#13 Lu. 2:25-30; A MAN WHO WAS READY TO
DIE
Introduction:
When Jesus was forty days old, Joseph and Mary carried
Him to the temple in
keeping with the Mosaic law. While they were there Mary made
a sin offering and a burnt offering to the
Lord in keeping
with the Law of Moses. It was while they were there at the
temple that they came in contact with a
man by the name of
Simeon.
In the title of this message I have called him "a
man who was ready to die." Actually at the time that they
first encountered him he was not ready to
die. It was after
their encounter with him that he was ready
to die.
I.
Death, not the most pleasant thing to think about
I am aware that death is not the most pleasant thing to
think about. This is especially true of our own
death. We
do not really relish the idea of
dying. But we do need to
spend some time thinking about our death
because death is
inevitable for all of us. The only thing that could prevent
any of us from dying would be for the Lord
to return and
catch some of us up while we are still
alive.
Our forefather, Adam, chose to disobey God and that act
of disobedience was a sin against
God. For that one act of
sin the curse of death has come upon all
the human race and
the Bible says that it is appointed to all
men to die. We do
not have to want to die. We are all going to die whether we
want to or not. We are all going to die whether we are ready
to die or not. We are all going to die whether we are
prepared to die or not.
Let me point out to you that there is a difference
between being prepared to die and being
ready to die. I am
sure that you have heard the story about
the preacher who
asked his congregation, "How many of
you want to go to
heaven?" Everybody in the
congregation raised his hand but
one young man. The preacher then asked that young man,
"Son,
why didn't you raise your hand? Don't you want to go to go
to heaven when you die?" The young
man replied, "Yes sir. I
want to go to heaven some day, but I
thought you were getting
up a load to go right now." One can be saved and fully
prepared to die, but still not be ready to
go right now.
II.
The man, Simeon
In verse 25 Luke introduces us to the man in our text
who reached the point that he was ready to
go. He was fully
ready to die. V. 25,
"And, behold, there was a man in
There is no doubt that this man was named after the
second son of Jacob by his wife Leah. Jacob's son by the
name of Simeon was the head of one of the
twelve tribes of
this name.
Luke says that the particular Simeon of our text
was in the city of
probably not his home town, but it was the
place of his
residence at the time. It is believed by some that he was
one of the Jewish rabbis who was serving
God in the temple.
This may be so. We cannot say with certainty that he was a
rabbi.
At least he was at
arrived with baby Jesus.
(V. 25), "...and the same man was just and devout,
waiting for the consolation of
upon him." In this Luke tells us four things about the
man,
Simeon.
First, he tells us that Simeon was just.
That is,
he was just with God. He was approved of God. He was
accepted of God. He was in good standing with God as far as
his soul was concerned. In other words, Simeon was a saved
man.
He was saved by repenting of his sins and trusting in
the Savior who was to come. There is no way that he could be
just with God any other way. There is no way that he could
be justified before God by his own works
of righteousness.
"But that no man is justified by the
law in the sight of God,
it is evident: for, The just shall live by
faith," Gal.
Simeon was saved. He was already
saved before Joseph
and Mary brought Jesus into his
presence. He had already
repented of his sin. He had already trusted in the coming
Christ as his Savior. He was already just with God.
Since Simeon was already saved, he was already prepared
to die.
He had already made his peace with God.
He was no
longer in danger of hell fire. He was saved and he was
prepared to die, but was not yet ready to
die. There was a
reason which we will see when we get to
the next verse.
Secondly, Luke tells us that Simeon was a devout man.
that is he was very devoted to God. He loved God and was
very active in trying to serve God.
I might ought to point out to you that not ever saved
person is a devout person. Some people are truly saved, but
they are not very loyal to God. They do not love God as they
should.
They are more devoted to the things of the world
than they are to God. They are a lot more loyal to their
club, or their favorite ball team than
they are to God. They
make very little effort to serve God and
find very little
time to worship and serve God.
But, thank the Lord, that was not the case with Simeon.
Simeon was not only saved, but he was
devoted to God.
Thirdly, Luke tells us that Simeon was waiting for the
consolation of Israel. The word, consolation, comes from a
verb which means "to console or to
comfort." In other words,
Simeon was waiting for the coming of the
promised Messiah of
God who would bring comfort and
consolation to the people of
Israel.
One of the ways that the Messiah would be a comfort
and consolation to Israel is that He would
set Himself up as
king in Jerusalem and would free the
people of Israel from
Gentile rule. All of the people of Israel understood this
and were hoping and praying for such a
Deliverer to come.
However, those who had a deeper insight into the
spiritual matters also understood that the
Messiah would free
the condemned sinner from the penalty of
his sin and would
make him fit for heaven.
There seems little doubt that Simeon understood that the
coming Messiah would save the people of
Israel in both ways.
The Messiah would indeed, save the nation
Israel from Gentile
rule, but even more important He would
save the lost sinner
from his sins who would trust put his
faith and trust in the
Lord Jesus Christ.
Personally I think that Simeon was a lot more concerned
about the Lord saving the lost sinner from
hell than he was
about Him saving the nation from the
Gentiles. Simeon was an
old man.
