What’s Your New Year’s Resolution? 

a sermon by Rev. Rebecca Segers

Isaiah 61:10-62:3

Luke 2:22-40 

Christmas Day is over.  The New Year begins today.  For us, it is a time of acknowledged transition.  A time when our secular calendar starts anew.  We consider the past year, its good and its ills.  We think about what we did well and what we would like to improve upon.  Traditionally, it is a time of resolutions.  A time to promise to do things differently, sometimes small things, sometimes large.  But it is a chance for us to step into the new day, the new year with hope and challenge and promise.

It some ways this is a similar undertaking for Mary and Joseph.  Their whole lives have changed with the birth of the baby Jesus.  The verse before the one we started with today tells us that they have waited the appropriate eight days before Jesus’ circumcision, the ritual that marked him as a Jew and in which he would have been officially named Jesus as God through the angel Gabriel commanded.  In the next verse, the one we started with today, we are told “(w)hen the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the law of the Lord, “every firstborn male shall be designated as holy to the Lord”), and they offered a sacrifice according to what is stated in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.”

Now the purification that is spoken of is for Mary.  After childbirth a woman was considered unclean for 33 days after the birth of a boy child and double that after the birth of a girl.  The ritual requirement to return the mother to cleanliness or closeness to God was the sacrifice of a lamb and a turtledove.  The exception is in the case of a family that is too poor to afford the cost of a lamb in which case it is all right to bring two doves instead.  So this verse is telling us that the familiy fulfills its religious expectations, but it is also reminding us that Jesus comes from a family that is not wealthy.

Additionally, they bring Jesus to be designated before the Lord.  This is a blessing of the child before God, sort of like our ritual of baptism today.  There are parallels with this story and the story in the Old Testament of Samuel and his mother Hannah bringing him to be dedicated before the Lord, his blessing by the priest, Eli.  This is how long these traditions have been passed down.  Stories in the Old Testament tell of us mothers being purified after childbirth and children being blessed before God for thousands of years before Jesus.

Ritual was and is a big part of Jewish life and one of the major focuses of this story is the ritual observance of Jewish law.  The author of the gospel of Matthew was very invested in Christianity remaining a branch of Judaism.  He strove with practically every verse he wrote to share both Jewish tradition and Jesus’ interpretation of it.  He did not imagine a separate faith with Jesus at its head, but instead a reformation of Judaism that incorporated Jesus’ teachings within it.

However, 2000 years later, we don’t have the same ritual link to God that the Jews in Jesus’ time did.  We don’t really have a lot of ritual observance at all, in fact.  Partly as a result of Jesus’ condemnation of the Pharisees and their observance of ritual without meaning, as Christianity developed there was less focus placed on the ritual aspects of religion, especially those that occurred within the home.  Even so, as the Christian tradition progressed, the Catholicism built more and more ritual into its worship services within the church sanctuary: things like the use of Latin as the service’s language even after people were no longer speaking it, the incense and acolytes and so on.  However, when Protestantism came along, it took the focus from external ritual and placed it on internal spiritual life, so ritualism once again took a big hit.  Now, with the demands of modern twenty-first century America including busy schedules, dual-career marriages, after-school activities and so on, for many religious ritual has been reduced to church attendance at Christmas and Easter and not much more.  This was certainly apparent last week as we enjoyed record attendance on Christmas Eve here at Sweet Hollow.  And as a matter of fact, we were planning on a small group here at the Presbyterian Church of Sweet Hollow this morning, knowing that this Sunday is immediately after the secular holiday of New Year’s Eve and the parties and celebrations that it promises.

The fact of the matter is, the presence and knowledge of God has receded from our everyday expectations.  Many people assume that God is only available in certain places such as church sanctuaries or in certain books, like the Bible.  We really don’t expect to access God in our everyday ordinary lives, and I tell you today that our lives are lessened by these assumptions, leaving us to a world that is blessed and bounteous in physical, worldly things such as food and clothing and shelter and material possessions, but lacking the mystery and wonder of God’s presence.

Where is God found?  How is God found?  These are questions that probably wouldn’t have even occurred to Mary and Joseph.  They found God in their lives around them all the time.  Both of them encountered God personally through the angel Gabriel in life and in dream form, but they also had a full ritual life that was demanded by their faith tradition.  They would have celebrated Shabbat and the lighting of the candles on Friday night celebrating the beginning of the Sabbath, which continued through the day Saturday until evening.  They would have also participated in regular annual festivals such as Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah and Pesach and Sukkoth.  They would have had these rituals deepened through the celebrations of marriage, which took a whole week and funerals, which also had their own ritual requirements.  And when a child was born, there were expectations there, too.  Expectations that we are told were fulfilled in these passages we read today.  And through the attendance to and participation in these expected rituals, they met people who embodied God’s will and God’s blessing for them.

