How we witness and embody our faith
The Presentation of Our Lord | Luke 2:22-40
Last week, we were in the synagogue, remember? That gospel was from Luke chapter four. Jesus had left the wilderness, where he was tempted by Satan with power and Jesus keeps throwing it back at him. Is that all you got? That’s the vibe, right? You’ve got to do better than that.
So then Jesus goes home and is preaching and people aren’t just loving it, they are rapturously enveloped by it and amazed by him, and he heads to the synagogue and reads from Isaiah about this being the year of the Lord’s favor and Jesus says. The scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. And the people are astounded.
We normally would get the second half of that story this week. The part where they stop listening to him and Jesus names their sin and they get mad enough to try and kill him. Which isn’t usually a response to being called out — it’s a response when you feel guilty.
But this Sunday lands on the Presentation of Our Lord, the day commonly known as Candlemas. So our gospel reading is drawn from earlier, chapter two, when Jesus’s parents, Mary and Joseph, brought the family to the Temple “for their purification according to the law of Moses.”
This is awfully pregnant wording the evangelist uses because there is a lot going on here. …
The full text may be found here.
For a limited time, you may find the audio here.
