“Finding Balance”
Luke 2:41-52
When we look at the life of Jesus and what the Bible tells us about Him we quickly notice that the majority of what we know is from his adult life…those 3.5 years He spent in ministry. There is of course the story of his birth. Also in the gospel of Luke we are told that following the birth of Jesus that the family returns to Bethlehem and during the next year the wise men follow a star to Him. All of the Nativity scenes we see with the Wise Men gathered around the manger aren’t actually correct. Jesus would have been walking by that point. Following that time, King Herod, afraid of losing power, had all the baby boys in the region who were two and under killed. The Bible tells us that an angel warned Joseph and Mary and they fled to Egypt with Jesus. Then after it was safe they returned to Nazareth where He grew up.
Then we see the baby Jesus in the temple, 8 days old as He is being dedicated to God. Following that, the scripture is silent about his childhood so we do not see anything until the time when He is 12 and He is at the temple amazing the teachers. Following that we then do not hear anything until He enters His public ministry at the age of 30. So we have an 18 year period of silence where the Bible only gives us one verse to tell us what it was like. It is a summation of what happened during that 18 year period. Here it is. Luke 2:52.
Now I believe that Luke must have heard from Mary, the mother of Jesus during these years….. so why did he choose only this one passage to share with us? Scholars often refer to these as the hidden or lost years because we know so little about them. But what we know is what God chose for us to know. What He gave to us is exactly what He wanted us to have.
Luke 2:52.
Now what does this passage say to us as his disciples now living 2000 years later? This is what this passage tells us.
Spiritual growth was not only a priority in the life of Jesus, it was everything.
Jesus taught us how to live a balanced life.
This verse follows the story of Jesus having traveled to the temple at the age of 12. This would have been a trip they would have made every year for Passover. The Bible tells us that it was their custom to do so. We quickly learn that when the feast was over that Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem… no big deal but he forgot to tell his parents. Joseph and Mary didn’t know it. The scripture says that “thinking He was in their company, they continued to travel.
It’s probably not very spiritual for me to admit this but I have found that I cannot read this passage anymore without thinking of the movie “Home Alone.” Kevin, remember Kevin, the little boy was upset and went to bed that night ….without setting his alarm clock. The family was catching an early flight the next morning and because they had such a large family, extended relatives traveling with them, they miscounted that morning and Kevin was left behind. Who does that? Joseph and Mary apparently.
With Jesus we don’t know if they miscounted or what. It was common for the women to leave earlier than the men because they didn’t walk as fast. That way they could all arrive at the same time and walk at a pace that was comfortable for all of them. So Mary likely left with all of the women leaving Joseph and Jesus behind. So why didn’t Joseph have him? It was also a tradition that children would often travel together as a group or with another relative so that is probably what Joseph thought.
So we know that after arriving at their destination and realizing he was not with them, they began to look. Have you lost one of your children before? I remember it happening at least twice to us. We found Ross sound asleep in his bedroom. The problem was he was under his bed. Brian was playing down the street, I think he had found a girlfriend, he was about 6 years old so he probably was on his 3rd or 4th one by that time… but anyway we could not find him for several hours. We laugh now but it’s not a good feeling when it happens.
So the Bible says they searched for him but couldn’t find him so they headed back to Jerusalem to look and 3 long days later they found him. Where was he? At church. Where else would Jesus be? My wife says that when she was a baby in this church … Bud and Mandy were custodians and Mandy worked in childcare some. Well Denise’s parents got home from church one Sunday and one of the workers in the church nursery called their house to say hey, you forgot your little girl… she’s here in the nursery. My wife is still traumatized over that.
So now they locate Jesus and he is in the temple doing two things…asking questions and answering questions. He is sitting among the teachers there, all adults of course, listening to them teach on various topics and asking them questions. But it’s interesting that the Bible says he was also answering questions AND the teachers were amazed at his understanding. Then Mary and Joseph saw Jesus and the Bible says they were astonished. They then asked Jesus, “son why have you treated us like this?”
When children are lost for a period of time, when we find them the response of the child and the parent are miles apart. The parent is anxious…. Mary and Joseph were. There were two emotions; they were anxious and they were astonished. They said “why did you treat us like this?” We feel like the child has disrespected us, ignored our feelings. And our emotions are really strong at that point and we may even be a little mad that they didn’t tell us where they were. But it’s different for the child; they’re like “hey, what’s up?” In fact Jesus says “why were you looking for me? Didn’t you know this is where I would be?”
Now it is at this point where we realize though that there was something very different about the child Jesus. The Bible says “they didn’t understand what Jesus was saying to them.” Jesus is 12, he’s a child and these are his parents and they don’t understand what he is saying. He was definitely ahead of the other children his age and most likely already ahead of many adults. And at this point we get this summary of the next 18 years of his life. Luke 2:52. That’s what those years were about.
