Promoted to the Head of the Class

One of Ann’s biggest pet peeves is movie directors who use flashbacks. She greatly prefers a plot that moves along chronologically without gaps or jumping around in the story.

Today’s text is an example of that jumping around. After moment by moment details of the pregnancy and first week of Jesus’ life, v.40 covers a 12 year jump and v.52 tells of a 18 year fast forward. But in the middle of these fast scans, today’s text details a 3-day event that gives a glimpse into the tensions of a 30-year process.

To set your expectations, this week I listened to one preacher on this section and he did the whole message in less than 6 minutes. I listened to another who took 3 weeks with a total of 2.5 hours of preaching. Today you will get somewhere between those two.

Jesus as a Child (v.40)

What does sinless look like in full humanity?

1. Did he ever cut himself in the carpenter shop?

2. Did he ever get an upset stomach?

3. Did he fall and skin his knee?

4. When playing baseball would he ever strike out? When playing football would he ever drop a pass? When playing volleyball would he ever hit it into the net?

5. Where there foods that he didn’t care for?

6. Was he held as a model for siblings and others in school? (Why can’t you be more like Jesus?)

Do any of you remember this imagined scene from The Passion of the Christ? - https://youtu.be/mzzVwci8qJY

Transition: From these questions and speculations, Luke is the only Gospel writer to give us a glimpse into an actual event and he only gives us one event from Jesus pre-teen years.

Jesus as the Boy (vv.41-45)

Annual Pilgrimage was obedience to law and culture (vv.41-42, Dt 16:6, 1 Sam 2:19)

Deuteronomy 16:6 ESV:2016

6 but at the place that the Lord your God will choose, to make his name dwell in it, there you shall offer the Passover sacrifice, in the evening at sunset, at the time you came out of Egypt.

1 Samuel 2:19 ESV:2016

19 And his mother used to make for him a little robe and take it to him each year when she went up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice.

1. Indicates the devotion of Mary & Joseph that Mary went as well.

a. Only the males were required to go to Passover.

b. At age 12, in preparation for becoming responsible for himself, boys may have been “invited to the adult table”.

2. Since both went, it may have been a whole family trip.

Strengths and weaknesses of Caravan travel (vv.43-45)

1. Children front, then women, then men so that men would not walk too fast.

2. As the final year before adulthood, it would be reasonable for kids to think he was with the men and for men to think he was with the kids.

3. Mary and Joseph had never experienced a single moment when Jesus was not where they expected him to be, doing what they expected him to do.

4. In case you are interested, v.43 contains a discrepancy in the ancient texts. Toward the end of the verse if you have a KJV or NKJV is reads “Joseph and His mother”. If you have a more modern translation it reads “His parents”. This is an example where later copies attempted to clarify, but neither should be considered an “error”. While both statements are true, the older statement is more likely what Luke actually wrote. Not v.48 Mary referred to Joseph as his father, so why should be have a problem with that title?

Transition: This passage is NOT meant to portray Jesus as disobedient nor His parents as irresponsible. Up to this point every detail is “matter of fact” until we consider Jesus’ unique abilities.

Jesus as the Son (vv.46-51)

As a Boy preparing for adulthood, he was astutely inquisitive (vv.46-48a)

1. Different translations provide nuance into the 3-day search. I like the NLT which gives a strong impression that he had been in the temple the whole time.

Luke 2:46 NLT:2013

46 Three days later they finally discovered him in the Temple, sitting among the religious teachers, listening to them and asking questions.

2. The 3 days is considered in every commentary written in the last 100 years to be 3 days since they last saw him: 1 day travel, 1 day return, 1 day searching.

3. “His posture is that of disciple rather than teacher at this point. The question-and-answer format was actually the teaching method by which rabbis operated. Still, however, the maturity and knowledge that were evident behind everything he said “amazed” them. He already showed his dexterity in matters of Torah, and this will become evident throughout the rest of Luke’s Gospel.”[i]

4. Remember, this scene is happening following Passover, during the Feast of Unleavened bread. As Jesus is asking questions and his questions are answered with questions, in the background is all the annual blood sacrifice that remembers the lamb that was sacrificed so that the death angel would pass over a house and permit the people to live. As will become abundantly clear in next week’s sermon, Jesus knew that He was to be the ultimate sacrificial lamb.

The Friction of a Stepchild (v.48b-49)

1. Parents frequently forget that their children are “on loan”

2. In these 2 verses (48-49) Luke capsulizes the reality that Jesus was fully human (with earthly parents) and fully divine (with the Heavenly Father).

