This morning’s Scripture lesson offers the Bible’s only account of Jesus as a growing boy.
On the cusp of becoming a teen-ager, Jesus and his family are back in Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover, and Mary and Joseph experience every parent’s worst nightmare – they lose track of Jesus and spend a frantic couple of days trying to find him.
Listen with open hearts for the Word of the Lord to you this day as Luke concludes the second chapter of his Gospel.
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 did not know it. 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.
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. 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.” 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. His mother treasured all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and in years, and in divine and human favor. (Luke 2:41-52)
This is the second time that Luke tells of Mary treasuring up and pondering things in her heart.
The first time that Mary takes a deep breath and thinks through the amazing things that had just happened comes when the shepherds dash into Bethlehem to see the joy of the newborn Jesus.
But this time, Mary is treasuring and pondering on the heels of 72 hours of heart-pounding, lump-in-the-throat anxiety – a moment of red-faced parental embarrassment followed by much-welcome relief.
Like most mothers, Mary has discovered that children produce all kinds of moments to treasure up and ponder over, and more often than not, those memories are equal parts incredible wonder, anxious fear, heart-breaking disappointment, and profound confusion.
The highs and lows of being a parent arising from the ups and downs of her son’s life leave Mary little else to do than trying to make sense of it all. How well she succeeds at that seemingly impossible task is lost to history, but it’s likely that all her treasuring and pondering creates more confusion than clarity.
But maybe at some level, she at least appreciates that the birth of the One whom angels declare Savior and Lord, the birth of the One whom Simeon declares the sight of salvation, the birth of the One whose arrival stirs Anna to praise and thanksgiving (Luke 2:21-40) has something – maybe everything – to do with the raw, jagged edges of life in a broken and fearful world.
A couple decades out from this story of “losing” Jesus in the hustle and bustle of the holidays, Mary will have more things to ponder over as she weeps for the son when Roman soldiers nail him to a cross. This child that she delivered never had an easy road to hoe – not at the start of journey and certainly not its bloody end.
“What did and does it all mean?” her heart shrieks. “Why have you treated us like this? We have been desperately searching for you and worrying our heads off? Where in blue-blazes were you? Where in blue-blazes are you?
When you finally find something that you’ve lost, you breathe a sigh of relief and shake your head in disbelief that it was in the last place you looked.
On one hand, it’s a silly thing to say. Of course you found it in the last place you looked, because once you found it, you stopped looking! But on the other hand, your finding the lost in the last place you looked speaks a certain truth: The longer you’re forced to look for something, the more unlikely are the places you check.
Lose a credit card, and you check the nooks and crannies of your wallet or purse first, then maybe your pants or coat pockets, then the kitchen counter and couch cushions, and maybe even the bottom of the clothes washer and the lint trap of the dryer.
And then finally, when you find your lost card stuck in the middle of a stack of playing cards jammed into the back of the junk draw, you might remember how in the world it was that you accidently stuck your Mastercard in between the nine of diamonds and the queen of spades, but a deck of playing cards surely isn’t one of the most likely places to check.
So it is with Jesus in these cold, snowy after-Christmas days of un-decking the halls.
You expect to find Jesus in the obvious places – in the manger scenes that you’ve packed away for another 11 months; in the lights that you’ve unplugged and wound up in a ball; in the ribbons, boxes and bows already buried deep in a landfill somewhere.
But if you keeping looking – diligently and faithfully – in the most unlikely places that compose the ordinary-ness of your life, you will find the light of Jesus shining as bright as ever with hope, joy, peace and love.
You will find the light of the Christ sparkling like a thousand stars with healing and assurance, courage and hope.
You will find the light of the newborn King glistening like the sun through a frost-covered window with grace, upon grace, upon grace.
Who knows what Mary and Joseph were actually thinking and feeling when they found their lost boy – or for that matter, who knows how they actually managed to lose the Savior of the world in the first place? I know from poor parental experience that these things happen.
But as another writes, this story – in its own quirky way – frames the very human, very earthy, very everyday nature of the the arrival of salvation in our lives. This utterly homely little story about parental error, deep panic, and great relief plays out on a very ordinary stage – the same very ordinary stage on which the drama of our lives unfolds.
And this utterly homely little story comes at a perfect time – when our lives are returning to some semblance of ordinary normalcy and our stages are being cleared of all their Christmas finery.
As all the tinsel and glitter are coming down and we’re finally catching our breath after all our hyperventilating to make the seasonal celebrations so “perfectly special” and “wonderfully magical,” we need to come back down to earth and watch God’s drama of salvation unfold quietly and steadily in the comings and goings of our lives.
We come back down to earth, because that is what God’s Son did: He came down to earth to redeem that same earth and the post-holiday lives we struggle and muddle through on that earth.
He came down to earth to be part of our utterly homely moments of error, panic, anxiety, illness, grief and loss that play themselves out on the very ordinary stages of our lives – perhaps the last places you’d ever think of looking for Jesus.
So don’t be surprised when you find Emmanuel – God with you, God with us – smack-dab in the middle of your every day.
Don’t be surprised when you find the King of Kings smack-dab in the middle of your weariness and fatigue, your worry and fear, your failure and disappointment, your grief and pain.
Don’t be surprised when you find a shoulder to cry on when that special someone you’ve had a crush on forever breaks it off with you or when that spouse you’ve loved forever does something that stretches the ties that bind to the breaking point.
Don’t be surprised when you feel the hand of Jesus wiping away your tears when your beloved pet breathes its last or as they lower your loved one’s remains into a grave in the bleak of winter.
Don’t be surprised when you feel the arms of Jesus holding you close as you slowly slide into the claustrophobic confines of the MRI machine for the test you dread and nervously spend the next few nights tossing and turning as you wait for the results that very well might not be good.
Don’t be surprised when your homesick college freshman texts you with word that dorm life is really cool.
Don’t be surprised when you meet that friend with whom you’re on the outs and your first words to each other are “I’m sorry.”
Don’t be surprised when you are suddenly able to stare down with courage, hope, strength and assurance whatever it is scares you to death.
“Why were you looking for me?” Jesus asks as a pre-teen boy. “Fear not,” Jesus will say as a full-grown man. “And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
As you treasure and ponder these things in your heart, join the heavenly host of angels in lifting up a song of praise: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill to all.
Amen, and amen.
Pastor Grant M. VanderVelden first preached this sermon on Sunday, January 18, 2018. It is being re-posted, because bitter cold and blowing snow forced cancelation of worship on Sunday, January 14, 2024. Scholarship, commentary, and reflection by Scott Hoezee and L.T. Johnson inform the message. Previous sermons from Advent and Christmas 2023 are available at FirstPresWaukon.com/sermons.