At the church where I serve we have been
spending the weeks leading up to Christmas looking at an account of Jesus life
in the Bible called the gospel of Luke, where we are discovering several
timeless truths when it comes to how we respond to announcement of the arrival
of Jesus as the Messiah that marks the Christmas season. This week as we come to the conclusion of this opening section of the gospel of Luke,
I would like for us to pick up where we left off.
And as we jump into the next section of this account of
Jesus life in the Bible called the gospel of Luke, we are going to discover
another timeless
truth when it comes to how we can respond to announcement of the arrival of
Jesus as the Messiah that marks the Christmas season. So let’s do that
together, beginning in Luke 2:21:
And when eight days had passed, before His circumcision, His name was then called Jesus, the name given by
the angel before He was conceived in the womb.
Luke begins this section of his account of Jesus life by
explaining that eight days after Jesus birth, and before Jesus was circumcised,
Mary and Joseph officially named their child Jesus. Now a natural question that
arises here is “Why did they wait until eight days after Jesus was born to name
Him?” Usually, in Jesus day, just as it is today, the naming of a child would
take place immediately after the child was born. Here however, Joseph and Mary
waited until the day that Jesus was circumcised. But why would they do that?
To understand why they would wait until just before Jesus
was circumcised, we first need to understand what circumcision is and its
significance to the Jewish people. Circumcision involves a surgical procedure
that involves removing the foreskin from the male genitals with a surgical
knife, or in this case, a knife made of stone. In a letter in the Old Testament
of our Bibles called the book of Leviticus, we see God command that a
circumcision was to be performed on the 8th day after a male child
was born.
The reason that circumcision was so significant was that
circumcision was a covenant sign that identified the Jewish people as being
God’s people. Circumcision was a religious act that was required to be
performed under the Law so that you would be able to be identified as being
right with God as part of the Jewish religious system.
Here we see Luke reveal for us the reality that Mary and
Joseph were responding to the birth of Jesus by following and fulfilling God’s
commandments when it came to Jesus. Instead of naming Jesus, as the first born
son, after Joseph or another male family member, Mary and Joseph followed the
angel Gabriel’s command to name the baby Jesus.
And Mary and Joseph also followed God’s command in the
Law to have Jesus circumcised. Mary and Joseph were responding in worship to
God by being obedient to God. Mary and Joseph were making sure that Jesus was
identified with God’s people so that He would be able to fulfill His role and
be identified as the rescuer of God’s people. But that is not the only way that
Mary and Joseph were responding to God’s call to worship, as we see in Luke
2:22:
And when the days for their
purification according to the law of Moses were completed, they brought Him up
to Jerusalem to present Him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the
Lord, "EVERY firstborn MALE
THAT OPENS THE WOMB SHALL BE CALLED HOLY TO THE LORD "), and to offer a
sacrifice according to what was said in the Law of the Lord, "A PAIR OF
TURTLEDOVES OR TWO YOUNG PIGEONS."
Now to understand what is happening here, we first need
to ask and answer several questions. First, what is Luke referring to when he
talks about the days for their purification? We God’s command regarding the
days of purification recorded for us in Leviticus 12:1. Let’s look at it
together:
Then the
LORD spoke to Moses, saying, "Speak to the sons of Israel, saying: 'When a
woman gives birth and bears a male child,
then she shall be unclean for seven days, as in the days of her menstruation
she shall be unclean. 'On the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be
circumcised. 'Then she shall remain in the blood of her purification for thirty-three days; she shall not touch any
consecrated thing, nor enter the sanctuary until the days of her purification
are completed. 'But if she bears a female child, then she shall be unclean for two weeks, as in her
menstruation; and she shall remain in the blood of her purification for sixty-six days. 'When the days of her
purification are completed, for a son or for a daughter, she shall bring to the
priest at the doorway of the tent of meeting a one year old lamb for a burnt
offering and a young pigeon or a turtledove for a sin offering. 'Then he shall
offer it before the LORD and make atonement for her, and she shall be cleansed
from the flow of her blood. This is the law for her who bears a child, whether a male or a female.
'But if she cannot afford a lamb, then she shall take two turtledoves or two
young pigeons, the one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering;
and the priest shall make atonement for her, and she will be clean.'"
According to the Law, which are the first five books in
our Bibles that contain a list of commands that reveal God’s nature and
character and the nature and character that the Jewish people needed to possess
and display in order to experience a right relationship with God, a Jewish
mother would be viewed as being unclean for 40 days after the birth of a male
child. Now a natural question that arises here is “why? Why would a mother be
viewed as being unclean after giving birth? I mean doesn’t God command us to
have children? Aren’t children a blessing from the Lord?”
To understand the answer to these questions we first need
to understand some biology and some theology. The mother, after the birth of a
child was viewed as being ceremonially unclean and unable to enter into the
temple to worship because of the discharges of blood that occurs after a woman
gives birth to a child. In the Old Testament, bleeding or the discharge from a
body lacked wholeness and was therefore viewed as being unclean. As we know,
the loss of blood can lead to death, which is the antithesis of a normal
healthy life.
