Looking for Jesus
Sermon Text || Year C: Holy Family
Looking for Jesus
When I was around nine or ten years old, my family attended a cabin building workshop in North Carolina. My Papa had plans to build his dream cabin on his property. While we were there, we were taking an elevator to a different floor. When the doors opened, I stepped off.
It was the wrong floor.
I wasn’t lost but for just a few minutes, but I can imagine the panic my family must have felt.
Now imagine they all assumed I was with a different part of the group and left me for three days. That’s hard to believe, right? But that’s exactly what happened with Jesus when he was attending his twelfth Passover in Jerusalem.
When Jesus was Lost
Now every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the festival of the Passover. And when he was twelve years old, they went up as usual for the festival. When the festival was ended and they started to return, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but his parents were unaware of this. Assuming that he was in the group of travelers, they went a day’s journey. Then they started to look for him among their relatives and friends. When they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem to search for him. Luke 2:41–45
The first thing this passage makes me think of is my relationship with my own son and daughter. Should I expect them to be more obedient than Jesus?
Now that that’s over, let’s move on.
It’s important to note that Jesus is twelve years old here. Craig Keener discussed the significance of this in his commentary on the background of the New Testament:
“Twelve years old” would have been one year before Jesus officially became an adult Israelite and accepted responsibility for fulfilling the law. (Although the official Jewish bar mitzvah ceremony may not have existed in Jesus’ day, its analogy to Roman coming-of-age rituals supports other evidence for an official entrance to adulthood around this age.)1
Why does this detail matter? Let’s read on:
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. Luke 2:46–47
So Jesus, as one would expect, was beyond his years and already had a deep understanding of the Law and the debates and discussions of the day. The questions he asked may have been ways to give answers, as Jesus often did in his teaching as an adult. Answering a question with a question was a way to get to the heart of a subject.
I find it interesting that Mary and Joseph searched for Jesus for three days. Instead of being in Sheol for three days, he was in his Father’s house for three days. Is this connection intentional?
After finding Jesus, Mary said to him,
When his parents saw him they were astonished, and his mother said to him, “Child, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously looking for you.” Luke 2:48
I like that she says “your father and I.” While Jesus answers with a comment about his “Father’s house,” I think it’s important to remember Joseph’s role in raising and caring for Jesus. This validates all of the fathers out there who are dads to children that aren’t biologically theirs.
Now, let’s see Jesus’s response and the outcome to the story:
He said to them, “Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand what he said to them. Then he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was obedient to them, and his mother treasured all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and in years and in divine and human favor. Luke 2:49–52
Jesus went home with them and was obedient for the rest of his time in their house, and Mary treasured all of these things in her heart.
When (and where) Jesus is Found
Jesus was found in the temple, his Father’s house. And he was found after three days.
Let’s think on this for a bit.
In John’s gospel, Jesus was in the temple, and after flipping the tables of the merchants, he defended his actions by saying, “Destroy this temple, and I will build it again in three days.”
When we read the gospel of Luke and come to the death of Jesus, we might begin anxiously looking for him, and when and where do we find him three days later? In the Father’s house, of course.
Or maybe as the Father’s house.
Do we treasure this in our hearts? Do we make room for him in our hearts?
We don’t have to travel to anxiously look for Jesus in a crowded, pilgrim-filled city because Jesus is right here with us.
Jesus answered him, “Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. John 14:23.
We are the house of God. We live in Jesus, and he lives in us. The Christ is present in each of us, and if we have eyes to see and ears to hear, we can look for (and find) this Presence in others.
How do we enter this house with Jesus? How do we invite him to live within us?
“So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. Luke 11:9
The door to the Father’s house is ready to be knocked upon. Stop anxiously searching and ask, seek, and knock. The results are guaranteed.
Lectionary Reading: December 29, 2024 - First Sunday After Christmas: Holy Family
Old Testament: 1 Samuel 2:18-20, 26
Psalm: Psalm 148
New Testament: Colossians 3:12-17
Gospel: Luke 2:41-52
Weekly Church Bulletin:
I’m going to start sharing these as a separate post on Thursdays to spread out how much you have to read.
Keener, Craig S. The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993. Print.