"Jesus Presented at Temple"
Mary and Joseph take Jesus to the Temple in Jerusalem, forty days after his birth, ‘to present him to the Lord’, as the Law of Moses required (Luke 2:22). St Luke stresses that the parents fulfil all their religious obligations meticulously; and the offering of two birds shows their humble poverty. But the significance of the Presentation goes much further. As the prophet Malachi had announced (Mal. 3:1):
Behold … the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his Temple.
Now it is two new prophetic figures, Simeon and Anna, who recognise that the Lord has indeed come to his Temple. They have been waiting patiently for the promised Saviour, the Messiah, and now they cradle him in their arms. Simeon gives thanks to God: ‘my eyes have seen your salvation’. Indeed, he is holding Salvation in his very arms, for the baby is Yeshua or Jesus, which means Salvation.