He had already seen most of his own generation go
to the grave. He could easily see that it was just a matter
of time for himself. It only by the grace of God that he was
still living. I would not say that he was totally
unconcerned about his nation being freed
from Gentile rule,
but he almost certain to be more concerned
about the Lord's
power to save the soul from the fires of
hell than he was
about His power to save the nation from
Gentile rule.
Simeon was familiar with the great promises of God made
in the Old Testament which said that the
Messiah, the Christ,
the Savior, the Redeemer would come. He believed those
promises.
Furthermore, he believed that those promises were
soon to be fulfilled. He looked for the Christ to come just
any day.
Every day he would expect that this just might be
the day that the Christ will come. When one day would pass
without the coming of the Christ, he would
anxiously look for
Him to come the next day. He was waiting every day for the
Christ to come.
Fourth, Luke tells us that the Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit
of God was upon Simeon. This means more than that Simeon was
a saved man. The Holy Spirit dwells within every person
who
is saved.
Romans 8:9 says that if any man does not have the
Holy Spirit then he is not even
saved. But this means that
the Holy Spirit had come upon him giving
him the gift of
prophecy.
He was a prophet of God.
III.
The promise of God to Simeon about death
V. 26, "And it was revealed unto him by the Holy Ghost,
that he should not see death, before he
had seen the Lord's
Christ." One of the things that the Holy Spirit had
revealed to Simeon was that he would not
die until he had
seen the coming of the Christ. You can see why he was
getting more anxious by the day. As the years went by and
his body was more and more stooped with
age, he would think,
"It just can't be long. He has got to come soon." I can
just envision the old man on this
particular day. His hair
is white with years. His shoulders are bent. His steps are
made very carefully---and that with the
use of a cane. His
hands and his feet are feeble. He knew that it could not be
long until he would die. He knew also that before he would
die he would see the Christ that God has
promised to send.
Perhaps he came to the temple almost every
day looking
for the coming of the Christ. There must have been a few
days that he missed. And the picture I get from the next
verse is that he just almost did not come
to the temple on
this particular day. But he had a special unction from on
high that he had better get up and get out
to the temple.
IV.
Simeon's wait for the promise to be fulfilled
V. 27, "And he came by the Spirit into the temple..."
It was the Holy Spirit who had told him that
he would not die
until he would see the Christ and so it
was the Holy Spirit's
job to get him out to the temple on this
day when Joseph and
Mary would bring Jesus to the temple. So he came by the
Spirit to the temple. He came by the leadership of the Holy
Spirit.
Perhaps he came also by the strength of the Holy
Spirit.
From the human point of view, it must have been a
struggle for him to get to the temple each
day. It must have
been by the strength of the Holy Spirit
that he managed
somehow to make that journey to the
temple.
I see an illustration of that right here in Pleasant
Hill.
I see old folks struggle to make it to our services
time after time, week after week. If they were coming by
human strength alone I think they would
have quit coming a
long time ago. I a convinced that through the Holy Spirit of
God they are given extra incentive to come
and extra strength
to enable them to come.
So on this day Simeon comes to the temple and seats
himself at a place where he can see the
people as they come
into the particular court where the
Israelite parents would
bring their infant firstborn son to
present him to the
Almighty God. I think surely that every day there would be
a
goodly number of infants brought in. No doubt as the days
went by Simeon had looked at numerous
little tikes as they
were brought in. On this day he saw first one and then
another.
He saw one right after another.
And then as Simeon
looked and he saw Jesus in the arms of
Joseph followed
closely by Mary and suddenly that feeble
old man came alive.
His face brightened up. His lips quivered. His wait was
over. This was the Christ right before his
very eyes. (V.
27), "...and when the parents brought
in the child Jesus, to
do for him after the custom of the
law."
V.
The fulfillment of the promise
V. 28-30, "Then took he him up in his arms, and blessed
God, and said, Lord, now lettest thou thy
servant depart in
peace, according to thy word: For mine
eyes have seen thy
salvation." Simeon was now not only prepared to go; he
was
ready to go. He was ready to die. There was nothing else
left for him to live for. He could die with a contented
heart.
He would die without any regrets.
He could die
without any fear. He would die with every assurance of going
to a better place.
I might ought to point out to you that Simeon already
had that assurance. He knew that the Christ was coming. He
already knew that his destiny was in the
hands of the Christ
and that his destiny was secure. But since he had been given
the promise of seeing the Christ, he could
not have died with
any degree of contentment until he had
seen the Christ. Now
that he had seen the Christ he was ready
to go. He was fully
ready to go. Yea, he was anxious to go. I think that
perhaps he was just as anxious now to die
as he had been to
see the coming of the Christ.
VI.
Our own attitude about death
But what about us? How are we
supposed to feel about
death?
Are we supposed to be anxious to die?
Well, let me
say first of all, that the first step is
not to get ready to
die, but to get prepared to die. Until a man, woman, boy or
girl has repented of his sins and trusted
in Jesus Christ as
his Savior he is not prepared to die. If one is still lost
in his sins and on the road to hell he is
not prepared to
die.
