cultivate that first love. Live in it. And when you see it fading, remember again where it was, pick it up, dust it off, and put it back in a visible place.

Simeon had received a promise—at what age? Thirty years old, forty years old? Who knows. Did an angel appear to him? I do not think so. But a very powerful impression took hold within him; who knows whether it was a dream—it is possible. But I believe that sometimes we romanticize the things of God too much and project things where there are none. Who knows whether it was simply that, in some powerful way, God told him, look, you will not die before seeing the Promised One of the nations, the salvation of the world.

And Simeon absorbed that promise and became saturated with it. He became pregnant with God’s promise and lived his entire life with that promise there, waiting in the hope that one day, before he died, he would see God’s Promised One. And he lived that way, and when the moment arrived, God told him, today is the day.

If God has placed something in your life—a calling, a concern, an impression of something He wants you to do, an impulse toward consecration, the surrender of something, a promise you made to the Lord—do not forget it. Hold on to it, cultivate it, bless it, greet it, and live in it until you see its fulfillment. If it is from God, it will be fulfilled; it may take ten, twenty, thirty, forty years, but be faithful to the Lord. Hold on to what you have, the Lord says to someone here, or to several people, this afternoon. Hold on to what you have received, exactly as I gave it to you, and do not compromise it. Be faithful.

God likes people who live there, every day. If God placed you in a position, stay there and do not concern yourself with whether you are happy, enthusiastic, or bored. You are a soldier; if you were stationed there, stay there and cultivate it until the very last moment.

The church is full of people who hold on to their visions only according to their emotions. No, you serve the Lord out of integrity. You serve the Lord out of conviction, not because of a chill or because your skin breaks out in goosebumps, or because angels shout at you or something. No, it is because God said it and I am going to do it, and the flesh will have to fall into line. Period. Faithful to the Lord.

Anna, at one hundred and something years old, is still there like a young woman, fasting, praying, interceding, crying out, visiting the temple every day, proclaiming the Word of God. Listen, to reach that age while consecrated to the Lord—those are the people God loves, you know? People who are surrendered to the Lord, who hold on to what they have received, and who are faithful; and that is why God called these two people to be witnesses of something as sublime as the presentation of His Son.

Two things about Simeon. The Bible says that Simeon was righteous and devout. Simeon’s character and his qualities have stayed with me throughout the years. I looked up both words, because when I see words like that in the Bible, I always try to squeeze every last drop out of them, and so I went to the original Greek, which is translated into Spanish as righteous and devout, and I looked up these two words because they are there for a reason. It says that Simeon was righteous and devout. The word righteous in the original Greek is dikaios. How good you sound; you can tell you are intelligent people—you even speak Greek.

And the other word, devout, is eulabes. Everyone say, “Eulabes.” How many dikaios and eulabes people do we have here in church today? These words are like two heavenly bodies revolving around a sun, and the two words add nuance to each other. It is as though you can understand them better when they come into play with each other. And what I thought when I looked them up in the original Greek—and the sense of these words in Greek literature, the New Testament, and the Old Testament—confirmed what I had thought.

Because you can say righteous and devout. It is not a repetition; there was something in Simeon’s person that I wish you and I could embody in our own lives. And when people ask me, “Well, Pastor, what do you believe?” one of the things I believe is precisely this: we need a balanced spirituality, and as a church we must seek both things.

The word dikaios, which has many different variants in Scripture, generally refers to measuring things, weighing them, judging them, and discerning their true nature—to going beyond appearances and seeing the reality of things. That is the intimation of the word dikaios, diakrino; in fact, that is where the word criticism comes from: to criticize, to analyze.

And what Scripture says is that this word, dikaios, refers to character; it refers to what I would call Simeon’s walk. Simeon was a man of integrity. Simeon was a man who lived what he preached. Simeon was a man who had a good testimony before others. Simeon was a man in whom, when you searched among the leaves, you found fruit.

There are many people in whose leaves you search and find nothing. That is why the Lord cursed the fig tree: because it reminded Him of so many Christians and so many Jews who appear very religious but bear no fruit. But Simeon, in that sense, fulfilled God’s righteousness. And this is what I say, brothers and sisters: look, as Christians, we must seek that life which backs up what we preach—a consistent life. But there is more to it than that.

Because right now I know that many of you, or some of you, are listening and saying, “Ah, that applies to me, glory to God. It is the others, these hypocrites around me.” No, look, it applies to you.

