In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

I think it’s important for us to remember as we are celebrating this feast of the Entry of the Lord into the Temple that in the course of all of creation, the Lord in the first place puts a particular order in things. He gives us this order to live by for a good reason: which is that we should be healthy, and that we should be a life-giving sort of person. There is an order in the creation, and in everything about us, and, in fact, in our history, which we are not necessarily always so willing to acknowledge because we are raised to consider everything that is happening as quite random, which is not exactly how it is.

Here we are today in the temple with the Lord. He is being brought into the temple by His parents, to do what is required according to the Law. When He is forty days old, He has to be presented in the temple with sacrifices because He is the first-born son. So, they come, and they are doing this. But then these two people come: first, Simeon. It does not say who Simeon is exactly, right now. This old man, who had been given by the Lord that he would see the Messiah, recognises Him immediately when he comes into the temple today. It has to be understood that this is not just some sort of happenstance. This old man was an old man in harmony with the Lord. His heart was in harmony with the Lord so that when the Saviour would appear, as He does as a child here, this old man knows for certain, because his heart is telling him. He understands in his heart because the Lord told him, exactly, that this is the Messiah, the Promised One. That is why he says: “Now Master, you are letting Your servant depart in peace because my eyes have seen Your salvation”. He points out in this particular hymn who this Messiah is, and what He is about. It’s not only the salvation of the people Israel. He is a light to lighten the Gentiles: that’s us. I think all of us here are among the Gentiles today. So this is what the promise is: that He is a Light to lighten the Gentiles.

Then after this, comes this very old woman. The way some of the writings are talking about it, it sounds like she is only 84 years old, but the way I have been accustomed to reading these passages is that she has been a widow for 84 years, and besides that she was a wife for a short time. This woman is definitely no spring chicken. So much for these ideas that people only lived for twenty or thirty years in those days. Maybe that might have been some sort of average because of sickness, death, and destruction, and so forth, but some people did live to a very great old age, and not only just this particular woman. At any rate, she comes into the temple, and she confirms the recognition of Simeon by saying exactly the same thing at the same time about Him. She recognises the Messiah.

It’s important, as the Apostle is saying in the Epistle to the Hebrews, to pay attention to the way the Lord works with his own creation. There was a particular order in the Jewish society at the time. There were two sorts of priests. There was the Aaronic priesthood – those were the ones who were charged with making the regular sacrifices, and so forth, in the temple. There were the Levites who were in charge of looking after everything else in the temple, somehow – they were preparing things one way or another. There was a sort of co-operative. The Levites were from the tribe of Levi. So, we have the descendants of Aaron, and we have the priests who were the descendants of the Patriarch Levi. The Apostle says that in the same way as Melchizedek ended up being a king and a priest at the same time, but was not related in any way to either of these priestly lineages, so is the Saviour. He points out that He comes from the tribe of Judah. The tribe of Judah is the tribe which is producing kings. From the tribe of Judah, the Apostle says, no priests have come. He is making a point of this because the Saviour, while He comes from the kingly tribe, as it were, and, in that respect is fulfilling the prophecies about where the Messiah should come from, and to whom He should belong as the legitimate descendant of King David; at the same time, this particular Person, our Lord, God, and Saviour, Jesus Christ, also ends up, like Melchizedek, being a Priest. Why? It is because He offered Himself as a sacrifice for us. In the way He lived His life, the way He lived for us, too, He is acting as a Priest in the manner of Melchizedek. That’s why the Apostle is making this sort of a connexion. The Lord makes an order in society, and in everything, and in all of our life.

At the same time, because He is Lord of the creation that He creates, He also is capable of making adjustments for our good from time to time. We generally don’t expect it when it happens, and we are generally confused, as people have been especially in the early days after the Incarnation. Who is this? He doesn’t exactly fit what we expected. They expected an earthly kingdom: He gives us the heavenly Kingdom. He is a King, and He is a Priest at the same time, like Melchizedek. They weren’t prepared for such things. The Lord, in His love for us knows what is good for us. He knows how to prepare us. He knows what to do with us. He knows what is necessary for us, and for our salvation.

The Lord works His wonders, as He always does – loving us, caring for us, protecting us. He is, in fact, asking us to have hearts that are like these two elders, Simeon, and Anna – hearts that are in tune with Him, in harmony with Him, ready to recognise what is His will, what is His way, what He wants us to do, instantly recognising it, like these two old people did. They recognised it for our salvation, too. So we say at the end of this Divine Liturgy that Simeon carried in his arms the Saviour for us, and for our salvation. All these things are accomplished for us, and for our salvation because, again, the Lord loves us. He cares for us. He is with us in everything, no matter how difficult our lives are; no matter how complicated things are; no matter how painful things are. He is with us. It’s important for us to keep our hearts in Him, so that He can always be refreshing us, renewing us, strengthening us, healing us, and making us strong to the glory of His Father, who is from everlasting, and His all-holy, good, and life-giving Spirit, now, and ever, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.

† Archdiocese of Canada - Orthodox Church in America