The Presentation of Christ in the Temple, 3 February 2018
Eldroth, Keasden
It was an ordinary day in the Temple for Simeon. But then he had the most memorable moment of his life. I wonder if you feel as I do, that sometimes, at the most unexpected times and in the most unlikely places, things can happen to give you a hint of heaven, a glimpse of glory? A Simeon moment?
I once stopped at a McDonalds on a very busy major junction, one of those drive-ins mostly built to cater for passers-by. It was full of business travellers, and other local customers too, carers with a young woman in a wheelchair, young apprentices on a construction job nearby. Normally in places like this you don't expect strangers to bother with each other. But that day something happened to change that.
The hint of heaven, the glimpse of glory, the Simeon moment, came to all of us there when another customer came in, a young mother, holding her very young baby in her arms. One of the assistants behind the servery squealed with delight when she saw this mum and baby come in and - ignoring the queue and breaking all protocol - the assistant held out her arms across the counter, and the mum - obviously her friend - came to the front and passed the child over to her for a cuddle.
It seemed like this was the first time that that McDonalds assistant had seen her friend's child and she couldn't help share her delight with everyone else there. Suddenly everyone in the fast-food restaurant were united in a beautiful moment. It might have been the first time that young mother had taken the child out to show her off to people, and - just by being there, just by exchanging a few smiles - all of us, finding ourselves gathered around a baby in the middle of that McDonalds helped her to celebrate her new-born pride and joy. [1]
The parent passing the baby over to the one who had been eagerly awaiting their first sight of this child. A Simeon moment. Just like that ordinary, glorious day in the Temple all those years ago.
Do you recognise the reality that sometimes, from the most unexpected people and in the most unlikely places, something happens which feels like a flash of real insight, a vision of heaven? Can you recall any Simeon moments in your life?
I’m a firm believer in what I call ‘Heaven in the ordinary’. The idea that God will show himself to us in the middle of our everyday lives, if we open our eyes to him; that that we can find Heaven not just in the afterlife but in the here and now, if we open our hearts to that possibility. [2]
After all, didn’t Jesus say that ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is 'in your midst', or translated another way, The Kingdom of Heaven is 'within your grasp'. [3] Scripture is full of this idea, especially the gospels which are dominated by the concept of the Kingdom of Heaven, or the Kingdom of God - the central idea of Jesus' teaching, and one which he unfailingly taught by telling stories which are deeply rooted in ordinary life:
- stories of the mustard seed and the yeast and the fishing net, which illustrate to us that the Kingdom of Heaven starts very modestly but keeps on growing;
- stories of the wedding banquet and the many other meals which he talked about or took part in, all of which illustrate to us that the Kingdom of Heaven is a festive, joyful and communal event;
- a story about a vineyard owner who pays equal wages to all his staff regardless of the hours they worked, which illustrates to us that the Kingdom of Heaven is a scandal of grace;
- and stories about lost sheep and lost coins and treasure hidden in a field, which help us to know that in the Kingdom of Heaven small things are valued highly, and ought to be sought out.
Other parts of scripture - particularly the Old Testament - promote strongly the sense that heaven is a transcendent 'other' place where God lives. Jesus himself affirms this when he tells his friends that he is going to prepare a place for them 'In my Father's house [where there are] many rooms'. [4]
But his chief concern of Jesus’ life and teaching is to break down any supposed divisions between a heavenly, spiritual kingdom and an earthly, physical kingdom. That's the whole point of the incarnation of course, that's why he lived the human life. To bring heaven and earth together. To completely and intimately connect the spiritual and the physical. And, though we hold to the hope of a final wondrous home where we will live with God, Jesus teaches us that our foretaste of that heaven, and our preparation for it, are to be found in the here and now, and in the closest, tiniest things which are so familiar to us that we generally neglect or undervalue them. Heaven is not 'within us' or 'in our hearts', but in the tangible stuff of ordinary life.
Remember when you first took hold of a child - your own, maybe, or a nephew, niece, grandchild, god-child: that feeling, that heavenly moment when your eyes met the child’s eyes and your fingers felt the warmth of their tiny body through their clothes, and those hopes and dreams for the baby, fears and apprehensions for its mother, welled up inside and spilled out from your heart. The moment when Mary and Joseph appeared in the Temple was just one of those ordinary moments of everyday life. The moment when Simeon took the child Jesus in his arms, part of the tangible stuff of which all our experiences are made, and though which we learn more about ourselves, and the divine.
We often think that it is major events which most determine a person. But we are more deeply and lastingly influenced by the tiny events of which everyday existence is made up. [5]
It takes the imagination of faith to be able to see heaven in the ordinary. May God give us the imagination of faith which Simeon displayed and Anna expressed in the Temple that day, when they saw, in an ordinary child, something special, something to praise God for. May God help us keep our eyes open for Simeon moments, so that all our daily lives can become like a communion, as we allow Jesus the human one to come to meet us where we are.
Notes
[1] Revised version of Jesus in the Temple and the baby in McDonalds: finding Heaven in the Ordinary preached in Somerset in 2016 and partly based on Simeon moments and Simeon sayings, preached in Liverpool in 2009. The McDonalds incident took place in Basford, Nottingham - a story I first blogged about in England and nowhere on January 22, 2009.
[2] Much of the following content is based on my talk, Heaven in Ordinary, given at the Greenbelt Festival, Cheltenham, August 2007.
[3] Luke 17.21.
[4] John 14.2.
[5] Siegfried Kracauer: ‘We must rid ourselves of the delusion that it is major events which most determine a person. He is more deeply and lastingly influenced by the tiny catastrophes of which everyday existence is made up.’ Quoted in Joe Moran, Queuing for Beginners, p.60.
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