Jesus was aware of His Divinity (v.49)

1. Jesus did not BECOME God at His baptism or any other time.

2. The mind of God in the body of a boy.

3. Things are about to change (not in who Jesus was, but in how he was perceived)

a. In the previous section He is welcomed by Simeon and Anna.

b. In the section before that He is welcomed by Angels and Shepherds.

c. In this section He is impressive to the teachers. This is the last time Jesus will every use this term for the religious leaders. They will use it for him, but he won’t us it for them.

In a movie that I won’t name here because it is not appropriate for all ages who are listening, there is a scene where the lead character prays to “sweet little baby Jesus.” It quickly becomes evident that he likes the image of an innocent baby in a cradle (or maybe a curious 12 year old in this scene) but he doesn’t want to submit to the Jesus who proclaims He is God in human flesh come to be the Lord and Savior of humanity.

d. The next time Luke describe an interaction between Jesus and the religious leaders will be in chapter 4 where we read.

Luke 4:28–29 ESV:2016

28 When they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. 29 And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him down the cliff.

e. V.15 of that chapter shows that Jesus’ public ministry is a continuation of v.52, with all the people praising him. But the religious leaders will view things very differently.

As a Son he was respectful and obedient (v.51)

1. Luke seem to go out of his way to clarify the obedience of Jesus, in light of his dual fathers.

2. Later (at the Cana wedding) Jesus will question who his family is, but here (regardless of biology) he is pictured as submissive.

Last week during Sunday School I noticed a quote on the screen, “Delayed obedience is disobedience”. It is also true that “partial obedience is disobedience.”

Transition: Verse 52 offers a summary of Jesus’ next 18 years which jettisons us into our world.

Jesus, an Example for Us (v.52)

As human he identifies with our process

1. As God in flesh, Jesus always had the mind of God, but as He matured He began to have more of the thoughts of God. I believe it is these thoughts from God that are coming out in the discussion with the teachers.

I am not what I was and by God’s grace I will not be what I am.

2. Likewise as we are conformed to the image of Christ, our thoughts, motivations and actions ought to look more and more godly.

Notice the slight difference between v.40 & v.52

1. Both include physical growth

2. Both include increasing wisdom

3. v.40 mentions Godly favor, v.52 adds favor with men.

Transition: One difference between teaching and preaching is in application. I don’t want our time this morning to go by without 2 examples of application.

Conclusion:

1. The process of maturing is God-arranged and healthy.

a. Paul makes reference that when he was a child he did childish things.

b. There are lots of things that the kids around here do that are cute and totally age-appropriate, but if teens or adults did the same thing it would be considered outrageous.

I enjoyed viewing many back-to-school pictures on Thursday. One parent wrote of a 1st-grader, “This year is the first year there hasn’t been tears at our house!”

Now, 2 weeks ago when some of you dropped children off for their first day of college, there were tears again. But those tears were for a different reason.

c. In 1 Jn 2 we find one set of instructions for fathers, another set for young men, and yet another for children.

d. It is good for us to be aware of our spiritual maturity and take notice of we are lacking movement.

2. Your progress does not erase the need for submission.

a. Even as Jesus is impressing the experts, He never gets too big for his britches.

I have a friend who consults with leaders. This week he tweeted a list of leadership ideas that has become obsolete; including the idea of “waiting periods”

Graduates tend to think they are ready for more than they are capable. And bosses are frequently too slow to pass on responsibility.

I proposed to Ron that “waiting periods” ought to be repaced with “training opportunities” or “proving periods.

b. One of the things I appreciate most about working with our elders is the humility and submission they show toward each other.

c. They each are accomplished and have earned the right to be heard, but they respect each other and demonstrate Christlike submission.

d. My prayer is that each of our lives would be marked by that same maturity and submission.

The Lord’s Supper

One of the reasons I modified submission with “Christlike” is because submission marked Jesus’ life from this earliest recorded incident all the way until his prayer in the Garden when He continued to submit to the Father’s will even as it meant death on a cruel cross.

Before we leave this morning, we want to take an opportunity to remember that submission and celebrate what it accomplished for each of us.

[i] Grant R. Osborne, Luke: Verse by Verse, ed. Jeffrey Reimer, Elliot Ritzema, and Danielle Thevenaz, Awa Sarah, Osborne New Testament Commentaries (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2018), 82.