The Rev. Allan Sandlin, associate rector> click here for the Scripture for the day
If ever there was a Bible story that a 6th grader would love, this morning’s gospel lesson from Luke is it. And it’s a gem of a story. Our children know this story by heart. Sunday School teachers love to tell it and children everywhere love to hear it because it’s the only story in the whole Bible about Jesus’ childhood. What child wouldn’t be fascinated with a 12-year-old who manages to get himself left behind in the city? And for the grown-ups: it’s an exquisitely told story—Luke really was the master of all storytellers and this one is unforgettable.
Although…I have to wonder if this is really the way it happened. I can imagine a precocious 12-year-old pulling off a stunt like this. And I understand that biblical scholars tell us that since Mary and Joseph were traveling with a large group of people, it is entirely possible they wouldn’t have missed Jesus straight away. But can you believe that once they figured out he was missing--practically flew back to Jerusalem and spent 3 days looking for him, they would be simply “astonished”? I think it’s a bit of a stretch to imagine they wouldn’t have had stronger words than that for young Jesus. I don’t know about you, but I think Luke’s presented us with a cleaned-up version of the story. Surely his parents had more to say to him than “We were worried about you, son.”
Yet even in this cleaned-up version, Luke is helping us work out something about the identity of Jesus, the mystery of who Jesus is. Luke tells us this story about Jesus as a young boy, a very human boy who loves his parents and who, at the same time, is finding his life tethered to God.
The other gospel authors come at the mystery of Jesus in their own way. For example, in the first chapter of John’s gospel, the author shrouds the incarnation in mystery and leaves us struck by the poetry and the depth of meaning: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth.
Luke shares with John the need to wrestle with the whole question of Jesus’ fully human—fully divine identity. But he doesn’t shy away from the earthiness, the poor and humble beginnings of the One who will be Messiah. Luke doesn’t spiritualize the teachings of Jesus or the meaning of his life. He tells stories that are rooted in the earth, that connect us to the humanity of Jesus.
Only a few days ago, we listened to the story of his birth. Jesus wasn’t born in a comfortable and clean room with handmaidens bringing Mary everything she needed, caring for the newborn child. Jesus was born in a messy, smelly barn with animals and shepherds attending.
In this morning’s lesson, it’s the nitty-gritty of family life Luke invites us to witness—and if the author of John’s Gospel wants us to understand that Jesus is co-eternal with God, Luke identifies the rest of his family for us. He writes: When his parents saw him they were astonished; and his mother said to him, “Child, why have you treated us like this? Look, your father and I have been searching for you in great anxiety.”
Jesus had a real human family, flesh and blood parents and relatives. And Jesus was just beginning to search for his identity, wondering who he was and in this story, the discovery begins to unfold. Jesus is devoted to Mary and Joseph yet he finds that he has another allegiance, an even stronger allegiance.
And here is what captures my imagination most: how focused this 12-year-old boy is. The young Jesus seems lost in wonder, absorbed with listening to the teachers, sitting right in the middle of them, asking searching questions. When I picture him there in the Jerusalem temple, I am reminded of a poem by James Evans McReynolds about a child’s incredible capacity to explore,
to be caught up in things we grown ups either take for granted or have completely lost sight of…
The poem is called A Sense of Wonder:
Linda lies on the garage floor
totally absorbed
experimenting
trying to burn a leaf with the sun’s
rays shining through glass.
She is exploring reality
testing how it works
caught up in its mystery.
Her total absorption suggests something of
a child’s capacity
to be captivated by reality
to wonder at its mysterious workings
to want to get involved with its
creative processes.
Growing older, we lose that childlike
openness and wonder.
Why do we live only on the
surface of things
hurried, preoccupied,
dulled to the marvels of the world,
no longer entranced by the power of
sunrays and glass to spark a dead leaf?
Adults tend to live on the surface of things, always in a hurry, anxious about the economy, wondering, perhaps, about our place in the scheme of things. But unlike us, Jesus, a young just-beginning-to-awaken young man, is very unhurried, very non-anxious, self-aware and full of purpose.
Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house? he says. I must be in my Father’s house, Jesus says, because it wasn’t a childish whim or politics, family alliances or religious requirements that compelled him to stay in Jerusalem—Jesus stayed in Jerusalem because he is inextricably bound to God’s design for his life.
Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house? Or as other translations have it, “I must be about my Father’s business.”
Joseph and Mary, like many other faithful people in Luke’s gospel, failed to understand what Jesus was saying. They didn’t understand why he had stayed in the temple, they couldn’t imagine what he would do with his life.
And yet, Luke tells us that Mary “treasured all these things in her heart.” She kept them there, holding on to them, pondering them, knowing perhaps that this 12-year-old boy did not really belong to her. She knew that his identity, finally, was to be found not in the long branches of King David’s family tree, but in the One Jesus would come to call Abba, Father.
And our children? We can understand why Mary would have treasured these moments in her heart. We can understand because we want to hold onto our children, to mold them and shape them after our will. How we long for them to see God the way we see God and instead they are likely to go off exploring on their own, away from our sure and steady hands. But then, we can’t package God into neat, easy-to-digest nuggets of wisdom to pass on to the next generation. God cannot be contained on earth or in heaven and each of us comes to God or more likely God comes to each of us, in ways that we can’t fully understand. And mostly catches us off-guard and unprepared. Somehow, that’s the joy and surprise and wonder of it all.
I wonder if anyone else was listening to the radio early this morning? When I come in for the 8:00 service, I usually listen to Krista Tippett’s show called “Speaking of Faith”. This morning she was interviewing author Robert Coles who has written a great deal about the spirituality of children. They were discussing these very things. How children have the capacity to marvel, to explore, to be spontaneous, and inquisitive. And more, how they understand things about God that echo the prophets, the philosophers and theologians. They get it in ways that we often don’t and if we pay attention they may become our teachers.
Don’t you who are parents or teachers or grandparents, don’t you sometimes catch glimpses of holiness in children, something that reminds you that they don’t belong to us? Do you see indications once in awhile that the Divine has touched them, graced them with love and that all we are asked to do is give them all the love we can muster and then stand back and let go?
That’s what Mary and Joseph did. Were they worried beyond belief when they realized they’d lost track of their son? Most certainly. Sterner words than Luke wrote down may well have been spoken between parent and child in the temple that day. But Joseph and Mary would give Jesus room to grow, to increase in wisdom and to blossom into a man whose other names include
wonderful counselor, prince of peace, God incarnate, man divine.
As we begin another year, I invite you to take some time to be captivated by the reality of Jesus, to wonder at his mysterious workings, to get involved with his creative processes…To regain a childlike openness and wonder, to search and ask questions and listen. It may be that as we explore and ponder who Jesus is we will also come to understand, however fleetingly, however wrapped in mystery it may be, that we, too, are closely bound to the Father, by grace, pure and simple.
Then, we may consider our own identity, something about where our primary allegiances are tethered. Should we discover God searching for us, we may be reminded that allegiance to God is born out of our experience of God’s love for us. And our response to such generous, grace-filled love can only be expressed by finding ways to join in that redemptive love, to participate in loving others as God first loved us.
We may find there are things we just have to do because of who we are. Then perhaps we can begin to grasp why Jesus said I must be about my Father’s business. (1) Amen.
(1) from Alan Culpepper’s reflections in The New Interpreter’s Bible.
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