The humility of God at age 12

Sermon for First Sunday after the Epiphany

Romans 12:1-5  +  Luke 2:41-52

Today’s Gospel of the Boy Jesus in the Temple is a foolish waste of time, in the eyes of the world. Christmas was OK; it’s a cute enough story, allows for some celebration. Epiphany itself was fine, with the visit of the wise men following the mysterious star, bringing their exotic gifts. And then, when Jesus is older, the world might find something interesting in His miracles or in His teaching. But what’s the point of dwelling on the behavior of a 12-yr-old boy? How can that possibly affect us here and now?

We Christians just shake our heads at the world’s own foolishness. They don’t understand that we worship that 12-yr-old boy. Literally. We fall down before Him, we kneel before Him, we call Him our God. And for that reason, we long to hear about Him. Everything about Him. (Even if our wretched sinful nature finds it boring or not worth paying attention to.) Yes, He was just a boy, and to Mary and Joseph’s eyes, He never looked like more than a boy, the whole time He was growing up. But sometimes, the divinity of that boy shone through the outward appearance, as it did at the wondrous visit of the wise men, as it did at His Baptism which we considered on Monday evening, as it does again in today’s Gospel. We see tiny rays of His divinity shining through the ordinary appearance.

That’s the first thing I want you to keep your eyes open for as we go through this story. Watch for the signs of Jesus’ divinity shining through, revealing this 12-yr-old boy as God. And second, knowing who He is, watch also for the marks of humility displayed by the Boy who was God.

Let’s walk through the story again. We don’t know exactly what age Jesus was when the holy family moved from Egypt up to Nazareth in Galilee. He was likely no older than two. So for about the past ten years, Mary and Joseph, at least, had been journeying back down to Jerusalem every year for the Passover. About a 65-mile trip each way, as the crow flies. About here to Deming. (On foot, of course.) This time, if not before, Jesus went with them. They traveled as a company of relatives and neighbors from Nazareth. They celebrated the Passover in Jerusalem, and then Mary and Joseph started back, but Jesus wasn’t with them. That’s hard to imagine, but we’re told they thought that Jesus was with some other relatives in their traveling party. After traveling all day, they finally decided to check, and didn’t find Him. So they likely spent the night worrying, then spent the next day traveling back, and then, finally, on the next day, found Jesus sitting in the Temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them and asking them questions, astonishing everyone there with His questions and with His answers.

When they saw Him, they were amazed; and His mother said to Him, “Son, why have You done this to us? Look, Your father and I have sought You anxiously.” And He said to them, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” But they did not understand the statement which He spoke to them. Then He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them, but His mother kept all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.

Did you notice the signs of Jesus’ divinity shining through? We see it, first, in His special zeal to be in His Father’s house, discussing His Father’s Word—zeal that goes beyond even what the most pious believer would have done. Second, we see it in His superior knowledge and understanding of His Father’s Word, even as a boy, which astonished everyone who heard Him. And third, we see it in His own words as reveals that He’s there on “His Father’s business,” which Mary and Joseph didn’t understand at the time, because Joseph had not sent Jesus on any business in the Temple. Somehow, they had apparently almost forgotten how Jesus had been conceived in the virgin’s womb.

Last year (that is, just a few weeks ago) during one of our Wednesday evening services, we heard the words of Isaiah 11—a prophecy of the coming Christ, who would be true God and true Man: There shall come forth a Rod from the stem of Jesse, And a Branch shall grow out of his roots. The Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon Him, The Spirit of wisdom and understanding, The Spirit of counsel and might, The Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD. His delight is in the fear of the LORD.

We spoke of the sevenfold gifts of the Spirit: Wisdom and understanding, counsel and might, knowledge, piety, and the fear of the Lord. All those gifts would be outstanding in the Christ. And already at the age of 12, we begin to see them all resting on Jesus. Piety and the fear of the Lord kept Him behind in Jerusalem to spend extra time in His Father’s house, doing His Father’s business. Might was the courage and bravery to sit there in the midst of the teachers, to engage with the rabbis of Jerusalem at the age of 12, without parents present; courage and bravery to stay behind in Jerusalem to do what His Father wanted Him to do. Knowledge, wisdom, understanding, and counsel all came together as He asked and answered the questions of the rabbis, so that all who heard Him were astonished at His understanding and answers. Counsel was also shown in giving the perfect reply to His parents when they found Him: Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business? In all these things, you can see the light of Jesus’ divinity shining through His humble appearance.

