Week of January 2, 2012

1. Read Luke 2:21-40.
2. When you were growing up, what teacher, coach or relative made you feel special? How did that person make you feel so good?
3. Who helps you feel special now?
4. Why is Jesus presented in the temple at this time: Circumcision? Christening? Purification? Dedication? What Mosaic laws are hereby fulfilled (see Leviticus 12:1-8, Exodus 13:2, 1,2 13; Numbers 18:15, 16)?
5. Why the name Jesus?
6. What does this temple ceremony reveal about the parents of Jesus: They were very poor? Religious? Proud? Dedicated? Fearful of their salvation?
7. How could Simeon possibly know this baby Jesus was the long promised Messiah (v. 25-28)? In Simeon's prophecies (v. 29-32, 34-35) what was he predicting about the work of Jesus? The fate of the nations? The pain of the parents?
8. Of whom does Anna remind you? How does she compliment Simeon's prophecy?
9. What impact would these startling predictions by Simeon and Anna have on "all" who were listening that day? On the parents of Jesus as they returned home (v. 33, 39)? On Jesus as He grew up (v. 40)?
10. How did your parents dedicate you to the Lord, if at all? How do you feel about the fact that you were or weren't dedicated? How did your parents help you mature spiritually?
11. When has God brought along someone to confirm something in your life, like Simeon and Anna did for the parents of Jesus? How did this make you feel?
12. Pray for one another.