Feb 2: The Lord Comes into his Temple

Hans Memling: The Presentation in the Temple
The National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., c. 1463

Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

Reading I: Mal 3:1-4

The Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight--indeed, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts (NRSV, Mal 3:1b).

Father, we read in the Pentateuch how, in the Exodus of your people out of Egypt, the eldest son of each Hebrew family was spared by the angel of destruction in the last and greatest of the plagues, the slaying of the first-born male offspring. In later generations, to celebrate the sparing of the first-born, every eldest son had to be presented to you, Lord, as gift and then purchased back, redeemed. Thus it was that forty days after his birth the infant Jesus was presented in the Temple.

Your prophet Malachi speaks of the sudden coming of the Lord to his temple. "He is coming," he declares.

How grateful we are, Lord, that as we say “yes” to you and accept you into our lives, you make all of us to be temples of your Holy Spirit and you come through your Word in the Spirit to take up your abode with us. Your coming is without distinction, in every time and place, to all who welcome you.

And even, if by our sinfulness, by our turning away from you, we desecrate the temple of our person and drive your Spirit away from his sacred dwelling place, you never abandon us. Out of your great love for us, your Word remains always present to us and through him, you offer us forgiveness and new life if only we would accept your Spirit again and allow him once more to transform us into vessels of your grace.

Today, on this feast of the Presentation, may I welcome the Lord Jesus into the temple of the Holy Spirit that is my person and, as Simeon received the infant into his arms and blessed you, Father, and the holy family, may the Lord Jesus, your Word made flesh, now bless all of us whom he has redeemed, bless us now and forever more. Amen.