The text this morning is from the Gospel according to Luke, the second chapter:
And the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom. And the favor of God was upon Him. Now His parents went to Jerusalem every year at the Feast of the Passover. And when He was twelve years old, they went up according to custom. And when the feast was ended, as they were returning, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. His parents did not know it, but supposing Him to be in the group they went a day’s journey, but then they began to search for Him among their relatives and acquaintances, and when they did not find Him, they returned to Jerusalem, searching for Him. After three days they found Him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard Him were amazed at His understanding and His answers. And when His parents saw Him, they were astonished. And His mother said to Him, “Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.” And He said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” And they did not understand the saying that He spoke to them. And He went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. And His mother treasured up all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.
Thus far the text.
My dear friends in Christ,
I think it’s hard for us to understand Jesus’ response to His parents here. I mean, He is supposed to be perfect, but it’s almost as if He responds to their concerns over His disappearance with, I don’t know, condescension? It’s like He’s talking down to them. In our world, if a child did that to their parent, wouldn’t they be seen as disobeying? Wouldn’t they be punished? I know I would have been.
But, see how Luke addresses this, right at the beginning and the ending. “And the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom.” “And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.” Luke informs us that this isn’t disobedience, it isn’t sin, it’s wisdom. But it’s hard for us to see that, isn’t it? We are so caught up in our sin-filled world and lives that we can’t understand that Jesus, the perfect Son of God, could do such things without it being sinful.
I mean, He grew up as a little child. He learned like any child does. He learned His letters and numbers. He memorized the Scriptures as all children do. He learned to walk, to talk, to think, to assess. He grew up like we all do, like we all did, and there was nothing supernatural about that. He grew up like us. He had to learn like us.
But, He is still, in this text, the God-boy, the Son of God in human flesh, incarnate for the sake of God’s people that this Jesus might save His people from their sins. He is fully human, and fully God. There is no way to really explain that. It must be believed by faith. It is not His divinity, however, that makes Him perfect, it is His obedience to the Law. He is fully obedient to the Law of God, fully obedient to His Father in heaven, no matter who He is or how He differs from us. He is always obedient, even to the fourth commandment, which is to honor your father and mother. He is never disobedient to that commandment, never broke it.
So, the problem as we look at this text isn’t Jesus; it’s us. We hear His words and we marvel at the audacity of them. We hear His words and can’t understand. We see the concern He caused His parents and we just can’t see beyond our responses. It’s because, if this were us here, if it were us who disappeared from our parents, we would be at fault. We would have the smart-aleck response. We can’t understand how there’s not sin here.
And doesn’t that reveal our hearts? We have such a hard time seeing beyond ourselves, that we project ourselves onto Christ. We want Him to be so much like us, and He is indeed like us, that we want to call this sinful, but still try to hold in tension the idea that He’s God for us. Do you hear how weird that is? It’s wanting Him sinful and sinless at the same time, because that excuses our sins, it allows us to sin, it allows us to be snarky and rude and condescending. It excuses our sin, but it doesn’t forgive. And for thinking that, it becomes clear that we are a contradiction in ourselves.
But, see Jesus, the unblemished, perfect Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, even as He sits here in the Temple teaching the teachers. He is surprised at His parents. He expects them to have already understood that this is where He must be, where He has been. He expects them to see and to hear the Scriptures that He must be in His Father’s house. This is not to say that if Joseph and Mary had let Him, He would have stayed in this place for His whole ministry. No, we see His ministry play out among the people of God, calling all people to Himself, Jew and Gentile alike, even you and me. But it is to say that the Messiah, the Christ, the one who would save the world, has His work to do in the Temple, in the place where God dwells.
After all, Jesus is the very presence of God among His people. For all time, when God is among His people, it has always been the Son of God who rests with them, guides them, accepts their sacrifices to Him looking forward to the sacrifice that He would make for them upon the cross. Jesus is God with Us, Immanuel, and He must then be with us, with His people.
But, Jesus, as He was teaching the teachers astonished them. This phrase comes up again and again as Jesus teaches through His ministry. It’s not a phrase to say, “Oh, that’s so cool, I never thought of it that way before.” It’s a phrase that points out the unbelief and the incredulity of the people at His teaching. It’s a phrase that marks out those who would stand against Him.
Now, I don’t know how many of these teachers were still alive when Jesus began His public ministry, but I’ll bet there were stories of the little boy that survived even to that day. And I’ll bet there were some who rejected Him as a boy in the Temple, and those stories and those reasons for rejection survived to that day. And so, Jesus, the Lamb of God, God with Us, left that Temple that day and went home with His parents and knew, according to the Scriptures, that His ministry, His presence, would indeed be among the people of God, the people whom God chose to hear His Word and believe it.
So where does Jesus go? Back to Nazareth. He goes back to the people among whom He would live until the time of His public ministry. It’s not to say that He forsook the Temple or the teachers there, for indeed He loves them as He loves the entire world, but that He knew, according to Scriptures, that He was to call all men to Himself.
And so He calls even us today, and so He teaches even us today. The teaching of Jesus Christ, the spotless Lamb of God, has not passed away for us. He teaches us still today, and His presence is still among us as He comes to us through Word and Sacrament. Jesus Christ is still with His people, He is still with you, today. His cross is given to you today.
The boy Jesus, who took human flesh upon Himself, would continue to grow into the man we see dying up on the tree in our place. Even during this time in the Temple, He is fulfilling the Law and the Scriptures for us. We may not understand it, but we believe it because that is what our Lord asks us to believe. We believe that this young man, Jesus the Christ, is our Lord. Though we may not understand all that He does, we may trust that He is indeed sinless and that He taught in the temple even for us, so that He might come out of the Temple and be among us.
Here is Jesus. Here is His sinless, perfect, body and blood for us, for you, that you might be forgiven, even for your unbelief. Here He is, out of the Temple in Jerusalem, and coming into the temple of the Holy Spirit, which is your body, that you might believe in Him even unto everlasting life. Here He is for you, so that you might have Him with you today, this week, even forever. For He sees your need, and He sees that you need more and more of Him, and so He gives it to you. He gives Himself to you that you might have Him always.
The boy Jesus grew up, He grew in wisdom and stature, He grew to be a man, that He might die for you, that His flesh would be crucified for you so that you would never have to be, never have to face the true consequences of your sin, and was resurrected from the dead for you that you may have life forever. And here, in this place, He teaches you to believe in Him that you may, not that you may make excuses for your behavior or your unbelief, but that you would be forgiven, and that you would grow in grace and truth, and that you would have life forever in His name. He is not in the Temple, but He is in you today, by faith, faith granted to you by His Spirit, that you may always be in His presence, for He is with you, always. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all human understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord! Amen.
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