Just who were these people?  Well, in the story we read today, they are the characters of Simeon and Anna.  Now I find these two characters very interesting for one primary reason.  Both of the characters in the story are elderly.  We don’t know how old Simeon is, but it has been revealed to him that he will see the Messiah before he dies and upon holding Jesus in his arms, he says that now he has been “dismissed in peace”.  In other words, he has been waiting his whole life for this moment and now can die in peace because he has seen the Christ.  On the other hand, we do know how old Anna is; the Bible tells us she is eighty-four.  Now eighty-four in Jesus’ time is about the same as a hundred and eighty-four in our own.  I mean, remember, there was no modern medicine, no dentures, no glasses, no blood pressure or diabetes medication, much less chemotherapy or open heart surgery.  These folks were old.  Much older than any of you sitting out in the pews today.  Which tells me something very important.  You are never too old to be of use to God.  If you are still here, God has need of and purpose for you.

How?  Well, let’s look at Simeon and Anna.  Simeon, we are told, is a devout and righteous man on whom the Holy Spirit rests.  From this we can gather that he not only is faithful in attendance at the temple, but that he also observes the sorts of rituals that I was talking about earlier.  He is so steeped in God’s will for him that he has had a revelation.  A revelation that told him he will not die before seeing the Lord’s Messiah.  Furthermore, we are told that he is guided into the temple on the day that Jesus is brought there to be blessed.  He is guided by God and upon seeing Jesus knows that he is the One that Israel, indeed, all people including the Gentiles have been waiting for.  He holds the child in his arms and praises God, saying just these things.

Then there’s Anna.  She is a widow and has been for many years.  She has dedicated her life to worship, staying in the temple day and night, praying and fasting.  When she sees Jesus, she also knows immediately who he is.  What does she do about it?  She praises God and tells everyone who is looking for redemption about Jesus.

So what can we learn from Simeon and Anna?  Faithfulness that is discernible by their presence.  A listening heart that results in openness to God’s will.  Honesty that manifests in the ability to speak the truth when you know it.  Most of us are good at at least one of these things.  As we look at each one of them, I would like for you to consider what it is that you already have pretty much under control and what it is that you could improve upon.  My goal, for those of you who’re not quite with me yet, would be to consider a New Year’s Resolution that isn’t about how much – or little – you’re going to eat this year, how you need to exercise or get a better handle on your finances or something that comes under the normal headings.  But instead, taking Simeon and Anna as our guides, I would like for us to consider what we are going to resolve in our spiritual lives.

So: Faithfulness that is discernible by your presence.  A listening heart that results in openness to God’s will.  Honesty that manifests in the ability to speak the truth when you know it.  Where are you strong and where do you need to improve?

I would venture to say faithfulness is a pretty strong point for those who are here today.  You may not think you are a particularly faithful person but let me tell you a little story that points up the meaning of that word.  I remember when I was attending Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church in Manhattan, the minister there told me once that I was faithful.  I had never particularly thought of myself that way and almost cringed to be described in a way that I did not feel worthy of, but the more he spoke the more I realized that what he meant by faithful was simply the fact that I showed up on a regular basis.  That when he looked out into the congregation to the spot where I always sat – for I had “my” seat, just as most of you do in this congregation here – he could always count on my being there.  You see, faithfulness isn’t about always believing the “right doctrine” or even always believing.  It’s simply about showing up.  About being in your seat, or at least a seat whenever you can be.  And if you can’t be in a seat here at the Presbyterian Church of Sweet Hollow on Sunday, being in one in some other church community wherever you are.  Faithfulness means just what we think it means when we consider the dog that waits faithfully for its master to return home every day after work.  It’s there.

As I mentioned, those of us who’ve made it into church on New Year’s Day when it’s the day after a New Year’s Eve Saturday have probably got the faithful thing down.  Or at least have begun a pretty intense New Year’s Resolution…But if it’s something you think you need to work on, keep it in mind as we lift up the other two ways that Anna and Simeon are role models.

The second one is a listening heart that results in openness to God’s will.  What do I mean by this?  Well, we are told that Simeon is in the temple that day because of the Holy Spirit.  Clearly, he pays attention when the Spirit tells him what to do.  Anna is always in the temple, so her presence isn’t particularly surprising.  But we are told two things about her that let you know she is always listening to God’s word for her.  One is that she is a prophet.  Now this is not something that is said very often about women in the Bible.  But here we are told an eighty-four year old woman is a prophet.  A prophet is who listens to God’s voice to him or her and then tells the people what God is saying.  So if Anna is a prophet, clearly she has a listening heart.  The second thing is the phrase: “at that moment, she came”.  At that moment.  As soon as Jesus is brought into the temple, Anna feels, Anna knows that something big is going on.  She is immediately in the Lord’s presence.

