Our readings this week are Luke 2:22-40 (the presentation of Jesus in the Temple) and Malachi 3:1-5 (the prophetic hope of God’s coming to his temple).

The image at the centre of these verses from Malachi is that of the refiner’s fire, purifying silver.

There’s a lot that can be said about purifying precious metals, as I discovered when I started looking it up; and there’s an awful lot of YouTube videos that are frankly slightly terrifying in terms of the temperatures, chemicals, and poisonous gases people seem happy to play with in their garages… do not try this at home! Here, though, are three of my takeaways:

The first thing is that the whole point of purifying silver is that what comes out at the end isn’t the same as the thing you started with – a lump of rock, a mixture of metals and dirt, becomes something beautiful. This becoming, though, is not brought about by transmutation – by turning something into something it wasn’t before – but through revelation: by making visible the beauty that is already present, just hidden amongst the dirt.

The second thing is that the purification of silver by any method (and it turns out there are a lot, who knew?) involves the introduction of an extra agent to the rock or slurry or filings; whether it be borax, acid, lead, carbon, or something else, the process relies on an outside agent. The silver cannot purify itself.

The third thing is this. That agent is introduced sacrificially. It functions by binding itself to the impurities, so that the silver might be released, or by absorbing the base materials into itself, so they no longer hamper the precious metal.

Why those three things in particular? Well, don’t they tell the story of our journey in and through faith? Isn’t transformation what we want for our lives? Isn’t that why we seek out a God of justice – of judgement even – so that our lives, a mixture of pure and impure, of righteousness and sin, might become something beautiful?

Perhaps the first encouragement we can take on that journey is the realisation that we’re worth it; that amidst the things of which we’re ashamed, and the work we know is yet to be done, there is already a person of value and beauty simply because we are a creation of God. A person who already, in so many ways, reflects his love into the world. That’s the beauty God sees in us—and the beauty he longs for us to recognize in ourselves.

Of course, we know that, much as we may want to, we don’t have the power within ourselves to reflect that beauty at all times and in all places. But isn’t that when we’re invited back into the mystery of Candlemas? Isn’t that where we need the reminder that, for us to shine as lights in the world, God himself entered it? The one who was already pure offers himself into our hearts and lives, absorbing into his being the things that stop us from being ourselves, and sacrificing himself so that they may be borne away. (cf. 2 Corinthians 5:21)

Luke tells the story of Christ arriving in the temple that the work of transforming the world might begin; but scripture tells us that we now are the temple, and that Christ is alive in us. That work of purification isn’t a one-off historical moment, it’s something that is there within us in every second of every day. It’s there for us to receive and live.

Are you ready to be refined?