Feb. 2, 2014: The Presentation of the Lord A
Were you ever called “four-eyes” when you were a kid? I certainly was! When I was in second grade, my mom noticed that I was squinting as I was trying to read something. When I went to the optometrist, I could not even read the big E that was at the very top of the chart; that’s how bad my sight was. When I got my glasses, I refused to wear them. I had to admit though, with the glasses I could see and did not have to squint.
We can become near-sighted about our faith too. We insist that we are spiritual and do not need any assistance in living out our faith. But let’s face it -- we’re not good at finding our way to God on our own. There is a good example of this kind of myopia in the Gospel today.
Mary came with her husband, Joseph, to hand over the child Jesus to the Lord as prescribed by the Law of Moses. The first-born belonged to the Lord according to the Book of Exodus (13:1-2) but the Book of Numbers (18:15-16) tells us the first-born could be redeemed or bought back by paying five shekels. Hundreds of faithful visited the Jerusalem temple that day to offer sacrifice and worship God. How many faithful and the religious leaders in the temple recognized Jesus? Just two--Simeon and Anna. Through the eyes of Simeon, we learn that something even greater is happening here. We learn that it is God himself who has handed over his only begotten Son to us. Today’s Presentation of the Lord is a prelude to another, future presentation – to that presentation that will take place on Calvary, in our Lord’s sacrificial death on the cross, of which every Mass is a re-presentation.
Simeon alone embraced the Child and saw in Him fulfillment, hope and truth. Lots of people come to Church today, give a nod to Christ and then move on with their lives unchanged. This last echo of Christmas this year teaches us that we can be like Simeon. We can embrace Christ more fully as He comes to the “temple” of our lives and see in Him our fulfillment of our hope and our truth. We can also do something Simeon could not do and that is to follow Christ with our life.
Simeon and Anna recognized Jesus because of their commitment and faithfulness to their prayer life. How many of us are not as faithful to prayer and cannot recognize the face of Jesus even in our own families? Forty days ago when we celebrated Christmas, how many of us did not recognize the Christ Child as Our Lord and Our Savior? Listen to this old spiritual hymn called, “Sweet Little Jesus Boy.”
Sweet little Jesus boy they made you be born in a manger
Sweet little holy child
And we didn't know who you were
Didn't know you'd come to save us Lord
To take our sins away
Our eyes were blind we could not see
And we didn't know who you were
You have told us how we are trying
Master you have shown us how even when you were dying
Just seems like we can't do right, look how we treated you
But please sir, forgive us Lord
We didn't know it was you
Sweet little Jesus boy born long time ago
Sweet little holy child
And we didn't know who you were