Certain pressures and fears here in this world can make
an unsaved person contemplate suicide and
even cause him to
take his own life. But until one is saved, there is no way
that he is prepared to die. So the first thing that we need
to do is to get saved. That way you will at least be
prepared to die whether you are anxious to
go or not.
But then after one is saved, what about it? What is the
saved person's attitude toward death
supposed to be? Let me
say this:
After one is saved there is no more reason for him
to fear death. Jesus told the theif on the cross beside Him
who had just been saved, "This day
shalt thou be with me in
paradise." Listen, that ain't bad! That is not even half
bad!
There is nothing like it here in this world. The only
Paradise there has ever been in this old
world since the
creation of man was the Garden of Eden and
that Paradise has
long ceased to exist. So you are not going to find any
Paradise here in this world no matter how
much money you may
accumulate or no matter how healthy you
may be. Everybody
who is born into this old world can look
forward to a life
that is filled with troubles and trials,
pains and
perplexities, sickness and sorrows, but
when he dies he will
go into the Paradise of God. I tell you the truth, "It is
no tragedy to go to heaven." And so we who are saved are not
to look to death with fear and dread.
But that still does not answer the question? What is to
be our attitude toward death? We who are
saved are not to
fear death, but does that mean that we are
supposed to desire
death as Simeon came to do? Are we suppose to reach the
stage when we are to say, "I am ready
to go right now, Lord,
and I do mean right now"? Are we to ever be that anxious to
go?
I think not. At least not in most
cases. The Apostle
Paul pretty well expressed the attitude
that the Christian is
to take toward death. In Philippians 1:23 Paul said, "For I
am in a strait betwixt two; having a
desire to depart, and to
be with Christ; which is far better: Nevertheless to abide
in the flesh is more needful for
you." Paul said that as far
himself, he really had a desire to die and
to go on to be
with the Lord. He knew in his mind that he would be better
off that way. But Paul also had another desire that was
equally as strong. Paul had a desire to continue to live in
this world so that he could be of help to
other people and of
service to God. I think that is the attitude we ought to
have toward death. We ought not to fear death because we
have trusted Jesus Christ to save us and
to take care of our
eternal destiny and we ought to be anxious
to get to that
better place. But on the other hand, we ought to have a
desire to be of service both to God and to
our fellow man
right here in this world and we ought to
be anxious to stay
here and do God's work just as long as the
Lord wants to keep
us here.
Then we ought to leave the decision entirely up to
God to decide how long He wants to keep us
here.
And I will tell you another thing we ought to do. We
who are saved ought to be just as anxious
for Jesus Christ to
come back to this world as Simeon was for
Him to come the
first time. We ought to be just as watchful for His
return
as Simeon was for His first coming. We ought to watch every
day for the return of Jesus. I am afraid that there were not
many people in the days of Simeon who were
watching for the
first coming of Jesus and I am afraid that
there are not many
Christians even today who are really
watching for His return.
I know that I do not watch as I
should. I suggest to you
that we should pray about the matter and
ask God to give us a
greater watchfulness for our Lord's
return. Let us pray
about it until we can watch every day for
Jesus to come and
catch us up to meet Him in the air.
Conclusion:
But first of all, let us get right down to the nitty-
gritty.
Are you saved? Are you prepared
today if Jesus were
to come and call you away in death? As for me, I am saved.
I am not worthy to be saved. As for my own self is
concerned, I am as much a sinner as
anybody else in this
world.
But thank God I heard the gospel of Jesus Christ and
I put my faith in Jesus and asked Jesus to
save my unworthy
soul.
And, thank God, Jesus did. Jesus
has saved my soul
and I a prepared to go whenever I may be
called away in
death.
Are you prepared? Are you saved?
If you are not saved, would you like to be saved? If
you would like to be saved, I am happy to
tell you that you
can be saved. If you want Jesus to save your soul and keep
you out of the fires of hell, you can be
saved. And you can
be saved this morning. You can be saved, right here right
now this morning. Listen to what the Bible has to say about
it:
"For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord
shall be saved."
Listen, you do not have to walk an isle and join a
church to be saved. You do not have to be baptized to be
saved.
You do not have to turn over a new leaf to be saved.
You do not have to live up to the standard
of the law to be
saved.
You do not have to hold to certain denomination to be
saved.
What you do have to do in order to be saved is to
know that you are a sinner and that there
is no way that you
can save yourself and call on Jesus and
trust Him to save
you.
The question today is not "Can Jesus save you?" and the
question is not "Will Jesus save
you?" Today the question is:
Will you call on the Lord Jesus Christ and
trust in Him to
save your soul? Will you do it?
If you are saved, I am going to ask you to dedicate your
life to the Lord. Just as Simeon devoted himself to the
Lord, I am going to ask you to devote yourself
to the Lord.
All I am asking you to do is to give
yourself to live for the
one who gave Himself to die for you. Will you do it? Will
you commit yourself to Him right here
right now today?
If you have some need of walking this isle, I am going
to ask you to come right now as we have
this invitation hymn.