Sermon Tone Analysis

A Fast for a New Year

A Fast For a New Year

Next week, we are going to begin a new series of messages for the new year.

But this morning, on the very FIRST Sunday of a new year.

As we enter the 2020’s, I want us to take stock of where we are and where we’re going.

I want to encourage you with hope and I want to challenge you with something we looked at, during the Advent season.

Challenge you with fasting.

To that end, let’s read .

Going to focus on vv.

36-38, the brief story of Anna.

1 ANNA’S PRACTICE

At the time Jesus is born, the Jews are under Roman rule.

The Promise Land is under the foot of foreigners … HEATHENS, with no regard for the God of Creation - the God of Abraham … The God of the Exodus … Israel’s God.

This is NOT a good time to be a member of the people of God, if dignity and hope are what you’re after.

How much was 1st Century Israel like 21st century Canada.

Obviously Canada was never a fully ‘Christian’ country.

But there was a time when lip service, at least, was paid to the God of the Bible.

Canada’s official motto, which is on the Canadian Coat of Arms to this day, has the Latin for ‘From Sea to Sea’, which is taken directly from ,

“He shall have dominion from sea to sea”.

In our day - mention of God in the public square is met by rolling eyes, or angry hostility.

There is a decision to be made, more and more so as the days go by: Will I live for the applause of the crowd?

Or will I live by faith in the God who has revealed Himself in this book?

Will I live according to the twists and turns of the spirit of the age?

Or will I live according to the Word of God?

And for those of us who have chosen the latter – “The Word of God is the only foundation solid enough to build a life on.

All other ground is sinking sand”.

For those of us who want to live under the authority of God’s Word – it’s tempting to feel alone in this world.

But there is a remnant.

God ALWAYS keeps a remnant.

The remnant may seem to be very small.

At the end of the Gospels - the beginning of the book of Acts - When the whole ministry of Jesus was over and all the believers in Jerusalem gathered in the upper room, there were only 120 of them.

At the beginning of Jesus’ life, the group was even smaller.

But among that little remnant that took their Bible, took the Old Testament seriously and believed it was an old couple, Zacharias and Elizabeth — he was a priest and she even came from the priestly line as well — there was a young couple, Joseph and Mary, who were righteous teen-agers, there were some shepherds, working the night shift, watching their sheep out on the hillside in Bethlehem.

And here, in Luke chapter 2, we meet a couple of more people in the remnant, namely Simeon, an old man, and Anna, an old lady.

None of them seem important.

I mean, there were thousands of priests in Israel and certainly Zacharias was not a particularly distinguished one.

He, in fact, lived in a little Judean village, not in the mainstream of things at all.

Joseph and Mary were from that lowly and despised place called Nazareth which was up there by where Gentiles lived and far away from religious feelings that were generated around Jerusalem.

And the shepherds were the commonest of the commonest and the lowest of the low.

And Simeon and Anna - both of them are nobodies - Senior citizens way past their prime, with nothing in either of their pasts that marks them out as anything special.

But God doesn’t look at people the way the world does.

So here we are in the Temple of Jerusalem.

According to the Old Testament Law - - 40 days after the birth, Joseph and Mary bring the tiny child Jesus into the temple.

It is the time for purification AND presentation.

This is THE TEMPLE … OF JERUSALEM.

This is the bustling center of spiritual activity that is so crucial for the people – this is the heart the identity and the hopes of Jewish identity – Now Jesus, the Son of God is here … and almost NOBODY notices!

Amidst the hum of prayers – lost in the busy-ness of that place- - there are two people - - both with faces marked by the years … both of them recognize the identity of this extraordinary infant.

First, verse 25 introduces us to a man, whose name is Simeon.

Verse 25 says he is ‘waiting for the consolation of Israel - and the Holy Spirit was upon him.”

Here is a man whose heart is in tune to the things of the Lord.

He’s concerned for the reputation of Israel’s God … and aware that God’s reputation is bound up with the situation of His people.

Simeon lays eyes on this baby - recognizes THIS is the One he was promised that he would see … takes the baby in his arms, and out of his mouth comes the overflow of a heart filled with praise: (verse 29), “Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word; (30) for my eyes have seen your salvation (31) that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples.

(32) a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel.”

“My waiting has not been in vain!”

In verse 36, we read of another aged intercessor - - her name is Anna.

What a remarkable woman.

Hers is a life touched by tragedy.

She was married for only seven short years - when her husband dies.

That’s a tragic, heartbreak in any culture, in any historical time.

But in first-century Judea, it’s also a devastating blow - - where your husband is not just your companion … If you are a woman - your husband is also your security.

The existence of a widow in Anna’s day … is a hard, precarious one.

For year after year, decade after decade - - - probably 60 years - - she has lived the difficult widow’s life.

It’s a hard life.

In fact, when the text tells us, in v. 27, that Anna was a widow UNTIL she was 84 - the wording leaves the meaning a little ambiguous here.

It could mean that she was a widow until she was 84.

It could also mean that she was a widow for 84 years.

Take your pick.

She wouldn’t have been married until she was 13 and the text does make it clear that she lived with her husband for 7 years.

So, if she was a widow for 84 years, that would make her 104 years old, when she’s in the temple with Jesus.

Either meaning is possible.

But what is very clear is where Anna’s energies and desires are directed over all these years.

Verse 37, “… She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day.”

Anna lived for many years in this world - - but her eyes are firmly fixed above.

There is no doubt.

Her heart is fixed on God and moved by a concern for his glory.

So she WORSHIPS and also SHE FASTS.

THAT IS NO COINCIDENCE ...

It seems to me that the more comfortable we become in the warm embrace of God’s material blessings,

.... the more content we become in this world.

.....

The more content we become in this world, the less we yearn for the next.

The less longing we have for heaven and the revealing of the Glory of Jesus Christ as King of Kings for all to see.

And something’s wrong with that kind of picture.

In , remember Jesus is talking to the disciples of John the Baptist.

John’s disciples can’t understand why everyone else who cares about the glory of God, seems to be fasting.

They are fasting.

Even the Pharisees (and John sees right through them) - they are fasting for the coming Messiah.

.....

So why aren’t JESUS’ disciples fasting?!

Jesus answers that this is a wedding celebration.

He is the bridegroom: “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them?” Obviously the answer is no - there’s no sadness while the groom is at the party.

But Jesus goes on, in v.15, “The days will come with the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.”

Jesus takes for granted that, when He ascends into heaven, His Church - His BRIDE - WILL mourn for His return - - and that the people of His Church will show their longing by fasting.

I want to challenge you to make fasting a part of your spiritual life in 2020.

Before Christmas we saw that fasting is not just an OT practice – it’s very much NT.

Jesus, in “And WHEN you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites ...”

Not IF you fast, but WHEN you fast …

Acts Chapter 13 is where the church in Antioch sends Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey.

, tells us how that first missionary trip came about … “While they were worshiping the Lord AND FASTING, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’

(3) Then AFTER FASTING and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them off.”

Let me remind you that fasting is more than simply food.

Some people aren’t able to fast from food for physical reasons.