Because the word devout refers to the passionate part of the Christian life, and do you know what happens? That is why I say these two words add nuance to each other. We must seek spiritual, passionate people, but also people who, when you weigh them in the balance, measure up to the stature of true Christians: character.

What God is seeking more and more each day in us—in me, brothers and sisters—is a character that reflects the character of Christ Jesus. Integrity, spiritual soundness. I was sharing with the brothers and sisters this morning, for example—forgive me if I am blunt and harsh in the way I express myself, but that is not my desire.

Every year, when the women’s conference takes place—which is such a blessing, where so many lives are touched, women are impacted and filled with the Spirit, the Word of God flows, and it is a wonderful time of worship—do you know what? Many times the leaders, including my wife, return home a little sad. Because, especially at the beginning, as happened this past year, there are so many ugly moments of conflict: women who want the front seats. One sister—just imagine—there was a table marked “Reserved,” and these sisters, bold as brass, or whatever you want to call it, went and sat there and removed the sign.

And when this sister, who was one of the ushers, arrived and asked, “Look, sisters, this is reserved. Wasn’t the sign here?” And do you know what? “Sister, there was a sign here. Where is it?” And one little sister, with the most brazen smile, pulled it out from underneath herself. She had sat on it to hide it, the way a mischievous little girl would do something like that.

Other sisters almost have to be restrained to keep them from pulling one another’s hair. Ushers are insulted, and I say that with pain in my heart, but it must be said because we want a full measure. Now, this happens in every church, and I know it is not unique to us. Unfortunately, some of those people are from our church, and sometimes they are among the oldest. Sometimes the younger women behave much better than the older ones.

There are also women pastors like that, and it happens every year, because they will not submit to the rules and react violently when they are corrected and asked as gently as possible. These sisters are just about ready to smear themselves with shoe polish before going there in the morning, because they know they are going to confront the devil himself.

So, do you see why I say that, brothers and sisters? Because where is the character of Jesus? Where is that righteousness of God? Righteous and devout. Some people believe that because they are devout, they do not have to be righteous. What this idea of dikaios says is that he was a man who reflected the character of Jesus.

Do you know when you and I will know that we truly possess God’s righteous character? When Frances, the attendant, comes over to you, taps on your window, and you roll it down. “Yes, brother?” “Brother, could you pull forward just a little more so another car can fit there?” And you say, “Of course, brother, certainly, absolutely.” And you swallow your pride, take your little car, pull it forward a little farther, and fit it in there. Or when you stop taking up two spaces because it is a BMW and you do not want anyone to scratch it, so you want room on both sides, even though you are stealing space from a brother. That is being righteous.

And look, I have to take my own medicine. There are areas in my life that I have to deal with, but He does not let me rest easy because I know that this is what God calls me to. And you and I—this church—must ask every day, and you must ask yourself: Does my life reflect the character of Christ? To what extent am I reflecting Christ’s love, patience, goodness, gentleness, submission, and tolerance? The fruit of the Holy Spirit—because sometimes we are titans when it comes to the gifts, but what about the fruit of the Spirit? To me, one as much as the other is evidence of the Spirit’s presence in your life. Do not compartmentalize and divide it; it is everything, all of it.

So Simeon was righteous, but he was also devout. The word devout, eulabes, means that he also loved God, was passionate about the things of God, observed the rites of the faith, attended church, tithed, fasted, held fast to the promises, and was passionate toward God—devout. That is the idea. The idea of devotion means that: passion for God. It does not simply mean being sanctimonious. No, it means being a person who is passionate toward God. That is the vertical dimension. Righteous is the horizontal dimension: my dealings with others, the kind of man or woman you and I are as a spouse, sibling, friend, worker, or driver; that people find that I have no hidden barbs, and they can touch me without finding anything there that will prick them. Because we have been treated by the water of God, which has been smoothing away the rough edges. But we are also people who jump, because this is not about taking that away either… No, glory to God! God wants passionate people who jump and leap and sing Pentecostal choruses, who are anointed, who go to church—all of that—but who also have that humble, simple part of the Christian life in its proper place. Am I making myself clear, brothers and sisters?

It is a balance: righteous and devout. And Simeon exemplified both things. He was also a man filled with the Holy Spirit. Sometimes when people hear me say this, they think I am throwing cold water on the Holy Spirit. No, quite the opposite. The point is that for the Holy Spirit to truly move in your life, you need the foundation of a Christ-centered character. And do not tell me otherwise, because that is what the Word of the Lord says. And I wrestle with that; it continually follows me throughout my life because I apply it to myself. You must apply it to yourself as well, because many times that spoils the party for me when I remember: I still have a long way to go in expressing the character of Jesus. But I know that this is what God calls me to.

