Simeon

Luke's Gospel chapter 2 and verse number 25. And behold there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon. The same man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel.

And the Holy Ghost was upon him, and it was revealed unto him by the Holy Ghost that he should not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ. And he came by the Spirit into the temple. When the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him after the custom of the law, then took he him up in his arms and blessed God, and said, Lord, now, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace according to thy word.

Okay, not according to what mine eyes have seen, but first according to thy word. For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou has prepared before the face of all the people. A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.

People that attend gospel meetings are very familiar with often a verse quoted by gospel preachers that is the absolute essence of being saved from John chapter 1, and it says this, but as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe in his name. And so sometimes the question is asked by people that are maybe not as familiar with the gospel, well how do I receive Christ? They would maybe think of a man like Zacchaeus that came down from that tree, and he went back to his home with the Lord Jesus, and he received him, took him gladly, and we could cite other passages of the Word of God where Christ was physically, literally received. What I've read to you tonight, just a way of application in the gospel, is one of the first men, first people, to receive Christ as he did.

I speak about this man Simeon. There are things that were important to him, there are things that he understood. Here was a man that was committed, he was just, and he was devout.

He was a man that had some understanding of what the Bible taught, and of what the Bible said, and he knew that promised to Israel, promised to the world, was a coming Messiah. And this man would live to be an old man waiting for the arrival of the Christ. And finally that day would come when it was announced that he was born, and then he would be brought, as he was here in this chapter, up into the temple, and his parents brought him in as we read it together to do with him according to the custom of the law.

But then comes the story of how this man reacted or responded to Christ. It's this, it says that he took him up in his arms and blessed God, and said now let us now thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation. Listen what he says, Lord now let us now.

In other words, I have seen him, now I'm ready to die. It was revealed unto him that he wouldn't die until he'd seen the Lord's Christ. We want to emphasize something already emphasized in this meeting, and it's this.

Whatever happens, friend, whatever takes place, when it comes to dying, make sure that's all you've got to do. Make sure there is nothing else to set in order. You make sure that you are ready.

Here's a man, and when the Christ is brought, he takes him up in his arms, and he blesses God, and says now let us now thy servant depart in peace according to thy word. In other words, he had the Word of God for it. Can I ask you tonight, maybe you don't like the term being saved, or the term born again.

Do you have Christ? Have you a time when you received him? A time when he became your Savior? When a time that you could speak of a peace that this man could speak of? Any experience like that? I meet people, and they will consent to the truth of the gospel, acknowledge that they need to be saved, and know they're not saved, and they wonder why. Well, I want to speak about one kind of a person that can't get saved, if you like, at the close of this meeting. It's the one-handed sinner.

You know, there are some men, and I admire them really well, I don't know if I do or not, but it's just their thing. They're naturals, even with a baby, okay, a young child. Now, I have 11 grandchildren, and I'm not natural with them.

When they hand them to me, I'm very clumsy. I don't know how to hang on to them. I hang on to them, but I'll tell you one thing I don't do, and I've never done.

I never put my hand out and say, yeah, take him here. I have neither daughter or daughter-in-law, or son and son-in-law that would ever allow such a thing. I will remember, never forget, when the first grandchild was born, I was having gospel meetings in a place called Banach, Nova Scotia, back in the middle of 1995, I think it was.

There's a dear old lady, Mrs. Robertson, 92 years of age. I said to my daughter, Joan, I said, listen, why don't you bring little Timothy, we'll go visit Mrs. Robertson in the home in Sidney Mines. Yeah, she said, we'll go see her, so went down to that nursing home, and there come around, there's Mrs. Robertson sitting there, dear old lady, 92 years of age.

And my daughter's carrying a little boy that's likely maybe five or six months. Just walked in, I hardly had introduced my daughter to Mrs. Robertson, and she saw the child, and she said, oh, my dear, I'll never forget, she said, let me hold your child. And so instinctively, at that age, children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren of her own, her arms so carefully and gently and lovingly went out to that child.

She just took that child back in. She just embraced that child. You know, in a spiritual sense, my friend, that's what happened the night I accepted Christ.

I just took him, friend, reached out with both hands, and just accepted him. It says concerning this man that he took him up in his arms, and he blessed God. My, this is what counted.

