The First Sunday after Christmas
Luke 2:41-52
During the first decade of life, children tend to view their parents as the greatest people in the world. This is the time of life when kids argue among each other, “My dad is stronger than your dad! My mom is prettier than your mom! My parents are smarter than your parents!” During this stage, parents are almost idolized by their children, and it seems they can do no wrong.
In the second decade of life, parents go from being the smartest people in the world to the dummest, most unfair parents on the planet. “Dad, I can’t believe you bought me that brand of jeans…nobody wear those anymore! Mom, I have the earliest curfew of anyone I know.” At this stage, parents can do no right.
In the third decade of life, the younger generation is beginning to figure out that their parents weren’t so clueless after all.
As we said before, today’s theme is all about obedience. And God teaches us today that we need to have the obedience of a 12-year-old. Now that might sound odd, given what we said about that stage of life. That’s one year before the teen-age years, and when you think of teenagers, you probably don’t immediately think of the word: obedience. Of course, we are not talking about just any 12-year-old. We need to have the obedience of the 12-year-old Jesus. This morning we will learn that this is an obedience that respects the Lord, and it is an obedience that respects the Lord’s representatives.
Part I
Maybe you spent some time with family these past few days. And even if you didn’t, you probably make a phone call or two to relatives far away. At a time of the year like this, it’s only natural to reminisce about the old days. You and your family might have told stories to each other about things that you did when you were younger. While some of these stories might be humerous and a little embarrassing, probably parts of those anecdotes reflect the kind of person you are today.
God gave us 4 books about the life of Jesus, but he gave us only one story about Jesus’ childhood. So this one story that we have of Jesus’ youth is God’s way of teaching us what all of Christ’s early years were like. Christ’s early years mirror his later years that we are more familiar with. We can sum up the youthful Jesus with the word: obedience.
We see that Jesus was given good models of obedience with the earthly family that God gave the Christ-child to. Look at our first verse, “every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover.” It was a requirement that all Israelite men who lived within 15 miles of Jerusalem to travel to the city and celebrate the Passover each year. Joseph lived in Nazareth, outside of this sphere. He didn’t have to go. And it was only the men who were required by God’s law to do this…the women didn’t have to go. But look at the devotion…the obedience…that this family shows toward God’s laws, “every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover.” They didn’t want to just give the Lord the minimum…they wanted to give him their devotion year after year.
And now we get to the more well-known part of this story. After the feast was over, the family returned home. And maybe you have wondered how on earth Jesus could have been forgotten in Jerusalem while his parents left. Back in those days, families traveled much like a family of ducks swims on a lake. The mother duck goes first, followed closely by the little ducklings, and the father duck protects the rear. Mary would have been traveling with other women who had decided to come along, and they would have started out an hour or so before the men. She must have thought that Jesus was with the guys, since at 12 years old he was just beginning to become a man. Joseph would have been traveling with the guys, and he must have thought that Jesus was with mom. The fact was that Jesus wasn’t with either. He was in the place that you’d expect to find the Son of God. He was obedient to his Heavenly Father by staying and learning more about his mission. And there they find him in the temple, eagerly learning the Word of his Heavenly Father. Young Jesus wasn’t being a precocious 12-year-old telling the religious experts how things were, but he was a humble student of the Word, enthusiastically engaging in Bible study: “they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.” It just wasn’t every day that you found a 12-year-old so interested in the Scriptures and so respectful to his elders, “everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers.”
We can learn a few things about obedience here. First, let’s take the attitude of Joseph and Mary toward God. They were not content to give God just the minimum amount of their time. Both Joseph and Mary could have skipped the Passover, and no one would have thought bad of them…after all, they weren’t required to go. But by going year after year, they showed what was in their hearts. God had created in them a love for his commands. How often are we like that? Or how often are we just the opposite of that? Sometimes Christians do only as much as the law requires. We can do just enough to keep people off our backs. I give God his one hour each week, and in return I expect the Church not to ask anything else of me. I have given God X-number of years on a church committee, and now my time is up. I won’t serve anymore since “I’ve have put in MY time.”
We can be more like Mary and Joseph when we study the pattern of the 12-year-old Jesus and apply that to our lives. We are talking about obedience today…and why did the Christ have to be perfectly obedient to his Father? Because we are perfectly disobedient to him. Most of the time, the reason that we sin is not because of ignorance to God’s laws. We know right and wrong, but so often we choose disobedience. Isn’t it often that you and I look at some of God’s laws and think, “that’s too restricting of a commandment. If God really loved me, he’d want me to be free to do what makes me happy.” And so instead of doing what we know God wants us to do, we disobey him and follow our own desires instead. That whole putting God first and letting everything else fall in line sounds good in theory…but in reality, God has to take second place. Because if I don’t look out for me, who else will? And that whole love your neighbor as yourself thing is just a pie-in-the-sky idea. I mean, what Christian even really loves others more than themselves? And there is an element of truth to all that. Humanly speaking, those things are impossible to do. About the only thing that human beings can do naturally is lead a disobedient life that looks out for primarily self, and then suffer the eternal consequences in hell.
