Dear friends,
I well remember the first infant that I ever held in my
arms: Holland Pryor
Greene, the newly-born
daughter (October 24, 1973) of our friends Tom and Cathy Greene. While sitting in that light
brown, wooden rocking chair at Tom and Cathy’s house with Bec kneeling close at
my side, I was afraid to move, even the slightest bit, as I held this tiny,
greatly treasured little girl in my arms. (As I was writing this, I
decided to see if I could find that picture. As you can see, I found it!)
So what prompted me to reflect once again, as I have many times
before, on that marvelous moment with little Holland (now Mrs. Breaux Nader of Baton Rouge) over forty years ago in the Greene
home? My return to that rocking chair came as I was pondering the experience
of a brother of ours who also once held an infant in his arms. I am of course speaking of that dear, old saint Simeon.
It happened, on a certain day in the Lord's temple, that as
Simeon was looking about, he suddenly caught sight of the
long-long-awaited One – the Deliverer! What he saw was not a young man
striding across the temple floor with the bearing of leadership about
him. No, what captured his eye was an infant, a newborn who was being
carried in his young mother's arms as she and her husband had come, in obedience
to the Law, to present their infant Son to the Lord. I have tried to
imagine how the old saint must have felt as he made his way toward the mother
and father and their baby. And when he approached them, what did he say?
"May I hold the child, please?" Was that what he
said? His lips must have quivered with each word. His aged eyes
must have glazed. His hands surely must have trembled with the kind of
fear that one has when he is about to hold something very, very precious.
As he carefully, gently received this cherished infant from his mother, Simeon
fully understood that he was holding the Promised One of whom Moses and the
Prophets had spoken and who had been the expectation of Israel for centuries upon centuries. But
what our dear old brother could not have
known was this: he was actually cradling his Creator. The Infant in
his arms was the Infinite. Simeon was holding the One who holds the
entire universe.
Concerning our
brother Simeon’s identity, the Scriptures only tell us that he "was a man
in Jerusalem," although some scholars believe
that he was a priest. However, there is
something of great importance that Dr. Luke makes strikingly clear about our dear
brother. Luke says that “the Holy Spirit
was upon him” and that “by the Spirit” he had received a personal revelation
that he would not die before seeing the Messiah and that “he came in the Spirit
(that is, in an extraordinary Spirit-given state such as that of the Apostle
John in Revelation 1:10) into the temple.”
Simeon, the man in Jerusalem,
was a man of the Spirit! And the Spirit had formed his character – he
was “righteous and devout” – and had filled his heart with longing – he was
“looking for the consolation of Israel.”
In the 1970’s, some
of you were among the millions of university students all over America (and in other countries) whom God was
calling into the blessed life of the Spirit.
Oh, what great days those were! We
could look at one another and see that the Holy Spirit was forming our
character, even as He promised He would.
And He was stirring our hearts with such a love for our Savior that we
were constantly “looking for” Him to appear “in the clouds” with His holy
angels and all the saints of heaven!
What the Holy
Spirit was doing to us, all those years ago, is very well summed up in that one
descriptor of Simeon: he was “devout.” What does this mean? In the Greek, we have a combining of terms
meaning “well” and “take hold.” To be
devout is to “take hold well” of God – to embrace Him well!
Brothers and sisters, as some of you may know, on Monday, February 2nd,
Christians all over the world will be celebrating “The Presentation of Our Lord”
and will be returning with Simeon to that moment when he held God in his
arms. May the Holy Spirit so work in
your heart and mine that not only on Monday but on every day we will embrace Him
well. Today we can hold Him in our
hearts; one day soon we’ll hold Him in our very arms!
In the love of
our Savior,