This is what mattered. The Bible speaks in 1 Timothy chapter 6 about laying hold on eternal life. Now, just let me part company with the theologians for a minute, okay? Laying hold upon eternal life is literally apprehending it for all that it involves.

You cannot have eternal life except you have Christ. And there's no way there'll never be a time again when he can be held as Simeon held him. But I want to tell you, I have read to you from a book that most of you are holding tonight that's all about Christ, all about the Savior.

Wonderful book, this book of God, this Bible tonight, that tells us of a Savior that was sent, of a Savior that came. This is a faithful saying, worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom I am chief. I tell you, dear young man, tonight, from the bottom of my heart, heart to heart, he's worth your embrace instead of that of your sin.

That's why people don't reach out with both arms. That's why both hands don't go to a Savior. Too often, the other hand's holding something else.

Sometimes it can be just something which you might think is so innocent, some little pleasure. Sometimes it's a person. Nothing, my friend, nothing can hold you back from reaching out with all that you have for Christ.

He did for you. When it came to Calvary's cross, one hand, then the other, nailed to that cross, positioned on that cross beam, before likely the soldiers were ready to spike his hands, was a Savior, as if to say, reaching out with both for you. He had a place in his heart for little children, I doubt very much.

In fact, read it closely. He picked them up in his arms ever so carefully. And when it came to that sheep that was lost, he would find the sheep was lost, and he would lift that little sheep that was lost, and puts it upon his shoulders.

My friend, he reaches out to you, young man, your girl in the meeting tonight. How many years has he been reaching out to you with both hands? You see, that's why that blind man says he's casting away his garments. Nobody told him he had to do that.

Likely people say, hey, come on. It's all he got. It's his means of living.

Why is he casting it away? He understood, friend. I could hold nothing else and a Savior at the same time. Woman in John chapter 4 leaves her water pot.

Who told her she had to leave her water pot? Nobody. But that man, the man of Galilee that she met at the well that day was worthy of both hands, not a water pot like the garment that represented the past. She would let it go.

You prepared to do that tonight? I was preaching to a lot of the audiences I have preached to that have been a lot smaller than this one is. In a very practical way, I would look into that audience and I'd say, do you think you could let your card game go? There's people there that know what I mean. I've had to look men in their face as they stood in their yard.

And I said, do you think you'd let that bottle of beer go? You might be surprised if I told you that they professed to be saved. They can't part with it. They can't let it go.

I wouldn't even guess. I wouldn't even suggest what you might be hanging on to tonight. There's something.

There is something, my friend, that hinders. I have to think of Felix and Drusilla, an unforgettable moment when Felix stood there and listened to a man that he sent for as he thundered the gospel into his soul. Maybe it is my imagination, I don't know, but I think there's a woman and her name is Drusilla.

That preaching was old hat to her. Maybe she kind of slips her hand through his and said, not for us. We can't make it if you get this.

I had a clergyman sit in my trailer a year and a half ago. I don't think I've even told this before. It's come to my mind now.

I said to that man, I said, then how did you get saved? He went to a place where they went forward and he went forward and they told him he was saved and the best he knew he was saved. The man knew nothing about salvation. He went home.

A couple weeks later they came, they said, hey, you're saved. You should be coming to praise meeting. Wednesday night, praise meeting.

Well, he said, they're going to go to praise meeting. So off he went to praise meeting. And well, in the praise meeting they were singing about the Lord Jesus like we were singing tonight on Calvary's cross.

And during that song, God saved that man. The point was so clear. I just said, hallelujah.

Wonderful. Come on, brother. We're not the only ones that preach the gospel.

God has his own way of saving souls. So he went back to them. He said, I just got saved.

They said, what do you mean? Yeah, you got saved the other night up the front of the church. No, no, he said, I didn't. He said, it was you tried to save me.

Back here he says, God saved me. When I realized there was a man died at Calvary's cross to save me. How about you tonight? Is he worth it? Hey, there's things in life, come on, young man.

There's things in life like my life. We like them. We reach out with both hands for them.

Fellas back our way, I don't have to be from Canada to tell you that hockey is big. They're about there with both hands to the stick. Other games they're into, and it's everything.

It's there. Why? Because it's important to them. And I want to tell you, I'm preaching one tonight that is worthy.

Your hands going out to him. There's another time when the Lord Jesus took his disciples in that upper room. A scene, if it doesn't humble you in reading it, then I have to be so cold and so far away from God.

