In Our Father’s House - Luke 2.41-52

            We’ve been speaking of Epiphany, the season of the church year when we focus on the shining forth of Christ and his good news.  But the wise men story of last week still had him a helpless baby – if there was a shining there it was heaven’s light shining on him.  Concerning his life from infancy to adulthood there’s near total silence in the gospel accounts.  And I guess not surprisingly, legend spinners stepped in to fill the gap.  There’s a story of the child Jesus making birds out of clay, then clapping his little hands and off they flew.  The gospel records are content with one incident, and it is a shining forth – though far from the stuff of silly legend.  Luke 2, verse 41:

⁴¹ Every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover. ⁴² When he was twelve years old, they went up to the Feast, according to the custom. ⁴³ After the Feast was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it. ⁴⁴ Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends. ⁴⁵ When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him. ⁴⁶ After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.

⁴⁷ Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. ⁴⁸ When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.”

⁴⁹ “Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?” ⁵⁰ But they did not understand what he was saying to them.

⁵¹ Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But his mother treasured all these things in her heart. ⁵² And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.

            A little background: the law of Moses asked of adult males three Jerusalem trips a year, for Passover, Pentecost and the Feast of Shelters.  But the dispersion of Jews into Asia and North Africa and beyond had made three visits impractical for many.  So the rule became, if you can’t make it for anything else, don’t miss Passover. 

            It says a lot about Jesus’ family that Mary came along, and Jesus, even before his legal coming of age required it.  They weren’t just fulfilling a duty, their hearts were in it.  They wanted to be in God’s house, and that as a family.

⁴³ After the Feast was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it. ⁴⁴ Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends.

            A word on the numbers involved here will make the incident more comprehensible: it’s said that at Passover time, the population of Jerusalem about quadrupled.  Think the Rose Parade crowd.  So when the pilgrims went home, there were hundreds strung out along the road, going at whatever pace was comfortable, and then sorting themselves out into family groupings for the night.

            It seems to me, if you were looking for evidence of the full humanity of the Son of God, you’d strike gold here.  Was Jesus a normal kid?  Look no further than Mary and Joseph’s assumption that their son was off with his friends somewhere.  He’s a good kid, they know his friends and they’re good kids – nothing to worry about.  So it’s all day before they miss him.

⁴⁵ When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him. ⁴⁶ After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.

The three days being the first day outbound, the next returning to the city, and the third combing Jerusalem for him.  At the end of which they find him in the temple courts.

            Let me read a bit from Alfred Edersheim’s The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah.

We read in the Talmud that the members of the Temple Sanhedrin, who on ordinary days sat as a court of appeal, from the close of the morning to the time of the evening sacrifice, were wont on Sabbaths and feast days to come out upon the terrace of the temple, and there to teach.  In such popular instruction the utmost latitude of questioning would be given.  It is in this audience, which sat on the ground, surrounding and mingling with the doctors, that we must seek the child Jesus.

Listening to them, Luke says, and asking questions.  ⁴⁷ Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers.  The thing that amazed, you notice, wasn’t the mere presence of a boy or the fact of his asking and answering questions.  That was normal.  They did it that way back then. 

            So what was amazing?  I suppose all of us have encountered precocious kids – or heard about them – kids whose vocabulary and interest level are those of a much older person.  Was Jesus amazing because he was astonishingly precocious?  That’s conceivable, I guess.  At least it’s the kind of amazing kid that we’re used to.  But consider the final verse: Jesus grew, in wisdom and stature.  Jesus wasn’t hatched as a miniature adult.  He grew, normally.  Mary and Joseph didn’t worry about him on the road precisely because they knew him for a normal kid, who’d be doing what the others were doing.

            It isn’t hard to imagine a kid raising eyebrows by being precocious. (Parenthetically - though I’ll admit it may be just jealousy - I find such kids a little irritating.  I like kids to be kids.)  But think of a different kind of amazing.  Can you imagine someone who can enter a classroom discussion without dragging in with him a sinful nature?  What would that look like?  Not, or at least not necessarily, a matter of displaying encyclopedic knowledge.  Certainly it would be giving real attention to what others are saying.  Listening, not just awaiting opportunity to talk.  A sincere pursuit of truth – of what God’s saying to us here – and that unstained by ego, unstained by trying to impress or be clever at others’ expense, pushing one’s self up by pushing another down.  That could be amazing, and attractive, and no less so for being in the vocabulary and at the interest level of a twelve year old kid.

