Luke 2:25 Commentary and Bible Study

‘And, behold, there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon.’ When you see that little phrase ‘and behold’, you know that you are being summoned to something which is especially striking. Here is something surprising, unusual, but something to be considered and for a number of reasons. The passage tells us not only of Simeon, but shortly after, there is the record of Anna, but there seem to have been very few people in Jerusalem who were deeply pious and sincere and earnest in their faith. It was Jerusalem where all the people worshipped, and yet for the most part the worship was not worship from the heart. It was not worship that sought communion with God. It was so often nominal worship, self-righteous worship, and worship according to ceremony and not according to the meaning of those ceremonies. So we are invited to consider carefully one who was an exception to this. Here was a man connected with the temple, whose name was Simeon, who was just and devout, and sincerely waiting for the coming of Christ. The term used comes from Isaiah in all probability, ‘waiting for the consolation of Israel: and the Holy Ghost was upon him.’ We note the features of his biography, because they minister to us. This verse is all we know about him, nothing more. Some try to relate him to this high priest or that person, but these ideas are all supposition and you can't establish it, but we know he was a priest. There seem to be no other priests who were anticipating the coming of Christ at that time. We tend to picture him as an aged man, but actually it was Anna who comes next who is described as aged, not Simeon. Nevertheless he had been given this promise (verse 26), and the impression is given that his death would follow soon after the promise was kept. He is described as ‘just and devout’ which means he was righteous and conscientious, and he obeyed the standards of God and strove to maintain them. He was a just man. How can you be just before God? We are all sinners. We cannot live a life of righteousness sufficient to please God, so the first part of this description tells us Simeon was a saved man, a converted man. He had been forgiven by God. He had been justified on account of his sincere wholehearted belief that God would send a Saviour who would bear away the punishment of sin on behalf of all who repent and trust in him. He had pleaded for forgiveness and turned to God, and God had given him a new life and a new heart. God from heaven had pronounced him to be justified, and would deal with him as though he were innocent, as though he had never seen. So Simeon was just in God's sight, not by his own deserving or his own merit, but because he trusted in the Messiah. In addition however, when we are converted we are not only given Christ's righteousness and clothed in it, but we are given an actual righteousness. That doesn't mean to say we become perfect, but we hunger and thirst after righteousness. Sin that used to be our friend is now are enemy, and when we stumble and fall we hate it and repent and seek the help of God to mend our ways, and there is constantly in our battle against sin. There is an active principle of righteousness within us. But secondly Simeon was devout, God-fearing, literally, ‘taking good hold of’ or ‘clinging to’. In Luke's usage devout has a religious significance holding well onto the duties and actions of faith in Christ. It is used by Luke in the book of Acts to describe worship, mainly of devout men in Jerusalem. He describes those who had come to Jerusalem from every nation speaking other languages, Jews who had been dispersed who came at Pentecost to worship in Jerusalem. They were conscientious in carrying out their religious duties. He was ‘waiting for the consolation of Israel’, that is, the coming Messiah through whom every promise made to Israel would be fulfilled. ‘Comfort ye, comfort ye my people’ says the Lord through Isaiah, and every comfort would come through Christ. He made possible by his grace every gift that we receive from the Lord. Even though there had been silence in terms of revelation for four hundred years Simeon was still waiting and was sure that God would not fail to keep his promise. There seemed to be many political discouragements in the land and Israel had lost it independence and its sovereignty, but these things did not shake his faith. Christ would come, and indeed Simeon had received a personal assurance that he would see the Christ child in his own lifetime. ‘And the Holy Ghost was upon him.’ This is a remarkable description which is certainly out of the ordinary, but tells us that because of his just and devout conduct, the Spirit of God was upon him to an unusual degree, even before Christ was glorified and the Day of Pentecost came and the Spirit was poured out.