Speaking of “humble,” it wasn’t only Jesus’ appearance that was humble. It was also His behavior, and that’s what I’d like you to consider next. And as we view this revelation of His divinity, we’re struck by another amazing revelation: the divine Son of God has humbled Himself and made Himself obedient, both to His Father in heaven and to His earthly parents.

One of the articles of faith we discuss in catechism class is Jesus’ state of humiliation: from His conception in the virgin’s womb through His burial and His time spent in the grave. He lowered (“humbled”) Himself down to the level of mortal man: (1) By setting aside the full use of His divine attributes to experience the limitations of mortal man; (2) By placing Himself under God’s holy Law to obey it perfectly (active obedience); and (3) By allowing Himself to be rejected, condemned and punished (passive obedience). Today’s Gospel is a good place to begin thinking again about Jesus’ state of humiliation.

As a little baby, Jesus didn’t choose where or how He would be born, or anything else. He was God, even as a baby. But at that age, nothing in His behavior would reveal it. The question that still had to be answered was, What would this Child’s behavior be like? What would that reveal about His divinity? What would it reveal about God?

As we learn that this child who grew up with Mary and Joseph in their home, in most ways like any 12-yr-old boy, is actually the Creator of the universe, we’re astonished at how humble He was. He humbled Himself, first, before His heavenly Father, and then, before the earthly parents whom His heavenly Father had given Him.

Jesus didn’t linger behind in Jerusalem to have fun, or to explore the big city, or to get away from His parents. He stayed behind to serve His Father, to do His Father’s business, not as a rabbi Himself yet, not as a Teacher or Preacher. But as a humble boy. But even a 12-yr-old boy can have an impact, if not on the world, then on the Church where he belongs. To see a young man so devoted to God, so eager to hear and discuss His Word, to hear Him talking excitedly, not about sports or TV shows or movies, but about God and Holy Scripture, wholly dedicated to God—that’s powerful. And it’s humble.

And then, to see how God—how Jesus—behaved with His parents…He was their Creator, and yet He submitted to them, both before and after the incident in Jerusalem. How else could they have so easily left Him on His own as they started back for Nazareth, just assuming He would be fine, because He never gave them a single problem? And after they found Him, it says again that He was subject to them. Even though He knew more than they did. Even though He was perfect and they were not. He humbled Himself before them.

When you consider the humility of God at age 12, when you look at that perfect example of keeping the 3^rd and the 4^th commandments, you must, at first, see how far short you have fallen, even as a child. When you consider how willingly and how respectfully He submitted to His teachers there in the Temple and to His earthly parents, you must recall your own behavior and your own attitudes and see how wretched you were or have been in comparison.

But then you realize, that’s why we needed Jesus to humble Himself, because our lack of humility before God and man condemned us. But here was Jesus, even as a child, willingly obeying, willingly submitting, loving His Father in heaven perfectly, loving His earthly authorities genuinely. And that is our salvation. That, and the obedience the same Jesus would show in Jerusalem some 21 years later at another Passover, where He would submit to His Father’s will and lay down His life as a sacrifice for our sins.

Now, St. Paul writes in today’s Epistle, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

By the mercies of God, because God was willing to take on human flesh and humble Himself for your salvation, you are called upon, not to show up in church once in a while, not to do this or that good deed, but to present your body, your life, as a living sacrifice to God, which is acceptable to God because you are a baptized believer in Christ Jesus. It would be so much easier to be conformed to this world, to think like the people around you think, to indulge in the sins that the world indulges in, to make up your own beliefs in God as the world makes up its own beliefs and calls them valid. But don’t. Don’t do it. Be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

Guess how you do that? Well, by sitting here and “foolishly wasting your time” pondering an incident from the life of Jesus at age 12. By allowing your mind to be molded by Scripture and by the life of Jesus, both here and at home. By making it your goal to live, not like the people around you, but like Jesus and like all the saints who have imitated Jesus in their own lives, from childhood through adulthood. Marvel today at the humility of God at age 12. Rejoice in the salvation earned for you by that humility. And go forth and put the same humility into practice. Amen.