So let’s think about this second possibility for resolution.  I think it’s the one that scares us the most.  A listening heart that results in openness to God’s will.  I mean, how do you have that?  How do you know that the voice you’re listening to is God’s and how do you then follow God’s will.  It’s a frightening and awesome thing to most of us; one that we’re afraid we don’t have the capacity or knowledge to fulfill.

First of all, I think it comes with practice.  God tells us to do things with little niggling thoughts that come into our consciences and won’t let us alone.  If we ignore the thoughts, then they fade over time and we become less receptive to God.  But if we respond, we will find our trust in our responses growing and our ability to hear God’s desire for us more often and more fully.  How do we know it’s God’s voice?  By the fruits of our labors.  By the final outcome of the things we do as a result of those little nigglings.

We have a wonderful example of someone who has listened to God’s will for her and followed them, each to the next in our guest speaker today, Judy Lee.  Even though she had moved to Ohio and was going through a complete change in her life and lifestyle, she realized that her longings and interests in peace and justice remained so she went to a conference.  God had her sit right next to Rick Ufford-Chase, our current moderator of the PC(USA) at supper one night and she didn’t sit back thinking she wasn’t important enough to talk with him, but instead found common interests in peace and justice.  He invited her to a party after the meal and she went.  There she was drawn into membership on the board of a national committee devoted to her interests and they sent her to Iran to do God’s work.  All this at a time when she thought she was retiring and wondering what on earth she was going to do with herself!  No matter who you are, no matter how young or how old, don’t ever think God is through with you.  Because if you listen to those little nigglings that are part of your being, God will find work for you to do that is especially tailored to your skills and gifts and strengths and interests.

Our own Ron Fischer is another example.  We all know how he loves to cook and that we are often recipients of this gift of his.  What you may not know is that several months ago, Ron really heard the call to do something for God with his gift.  So I made some phone calls and we found a community kitchen right here in Dix Hills that not only needed a cook, but needed a head chef for Wednesdays.  Now Ron is serving food his way to those in need in our own community every Wednesday at lunchtime and filling in on other days when needed, too.

What might God be telling you to do lately?  I invite you to start this year by listening.  Listening to your heart as it yearns for those things that you love to do or do well and think about how God is leading you to use your gifts in the Lord’s work.

Finally, using Anna and Simeon as our example, we have honesty that manifests in the ability to speak the truth when you know it.  Both of these folks praise and glorify God when they see the baby Jesus.  This is something that is very difficult for we Presbyterians.  We love our church and we love our God, but we don’t love telling anyone else about it.  We’re afraid that we’ll be perceived as “Bible-thumpers” or something worse.  We don’t want to share the good news for fear that it will somehow reflect poorly on us.  We want to do things decently and in order and that certainly doesn’t mean any standing on street corners doing anything embarrassing like telling people about God in Jesus Christ.

Yet we are called by God through the Scriptures to share the good news.  So how do we do that in a way that we can handle?  How do we let people know about the community that we have here without making ourselves too uncomfortable?  Perhaps we tell our friends first.  We invite them to join us at worship on a Sunday or even a fellowship event like the upcoming trip to Staller Arts Center to enjoy “Willie Wonka” or later in the spring, the Sunday School Barbeque.  I have some marvelous news in that the session has recently voted to support recording the sermons here at Sweet Hollow and very soon, we will be both streaming them on the web so that anyone with a computer can get not only a written copy, but can actually hear them spoken, and also we’ll have them in CD format, so that our folks who are not able to make it to church as often either because of illness or weather in the wintertime will be able to listen to them.  And you can take copies to listen to yourself again or to give to friends.  It’s a lot easier to say, “Here’s a CD from my church of a sermon that really spoke to me.  Maybe you’d like to listen sometime” than to stand on a street corner, isn’t it?

Once we get more comfortable with inviting our friends, perhaps we could reach out to acquaintances, too.  Opportunities abound for us to invite people to join us in fellowship and community and love and worship of God.  Remember, you are the people that others meet each day – in the grocery store, in your professions, at the gym or the pizza parlor or the beauty salon or the doctor’s office.

So those are the possible New Year’s Resolutions that I believe God is telling us to think about today.  Resolutions that aren’t about personal secular things, but instead are about our lives and connections to God and the Holy Spirit.    Faithfulness that is discernible by your presence.  A listening heart that results in openness to God’s will.  Honesty that manifests in the ability to speak the truth when you know it.  What will you resolve this year?  And if you do, how will you follow through?  Just think about it.  You aren’t so different from Simeon and Anna, you know.  Just two ordinary people doing their best to be faithful to God.  What amazing things ordinary people can do…