Liturgy: “A Soul-Enlivening Hope in God”
Somehow in my own faith journey, I’ve come to see that what Anna rejoiced over that day in the temple is what my heart yearns for.
What is the King’s Liturgy? King’s Liturgy defines our experience together as a Christian community. It outlines the rhythms we celebrate with the Church at large: Scripture readings, Sabbath habits, and celebration of Holy Days and historical events.
This Week’s Lectionary Readings:
Malachi 3:1-4
Hebrews 2:14-18
Luke 2:22-40
Psalm 84
This week’s liturgy is contributed by Brian Brenberg, Associate Professor of Business and Economics:
My kids have long been fascinated by the meaning of their names. Two of my kids, Maria and Timmy, are especially proud to share a name with a prominent character from the Bible. And, frankly, that’s created a little tension with my other daughter, Anna. It’s hard, after all, to compete with an older sister who shares the name of Jesus’ mother, and a younger brother who shares the name of the Apostle Paul’s “true son in the faith.”
But as my Anna grows up, I think she’ll come to see great beauty in the story of the old woman from the bible with whom she shares a name. The appearance of Anna the Prophetess in our passage from Luke is brief, but the brevity brings into striking focus a life characterized by the faithful desire for rescue and God’s gracious provision of a redeemer.
Luke tells us that Anna the Prophetess “did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day.” What I saw in this old woman when I was a young man, and what I suspect my young daughter sees now, is a monotonous, one-dimensional life beset by hardship and loneliness.
Perhaps that’s what Anna the Prophetess once saw in her own life, too.
But what’s so compelling to me now about Luke’s aged Anna is her deep, soul-enlivening hope in God, evidenced by the thanks that burst from her lips at the sight of her savior.
Somewhere along the way, God’s promise of redemption became supremely beautiful and satisfying to Anna the Prophetess. Somehow in my own faith journey, I’ve come to see that what Anna rejoiced over that day in the temple is what my heart yearns for. And I pray that, sometime, I might delight with my own Anna in the beautiful, joyful example of that great Prophetess with whom she shares a name and a hope.