Christmas II

Year A
Sunday 26 December 2010
St. John’s Church in the Village
New York City
The Rev’d Lloyd Prator

There are not usually two Sundays during the twelve days of Christmas, so this reading, about the finding of Jesus in the temple is a passage from Luke’s gospel which we do not often hear. But it is really essential to the Jesus story, because it probably shows us the first time that Jesus really knew who he was.

Some background: Jewish tradition decreed that every male, twelve years of age and over, who lived within 15 miles of Jerusalem, had to attend the Passover at the temple there in the holy city. This important step in his maturation meant that from now on, any Jewish boy would be not only son of his parents, but also the son of the law. By his life and by his faith and practice, he would show that it was the law of God which shaped and formed him and which claimed his allegiance.

This trip to Jerusalem must have been quite a moment in time. For a parallel, for those of you who did not grow up in New York, it would be like the first time you went to New York City. Walking around stepping off curbs because your eyes were on the skyscrapers, seeing sights you had never before beheld.

After the temple worship was over, the family went home. Now the idea that they could somehow miss their first born child and leave him behind sounds like a particularly bad update of the Home Alone series of movies, where the little boy gets left behind in various places. But that is not what was going on here. It was customary, we learn from scholars, for such caravans of families to go in two parts. The women and children went first, because they moved more slowly, and then the men brought up the rear. They would come out about even by the time they got back to Nazareth. At least that was the plan. .

But apparently Mary thought the boy was with his foster father, and Joseph figured he was with the women.

So, back they went to Jerusalem to look for him. Now, it is easy to interpret this story as Jesus behaving like a precocious smart-ass giving the temple clergy a rough time. Why can’t I have bacon for breakfast? What is wrong with lobster? Suppose I have to work on Saturday. No, that was not the situation at all. At the time right after the Passover celebration, the Jewish religious leaders used to lurk about in the temple precincts taking all manner of question from anyone who cared to ask anything at all. Jesus was just being an avid student, not a smart kid at all.

Anyhow, they found him and you can see some of the parental irritation creeping into the gospel. Didn’t you know we would worry? You give us such a hard time? Your Father and I were so worried. Words which have been on the lips of every parent ever since.

And Jesus takes the words about his father, and gently applies them not to Joseph, but to his father in heaven: God. The evangelist is probably trying to tell us, that when Jesus began to mature, he began to understand himself, his own true identity, his situation of being the son of God, the complete revelation of God to us. Such self awareness probably came slowly, gradually, with, perhaps many events like the one told today where Jesus slowly becomes aware that something is different about him.

And the thing that is different is that he is the son of God. And, at the same time, a human being. From the earliest days of Christian faith, the dual nature of Jesus has been stressed. He was God, because the human situation demanded a repair job that only God could do. Men and women had their chance at it and had failed time and time again. Only God could fix the problem. And, then, he had to be human because it is the human situation which needs to be fixed. He was doing something for us, so there had to be a pathway between him and us for us to receive the benefits.

Bod God and Man. That is what we call the Chalcedonian definition of who Jesus is.

But there is more here than just theology. There is also commentary on the human scene.

First, growing up involves some brilliant moments of insight. Anyone who has ever raised a child knows that the teen years, when the boy is becoming a man, or the girl a woman, are some of the tenderest, most fragile times in human life. It is as if there is a neon border around the ages of twelve through seventeen to remind parents that these are the times of self discovery. A boy discovers something of how it is to be a man. The first shaping of puberty takes place. The glimmer of vocation begins to shine in the heart. These are times of brilliant transition—and amazing challenge for a parent.

Second, note please that armed with this new sense of who he is, Jesus does not spurn his parents and take off on his own. He, we are told, went home with them and obeyed them.

That is a good lesson for all of us, not just for the son of God. The fact that Jesus was God’s son made him the perfect son of his earthly parents. He did not look down proudly upon the humble Mary and the strong, hardworking Joseph.

A true Christian, or a true man or woman of any faith, I suspect, does not allow his faith to let him look down upon the ordinary things and ordinary people of the world. The true follower of God does not despise those things and people which bind him to the earth. Being a true follower of God means discharging one’s earthly obligations with devotion and care. It means paying your taxes, thinking and voting carefully, taking the time to be gentle with those around you, even the dull and the insipid. The person whose heart is in heaven does not allow his mind to leave earth.

Like Jesus, we have obligations in both realms. That is the gospel, and that is the heart of the faith of Christmas.