So how do we become more like Joseph and Mary, who went above and beyond the call of duty to God? It’s when we look at that 12-year-old. I can’t perfectly place God first in my life, and you can’t either, no matter how hard we want to and no matter how hard we try…but this 12-year-old Jesus could. We talk so much about Christ’s work on the cross for us, that perhaps we sometimes lose sight of the fact that he did another thing on our behalf: he was perfectly obedient for us. And he transfers that perfect obedience to us. And what do we disobedient people pay for this ticket out of hell? Not a cent. Not a work. God asks nothing of us, partly because we have nothing to give him, but a fuller explanation is his grace…that undeserved love. You need to have the obedience of a 12-year-old, and you have it, because a 33-year-old died on a cross to give it to you. So as I encourage you this morning to, “have the obedience of a 12-year-old,” keep in mind that Christ’s perfect record of obedience has in fact been given to you already.
Part II
I was probably about 5 or 6 years old when I got lost at a store. And let me tell you, being separated from my parents was sheer terror. The way that your mind works when you are that young, I didn’t know if I would ever get back home…if I would ever see them again. For all I knew I would spend the rest of my life at Sears. Now envision the fear that Joseph and Mary felt when they thought they had lost the Christ child. Here God had entrusted to them the job of taking care of the Savior of the world, and they lose him in the big city.
Picture the frantic search of Mary and Joseph – retracing their steps…visiting the places they had slept. Going to all the places they had eaten. Talking to anyone who looked familiar who might possibly know where their son was. And then imagine their emotions when they find him. First there was relief, but soon it’s replaced by irritation after all Jesus had made them go through. Even though she doesn’t fly off the handle and overreact, you can sense a little bite in Mary’s words, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.” And at first when we read Jesus’ answer, it might sound a little snotty, “Didn’t you know that I had to be in my Father’s house?” But of course, since Jesus is perfectly obedient, those words couldn’t have had a sarcastic tone to them. The best way to take them is Jesus being honestly surprised that his parents wouldn’t have known that he would be in God’s house, since he was God’s Son.
And yet, Jesus does not just say, “I’m obeying God so forget you,” but he also is obedient to God’s representatives. Verse 51 says, “Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them.” This 12-year-old recognized that God had placed human authorities over him, and he gladly obeyed them.
Many people don’t feel a pressing need to obey the representatives of God. God places authorities over us in the home: parents, grandparents, and even older brothers and sisters. And sometimes these people are hard for us to obey, especially if they are just a few years older than us, or if they seem out of step with the times. God places people over us in the church: pastors, teachers, elders. And yet, if we don’t like the way that the church is being run under these leaders, perhaps we sometimes feel that honoring them as God’s representatives is optional. The Lord places powers over us in society: bosses, policemen, judges…but doesn’t it happen that instead of obeying them as we would obey God, we look for loopholes around complying with their instructions? I guess it all boils down to the fact that all these people are imperfect sinners like we are. They don’t always have the best judgment and the right answers. And so it becomes easy not to obey these people as we would obey the Lord.
But you know, I seem to remember that God gave us a few commandments. I think there were 10 of them. And doesn’t one of them have to do with the authorities that God has placed over us? The 4th Commandment reads, “Honor your father and mother that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.” Did you notice something about that commandment? There is a promise attached to it. The Lord promises that things will go well for you when you gladly follow this commandment. But you know, many miss out on the blessing, because they ignore the command before the promise. They want the blessing, but they don’t want to observe the command. But why should people expect things to go well with them when they don’t honor God’s representatives the way he asks them to?
So today, let’s have that obedience of a 12-year-old by being respectful and dutiful to the representatives the Lord has placed over us in our families, in our church, and in our society. Let’s do it not because we HAVE TO, but because we want to show God that we are happy the he places people over us for our own good. And if we are in positions of authority over others, let’s keep in mind that we represent the love of our God to the people under our care.
I really like the answer that Jesus gives to his mother’s question. Literally the Greek says, “Did you know that I had to be doing the things of my Father?” You do the things of your Father when you are obedient to those he has placed in positions of care over you. So have the obedience of a 12-year-old.
Conclusion
Our relationship with our parents changes over the years. We talked about the first few decades of our lives already. And that parent-child relationship continues to morph. Some of you have been or are at that stage when the tables are turned, and you as children have become the caretakers of elderly parents.
But no matter what decade of life you are in, may your relationship with your Heavenly Father never change. Continue to look to him as your dear Father, who sent his only Son, not only to die in your place, but also to be completely obedient in your place. Keep on serving your God as you would serve the gentlest, fairest, full-of-love Father that you could ever have. Amen.
sdg