Thus, in the Bible, we see blood portrayed as, on the one
hand, representing a cleansing agent for the selfishness and rebellion that
separates us from God, and on the other hand, a polluting substance when it is
in the wrong place. And because God is perfect; and because God is Holy, which
means to be totally separate in terms of character and conduct, God presence
could not be present with anything that was unclean.
So, after a male child was born, on the 8th
day that male child would be circumcised, but the mother would remain unclean for
33 more days. During that time, the mother was forbidden to enter into the
temple area to worship God as she recovered physically from giving birth. After
the 40 days for her purification were over, the mother was to present a lamb
for a burnt offering and a pigeon or a turtle dove for a sin offering. This set
of offerings was required before the mother could return to the state of being
considered clean and able to participate in the worship of God.
This leads to a second question, which is, “why did the
mother have to bring these offerings and present her firstborn son to the
Lord?” We find the answer that question in the second letter in our Bibles,
called the book of Exodus. In Exodus 13:1 we see the Lord say the following to
Moses:
Then the
LORD spoke to Moses, saying, "Sanctify to Me every firstborn, the first
offspring of every womb among the sons of Israel, both of man and beast; it
belongs to Me."
A few verses later, in verse 11, we read the following:
"Now
when the LORD brings you to the land of the Canaanite, as He swore to you and
to your fathers, and gives it to you, you shall devote to the LORD the first
offspring of every womb, and the first offspring of every beast that you own;
the males belong to the LORD. "But every first offspring of a donkey you
shall redeem with a lamb, but if you do not redeem it, then you shall break its neck; and every firstborn of man
among your sons you shall redeem. "And it shall be when your son asks you
in time to come, saying, 'What is this?' then you shall say to him, 'With a
powerful hand the LORD brought us out of Egypt, from the house of slavery. 'It
came about, when Pharaoh was stubborn about letting us go, that the LORD killed
every firstborn in the land of Egypt, both the firstborn of man and the firstborn
of beast. Therefore, I sacrifice to the LORD the males, the first offspring of
every womb, but every firstborn of my sons I redeem.'
In these verses we see God command the Jewish people to
respond to what He had done to deliver the Jewish people from slavery at the
hands of the nation of Egypt. As part of that deliverance, one
evening, the Lord went through the land of Egypt and struck down all the
firstborn in the land of Egypt, but He passed over all of the Jewish homes who
had marked their doors with the blood of the lamb. This feast was referred to
by the Jewish people as the Passover. In addition to celebrating the Passover
feast, God commanded that all
firstborn sons of the Jewish people were to be consecrated to the Lord as a
response to the sparing of the lives of the firstborn Jewish people during that
first Passover.
Now, with these questions answered, we get a picture of
what Mary and Joseph were doing in response to the birth of Jesus that first
Christmas. Mary and Joseph were responding to the birth of Jesus by following
and fulfilling God’s commandments to dedicate their firstborn son to be Holy to
the Lord.
In other words, Mary and Joseph were following God’s
command to dedicate Jesus to be wholly devoted to the Lord. Jesus was being
dedicated to live a life that is separated to God and separated from all that
is unclean. Jesus was being dedicated by his parents to live a life that was
committed to God and the mission of God in the world. Mary and Joseph worshiped
God by giving their son who was the Son of God back to God.
Now you may be thinking to yourself “well Dave, why did
Mary and Joseph offer up a pair of turtledoves instead of a lamb?”
If you are here this morning and that question is running through your mind, I
want to let you know that is a great question to ask. And we find the answer to
that question from Leviticus 12:8, in God’s command when it came to the days of
purification:
'But if she
cannot afford a lamb, then she shall take two turtledoves or two young pigeons,
the one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering; and the priest
shall make atonement for her, and she will be clean.'"
Now look again at how Joseph and Mary fulfilled God’s
command in Luke 2:24:
and to offer
a sacrifice according to what was said in the Law of the Lord, "A PAIR OF
TURTLEDOVES OR TWO YOUNG PIGEONS."
You see, Mary did not offer a
lamb and a young pigeon or a turtledove, did she? No, Mary only offered a pair
of turtledoves of pigeons. And the reason that Mary did not offer a lamb was
because Mary and Joseph could not afford a lamb. Mary and Joseph grew up in
blue collar working class families. Mary and Joseph were most likely teenagers
from a small town who were newlyweds and had little or no financial means. Most
likely, Joseph had just opened up his carpentry business. For Mary and Joseph,
their response to the birth of Jesus and what God was calling them to that
first Christmas was to respond in worship to God through their obedience to God
with whatever resources they had.
However, as Mary and Joseph
worshipped the Lord for their firstborn son who just happened to be the arrival
of the Messiah, they were not the only ones who were aware of the announcement
of the arrival of the Messiah. Tomorrow, we will see Luke reveal for us how
another man responded to the presence of Mary, Joseph, and Jesus in the Temple…
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