Luke introduces us to his fourth adult witness to the identity of Jesus.[1] In each case, he emphasizes the piety of the witnesses. Zacharias and Elizabeth “were both righteous in the sight of God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and requirements of the Lord” (Lk 1:6). Both were “filled with the Holy Spirit” (1:41,67). Simeon was “righteous and, looking for the consolation of Israel; and the Holy Spirit was upon him” (Lk 2:25). Now he tells us that Anna “never left the temple, serving night and day with fastings and prayers” (Lk 2:37). “Stress is laid,” Marshall points out, “on her single-minded devotion to God.”[2] Why? Because, as in the case of the others, she is being identified as a credible witness. She is devout. She is a woman of prayer. First century Jews would have respected her and acknowledged her piety. Yet she recognized the Messianic identity of Jesus, thanked God for Him, and told others about Him. So while it is true that “many religious people failed to accept Jesus,” says Morris, “this early recognition came from those who faithfully observed the requirements of their religion.”[3] God uses all types to serve Him and be His witnesses. However, what the most effective of His servants have in common is piety, that is, love and devotion to God, along with obedience to His word. Let us then look at Anna.

Aged

And there was a prophetess, Anna the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived with a husband seven years after her marriage, and then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. (Lk 2:36-37a)

The first thing that we might notice about Anna is that she is old. We only know about Anna what Luke tells us in these verses. She was a “prophetess,” one filled with the Holy Spirit (1:67, 2:25), and through whom God spoke. She was of the tribe of Asher, the eighth-born son of Jacob through Leah’s maid Zilpah (Gen 30:13). Anna was “advanced in years.” It is not clear if Luke means for us to understand that Anna was 84 (most likely), or that she was 84 plus 7, plus her age at marriage, which, if she were married at 14, would make her 105 (less likely). Regardless, she was quite aged. Yet what do we know about her? She served God all through the years, right across the decades, in her 20’s, 30’s, 40’s, into her 80’s and perhaps beyond. Now as an elderly woman she continues to serve. We can be confident that habits formed in her youth determined the habits that would characterize her when old. She is thankful, prayerful, and useful to God as an elderly woman because she had been thankful, prayerful, and useful all of her life.

We note this because of the common observation that as we age we tend to become more of the same. If we are grouchy as youths we will tend to become grouchier as we age. If we are bitter in our 30’s we will tend to grow more bitter by our 60’s. If we are anxious or fearful in our 40’s we will tend to be more anxious or fearful in our 70’s. Character flaws are typically compounded by age. At the same time, virtues, when properly nurtured, also are compounded. When vices are mortified and virtues nourished by the word and prayer in our early years, those virtues tend to flourish in our later years. We’ve often noticed that there is nothing so beautiful as the character of a devout elderly Christian. Recall Elizabeth Hostetter and Rosie Payne, just to name two elderly women from our congregation, in whom the fruit of grace had been encouraged to grow. Their “quiet and gentle spirit,” their humility, their meekness, cultivated over decades of time, was a beautiful thing to behold. Mrs. Hostetter was once asked what her favorite decade was. She said she thought her 80’s were her best decade because she had learned by then to trust God and enjoy His presence, and yet she was still mobile. She, Rosie, and Mrs. Lomel (to name another) would spend blissful hours in prayer and Scripture reading, with deep pleasure and contentedness.

The same could be said of my revered teachers in England, Dr. J. I. Packer and Rev. Alec Motyer. Decades of walking with Christ, of mortifying sin, of growing in grace; decades of the sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit, of marinating in the word, produced exceptionally deep, humble, devout men. The same could be said of one of the fathers of the PCA, Rev. Paul Settle, a man I much admire and whose godliness I wish to emulate.

Anna is spending her final hours not in gossip, not complaining, not embittered, not criticizing everyone and everything, not cynically commenting on the flaws of those around her, but joyfully serving God. Why? Because she had slain those destructive dragons in the earlier stages of her life and had been mellowed by the grace of God into a woman of attractive character.

