The Lord Comes to the Temple: Reflections on the Readings for the Presentation of the Lord

Malachi 3:1-4
Psalm 24
Hebrews 2:14-18
Luke 2:22-40

This year the Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time coincides with the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord. The King of Glory is consecrated to His Father. And Mary, Our Blessed Mother, fulfills the requirements of the Law with her purification. It is also known as Candlemas during which most parishes will conduct the blessing of throats and candles.

It is a few generations after the Babylonian exile and, despite a return to Jerusalem, the Jewish people have not truly returned to God. They are still acting in opposition to God’s desires, marrying outside the faith (i.e., with followers of other gods), divorcing, engaging in sorcery, withholding tithes, providing impure sacrifices, and taking advantage of others. The priests, who should be providing correction and guidance (see Ezekiel 34), are too busy bolstering themselves by telling the people what they want to hear and conniving with the evildoers.

It is at this point that Malachi, the messenger of God, tells them that “suddenly there will come to the temple the LORD whom you seek, And the messenger of the covenant whom you desire.” It will be a cleansing coming, like refiner’s fire. This brings to mind two aspects of Jesus’s coming to the temple; His first appearance at the presentation which we are celebrating and also His cleansing of the temple as described in John 2:15.

Jesus’s coming will be one of purification, just as He died for our sins and thus made it possible for us to die to our sins.Thus our bodies , the temples of the Holy Spirit, may be refined and cleansed “like the fuller’s lye.”

And therefore, as the responsorial says, the King of Glory will come, and He is the Lord. When the psalmist says, “Lift up, O gates, your lintels; reach up, you ancient portals, that the king of glory may come in!” he could well be telling us to open the gates of our hearts to let Him in. And why is this important? Because: “Who is this king of glory? The LORD of hosts; he is the king of glory.”

In the selection from the letter to the Hebrews we see that the King of Glory comes to us in the flesh. He was not coming for the sake of the angels but for the children of Abraham. Therefore, “he had to become like his brothers and sisters in every way,
that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest before God to expiate the sins of the people.” As Bishop Fulton Sheen explains in his Life of Christ, “The object of His ... birth [was], namely, to identify Himself with sinful humanity. Had not Isaias foretold that He would be ‘numbered with the transgressors.’”

The letter tells us it is through His sharing in the flesh of humanity that Jesus is able to destroy the devil and to free those who had been slaves to their sin. Furthermore, “Because he himself was tested through what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested.” We are told not fear this testing and should actually welcome it. “In this you rejoice, although now for a little while you may have to suffer through various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that is perishable even though tested by fire, may prove to be for praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” (1 Peter 1:6-7)

Saint Luke tells us that Mary and Joseph were followers of the law, taking Jesus to the temple to be presented to the Lord. He would be consecrated to the Lord through the sacrifice of “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.” According to the Law of Moses, the child was to be redeemed, and the mother was to be purified (40 days after giving birth). Dr. Scott Hahn notes in his reflection on this feast, “The Redeemer seems to be redeemed. She who is all-pure presents herself to be purified. Such is the humility of our God. Such is the humility of the Blessed Virgin. They submit to the law even though they are not bound by it.”

Upon entering the temple Simeon, a righteous man who was promised by Holy Spirit that he would see the Messiah before dying, “took him [Jesus] into his arms and blessed God.” He describes the Babe as “a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and glory for your people Israel.” Thus we again see that Jesus came for all people, not just the Jews.

Sheen goes on to describe the encounter as follows:

“After his hymn of praise he addressed himself only to the mother. Simeon knew that she, and not Joseph, was related to the Babe in his arms. He saw furthermore that there were sorrows in store for her, not for Joseph.

“The Child would create terrible strife between good and evil, stripping the masks from each, thus provoking a terrible hatred. He would be at once a stumbling block, a sword that would divide evil from good, and a touchstone that would reveal the motives and dispositions of human hearts.”

In other words, Jesus would be a force for change. Again, in Sheen’s words, as with the Wise Men (the Magi), “... no one meets Christ and remains the same.”

Simeon recognizes Jesus, the Babe, as a controversial figure. As Jesus Himself would later say, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace upon the earth. I have come to bring not peace but the sword.” (Matthew 10:34)

The encounter with Anna also spoke to Jesus’s role as the Redeemer. “... she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were awaiting the redemption of Jerusalem.”

In summary, we see that Jesus coming to the temple, as the King of Glory, brings purification, salvation, redemption and the preparing of our own bodies, temples of the Holy Spirit, for a future in our heavenly home, by freeing us from sin. How we respond to that is up to us. Will we be changed as the Magi were and as Simeon indicated or will we reject His salvation and stick with the devil through our sinfulness? The choice is simple (although not necessarily easy), God or not God.

“The will of Christ to save is limited by the free reaction of each soul either to accept or reject.” Sheen, Life of Christ