Looking for Jesus

Luke 2:49

After a full day of traveling back toward home from Jerusalem and the Passover observance, it’s sundown and time to round up the kids and camp for the night.  But where is Jesus?  They had never known Him to be anywhere other than where they expected.  The kids all hung together in this big caravan, which could have included hundreds of heads. 

They had to spend the next full day just getting back to the Holy City, and then the next day after that, looking for Him in a big city that has been swelled with perhaps a million extra pilgrims, and everyone dressed alike.  It’s good that it didn’t take many more days. They were blessed just to find Him at all.

Where did they find Him?  Of all places, they found Him in the temple. 

verse 46           They came upon a traditional typical scene, teachers seated.  That's how they taught in ancient Israel.  And seated in the middle of the teachers were the students, the pupils, Jesus being the pupil identified here, sitting in the midst of the teachers.

Now this maybe needs a little bit of discussion.  We don't know who these teachers were.  Luke is kind to them.  He calls them teachers. Didaskalos is the word, and it's a word that he never uses to refer to Jewish teachers again.  From now on when he identifies them, he'll identify them as nomikos, lawyers, or grammateus, scribes, but he never calls them teachers again.  He reserves that word for John the Baptist and most particularly he reserves that word for Jesus.  Once Jesus became the teacher, nobody else is called by Luke a teacher.  But for now he gives them credit as teachers.

The Passover has just ended.  Just after the Passover many people would linger, and great teachers who were devout Jews would come from all over the dispersion. Jews had been scattered over the Roman world and even down into Africa.  At the end, most of those remaining are the most devout.  This is an opportunity Jesus seized upon.  It’s an opportunity that never would be afforded Him in the out-of-the-way place called Nazareth where He lived, to be able to sit in the midst of the great Jewish teachers, those who are expert in the law, expert in the prophets. He would have wanted to know how they viewed the Old Testament.  He would have wanted to know how they viewed the prophecies regarding Messiah, how they viewed the sacrificial system, because it was all related to divine truth which consumed His mind.

So there He was.  But His posture is not of a teacher, it's of a student.  He was the listener.  He was the questioner.  The customary pattern for teaching in Judaism, and even by the apostle Paul, was for students to gather around the teachers and stimulate discussion by asking questions.  This would engage the dialogue.  And by the way, this is the only time ever in the gospels that Jesus is the learner, the only time.  He is the student here.  He will never be the student again.

He's not asking for answers, I don't think, from these men, but He's listening to how they understand the truth of God.  He has a consuming desire for it.  He has a hunger for discussing the truth of God.

Someday He will also ask questions of teachers again.  But He will ask them questions that only He can answer. And as you go through the gospel of Luke and the other gospels, you'll find other times when Jesus asks questions to the religious leaders, but He always asks questions that they can't answer and then He answers them Himself.  And in so doing He uses this traditional methodology to literally cut through the hypocrisy and pierce to the heart of their apostate religious establishment.  But He isn't going to do that for another eighteen years.  That is an immense test of patience.  Can you just imagine how many stupid conversations Jesus had to listen to over the next eighteen years?  But He is here the young learner.

Verse 47          They were amazed, it says.  And by the way, that is a response that you're going to find all through the gospels. Wonder is associated with Christ.  Back in chapter 2 verse 18, "All who heard it wondered at the things which were told them by the shepherds."  Back in verse 33, "His father and mother, Joseph and Mary, were amazed at the things that are being said about Him."

You're going to find that repeated throughout the gospel story.  He creates wonder and astonishment and amazement, the kind of wonder created by the presence and power and wisdom of God.

But there is no conceit here.  There's no pride here.  There's no self-centeredness, self-promotion, there's no arrogance.  He is a respectful boy.  He is a humble learner.  His questions are so penetrating and so insightful that they generate astonishment on the part of the great teachers who surround Him.  His questions show deep wisdom.  They show clarity. They show precision.  And He gives answers that are staggering to the minds of these experts.

Again, remember He knew who He was and He knew why He had come. And the imagery of the Passover was very clear in His mind as the Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world.  And He saw a people engaged in acts that were endeavoring to offer some atonement for the overwhelming burden of their sins.  He could see the power of sin in the butchery that was taking place and in the guilt-ridden lives of the people.  He could see the hypocrisy of Judaism. 

verse 48           His parents finally saw Him and they were astonished like the other people.  Jesus astonished everybody all the time.  Maybe they thought He would be standing somewhere saying, "Where's My mommy? I don't know where My parents are, I'm lost. Could you help Me?"  But He seemed absolutely impervious to any human circumstance.  The only way He was lost was that He was lost in the moment.  Here He was three days later.  Where had He stayed?  Where had He eaten?  Those things were not on His mind at all, apparently.  He was concentratingly engaged in a dialogue about the Old Testament.  It was amazing to His parents. And then very personally perturbed because for three days they have been without Him, His mother says to Him in verse 48, "Son, why have You treated us this way?"