Submissive

Second, we should notice that she was one who had known sorrow. She had experienced great sadness in her life. We are told that she,

lived with a husband seven years after her marriage, and then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. (Lk 2:36b-37a)

She had enjoyed only 7 years of marriage. She had been widowed for some time between 63 and 84 years. Alone. On her own: No husband; no mention of children; deprived of normal family life. Yet she seems not to have become bitter. She didn’t allow herself to grow angry with God, but instead served Him. She accepted God’s will for her. She embraced her lot in life. She saw God’s hand in it and submitted to His plan.

Because Anna was a person of “like passions,” that is, a person like the rest of us, there are certain things that we can surmise. We can know that the death of her husband meant the death of her vision of life. All that she had dreamed her life would be was buried in the grave with him. As a first century Jewish girl, her highest aspiration would have been to be a wife and a mother, as was her mother, and her mother before her. Her husband’s death would have been a devastating blow, a crushing loss. There would be little prospect for remarriage for a barren widow of seven years. Her life, as she would have imagined it, was over.

Did she then shake her fist at God? Did she curse God and die (Job 2:9)? Did she indulge in self-pity? Did she bad mouth God and complain of His abandonment of her? It seems not. She had few options, but she did what she could do. She could serve God through prayer, not curse God but serve God. We are likely to be right in thinking that she had no children. There were none to care for. She has no other obligations to keep her from this form of service (1 Cor 7:25ff). She devotes herself to a life of prayer in the temple.

How does one recover from the devastating losses that life brings? Some of us, maybe all of us, have suffered crushing disappointments. You have seen your dreams die, your hopes and aspirations buried. Joni Eareckson Tada, rendered a quadriplegic by a terrible diving accident, once asked J. I. Packer what she could possibly do that was meaningful. His answer: “You can worship God.” There is no higher activity than that. Remember Milton’s immortal words: “They also serve who only stand and wait.” Even a “quad” can pray. Elderly Anna can worship God.

How does one move on? One embraces one’s God-given lot. We can do so when we are confident that our losses come to us by the hand of our loving Father and for our good. “What you meant for evil,” Joseph told his brothers who had sold him into slavery, “God meant for good” (Gen 50:20). This is always the case, and this is what Christians have always said. God allows evil for the greater good. “Shall we indeed accept good from God and not accept adversity?” Job asks his despairing wife (Job 2:10). “When peace like a river attendeth my way,” says the hymn writer, or, “when sorrows like sea-billows roll.” Then what? “Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say, ‘It is well, it is well with my soul’” (my emphasis). What guards the heart from complete despair, from crippling despondence, from soul-consuming anger? This:

and we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. (Rom 8:28)

All things are for our good. Anna embraces this. “My life as a wife, and my dream of life as a mother, are over. This is what God has ordered for me. What shall I do? Praise and serve Him, as did Job before me:”

The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. (Job 1:21b)

Disciplined

Let’s look more closely now at the outward expression of her piety

And she never left the temple, serving night and day with fastings and prayers. (Lk 1:37b)

She “never left the temple”? This undoubtedly is hyperbole. Calvin calls it “an exaggerated way of speaking.”[4] It may indicate that she had “quarters within the temple precincts,” explains Morris, or “she was constantly at worship.”[5] She “never missed a service,” we might say, attending “night and day,” or evening and morning service. Night is mentioned first because of the Jewish way of reckoning time, with the new day beginning in the evening at sunset (cf. widows of 1 Tim 5:5). Her “fasting and prayers,” whether engaged in personally or as a part of the public religious exercises, “point to a disciplined life,” adds Morris.[6]

