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Sunday after Christmas; Dec. 29, 2024; Luke 2:41-52
The star of the show in this season is always the story. The biblical text. Last week, the
Magnificat, and on Christmas Eve, the story of Christ’s birth. O Holy Night. We never
tire of hearing those texts of Christmas.
But then, today, a strange thing happens in the lectionary passages. We basically put
Jesus in a time machine. It gives us a little lectionary whiplash. But still and always, the
text is again the star of the show.
Today’s lectionary passage jumps from the story of the new baby which we read on
Christmas Eve, to this Sunday, and suddenly the boy Jesus is 12 years old! And they say
kids grow up fast today! In another week or two, Jesus will be 30 years old and he’ll be
coming to John the Baptist for his baptism!
So this Sunday, Jesus is already in the time machine. And it’s true for most of us, the
older we get, the faster the clock seems to go. So maybe Jesus jumping from infant, to
youth, to adult in the three-week lectionary cycle resonates a little bit.
Today’s text reflects another reality of our lives, and it’s the reality of competing
priorities. How many times have we thought, “If I could just get us all focused in on the
same goal….if we could get everyone on the same train, pulling together—just think of
the problems we could solve.
And Christmas is certainly a time when we hope that kind of cooperation happens.
Getting all the Christmas tasks done, cooking and wrapping gifts, sending cards and
loading the car. It’s hard to get everyone on the same page. But add to that unexpected
difficulties—which a lot of us have had this week for various reasons—you can be sure
those competing priorities show up.
Mary and Joseph have one of those moments in our text this week. And it reminds us
that there truly is nothing new under the sun. Family life today in some ways is the same
as it was in Jesus’s day. News flash: Nothing is uncomplicated.
And in today’s text, Jesus and his parents are not on the same page. They have
competing priorities. And they bump up against each other, all the “musts” of their roles
and responsibilities. Jesus’ parents “must” look for him when he’s lost. That’s their job.
They’re his parents.
Jesus “must” be in his Father’s house, in the temple—learning and growing in the faith.
That’s his job. Both roles, both “jobs” are important and right—and not particularly
complicated until they collide in the messiness of life on the ground. Let’s hear the story
from Luke 2:41-52:
Now every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the festival of the Passover. 42 And
when he was twelve years old, they went up as usual for the festival. 43 When the festival
was ended and they started to return, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but his
parents did not know it. 44 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.
45 When they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem to search for him. 46 After three
days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and
asking them questions. 47 And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and
his answers. 48 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.; 49 He said to them, ;Why were you searching for me?
Did you not know that I must be in my Father; 50 But they did not understand
what he said to them. 51 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.
Friends, this is the Word of the Lord; thanks be to God.
Well, I, for one, am glad to know that even in Jesus’s family things weren’t always
picture perfect. I look back over our lives, times like this when as a parent you’re
frustrated or scared, I can just picture Mary grabbing Jesus by the tunic and giving him a
little shake as she says, “Child, why have you treated us like this?”
I think that’s why I love this story of Jesus and Mary and Joseph so much. They’re so
strangely normal to be who they are.
First there’s Joseph, not really technically Jesus’s father, he’s really the step-father of this
strangely cosmic blended family. Have you ever thought about that? That Jesus actually
grew up in a blended family? And there’s Joseph, this step-father, acting in the role of
father— but standing back and letting Mary take control of this wayward child while
Jesus talks about his other “Father” as if Joseph wasn’t even there. As if the word
“Father” doesn’t even apply to him.
And then there’s Mary, who has to be more than a little embarrassed that she didn’t know
where her kid was for a full day into this caravan journey. And you know that Mary and
Joseph are both panicked that they haven’t found him in three days’ time.
And then there’s Jesus—a kid who’s probably just figuring out where his place in the
world is, like every 12-year-old—and he can’t figure out why his parents can’t get with
the program. And his answer definitely borders on rudeness—it’s like his saying in
today’s language, “Well, duh!” to his mother. Like so many 12-year-olds, he doesn’t
understand yet that his actions affect the folks around him.
Life on the ground—for Jesus, for his parents, and for us—gets messy. Not by anyone’s
fault. In this story, not by anyone’s misbehavior. It’s just messy and complicated with
people and roles and responsibilities colliding—and it’s not always clear how to navigate
it. Even for Jesus and his family. And that’s comforting to me. Life is just complicated
that way. It was for Jesus. It is for us today.
And all the time these three are bouncing off and back against each other, there are still
those moments, when all the stars seem to align. Glimpses of rightness in the middle of
it. Jesus, learning in the Temple, that felt right. Mary and Joseph, when they locked eyes
on their boy and they knew he was safe...that felt right. Even if only for moments, their
stars seem to have aligned in this season of following stars.
This story for me is a word about finding the moments of what’s right even in the middle
of frustrating life mess. If even in Jesus’s family life there are moments like this, it
seems that maybe we can extend a little grace and understanding to ourselves in our own
family messes.
Was Christmas at your house picture perfect this year? I hope so. But if it wasn’t, give
yourself enough grace to know that even Jesus’s family had moments like that too. And
hopefully we all had a few snapshots of “picture-perfect” out of all the rest of it.
Finding those little right moments to snap that are Facebook worthy is sometimes the
reality of life on the ground, and even if it’s not absolutely, completely perfect, it can be
good enough. If we let it be that. And that is enough to celebrate.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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