She puts a mom style guilt trip on Him! Quite possibly this is the first time the sword pierces Mary's heart.  You remember back in chapter 2, verse 35, Simeon had said that this child is going to put a sword through your heart, Mary.  Well now it had been twelve years and there wasn't any sword.  This child had been nothing but a joy.  After escaping Herod, after escaping the slaughter, they had returned back from Egypt to Nazareth.  They had lived there for these years.  The child had been nothing but obedient, nothing but compliant, nothing but submissive, nothing but loving.  And certainly Mary loved that...a Son like no other child and certainly that Son loved her like no one ever loved her.  One can only imagine what it was like to have a perfect child, the sinless Son, God in human flesh with all the sensitivity and tenderness and kindness and mercy and grace that that child could bring to bear upon her life and Joseph's.  There had never been a sword, but now there’s a sharp edge.

She had never seen Jesus behave like this.  Jesus never intended it to be personal. He wasn't treating her in any way, nor was He treating Joseph in any way.  It's a normal motherly rebuke and she cranks it up a bit by saying, "Behold," which is an exclamation. Do you realize how much anxiety You have caused us?

This whole scene was necessary to establish His identity.  This was the inevitable break between Jesus and His earthly family because they were just temporary.  He had come to do the will of the Father.

v. 49        That's the crux of this whole text.  This is a profound statement.  The only words recorded of Jesus in thirty years and they tell us who He was and why He came.  In other words, you should have come here first. You know who My Father is and you know this is My true house.  I don't really belong in your house in Nazareth.  God is My true Father, I belong with His people in His house.

Verse 50          They didn't understand. They knew who He was.  They knew He was virgin conceived.  They both knew that.  They had been told that by God through an angel. They knew by way of twelve years of perfection.  They knew what kind of a child He was.  And in those days they had a family business, Joseph was a carpenter and the family business would be right there adjacent to the home they lived in.  Children weren't isolated from their parents; the whole family lived in one room.  They were together twenty-four hours a day for twelve years.  They intimately knew this child. 

But they still didn't understand what He meant by what He said.  It was profound enough to be beyond their grasp.  It’s so profound that some of us are still trying to figure out what He meant.  And it's not unusual for this to happen.  In the ninth chapter of Luke, for example, Jesus is speaking to the disciples and He says, "Let these words sink into your ears, for the Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men."  That's what He says.  "But they did not understand this statement," verse 45.  There were a number of times when Jesus said something to the disciples and they didn't understand it.  And it goes on to say, "It was concealed from them so that they couldn't perceive it” and they were even afraid to ask Him about the statement so they just stood there befuddled by it.

Well we understand that.  I mean, there are things in the Bible that Jesus said that we're still trying to get our arms around. 

v. 51        He continued for eighteen years to be subject willingly until He was thirty years old and began His ministry.

His relation to God did not nullify His duty as a human to His earthly parents.  He would obey the fifth commandment, "To honor your father and mother."  He was an obedient child all through His birth to twelve years and He would be an honoring adult, and appropriately submit Himself to His parents from the age of twelve to the age of thirty.

The question is, why is it necessary?  This is something that is so profound and so staggering. 

The end of v. 51 says Mary had a lot to think about.  Back in chapter 2 verse 19 it says the same thing, when she heard from the shepherds she treasured up all these things pondering them in her heart. 

In fact, I think a sword pierced her heart here, just as it did in another instance recorded in Mark 3 when she came to find Jesus one time with some of her other children, His brothers and sisters. And the crowd said, "Your mother is seeking You."  And Jesus said, "Who is My mother?  Whoever does the will of My Father in heaven, the same is My brother, My sister, My mother."  And He distanced Himself from that human relationship, not because He didn't love her or His siblings, He loved them with a perfect love, but Mary needed not to see Him as a Son to do what she wanted but as a Savior doing what the Father demanded. 

V. 52                For the next 18 years He grew spiritually, physically, intellectually, and socially.

But it’s v. 49 that is central to all of this. I'm going to try to plumb the depths of it next time.