But I also want to be passionate toward God; I want to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Simeon was a man who moved—his life, it says, was filled with the Spirit. The Spirit of God was with him and in him, and everything he did was characterized by the Spirit. He received revelation from God. God told him, “You will not die until you see My Anointed One.” And it says that, impelled by the Holy Spirit—“in the Spirit” is the translation in the original Greek—the Spirit took hold of him and brought him to the temple at the appointed time so that he could witness the presentation of His Son in the temple. Because God wanted a human witness apart from Joseph and Mary, who were inevitably involved.

I believe that Anna and Simeon—to me, and perhaps I am a little romantic—were like independent witnesses representing the human race, whom God had brought there and wanted to be present at that moment as witnesses when that incredible event took place, when the Trinity was there: the Son being presented, the Father receiving the presentation, and the Holy Spirit moving and bringing Simeon, all three present there at that moment.

And Anna and Simeon, a man and a woman, like Adam and Eve but rather advanced in age, representing the human race, welcoming the Son of God into His ministry and saying, “Welcome, Messiah. Welcome to earth, Son of God. We bless You and open the doors to You.”

Do you know what? God has given man dominion over the earth. He entrusted the earth to him. And God Himself abides by authority. What a thing—He submits His own authority, and He declared that man had authority on the earth and said, “I want two members of the human race to welcome My Son and be present, and I want them to be people filled with the Spirit and people already advanced in age, who have some mileage on them.” Do you know why? It is one of the things I say: this culture glorifies the young, but do you know what? Old people also have a great deal to do.

I was telling the brothers and sisters, “Look, one of the things God has told me to say to you is this: do not give yourself up for dead because the years are passing. The best years of your life are still ahead of you.” Yes. And as the years go by, you become better and better, you know? Amen.

As for me, brothers and sisters, I do not anticipate a decrepit old age. I want to serve the Lord with fire and passion until the last of my days. And I believe that what happens is that the more battles you have fought, and the more things have been stripped from you, the better prepared you are to receive the true anointing of God in your life. Because God does not move only through the young or the old; God moves through empty vessels that can contain His Spirit. And sometimes God has to empty us of a great many things so that His glory can then be deposited upon us. And old people have fought many battles, and we have lost much, and we have experienced much, and then God can say, “Now you and I can work together. Now I can use you.”

Do not surrender, do not give yourself up for dead, do not give up, and do not think that you are like a little candle slowly going out, its wax drying up until nothing remains. The best times are ahead of you. Though the outer man is wasting away, the inner man is being renewed day by day.

The Word of the Lord says that even in old age they will bear fruit; they will remain vigorous and green, proclaiming that Jehovah, my strength, is upright and that there is no injustice in Him. God does not give more to the young than to the old; He is not unjust. He gives equally to everyone. He gives one thing to the young and another to the old. If someone asked me, “Do you want to be twenty years old again?” Absolutely not. I am telling you honestly, brothers and sisters. I look at myself at twenty or twenty-five, and I frighten myself, honestly. I am ashamed.

God gives to you according to what is within you, brother. And God can use you at any age. The only thing is that you must be faithful, be filled with the Spirit, love Him above all things, hold fast to what you have received, seek His presence, allow yourself to be moved by His Spirit, love the intimate place of God’s presence, pay the price, and strip yourself of every secondary interest except the glory of God in your life. Live for Him, consumed with desire for Him.

And that is why, when Simeon had fulfilled his purpose and God had fulfilled the promise He had given him, he said, “Lord, now You dismiss me in peace.” Notice something: he does not say, “Dismiss me in peace.” No, he says, “Now You dismiss me.” Yes or no? In other words, what he is expressing is certainty: “I am leaving now. My ticket has already been stamped because I have fulfilled my purpose here on earth. Nothing is keeping me in this world.” He does not ask Him, “Lord, give me twenty more years of life.” No. “Lord, I have fulfilled my purpose. Glory to God, I am going with You.”

Because that is how one has to live, brothers and sisters. The only thing that keeps us in this world is how I can be used by God; that is what should keep you here. How can you be useful to the Holy Spirit, to the Kingdom of God? Paul said, I would love to be with Christ because being with Christ is much better, but if my remaining here on earth serves some purpose, then glory to God, I will stay.

