Advent2025_Dec23

Speaking of the Child
Luke 2:33–38

Those who truly encounter Christ cannot help but speak of Him . . . mission begins with worship.

If Simeon proclaims the mission, Anna gives us a glimpse of how it begins.

Luke describes her with quiet respect. She’s a prophetess, advanced in age, long acquainted with prayer and worship. But pay close attention to what she does at the very moment she sees Jesus. She doesn’t stay in silent awe. She doesn’t retreat into private devotion. She doesn’t quietly savor the moment.

She moves. Luke says that she “came up at that very hour” (the same hour Simeon is blessing God) and she does two things. First, she gives thanks. And then, she speaks of the Child.

That second action is the one we must linger over. Anna becomes, in Luke’s Gospel, one of the earliest voices of proclamation. She is not preaching in the sense of formal teaching. But she is declaring openly, joyfully, and intentionally the news that redemption has arrived.

And notice whom she tells: “all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem.”

She knows her audience. She looks for hearts that hunger for hope. She speaks to those whose longings match her own. This is not accidental. It is the quiet beginning of a pattern of a movement that the book of Acts will unfold in full:

• Those who see Christ speak of Him.
• Those who worship become witnesses.
• Those who receive grace cannot help but share it.

Anna’s voice becomes the first small spark of the outward movement that will eventually carry the gospel from Jerusalem . . . to Judea . . . to Samaria . . . and to the ends of the earth.

She stands here at the hinge of Advent, right between fulfillment and mission, and shows us that the mission of God does not begin with strategy or programs or power. It begins with gratitude, with a heart captured by Christ, with a tongue loosened by joy.

Anna is not merely a faithful widow. She is, in this moment, a forerunner of the Church’s witness. The pattern is simple and striking: She saw the Child. She worshiped God. She spoke to others. This is mission in its earliest form.

Friends, it’s not complicated nor formal, but it overflows from a heart awakened to the Redeemer. May we, like Anna, be people whose joy in Christ naturally moves toward others . . . especially toward those who, whether they realize it or not, are waiting for redemption too.
___

For Young Ones: Anna told others about Jesus. Who is someone in your life who might like to hear about Him too?

For Older Ones: Who around you is “waiting for redemption”? Where might God be inviting you to speak of Christ with gentle courage?

Pray: Lord Jesus, stir in us the same joy that moved Anna to speak. Let our worship today become witness tomorrow.

Family Practice: As a family, choose one person or place to pray for—someone who may be longing for hope. Pray that Christ’s light would reach them.