As a living Savior, a loving Christ, as he was girded in that upper room, he would stoop. And I believe with both hands, he would pick up the feet of those disciples. Who's to tell where they had been and what they looked like.

And he began to wash their feet with both hands. That's why the Lord Jesus taught. He taught like this very clearly.

He says, if I foot offend thee, he says, cut it off. For people have got other places to go. He says, more than I, he says, if thy eye offend thee, pluck it out.

People have got other things to see. And he goes on, he says, if thy hand offend thee, people have got other things to do. He says, better you didn't have it, than to have all these things.

And never enter into the kingdom of God. And so Simeon then took him up in his arms and he blessed God and he said, Lord. That's a lovely thing.

I'll tell you, I preached that. He didn't have to say anything more. Lord.

That blind man in his desperation when he cried out, all he had to say was Lord. No man calleth him Lord but by the Spirit. That repentant thief that every gospel preacher loves to preach about.

So close to the Savior as he dies. He goes on, he says, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom and so on. All he had to say was Lord.

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth, Jesus is Lord. He won't be Lord and he can't be Lord to the one-handed sinner. So what has to go? I don't want it to sound crude or cruel or brutal.

But if you aren't willing to let it go, God's got his way of taking it away. I could take you to a little town. Down in Nova Scotia where a man said to a preacher one day, he said, sounds pretty good to me.

He said, there happens to be things in life that are important to me right now. In fact, three of them. He said, my job.

He obviously had a good job. Look at the place where he lived. Swimming pool.

Beautiful home. He said, my job. He says, my wife.

He says, and that little boy. He said, I got a future planned for him. They were going to do this, they were going to do the other thing.

In a very polite way, he just simply bid the preacher goodbye. It would only be a matter of months and that man had lost his job. Oh, he picked another one up, not like the job he had.

He came home from work one day and couldn't figure out why all these cars were in his yard. What's going on, he thought. Everybody was so quiet.

People were weeping before he got there. His little boy was found floating in the pool. Job is gone.

The hoose is gone. The boy's gone. The wife eventually left too.

He said, I don't have those big things in life. I just live here in Wisconsin. We live a very simple life.

I don't have these things. Maybe you don't, friend. Maybe you don't, but there's something that holds every sinner from Christ.

That's why on that chart, it's a narrow door. There's room for you and you alone. Nothing else you're trying to hold in your hand.

This man here, I don't think he had a lot in life, but I'll tell you this much, he had Christ. Lord, he said, now let us now, thy servant, depart in peace. That's the way people go to have Christ.

They die in peace. For he goes on and he says this, according to thy word. I love that.

According to thy word. For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people. A light to lighten the Gentiles and the glory of thy people Israel.

What a salvation. What a salvation, friend. Jew and Gentile.

Matters not the culture, the creed, the background. Matters not, my friend, your status in life tonight, who you are or who you are not. You are a soul traveling to eternity, either going to heaven or hell.

Every person going to heaven is the moment in their life. Can I put their experience in the words I'm preaching tonight? Come on, I can see Christians and they're responding to it as I speak. Sure you did.

So did I. I was so desperate. What did he want me to do? These hands were ready to do it. But I realized it all had been done.

That by his hands, he'd finished the work. When he cried, it is finished. A number of years ago, quite a long time ago.

There are some archaeologists doing some work on Mount Versailles. And there's a lot of people that were entombed in the lava that flowed down that mountain. People were warned about it and told to stay away from it.

But people lived in that area. When these archaeologists were going in and they were doing their digging painstakingly, they came across what, and it wasn't the first time, but it was in such shape and right into the lava itself. It happened years ago.

It was a little boy. And as they dug around the head and the arms, the arms were stretched out like this. Two heads just perfectly out like this.

The man that was leading that work, those that were under him said, who's he reaching for? Who's he reaching out to? That man says, dig carefully a little further, and you'll likely find out who he's reaching out to. Who you're reaching out to tonight. As they began to dig, they found another set of hands.

They dug around those hands. You know what they arrived at? It was his mother. She was reaching out to him.

And he was reaching out to her. Those hands never met. My friend, there's a hand that is outstretched from heaven tonight, an arm that is ready and is willing to save.

There's arms stretched wide as we often sing on Lord's Day morning on Calvary's cross. They're not there tonight. They reach out to you, young man, in this gospel meeting tonight for salvation.