And those are our perspectives, brothers and sisters. We say the opposite: I am going to cling to life tooth and nail, and if God wants to take me, I will have to say yes to Him. No, it is exactly the opposite. The child of God lives in terms of eternity. How can God use you? What gives you value and makes you worthwhile is the extent to which you serve the Kingdom of God. The extent to which the Spirit of God delights in dwelling in you and moving through you. Everything else is secondary. Strip yourself of everything so that, like Simeon and Anna, you can be used for God’s great purposes and for the movements of God in history.

Let us strip ourselves of everything. Please stand. The Lord is calling us, brothers and sisters. The Lord is calling us this afternoon to be filled with His presence, and I believe that the foretaste during the time of worship was meant to prepare us. I give glory to God for the worship team, and sometimes the enemy—frankly, brothers and sisters, the flesh stirs and tries to hinder certain things—but no. What God is saying to me is, look, church, be filled with the Holy Spirit, give Me My portion; and God says to you, give Me My portion, seek Me above all things, because I want to do great things.

There is much, brothers and sisters, that I have left out of the sermon, but allow me just this one little thing. Simeon says of the Lord that He is the consolation of Israel. That is what Jesus was. Simeon saw Him as the consolation of Israel. Why the consolation of Israel? Israel had suffered greatly and had been punished greatly, had been greatly humiliated, had been greatly shamed, was under the Roman boot, and the Messiah was the glory of His people; He was the consolation of His people.

And Simeon discerned that: history was going to change with the coming of the Messiah, and the condition of his people would be different afterward. Look, I believe that today the church is like Israel, in shame and barrenness, and what we often do is manufacture the glory, because we desire it, and like good Pentecostals, we invent the glory. But many times it is not genuine glory.

And that is what I have been preaching many times. Sometimes it is genuine, but sometimes it is not. And the church of Christ at this time is in shame. And the word of God does not flow as abundantly as God desires. The prophetic word, the gifts of the Holy Spirit—and the church, like Israel, is in shame at this time before society, before principalities and powers, and before itself.

And I believe that God has a visitation of His Spirit through which He wants to change things, lift up the head of His church, and restore its honor. I do not know for how long, but it will allow the church to rejoice once again, celebrate the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and have authority on the earth for a time. And a visitation of the Holy Spirit is coming to comfort the church and give it the glory that the church deserves, and people like Simeon and Anna are needed—people who have sensed this imminent visitation of the Spirit of God, who are eager and preparing themselves, and who, when it comes and is manifested, can discern it, celebrate it, recognize it, declare it, and proclaim it to others. And that is the time we are in now. And people are needed who will lose everything and surrender everything so that God can announce to them, this is the time of My visitation.

So let us prepare, brothers and sisters, for what is coming. The Lord says, prepare your house, prepare your temple, cleanse yourself and be healed. Surrender everything; die to everything you possibly can, because My visitation is imminent, and I want you to be there, present, and to discern it and see it. I want you to be one of My witnesses, and I want you to proclaim it to others. We are being called to that. I am being called to that.

Believe it, receive it, and say no now to a generic gospel, a religious, mediocre gospel. It is time to be like Anna and Simeon, dried up in the flesh but with the Spirit burning within and manifesting Himself, because there is less flesh to burn. All that remains is the skin, the parchment. The flame can be seen in their innermost being because the skin is so transparent with age. That is how it should be with us. Let the flesh be almost transparent. It will never be completely transparent, I tell you, but there is still a great deal of flesh to weaken. Then the power of God will be able to manifest itself in us.

May the glory of the Lord visit us in this Christmas spirit. We receive the visitation of the Holy Spirit and say, Lord, come and fill us, fill us and deal with us. Cleanse us; strip us of everything that is not Yours, Lord, of every agenda that does not come from You. Forgive us for being so difficult to soften, Father, but we desire that You fulfill Your purposes in us, Lord. And we want to be suitable instruments for You through which You can manifest Yourself. Do it, Lord, for Your own sake and not for ours, because we do not deserve it; but for Your own sake, Lord, do it.

We worship You, we bless You, and we kiss Your feet and Your hands, Lord. Our God and our Sovereign, our King, our heavenly Father, we love You, we love You, we love You, Lord. Glorify Yourself. Thank You, thank You for Your indescribable gift, Lord. Blessed and praised be Your name. Thank You, Jesus, amen and amen and amen.

Glory to the name of Jesus.