Now for the remainder of the message I want to give you a question for you to think about? What will be the summary of the next 18 years of your life? Some of you will get married, some will have children, some will go to work; some will retire. But one thing is for sure, for all of us the next 18-20 years will bring many changes. You have to ask yourself, what will I do with those years? What will our priorities be for those years?
All of us have priorities. You may not be able to name/describe them if I were to ask you, but you still have them. Priorities are a lot like habits … some are good and some are bad. But a priority is simply a measure of how we spend our time. And for Jesus there were 4. Here they are.
Priority one. Jesus grew in wisdom. The book of James tells us that if we want wisdom all we need to do is ask. So there are apparently a lot of people who never ask. Would you agree? Because I don’t see a lot of wisdom in this world. Do you? James tells us that the source of all wisdom is heaven. Jesus had it and there are several things we need to know about wisdom.
(1) Wisdom has a beginning. There is a specific time when it begins to enter our lives. The psalmist said, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Fear often means respect and that is what as it does here. If you respect someone you tend to do what they tell you. We “disrespect” someone when we disobey. The first step to get wisdom is to fear/respect God by doing what He says. That shows that we are wise. When we disobey it shows that we are foolish.
(2) The world offers many paths to find wisdom but they will not get you to your destination. If wisdom is your goal and you take the path the world offers, you will not make it. The world promises it but the world cannot deliver. The world will tell you do this or do that and you will have success. We see this early in the scripture that God says to Adam and Eve… you are free to eat from any tree in the garden, except one. And of course that’s the one they ate from. Why? Genesis says that they believed that by eating from that tree that they would gain wisdom. God says don’t do it, it won’t work. Satan says that’s not what He means…. so they do it. And 2000 years later we still have not learned to listen to God instead of listening to the world.
(3) The greatest source of wisdom is the Bible. 2nd Timothy 3:15 says that “the holy scriptures are able to give you wisdom.” All true wisdom comes from this book. Period.
(4) Wisdom also has an end. God has the power to destroy wisdom if we use it for the wrong purpose. He says, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise.” Ever known someone who just seemed so smart but they then do something that’s not so smart? Or you grew up with someone who was so intelligent and you talk to them years later and you think what happened? They had wisdom they lost it. If you misuse it God takes it away.
Priority one. Jesus grew in wisdom. He grew wiser.
Priority two. Jesus grew in stature. He grew physically. He was fit. The scripture tells us that our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit. We house God in our bodies. We need to take care of them. We need to be in the best physical shape possible. They key is balance. We don’t spend our life at the gym/CLC but we do need to take care of ourselves. Think about the lifestyle of Jesus.
• He worked in the carpenter’s shop with His father. It was hard physical work. Different tools then.
• He walked constantly. From town to town teaching and doing ministry.
• He stopped to rest. He got away.
• He endured the cross. No man could have endured what Jesus went through if he was not in good shape physically.
Priority three. Jesus grew in favor with God. Jesus grew spiritually. That is hard for us to grasp but that means He was at this level and then moved to this level. As a child He was not fully developed spiritually. He prayed, He read and memorized scripture, He went to the temple every week, He taught, He learned all He could by asking questions of the teachers in the temple. And it was his purpose every day to do the will of God and nothing else. And so He was constantly growing in favor with God.
Priority four. Jesus grew in favor with man. He grew in relationships. Until the final week of His life Jesus was very popular. People loved Him. Everyone wanted to be friends with Him. He is described as the friend of sinners. The tax collectors and sinners were in a class all by themselves and they were not well thought of. But Jesus was their friend. He never overlooked anyone. What about you? Listen, the majority of the people you will lead to Jesus will be people you are friends with. Because they must accept you many times before they will let you talk about Him.
This is what God wants us to know about those 18 years. Jesus grew. Henry Blackaby says you cannot stay where you are and go with God. We must grow.
For me I have found that one of the most important things in life is balance. Balance. All of us know what it feels like when life gets out of balance. There are times when life feels like a balancing act. Have you ever been to the circus and seen a plate spinner? They spin 8-10 plates at one time. They get started here and move down the line… but as they keep moving, the plates that were being spun at first are now slowing down. So to keep them going as soon as you get 3 or 4 started you have to start running back to the first one. And it’s non-stop. And if you take a break they will begin to fall until all of them crash. We do that. And the “hurrrier” we go the “behinder” we get and the faster and harder we work the more out of balance our lives become. Ever feel that way? Let me ask you something. What do you plan to do with the next 18-20 years of your life? No matter who you are, your life will change dramatically. What will be the summary statement for you for the next 20 years? I want the next 20 years of my life to count for something. And the time to start is today. Right now.
Don’t waste another moment. Don’t know Christ? Come to Him today. Need a church home? Join this one today. Need a fresh start? Come and pray with the pastor. Whatever God tells you to do, don’t put it off. Start today.
Prayer. Thank you for the example you give us in the Bible of how to live our lives. None of us have arrived, none of us will ever arrive until we stand face to face i
