We're thinking today about
Anna.
She was 84. She had been
married for 7 years, then widowed, and since then she had lived in the temple
I suspect people thought
she was mad.
She has lived in the
temple many years. Let’s assume that she got married at 15 and her husband died
7 years later. She probably did not have children. Since then, for 62 years,
she has lived in the temple courts. It was a big area, and no doubt she found a
quiet corner where she could sleep. And she would have been dependent on the
gifts of others.
She worships there; she
prays and fasts.
She waits for God to come
and set his people free.
Most people would say,
“what a wasted life”.
Some of you may have heard
of a Samuel Beckett play called Waiting for Godot, in which Vladimir and
Estragon sit around waiting for someone called Godot, who never appears.
And here is Anna, waiting
for ‘the redemption of Israel’, waiting for God.
Is she a Vladimir and
Estragon? A bummer wasting her life.
Or is she something more?
Luke certainly thinks that
she is much more.
He describes Anna as a
prophet: someone who speaks the words of God to her generation.
And someone whose
lifestyle speaks as loud as her words
We need people like Anna
She reminds us that life
is not about buying and selling, it is not about stuff, it is not about sex, it
is not about status.
She makes us question what
life is all about.
Is it really just about
passing exams, getting a good job, finding a life partner, getting married or
having children?
Is it really about seeking
to be famous or rich or powerful or beautiful or even just plain comfortable?
And what happens when
death steps in? Either the death of one we love or our own death?
You see, if we are
prepared to look and listen, people like Anna can help us glimpse another
world.
Anna longed for God and
the things of God.
She delighted in God.
She was like the Psalmist
who said, ‘I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than live in
the tents of the wicked’ (Psalm 84:10)
And Anna hoped in God.
She waited for the
redemption of Jerusalem: when God would step onto the scene of human history
and set people free from sin and death.
There are many Annas:
people who - whether because of a tragedy or a significant life event, or an
encounter with God - have been forced to think through what it is all about,
and have chosen to turn their backs on the world for the sake of God.
One of the people you may
have heard of is blessed Xenia of St Petersburg. She lived in the C19th. She
was a bit like Anna. Widowed at the age of 26, she abandoned her former way of
life, sold all that she had and for 45 years, usually wearing her late
husband’s uniform, she lived as a ‘fool for Christ’.
She wandered through the
poor section of Petersburg with no place to lay her head. When people did give
to her, she gave to others.
And she devoted her life
to God. When they were building a church in the Smolensk cemetery, she brought
bricks to the building site. But she did so at night so that no one would see
her.
Perhaps she also was just
an eccentric.
Or maybe, like Anna, and
maybe like many others who have turned their backs on the neon lights of the
world for the fire of God, she had discovered that we don’t need to live for this
world or for the things of this world, but we can live for that world.
Perhaps, like Anna, she
had discovered that a longing for God and for the things of God can trump all
longings that this world offers.
Godot never turns up and
Vladimir and Estragon continue their futile waiting.
But Anna gives us hope.
Anna takes the baby Jesus
in her arms and realised that here was the one she was waiting for. And
although nothing was going to happen for at least 30 years, by which time she
would be well dead, she knew that here was the one for whom she had been
waiting.
He was the one who would
set people free from sin and death.
He was the one who would,
one day, - and we still wait for this - bring in the Kingdom of God in its
fullness
And she speaks of it to
whoever will listen.
And she praises God.
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