We recognized, of course, that Luke mentions this as a commendation. Her disciplined devotional life is a virtue. Luke is highlighting it because it is praiseworthy. Anna was not one who trifled with God. She did not serve with half-measures. She served wholeheartedly. This is what the godly do. This is the norm. They “discipline (themselves) for the purpose of godliness” (1 Tim 4:7). Want to grow in Christian maturity? Want to grow in godliness and Christ-likeness? There are spiritual disciplines that nurture growth and apart from which growth is unlikely. In one sense the disciplines of weekly public worship and daily private and family prayers parallel the disciplines that are necessary if one is to become a violinist, a mathematician, a Latinist, or a golfer. It takes discipline to become an accomplished musician, scholar, or athlete. Discipline is also at the foundation of godliness. It will be necessary to open the Bible and bow one’s head and pray with disciplined regularity. Fasting is mentioned not as an end in itself, but a means of devoting more time to prayer. Fasting allows one to set aside the considerable time spent in food preparation and consumption for extended prayer. Disciplined piety is the means that the Spirit of Christ uses to grow His people.

However, one mustn’t think of Anna’s life of fasting and prayer as a drudgery which she forced herself to do. She would have learned to love to “draw near to God” by faith in prayer (Heb 4:14,16; 9:22). This is what we do in prayer. Prayer is drawing near to God, the God whose presence is the fullness of joy (Ps 16:11), whose lovingkindness is better than life (Ps 63:3), whose nearness is our good (Ps 73:28). Prayer is not drudgery but a delight (Ps 37:4). Discipline is required because of the constant distractions of the world. Our attention is easily diverted. This is why we urge an unfailing commitment to public services, evening and morning, “night and day.” This is why we urge modest attempts at family prayers and personal prayers. Start with 7 minutes devoted to personal devotions. Read a few verses and pray. Start with 10-15 minutes for family devotions. Sing, read Scripture, and pray. Draw near to God. His presence is not only a delight but is also transforming. It is in the presence of God that we are transformed into the likeness of God. As we behold the glory of the Lord in Christ Jesus, says the Apostle Paul, we “are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory” (2 Cor 3:18).

Witness

And at that very moment she came up and began giving thanks to God, and continued to speak of Him to all those who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem. (Lk 2:38)

“At that very moment,” the moment of Simeon’s Nunc Dimittis, Anna “came up” to “them” (NIV), to Mary and Joseph and Simeon, and immediately recognized the infant Jesus’ identity. As a woman of prayer she “began giving thanks to God.” She praised God that the Messiah, the Redeemer had arrived, but she didn’t stop there. She told others. She “continued to speak of Him to all those who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.” She became Christ’s ambassador. Why does she witness to them? Because she shared in their hopes for the Messiah. She went to them because she too was “looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.” Like Simeon, her center of gravity was the Messiah. She was “looking.” This was characteristic of her. She was longing for the Messiah, looking, hoping, yearning for her Savior, her Deliverer, her Redeemer to come.

Praise was reflexive to Anna. So was witness. Indeed the connection between the two is natural. What we find praiseworthy, whether in food, or an exercise routine, or an athletic event, or a favorite musical selection, we tell others. Lately I’ve enjoyed Schubert’s 5^th Symphony. Now I’m telling you about it. It’s natural. Redemption is good news. “Come and see,” says Philip to Nathaniel (Jn 1:46). “Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done; this is not the Christ, is it?" (Jn 4:29), asked the Samaritan woman of the Samaritans in the city. Witness is an evitable part of the life of the devout. It is a natural expression of Christian piety.

Our prayer must be that we may become credible witnesses to Christ like Anna. Credibility is built on a life submitted to God, devoted to God, and centered in Christ. Jesus connected the former two when He preached the beatitudes, and then described His disciples as a light that shines in the darkness, as a city set on a hill, as the salt of the earth (Mt 5:3-15). This connection lies behind the qualifications of church officers (Acts 6:1-8; 1 Tim 3:1ff; Titus 1:5ff), and particularly of ministers. “Give attention to yourself and to your teaching,” the Apostle Paul tells Timothy (1 Tim 4:16). Our credibility as witnesses is tied directly to both our conduct, our piety, our devotion to God, and to the content of our teaching. Let us then, like Anna, be both: devoted to God and bold witnesses for Christ.