Candlemas 2013

May the words of my mouth and the thoughts of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight now and for evermore O Lord our strength and our redeemer. AMEN

Today we are using the readings for the Feast of Candlemas or the Presentation of Christ in the Temple. At one time it was a hugely important festival but it’s importance now in this country at least seems to have diminished a bit. It has become associated with rhymes such as, “If Candlemas day be sunny and bright, winter again will show its might… If Candlemas day be cloudy and grey, Winter soon will pass away.”

But the importance of candlemas is certainly not restricted to superstitious rhymes about the weather, or to pagan festivals often associated with it.

It falls 40 days after Christmas and the Christian celebration can be traced back some 1500 years. The message of Candlemas remains tremendously important. For some countries Christmas decorations are left up until candlemas as a kind of reminder that whilst the Christmas season may be over the light of Christ is a light that shines beyond the Christmas season, beyond epiphany and even candlemas and out into the rest of the year.

The gospel reading for Candlemas is the account of Jesus being presented in the Temple as a baby – there his presence is noted by Simeon, an old man who had been promised in a vision that he would not see death until he had set eyes on the Christ… Prompted by the Spirit he came to the Temple; and when the parents brought in the baby Jesus, Simeon took him into his arms and blessed God; and he said the words we know as the “Nunc Dimittis” – a song sung at every evensong service.

Simeon had recognised his Saviour – he had recognised that Jesus was the signal for a new age to begin.

And this new age, Simeon believed, would be totally different from the old one. In this new age the grace of God would be shared among all people and not the special few, and this was a teaching that was to cause enormous problems in the early Church – the Jewish Christians did not want non-Jews brought into the faith of Christ unless they became Jews too…

But they failed to understand that in this new age, Jesus didn’t demand that people all shared one culture as a qualification for salvation – Jesus was to welcome the outcasts, the sinners, the neglected, the poor – Jesus was to invite all people to enter his kingdom..

In Franco Zeferelli's film, Jesus of Nazareth, Simeon is portrayed not only as old, but as blind as well. In the film we see Simeon waiting in the temple precincts, and then as the rabbi prepares to perform the circumcision, the old man makes his way into the temple following the sound of the baby's squeals and crying. He lifts the tiny infant high in his trembling hands and says "Lord now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace according to thy word."

By portraying Simeon as blind, the film attempted to show that it is with the eyes of faith that every promise of God is seen to be fulfilled. A new age began as Jesus began his earthly life, and it is a new age that we are still part of today…

And in this new age one of the great symbols will be the symbol of light… Simeon calls Jesus "a light to enlighten the Gentiles". Because of that, the feast of candlemas got it’s name and this day was often celebrated as a feast of candles.

One of the things that has become increasingly more popular in recent times is the use of candles – and with popularity occasionally comes jokes - jokes like 'what did one candle say to the other - let's go out tonight' or 'you know you're getting old when the candles cost more than the cake'....

But seriously candles have become important symbols again -  many people find it helpful to light a candle in memory of a loved one – others will put candles on the dinner table or around the house. Sometimes we light up the Church with candlelight, and the main reason for that is that candles are a living flame.

Lights shine, perhaps more brightly than candles, but they shine without the same warmth and glow… People like to see a living flame, and that is what Simeon saw, whether he was blind or not, when he recognised Jesus as a baby in the Temple.

He saw a child whose light was going to make a difference to him and to millions since, and we are urged to shine as the lights for him today… By ourselves we will try hard and we can make a difference, but together we can do so much more. And most importantly of all it is with the light of Christ that we will really make ourselves, and his message and his character, better known.

We are told that he is the light that no darkness can ever put out, the light to be a light to lighten the gentiles, the nations, all the nations and races and cultures of people.

Candlelight can be tremendously moving – the living flame can touch hearts, but the remembrance of candlemas is certainly not all about a nostalgic recollection of the circumcision of Jesus, it is not all about the remembrance of a child in the temple – it is a reminder that the light needs to shine today in a world where there are so many areas of darkness.

Pope Paul VI wrote about how we can make that light shine – he said, ‘The candle tells us: by burning, and being Consumed in the burning.’ In other words the light of Christ will only shine through us if we are prepared to allow the message of Christ to be fed out through us.

And so we think of light and we return to Simeon. Like many characters in the bible we don’t know a great deal about him – in fact 11 verses are all we have of him. It would be good to know more perhaps – we live in an age where we are use to knowing so much about people through papers, and tv and social media and so on, but what we do know is still pretty important.

We are told he was devout and righteous and that the Holy Spirit rested upon him. He was clearly a man who listened to God – he had been told he would not face death until he had seen the Saviour and he believed it !

He was a man who was willing to be led by the Spirit – the Spirit we are told guided him to the Temple that day when he saw Jesus. And there he celebrated his meeting with the Messiah. He proclaimed that this boy was to be destined for the falling and rising of many – he warned Mary that there would be pain for her as she watched her son grow and teach and live the gospel.

And so we may want to know more of Simeon, but what we know is enough to challenge and to guide us.

We can all seek to be devout and righteous – and we can open our lives to the power of the Holy Spirit working within us. Soon we will enter Lent, a time traditionally associated with making a little extra time for God, but there is no set season for that – God invites us to share a relationship with him every moment of every day.

He fills us with his Spirit and we are invited to listen to his guidance – to look for opportunities  and possibilities – to look at the world with a new vision, filled with hope and the knowledge that Christ is with us in all that we do.

And as Simeon celebrated his meeting with the Messiah, so can we. For Simeon, one thing I’m sure of, though we’re not actually told it, is that his life was never the same again.

We too can celebrate a life that has been transformed by God as we open ourselves to his strength and power and love, but going back to the end of the meeting in the Temple Simeon speaks to Mary and says, ‘This child will be destined for the falling and rising of many, and a sword will pierce your soul too…’ In those words Simeon was reminding Mary that being so closely associated with Jesus would hurt, that sometimes the pain that he felt would hurt her too…

Being truly consumed in the light of Jesus shining in the world today will inevitably mean times of struggle, times of pain and times of all kinds of testing, but the choice we are faced with is that it is only by being consumed completely in the message of Jesus that we will ever obtain the complete fullness of life, and the peace and the joy that is his wish for every one of us eternally.

Simeon was a man confident that God was working in and through him – that wasn’t arrogance, but an experience – an experience of accepting that God’s promises were for him personally. Jesus is not a good idea or good man or a nice story but a man who came to earth to enter into our lives and into our world.

And so let Jesus shape us into who he wants us to be – let us renew a sense of confidence in him and in what he is doing in and through us. AMEN