Bereft, yet Blessed: Lessons from the Life of Anna

This Christmas season, it seemed like my attention was constantly being called to Anna’s part of the Christmas story. The Bible only tells us a little about her, but what it does say gives us an interesting peek into her character and how God orchestrated events in her life to call her to a place of service.

Anna’s part in the Christmas account comes as Mary and Joseph are in the temple, performing the normal ceremonies attending the birth of a firstborn son. Simeon, led by God, comes in and recognizes the baby as the promised Savior, and takes Him up in his arms, blessing God and proclaiming the identity of this tiny child. That’s when Anna appears.

“And there was one Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Aser: she was of a great age, and had lived with an husband seven years from her virginity; And she was a widow of about fourscore and four years, which departed not from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayers night and day.

And she coming in that instant gave thanks unto the Lord, and spake of Him to all that looked for redemption in Jerusalem.” (Luke 2:36-38)

That’s it. That’s all God has recorded for us concerning this faithful lady, but it’s enough.

Look at that first verse again. It tells us that Anna was a prophetess. That in itself is remarkable, especially during a season in Israel’s history when new revelation from God was rare. Whether she was called a prophetess because she received and proclaimed direct revelation from God, or simply because she proclaimed the already revealed truths of God’s Word at the time, we are not told. We only know that she was known to be one who spoke truth from God.

We are also told a little of her history. She had been married for seven years before her husband died, and she doesn’t seem to have had children. This would have placed her in a place of poverty and also of societal censure, as childlessness was commonly viewed in that time as a sign of God’s judgement for some heinous sin.

At some point, decades and decades before we are introduced to Anna in the temple, there was a moment in her life when everything changed. God allowed a painful bereavement that changed the course of her life, pushing her out of married life and into widowhood.

I can’t imagine how painful that must have been for her, and yet God had a purpose in it. He took away what seemed to be her life’s calling and gave her instead a new calling: the purpose of her life was no longer to care for house and husband, but to serve God in fasting and prayers.

It was Spurgeon, I think who once said that the Lord gets His best soldiers out of the highlands of affliction, and Anna is no exception. God used the terrible circumstance of her widowhood to draw her into closer fellowship with Him, and to set her apart for a ministry, the great significance of which she could never have imagined.

As Christians, we serve the same God Anna served, and rejoice in the same Savior for which Anna gave thanks that day in the temple.

Anna’s God has not changed, nor will He ever change. He is the same “yesterday, and today, and for ever.” (Hebrews 13:8)

This means that we can trust Him to work in our lives, just as He did in hers: to use the sorrows, loss, and seeming hopeless situations in our lives to draw us into closer fellowship with Him. It means we can trust that when He redirects our lives, or redefines our calling, He only does so to further our good and His glory.

Anna’s story comprises only three verses, but it illustrates the glorious truth that Anna proclaimed to those waiting for the Messiah, and it’s just as true today:

You can trust God.

 “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose.”          Romans 8:28