Jesus The Teenage Rebel

Jesus The Teenage Rebel

“I wish there were a couple hundred more verses at the end of Luke 2… (PUT IT IN CONTEXT!)

- as a youth pastor, more stories about Jesus teen years. some indication of how He related to His peers. of how He and His parents got along.

- somehow we get this idea that Jesus’ growing up must have been conflict-free; that since He was sinless everything would have been just fine all the time. that simply can’t be true – Jesus was perfect but His parents (and siblings) weren’t!

- maybe Mary was having a bad day and got all mad at Jesus for something He didn’t do, or maybe Joseph hit his thumb with His hammer one time and tried to blame it on Jesus because He made some noise in the shop right then, or maybe one of His siblings lied and got Jesus in trouble (it wouldn’t be the last time He was punished for someone else’s wrongs)… How would Jesus have responded when He saw His parents sin? There may have been some conflict!

- point is: there would inevitably have been some conflict., for though Jesus was without sin, His parents and siblings were not.

I hope that those of you who are parents of teens, and those of you who are teens, will take some comfort from that. Some conflict is normal

- although there are not a bunch of stories of Jesus as a teenager, there is one: Luke 2:41-52. And you know what it shows us? There WAS some conflict; Jesus was a teen-age rebel!

HAVE ALEX/JENNY READ THIS SCRIPTURE…

A little bit of historical background… Jesus’ education:

- at the time of Jesus, most Jewish kids went to school. in synagogue.

- 3 schools:

- #1 – Bet Sefer – house of the book – you went seven days a week for 5 years (mornings only) and learned to read and memorized Torah (our Old Testament – except for Song of Songs and David and Bethsheba…) No Questions Allowed!

- #2 – Bet Talmud – house of learning – at this point you went morning and evening, 7 days a week for another 5 years. And here you memorized all the previous interpretations of Torah (which is collected is writings called the Talmud). Still you couldn’t discuss anything or ask questions. You would be about half way through this school when you had your bar mitzvah (turning 13). This was where almost everyone stopped – memorize the Torah and the Talmud, and then if you didn’t really have any new ideas or interpretations of Torah you would quit school and continue to learn a trade from your father.

- #3 – Bet Midrash – for really gifted, finally you could discuss and argue and interpret (and you can imagine that after 10 years of memorizing without speaking some may speak with some passion when they are finally able to!)

- so the normal pattern for raising your kids in first century Palestine was to send them to school when they were between 5-7, have a bar or bat mitzvah the Saturday before their 13th birthday (which welcomed them as adults into Jewish society), teach the boys a trade at their father’s side and the girls all of the home skills of cooking and sewing and child-rearing, and then get them married off by age 18. Now this is important: in Jewish culture – if you were not married by age 20 at the latest, not only were your parents and family upset, but God Himself was very angry with you!

- so that’s a bit of cultural background to the passage that Alex/Jenny read, which I thought you might find interesting just as context. Since this passage tells us Jesus was 12, we can assume he was in the middle school working hard at memorizing the Talmud.

Anyway, enough history. Let’s look at the passage:

vs. 41-42: notice what is going on here: the family, together, having a Spiritual holiday. “every year” they went to Jerusalem for the feast of the passover.

- Sue’s holiday comments at our deacon’s meeting

- family, together celebrating their spiritual heritage.

- THAT IS TRUE CHRISTIAN EDUCATION!! it is the family TOGETHER celebrating and remembering and learning.

- we have a few things like that – a few customs and traditions: Christmas is one – kids being a part of the kids Christmas pageant, going to church together on Christmas eve, our Lent campaign that we encourage families to work on together, our Easter services…

- even (maybe especially in our culture) getting to church together week after week. This teaches our kids – when the family goes to church together.

- TANGENT TIME: I want to encourage you to try really hard to enjoy coming to church as a family. Make sure you get here five or ten minutes early, so that you have time to get the kids boots off and coats hung up and can get into the sanctuary and find your seat before things begin (I know I’m asking a lot here, especially at Laurier…). But then you’ll be ready to worship, and you’ll show your kids how important God is. And maybe you can find something as a family that you can do each week to make it more enjoyable – stop for a slurpee on the way home, or let your kids invite a friend over, or have lunch with some friends – whatever you can think of to really make each Sunday a positive experience for your family. For lots of you it is already – if it isn’t I challenge you to sit down today after church as a family and decide how you can make it more enjoyable!