Anna

Luke 2:36-38

"[Anna] was very old" (Luke 2:36). She was either 84 years old, or she had been a widow for 84 years. Either way she was old.

Now when you are old, you are supposed to take a break, move to Florida, play golf or shuffle board, and enjoy long warm days on the beach drinking virgin pina coladas.

But Anna didn't get that memo. No, her old age was spent in worship. She "never left the temple but worshiped night and day, fasting and praying" (Luke 2:37).

Worship consumed her.

The time she spent in the temple was not on a checklist, a to-do list, a must-get-through-this, but something she was irresistibly drawn to. It may not have started out that way. In her younger, more busy years, she might have had to force herself to pray. But something happened to her along the way---she got hungry for God.

Her hunger culminated in golden years of worship. What if my life goal was to spend my retirement in praising God? What a goal! What a longing! Let each year add breadth, depth, and hunger to my walk with God.

Here's something amazing about Anna. She was living a Revelation lifestyle.

"Each of the four living creatures had six wings and was covered with eyes all around, even under his wings. Day and night they never stop saying:
'Holy, holy, holy
is the Lord God almighty,
who was, and is, and is to come'

Whenever the living creatures give glory, honor and thanks to him who sits on the throne and who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before him who sits on the throne, and worship him who lives for ever and ever. They lay their crowns before the throne and say:

'You are worthy, our Lord and God,
to receive glory and honor and power,
for you created all things,
and by your will they were created
and have their being' (Revelation 4:8-11)