The Passage<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom.\u00a0 And the favor of God was upon him.\u00a0 Now his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the Feast of the Passover.\u00a0 And when he was twelve years old, they went up according to custom.\u00a0 And when the feast was ended, as they were returning, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem.\u00a0 His parents did not know it, but supposing him to be in the group they went a day\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.\u00a0 And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd when his parents saw him, they were astonished.\u00a0 And his mother said to him, \u2018Son, why have you treated us so?\u00a0 Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.\u2019\u00a0 And he said to them, \u2018Why were you looking for me?\u00a0 Did you not know that I must be in my Father\u2019s house?\u2019\u00a0 And they did not understand the saying that he spoke to them.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them.\u00a0 And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart.\u00a0 And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 [English Standard Version]<\/p>\n
\u201cBlessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him in love.\u201c\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0[Ephesians 1.3-4]<\/p>\n
\u00a0In the Name of Christ + Jesus our Lord<\/em><\/p>\n The Incarnation of the Father\u2019s Son, with deep gratitude, is an overwhelming reality.\u00a0 The impact of its Twelve Days has been spreading and will come to a significant conclusion on Thursday of this week with the observance of our Lord\u2019s Epiphany.\u00a0 After four weeks of pushing through the Advent season wrestling with the world\u2019s understandings and practices of Christmas (the weeks in which the Lord was coming toward us!), we have now hurtled through most of the Twelve Days where the reality of the Son\u2019s Incarnation is splashing all over our lives.<\/p>\n Moving from the world\u2019s Christmas to the Church\u2019s Christ Mass is a highly significant turn.\u00a0 It reveals that the Lord\u2019s people take Christ Mass seriously because it moves the natural attention from ourselves to the LORD God who is plunging into our lives and rescuing us from the world\u2019s life!<\/p>\n These Twelve Days emerged in the Church\u2019s history hundreds of years ago by fits and starts; they began to achieve definition in the early thousands as the traditions from Italy and France came together, traditions that have continued to run on into the two thousands.\u00a0 The Days started on 25 December because that date was nine months after 25 March, the date believed to be the day when our Lord was crucified.\u00a0 The Days conclude on Thursday of this week (06 January) when the Church celebrates the Lord\u2019s Epiphany.\u00a0 In this span of Twelve Days we are literally churning through the first thirty years of Jesus\u2019 Life!<\/p>\n During these Twelve Days, we have been keenly aware of our Lord\u2019s saving activity, even as we have been reminded of the self-absorption and meanness of this world\u2019s life, the life from which we are being rescued.\u00a0 Such awareness hit us fully as we moved from the Son\u2019s Birth a week ago yesterday to the following day (26 December) when we remembered Stephen, the first person to be put to death for pointing to the world\u2019s redemption through the Son\u2019s dying and rising. \u00a0On the next day (27 December) we remembered John, the writer of the fourth Gospel, the only disciple to die of natural causes.<\/p>\n This awareness continued the following day (28 December) when we remembered the Holy Innocents, the boys in Bethlehem two years or younger who were put to death because the king believed they were a threat to him.\u00a0 The awareness was deepened yesterday (01 January) when the Church observed the Circumcision and Name of Jesus.<\/p>\n Such awareness remains on high level today when we see our Lord taking part in the Passover observance at the age of twelve and discussing significant matters with the Jewish teachers in the temple.\u00a0 This high level will extend to this coming Thursday (06 January) when we remember the visit of the wise men to the infant Jesus in Bethlehem.<\/p>\n Today\u2019s Gospel deepens the impact of the Son\u2019s Incarnation as he travels with his parents to the annual observance of the Passover in Jerusalem, but is separated from them because he gets caught up in discussions with the teachers in the temple.\u00a0 The passage opens with Luke\u2019s comments that as Jesus grew, he became strong, filled with the wisdom and favor of the LORD God.<\/p>\n In verses 41-42 Luke describes the trip to Jerusalem, noting that it was the custom of Jesus\u2019 parents to do this every year and that Jesus was twelve years old. \u00a0\u00a0In verses 43-45 Luke points out that Jesus and his parents were separated as the Passover observance concluded (he stayed behind in Jerusalem as they began the trip home).\u00a0 However, they did not realize the separation until they had traveled that first day.\u00a0 Initially they looked for him among their relatives and acquaintances.\u00a0 But when they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem and continued their search.<\/p>\n In verses 45-50 we get to the center of the story.\u00a0 After searching three days, Mary and Joseph find Jesus in the temple; he\u2019s sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.\u00a0 Luke reports that all who hear Jesus are amazed at his understanding and his answers.<\/p>\n His parents are astonished when they see him.\u00a0 Mary wants to know why Jesus did not tell them what he was going to do after the Passover.\u00a0 She points out that she and Joseph had been in great turmoil looking for him.