My new biblical hero!

Luke 2: 36- 38
There was also a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was very old; she had lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, and then was a widow until she was eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped night and day, fasting and praying. Coming up to them at that very moment, she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem.

When 84 year old Anna left the temple on that day, she probably didn’t imagine that that regular day would be the day that changed her life so much so that she had to tell everybody that she possibly could about it. While spending all of her time within God’s temple, The Lord allowed her to see the face of a baby unlike any other. It was revealed to her at once, the greatest revelation of her life story. There before her was God, creator alpha and omega, in the form of a little baby. A baby that would grow to become the perfect flawless lamb that would take the sins of all mankind. What a privilege it was for her to meet Jesus Christ, the redeemer of sins, face to face when all she was doing was her daily routine of staying in the temple as she worshipped night and day, fasting and praying. I believe that God saw her heart and gave her that privilege making this very important point: “Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart.”

Anna was a prophetess. The word says that she was 84 and instead of living her life and doing her duties, her time was devoted to her God. What was it that drove her to the point where her home became the temple? Surely enough it wasn’t the Priests or the Pharisees or the temple decorations. Surely it wasn’t all of the religious debates or godless chatter about man made laws that the religious men of that day created and named as laws of God. No, it was something else.

I don’t know if Anna realized that at the moment (or moments) where she decided not to leave the temple, that she was following in the tradition of Joshua son of nun (Warrior, aide to Moses and eventually leader of the Israeli nation) in deciding not to leave the temple but it must have been the best decision that she ever made. My belief is this, that both of them although in different time periods and different time periods, had the exact same motive for remaining in the temple/ tent of meeting.

The reason was this: When Joshua entered the tent of meeting, his motive perhaps was simply assisting Moses in entering or perhaps it was just part of his job description to not let Moses out of his sight but as it turns out, Joshua entered into the tent and I believe that this changed him forever. This moment ruined him for anything else!

I believe that Anna upon entering into this temple took a long journey. Although she was probably just in the outer courts of the temple, I believe something drove her to go further. I believe that although her body physically stayed in place, that her spirit began to cry out and chase something within that temple. Her spirit then ran past the holy place and straight into the holy of holies where her soul met with God and she would never be the same! And when she met with God, something inside of her happened. She realized that NOTHING was even close to what she felt when she came face to face with the author of life and creator of the universe. I believe that the fire and peace that she felt in the presence of God was enough to ruin her to anything else for the rest of her life. My biblical hero is Joshua son of nun but today I discovered a new hero, Anna, prophetess and woman of God; Pursuer of God’s presence. So both of these people share one thing in common and that is this: They entered into the very presence of God, fell in love with God’s presence and realized that it was everything that they had always been searching for. They were ruined for anything else and made their home in the courts of the Lord almighty. They never left God’s presence!.
Today my exhortation for all of you (as well as myself) is this: fall in love with God! Fall deeply and madly in love with God! We don’t even know but there is so much power and beauty and fire within the presence of God. Lets begin to fall in love with it again! Let’s contemplate the beauty of our god and speak to him face to face as Moses spoke to him or as a man speaks with his friend (ex. 33:11). Lets stare into His eyes and let them burn deep into us. As he exudes his holiness, let us take note of those things that stop us from getting closer to him (sin) and let His fire purify us. As we enter into his presence, we must ascend to where He is so lets allow Him to give us perspective into the future through revelation and prophecy while we sit in his courts. Let us realize that if we spend time in God’s presence, he will whisper words into our hearts that will penetrate the hardened hearts of others so much more then we could ever do though countless hours of study! Let’s fall in love with God and follow the tradition of Joshu and Anna. Let’s decide never to leave his presence.