The Generational Praise of Anna

Psalm 148: 1-2, 9-14; Luke 2:22-40

My grandmother was Evelyn Kay Dudley. She went by her middle name, Kay, which also happens to be my mother’s middle name, my middle name, Kami’s middle name, my cousin Charli’s middle name, and I have a cousin named Evy- short for Evelyn. You could say that Gammy, her moniker for us grandchildren, was an influential and special lady in our family. Gammy was also special and influential in her professional life, having worked for a governor in Oklahoma for many years, but what was most important to her, and what we remember and cherish most about her, was her faith.

Jesus truly was her closest friend and in her old age she continued to prophesy of his goodness and grace. She had Alzheimer’s in her last years on earth, but she never forgot the promises of God, even if she questioned God’s plan for keeping her alive so long after my poppa died! In reading Anna’s story, I kept being drawn back to Gammy. Their steadfast faithfulness, letting their life show the fruit of the Spirit, and the lasting impact they left on generations that they’ll never see. Their praise never pointed to themselves, but to God.

Anna was a widow and she devoted her life to the temple. Anna pretty much lived at the temple, studying scripture, serving, and waiting for the long-awaited redemption of Jerusalem.

The work of the Spirit, especially in Luke’s infancy narrative, demonstrates that God’s love is rooted in neither social status nor gender nor geography.

God’s love rests on the unlikeliest of people.

We know Anna is of old age and has been widowed for the majority of her adult life. This places her in not only a vulnerable state, but one without much influence or power either.

Yet, she’s a prophet, and a female prophet whose name is recorded. 

She see’s, she’s filled with the Spirit, and she speaks.

Unlike Simeon, we don’t get a recording of her words, but we don’t need them to know that she was a prophet. Her life’s testament and actions reveal to us that she praised God her whole life long.

She spent her days fasting and devoted to prayer, night and day. She was in close relationship with God.

Waiting and anticipating the day when what would seem like an ordinary, ritual of a Jewish child dedication in the temple, turns out to be anything but an ordinary babe.

Might the words of her lips have echoed Psalm 148: “young people, old and young together! Let them praise the name of the Lord, for God’s name alone is exalted” as she bears witness to the Christ-child. Might she have been the first to proclaim to the Good News that God was doing something new here with this baby boy? We often think about the women leaving the empty tomb to proclaim resurrection, but what about Anna who can’t contain her joy and excitement and leaves to tell all who would hear about the redemption that has come!?

Anna saw something in Jesus that wouldn’t have been apparent except through the eyes of discernment.

Discernment doesn’t come by happen stance, but through a steadfast communion with God. Through habits and rituals, a life led through faithful commitment to the teachings of God. A discernment that comes through Hope that God would fulfill the promise to send a Messiah.

A discernment through Peace that comes from meditation, fasting, and prayer.

Anna’s life drew me back to The Way of the Heart by Henri Nouwen.

This little book has three movements, Solitude, Silence, and Prayer and this is what he starts out with about each.

On Solitude he says: Solitude is the place of purification and transformation, the place of the great struggle and the great encounter… the place of our salvation. -Sums up Anna’s life in the temple!

On Silence he says: First, silence makes us pilgrims. Secondly, silence guards the fire within. Thirdly, silence teaches us to speak. Could Anna proclaim what her eyes beheld because a life of learning silence had taught her to be led by the Spirit and NOW was the time to preach?

And finally, on prayer Nouwen says: The prayer of the heart opens the eyes of our soul to the truth of ourselves as well as to the truth of God. The prayer of the heart challenges us to hide absolutely nothing.”

It didn’t matter what others thought of Anna spending her days in the temple, that she was a widow, or that she probably depended on others greatly, the prayer of her heart was devoted to God and she had nothing to hide, she knew who she was, and she knew that God’s truth was smiling back at her from the arms of His mother, at eight days old.

These spiritual disciplines propelled Anna to be at the right place, at the right time, to praise, to proclaim Good News to all who would have ears to hear it.

God’s love is rooted not in those who practice perfectly, but whose life leads to praise.

The text places Jesus within his Jewish context, and within the long line of prophetic voices. While we may not practice the same Levitical law when it comes to, well, much of anything! But here presenting children in the temple, we do still dedicate our children as demonstrated just last week!

It’s in this space that we commit to loving parents, and their children, through life’s joys and challenges. As a community of faith we promise to walk alongside of one another whatever may come.

The same grace that was bestowed on Mary at the beginning of her journey, is now bestowed on Jesus, by Simeon. Notice it doesn’t occur at Jesus’ birth, it doesn’t occur with the angels, it doesn’t occur with the shepherds arriving, it occurs when Jesus is intimately and ritualistically connected to the broader community, where he was connected to a community that would nurture him, care for him, teach him and help shape him into the Messiah that he’d be introduced as 30 years down the road. He’s part of something, renewing it, and THIS is what Simeon and Anna have waited their whole lives for. To be part of the redemption story that they’ll never see come to fruition.

The dedication wasn’t just rainbows and unicorns though, Simeon recalls to Mary that her own heart will be broken.

We often separate the manger from cross, the nativity from Calvary. Each has their own place, but here Simeon binds those two together from the very beginning.

What is it that Simeon and Anna know from years of dedication to God and God’s people in the temple? God’s people know that faithfulness doesn’t mean sorrow won’t come.

A life of Love is filled with Joy AND heartache. Tragedy is not void of God’s redemption. Simeon and Anna have the eyes to see a glimpse of God’s reign to come, one that includes miracles and pain. Terrible things will come, but Simeon can be at rest knowing this child has entered the chat. It wasn’t that Simeon or Anna were to see the fulfillment of things to come, but that they were PART of the story. Hasn’t that been the role of the church for centuries? It’s not that we can fix all of the terrible things that are happening, but that we get to participate in the unfolding of God’s story that is still at play. We get to catch glimpses of joy and peace, hope and love, and it empowers us to keep going so that others may take up the torch and bear witness to the great things God has done and will continue to do.

The same way Anna, and Gammy, and all of those saints before us who live their life in such a way that they have eyes to see and a readiness to praise God. A readiness to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ, a legacy for generations and generations to come.

Thanks be to God.

Amen