\u00a0 Jesus responds by wondering why they were looking for him, did they not know that he had to be in his Father\u2019s house?\u00a0 Luke comments that they did not understand what he just said to them.\u00a0 But he returns to Nazareth with them and is obedient to them; during this time Mary is pondering all these matters in her heart.\u00a0 The passage closes with Luke stating that Jesus increased in wisdom, in height and in favor with God and man.<\/p>\n It is striking that this passage is the only biblical story between Jesus\u2019 Birth and Baptism.\u00a0 At his Birth, it was the angels and Simeon who proclaimed who Jesus is.\u00a0 Here, in Luke 2, Jesus speaks for the first time, describing his vital relationship with the Father.\u00a0 It is important to notice that the center of this passage is not Jesus\u2019 intelligence at a young age, but his reference to the LORD God as his Father.\u00a0 Following his Baptism, Jesus, in the course of his ministry, will come to Jerusalem and its temple, carrying threats and prophetic witnesses about the city and its presumed holiness.<\/p>\n In this passage, however, Jesus and his parents come obediently and faithfully fulfilling the duties of the Law.\u00a0 The astonishment that greets Jesus\u2019 understanding and his answers in the temple anticipate the amazement that will greet Jesus\u2019 teaching when he begins his ministry and amazes the scribes with his answers.\u00a0 This amazement is shared by Mary and Joseph, but then we are moved to their lack of understanding of what Jesus has said to them about his Father.<\/p>\n His parents are carrying us, in a way, from his Birth to his Baptism, but they do not yet fully grasp whose Son he really is.\u00a0 Jesus\u2019 presence in the temple and his listening to the teachers indicates where his calling lies.\u00a0 While he is tied naturally to his family in this world, he is truly tied to his relationship with the Father, a relationship that has brought him from eternity to the world.<\/p>\n Notice, too, that the Jesus who goes to Jerusalem with his parents to keep the observance of \u00a0the Passover is also the same Jesus who keeps the command of honoring his mother and father.\u00a0 Mary keeps with concern these events in her heart.\u00a0 This mulling over is preparing her for the future understanding that will emerge as the Son who is born from her is crucified and resurrected.<\/p>\n This passage from Luke 2 is not that complicated, but attempting to see that the relationship between Jesus and his Father is more vital than his relationship with Mary and Joseph is a complicated attempt.\u00a0 When daughters and sons are born into this world, they are automatically given the instinct and drive of focusing on one\u2019s self. \u00a0\u00a0This instinct and drive did not apply to Jesus, however, because he is from the Father.\u00a0 His Birth makes it possible for him to enter the self-centered life of the world and to rescue the people who are trapped and sinking because of those instincts and drives.\u00a0 As we mature in the world\u2019s life, however, this focus on self creates difficulties and problems with others because then you have two selves (or more!) colliding with one another.\u00a0 This creates tensions and misunderstandings, a reality that is reflected in Jesus\u2019 back and forth with his parents, a reality that gets reflected in our lives on a daily basis.<\/p>\n Such back and forth, moreover, is powerfully instructive for the Lord\u2019s people today.\u00a0 With Jesus\u2019 Incarnation making its impact on us during these Twelve Days, we recognize how his rescue of us from the world\u2019s life is always at work.\u00a0 We know that Jesus\u2019 relationship with his Father was perfect, what is astounding is that we are rescued and drawn into that same relationship!<\/p>\n We are reminded that this drawing occurs when we are baptized; in those brief moments, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit actually pull us into their Life!\u00a0 The great news is that as we make our way through the world\u2019s life, this relationship with the LORD God becomes the dominant one!\u00a0 This relationship pours in on us from the Lord\u2019s holy places of the Scriptures and Sacraments, grounding us in his saving and sustaining activity.\u00a0 That activity is and has been very evident in these Twelve Days.\u00a0 It is sharpening our understanding as the LORD God moves us from focusing on ourselves to focusing on him.<\/p>\n During these same twelve days, the life around and within us is being reviewed, ranging from the attempts to get under the virus and its variants to the parish communities who are attempting to reset their ministries to financial people trying to direct the country\u2019s economy to the parishes calling for a long and deep repentance to the threats posed by other countries in the world to parishes encouraging their members and friends to be drawn into the Lord\u2019s holy places.<\/p>\n Looking deeply into such reviews, we see how trapped the world is in its own life, how it asserts its ability to deal with its realities and then finds itself choking and stumbling as those realities grind them down.\u00a0 During these Twelve Days, however, the Lord\u2019s people are mindful of the deep thanks we offer him because he has rescued our lives from themselves.\u00a0 His saving and creating activity is stupendous, and his ways, for our sake and the sake of the world\u2019s people, runs on and on and on!<\/p>\n Now may the peace of the Lord God, which is beyond all understanding, keep our hearts<\/p>\n and minds through Christ + Jesus our Lord.<\/p>\n —<\/p>\n Pr. Carl A. Voges, STS, \u00a0Columbia, SC; carl.voges4@icloud.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Christ Mass Two (Revised Common Lectionary) | 01.02.22 | Luke 2.40-52 | by Carl A. 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