But you get used to it. If I could just apply it, that's like the man with the withered hand. That's why the Lord Jesus would restore that man's hand.

Not so he could go back to playing his baseball. Not so he could go back to his sports arena. So you could reach out with both hands to the Savior.

You know what the difficulty is? You get used to the one-hand business. I have a man I preach with and I've had a number of series of gospel meetings with. His name is Robert McIlwain.

Northern part of the province where I live, Robert had a terrible aircraft accident. A lot of his body was burned. And it's very obvious when you see Mr. McIlwain today that he's been through a lot.

He is a hand that has very limited use. Very limited. I've been with him.

I've done a lot. I think I've done a few things for him. We worked together in tent meetings when those black flies in Prince Edward Island would eat the ankles off anybody and I'd get down, I'd spray his ankles for him.

I'd do different things. You know, he never asked me to tie his tie. Never asked me to dupe his shoes.

You know why? Robert does that. You see it like that? He's got used to it. He's got used to it.

That's your condition tonight. You've just got used to it. So you're going to die and go to hell with all that God has blessed you with, simply because you're too proud to reach out to one who can meet your need and allow you to die in peace.

A savior. One who wants to be Lord. That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth, Jesus is Lord.

Believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead. Thou shalt be saved. I wonder in this nice size company tonight if there isn't someone here you know right well.

That's what's happening with me. You got something you think I... See that's the rich young ruler. There's things in his hand.

Oh I know you couldn't see them. He's going back to them. How blind man.

He's got nothing to go back to. What do you have to go back to? Just his poverty, just his want and his shame and nothing. So he cries out Jesus now son of David have mercy on me.

Not the rich young ruler. He's got things to go back to. Plenty of them.

All kinds of possessions. Man Luke's gospel chapter 12. He looks this way and he looks that way and he's got lots to go back to.

Does he get salvation? No. Goes back and picks up life with both hands. I sat in a Cincinnati airport three years ago.

One of those days flying commercial and flights were grounded. We were stopped in Cincinnati because weather was bad on the east coast and nobody's moving. It wasn't that bad in Cincinnati.

In fact the sun was shining. While I was sitting there people were really annoyed, provoked. Flights were canceled and you know how it is.

I'm sitting there on a bench working my laptop. I mean I just know a little bit about what it's like when you're trying to fly in bad weather. This man comes over you know kind of a talkative sort of fella and he's got his wife with him and he sits down and he puts his arm around her and he says well dear he says you know on my note he wanted everybody to hear.

At least he wanted me to hear. He says we're really in no rush. We've got it made.

He says we've got a home on the west coast of Washington. We just left it. He says and we've got a home out in Maine and we're on our way to it and it's waiting for us.

I said excuse me sir that sounds pretty good. He says it is. I said how about up there? You got a home up there? Oh he says heaven? I said yeah heaven.

And that airport went about as quiet as this one is. I gave him a gospel track. He sat there and he read the whole thing.

How about you tonight? I wonder before this weekend is that what these hands will pick up. What they'll reach for. That's going to that's actually going to condemn you to the eternal burnings forever.

Because you'd refuse to let them go that you might take Christ. You take him tonight. Trust him as your savior and be saved shall we pray.

Our Father in the name of the Lord Jesus we bow and thank you for the gospel. What a wonderful thing Lord. What a wonderful person to know.

What a thing that God ever spoke to us. Ever brought us into his grace. That we'd even be standing here in Gays Mills on this platform looking at people enjoying their fellowship.

Being with people of God today we'd never have known apart from thy grace. Thank God that thou didst ever send forth thy son. That he did ever reach out to us in love and mercy and pity.

And oh God we thank thee that the spirit of God that we're reminded of in our readings today ever did deal with us. And he's reached out to us. We thank thee for our savior that still reaches out and will come to take his own home.

Lord bless the gospel. We praise we thank thee for it in the savior's name. Amen.

Number 333 will be our closing song 3 3 3. Just as I am without one plea that thy blood was shed for me that thou bidst me come to thee O Lamb of God I come. We're singing verses 1 2 and 6 only. 1 2 and 6 of 333.

Just as I am without one plea that thy blood was shed for me that thou bidst me come to thee O Lamb of God I come. We're singing verses 1 2 and 6 only. 1 2 and 6 of 333.

O Lamb of God I come.