Sermon Text:

Epiphany 1/St. Luke 2:41-52

Now his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the Feast of the Passover. And when he was twelve years old, they went up according to custom. And when the feast was ended, as they were returning, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. His parents did not know it, but supposing him to be in the group they went a day's journey, but then they began to search for him among their relatives and acquaintances, and when they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem, searching for him. 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. And when his parents saw him, they were astonished. And his mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.” And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?” And they did not understand the saying that he spoke to them. And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.

Why have you treated us so? —Jesus’ mother’s question of the twelve-year-old Him in our text. Might strike you as something you’ve said, or thought in your life, huh? Why have you treated us so? It’s the statement of someone who’d expected better. Couldn’t that other person have been more thoughtful, or more generous, or more encouraging, or more loving (whatever the situation may be)? 

It isn’t hard to imagine scenarios wherein other people might make us feel this way. After all, people are people. We say that, don’t we? —people are people. And when we say it, we mean they’re flawed, like us. 

• The most devoted husband or wife isn’t that 100% of the time. Those of us who are husbands and wives know this of ourselves.

• The parent most attentive to her child’s needs nevertheless has shortcomings.

• A child particularly thoughtful when it comes to cooperating with parents isn’t always that way.

There is enough evidence of sin in our own lives. It isn’t hard to see. So, Mary expresses something familiar to all of us when she asks, Why have you treated us so? (I know, there’s an implication there that makes us uncomfortable in this particular situation. We’re going to get to that.)

The sentence in the text that comes just before: Why have you treated us so? —is this: And when his parents saw him, they were astonished. We examine this text today in this Epiphany Season so that we might see Him (so that we might see Jesus). We’re meant to see Him as the One Who rights our wrongs with God and puts us under His grace.

There is a lot we don’t see about Jesus’ early life from what’s written in the Bible. We don’t see

• the seven-year-old Who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin (Hebrews 4:15), or the four-year-old. We don’t see

• the child who never pushes his mother’s buttons so that she loses her cool (she may have done that, but not on His account).

You might have a lot of questions about Jesus’ childhood; and that’s okay - something to anticipate knowing when you’ve left this world and attained the kingdom.

But with all that we are not seeing of the child-Jesus, think about what we are seeing as we look at this text. Jesus’ parents have traveled to Jerusalem for the Passover, Jesus with them (about a confirmation-aged young man by now). With the feast ended, Mary and Joseph head back. Supposing [Jesus] to be in the group they go a day’s journey. But they begin to try to locate Him among the relatives with whom they have presumed He’s been traveling.

They can’t find Him. He isn’t there.

And it’s quite concerning for them, needless to say. It gets to a point at which it has been three days since they began to panic at not finding Him. And, of course, when they find Him, it is the case that He has been safe and sound, among the teachers at the Temple, listening to them and asking them questions. 

That reminds us of Mary’s question that we highlighted in the beginning: “Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.” Remember, we said that why have you treated us so? —might strike you as something you’ve said or thought of someone from whom you’d expected better. And when we’re asking why have you treated us so? —of ordinary people we don’t think twice about it because, after all, they’re flawed. They’re sinful, like us. Quite possibly, they have wronged us in some way. 

But it can’t be the case with Jesus. Even this twelve-year-old isn’t flawed like that, like we are. So, whereas ordinarily the answer to Mary’s question: why have you treated us so? —could very reasonably be that the person was insensitive, or uncaring, or unkind, or unloving, it can’t be in this case. Jesus can’t be any of those things - even though He’s twelve. Though Mary has felt that Jesus has been one or all of those things toward her and her husband in this moment, something else has to explain it. She’s going to be growing as she learns the answer.

The three days are interesting, aren’t they? You know, if this was something that had happened over the course of a few hours, we might think differently about it. Three days is a long time when a child is missing. It occurs to us that Jesus has been making all kinds of conscious decisions during this time. He has been deciding, when it got toward evening, to sleep somewhere apart from His family, for one thing. Apparently He has been eating. They don’t find Him in any kind of distress after the three days. Quite matter of factly, He says to His mother: “Why were you looking for me? (as if this sort of thing had happened hundreds of times before).

That brings us back to her question, doesn’t it? Why have you treated us so? When we think about it, their astonishment at seeing Him under those circumstances has at least something to do with seeing Him looking so comfortable, right? They’ve imagined Him to have been suffering in any number of ways. He needs them, doesn’t He? They’re His parents! And then, maybe it occurs to them: He could have prevented their suffering by just keeping in touch with them, and going along with them when they headed back for home. Instead, here He has been - not seeming like their suffering matters to Him in the least!

We’ve talked about us asking that question, why have you treated us so? —of other sinners like ourselves. 

What about when we’re inclined to ask it of God? Why have you treated…[me] so? Mary doesn’t say it; but she’s kind of implying: don’t you care? Haven’t you been kind of cruel to let us sweat it out for all these days, like this?! At a certain point this twelve-year-old boy kind of disappears, and God is standing there. Yes, why would God do this to them? Why would He let them struggle like this? Why would He let them go on in this agony? 

Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house? —He says. Jesus has been the dutiful son of these parents for twelve years. He has never failed to be obedient in every single thing. That’s what the Catechism calls His active obedience. We see His perfection, His divinity, also in His being submissive to the teachers in the Temple, under whose instruction He puts Himself out of obedience to the Father. We see it in what it says about Him at the end of the text, that He went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. 

On the occasion of our text, the time has come, also, for Him to emphasize His duty toward the heavenly Father and His House. It is the Father to Whom He will submit in what the Catechism calls His passive obedience, His dying to make atonement for the world’s sins. In putting an exclamation point on His identity as God’s eternal Son, and as the world’s redeemer, Jesus directs His mother to the end of all struggle and all distress. The relief to her suffering is to be found in seeing Jesus as the one Who rights her wrongs with God and puts her under His grace. He has hidden Himself from her for the moment, causing her great suffering in order to show her the ultimate relief.

When you find yourself distant from God, grieving over your failures as a parent, or as a child to your parents, as someone from whom others could have expected better, someone who could have been more thoughtful, more encouraging, more generous, more loving - when you recognize these failures as the characteristics of a sinner who falls short before God; and when you feel as though your prayers have gone unheard and uncared-about, look to the One to Whom the Spirit has directed you in this text this morning. Look to the One Who rights your wrongs with God and puts you under His grace. This One Who died in your place to make atonement for sins isn’t absent. He’s before you in His Word at this very moment. He’s before you on the Altar in the true presence of His body and blood in, with, and under bread and wine given for your forgiveness and assurance as you continue in this life - struggling sometimes, experiencing Christ’s difficult discipline. He prepares you for His eternal kingdom in which all struggle will be safely in the past.

Let us Pray:

Lord God, heavenly Father, You know our frailty; as we search for you where you are found, in Your Father’s House, in Word and Sacrament, let us find You that we might see you as you are, as the perfect Son of Mary and of God, Who stands in our place under the Law, Who dies our death, righting our wrongs, putting us under God’s grace, securing for us eternal life. Amen. 

Other Lessons for the day":

Isaiah 61:1-3

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
    because the Lord has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor;
    he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives,
    and the opening of the prison to those who are bound;

to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor,
    and the day of vengeance of our God;
    to comfort all who mourn;

to grant to those who mourn in Zion—
    to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness instead of mourning,
    the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit;
that they may be called oaks of righteousness,
    the planting of the Lord, that he may be glorified.

Romans 12:1-5

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. For as in one body we have many members, and the members do not all have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.