⁴⁸ When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.”

It’s hard not to side with Mary, and I guess our text allows us to.  I was a little older than Jesus was here – somewhere in my high school years – out in someone’s car after a basketball game, the night was crystal clear, and someone said, why don’t we drive up to the top of Mt. Wilson?  We did, and I got home around midnight, to a scene much resembling the one here.  I knew where I was, and that I was perfectly safe.  But Dad and Mom sure didn’t.  And they said as much.  Son, why have you treated us like this?

⁴⁹ “Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?”

The first recorded words of Jesus, the Son of God, and it’s interesting the awareness they show of his identity and his mission.  I had to be in my Father’s house.  That’s obvious to him, and he seems surprised it’s not obvious to his folks.

This scene is taking place in the temple, the same place where twelve years before an old man named Simeon took the infant Jesus in his arms, prophesied over him, then handed him back to his mother, saying to her a sword will pierce your own soul too.  You can imagine that this scene, twelve years later, served to twist that sword a bit.  Not that Jesus could be so thoughtless as to go off like that and leave them worrying.  That pain would be gone in the relief of getting him back safe.  Rather, the realization that the Father’s house in question was not their residence in Nazareth, and his Father’s business was not going to be carpentry, that his days with them were numbered.

            If it be asked, how does this story touch us?  First, and maybe foremost, it’s a strong witness to the true humanity of the Son of God - that he could be and indeed consistently was taken for a normal human being.  That he was the divine Son of God could be a tough sell; that he was human was evident to all.

Beyond that?  There’s this point of application: Jesus had to be in his Father’s house, about his Father’s business.  And however good and blessed and God-given Jesus’ home life with Mary and Joseph was, there’d come the time for doing the heavenly Father’s will, and Mary and Joseph would either let go and say to God, Thy will be done – or they’d fail to.  And Simeon’s comment about the sword piercing her soul suggests that it wouldn’t necessarily be easy or painless doing so.

            That was true for Jesus, and in a sense not very different, it’s true for Jesus’ disciples.  The sons of Zebedee for example.  It was a good, God-honoring thing that James and John should work with their father in his fishing business.  Until Jesus said to the young men, Follow me, and called them away to their heavenly Father’s business.  Jesus’ words to his parents here have kind of a hard edge to them (sounds that way to me anyway).  But when it comes to doing God’s will or failing to, the edge does not get one bit softer in Jesus’ adulthood.  We read in chapter 14

²⁵ Large crowds were traveling with Jesus, and turning to them he said: ²⁶ “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple. ²⁷ And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.

The edge didn’t get any softer.  But it wasn’t soft for Jesus, either.  Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?

⁵¹ Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But his mother treasured all these things in her heart. ⁵² And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.

            One further word of application: Jesus had to be in his Father’s house.  If you take that not in the sense of external obligation but real inner determination, so did his folks.  The law didn’t insist on their all going.  Joseph and Mary were both of the house, and the heart of David, David who testified, “I rejoiced with those who said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’”

Jesus enriched that tremendously in telling the Samaritan woman, neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.  He ushered in the age when worshippers wherever they might be could worship him in spirit and in truth: on a riverbank in Philippi or under a shade tree in Africa or in a subway station in D.C. or a nightclub in downtown L.A..  You, God’s people, Paul says in Ephesians, You are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.  Your individual body, with hands, feet and nose, is a temple of God’s Holy Spirit.  No less your corporate body - Immanuel Lutheran Church – You are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.  You together are a house of worship, wherever you gather.  Don’t forget, don’t slight, the together there.  Mary and Joseph rejoiced with those going to God’s house. Allowing that house to be a nightclub or jungle clearing somewhere doesn’t take away the precious together of worship.

            Jesus said he had to be in his Father’s house, and his parents couldn’t understand.  But Mary had a good way with God’s mysteries.  She had the humility of a servant who doesn’t insist on everything being explained before setting out on the path to obedience.  His mother treasured all these things in her heart.  When the shepherds came to them from the hillside and told them what the angels had said about the child, it says, Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.

            Of all New Testament passages, this is far from the easiest one.  Mary didn’t understand.  And, pondering how the eternal Son of God could be a human baby, or a normal 6^th grader, we may not do much better.  But she treasured it all in her heart.  The shepherds let it all out, glorifying and praising God for what they’d heard and seen, and returning back home they shared it with all who’d listen.  Mary thought about it.  We can be both, we can do both, as in this season we follow Jesus from the manger to the cross.