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When they saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us this way? Behold, your father and I were anxiously looking for you.”
He said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Didn’t you know that I must be in my Father’s house?” They didn’t understand the saying which he spoke to them. And he went down with them, and came to Nazareth. He was subject to them, and his mother kept all these sayings in her heart.
Luke 2:48-51 sits inside this longer paragraph.
When he was twelve years old, they went up to Jerusalem according to the custom of the feast, and when they had fulfilled the days, as they were returning, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. Joseph and his mother didn’t know it, but supposing him to be in the company, they went a day’s journey, and they looked for him among their relatives and acquaintances. When they didn’t find him, they returned to Jerusalem, looking for him. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the middle of the teachers, both listening to them, and asking them questions. All who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. When they saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us this way? Behold, your father and I were anxiously looking for you.”
He said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Didn’t you know that I must be in my Father’s house?” They didn’t understand the saying which he spoke to them. And he went down with them, and came to Nazareth. He was subject to them, and his mother kept all these sayings in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.
When they saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us this way? Behold, your father and I were anxiously looking for you.”
He said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Didn’t you know that I must be in my Father’s house?”
They didn’t understand the saying which he spoke to them.
And he went down with them, and came to Nazareth. He was subject to them, and his mother kept all these sayings in her heart.
And when they sawe him they were astonyed. And his mother sayde vnto him: sonne why hast thou thus dealte with vs? Beholde thy father and I have sought the sorowenge.
And he sayde vnto the: how is it that ye sought me? Wist ye not that I must goo aboute my fathers busines?
And they vnderstode not the sayinge that he spake to them.
And he went with them and came to Nazareth and was obedient to the. But his mother kept all these thinges in her hert.
So when they sawe him, they were amased, and his mother said vnto him, Sonne, why hast thou thus dealt with vs? beholde, thy father and I haue sought thee with very heauie hearts.
Then said he vnto them, Howe is it that ye sought me? knewe ye not that I must goe about my Fathers busines?
But they vnderstoode not the word that he spake to them.
Then hee went downe with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subiect to them: and his mother kept all these sayings in her heart.
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv48, 51 All duties which we owe to men as they…
All duties which we owe to men as they were not to be neglected, so are they according to our vocation, not to be preferred before the glory of God.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv48–51 48 And when they saw him, they were amazed:…
48 And when they saw him, they were amazed: and his mother said unto him, Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing.
Ver. 48. Have sought thee sorrowing] Animo tristissimo, et afflictissimo. God often cures a lethargy of security, by a fever of perplexity.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv48, 49, 51 Though something must be allowed to a woman’s passions…
Though something must be allowed to a woman’s passions and a mother’s indulgence, yet one would think that, especially considering where they found him, and what doing, she should not have spoken thus unto him, had she had a clear and distinct knowledge of his Divine nature, in union with her flesh: she speaks to him with the authority of a mother,
Why hast thou thus dealt with us?
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv48–50 Without doubt it was impossible to express the sorrow…
Without doubt it was impossible to express the sorrow of the Holy Virgin’s soul, when all the search of three days could bring them no tidings of their holy child. How did she blame her eyes for once looking off this object of her love, and spend both days and nights in a passionate bemoaning of her loss!
O blessed Saviour, who can miss thee, and not mourn for thee! Never any soul conceived thee by faith, but was apprehensive of thy worth, and sensible of thy want: what comforts are we capable of, while we want thee? And what relish can we taste in an earthly delight without thee?
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv48–51 And he said unto them, how is it that…
And he said unto them, how is it that ye sought me?.... That is, with so much uneasiness and distress of mind, not trusting in the power and providence of God, to take care of him; and in other places, besides the temple, where they had been inquiring for him:
wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business? or "in my Father's house", as the Syriac and Persic versions render it; where, as soon as you missed me, you might, at once, have concluded I was, and not have put yourselves to so much trouble and pains in seeking for me. Christ seems to tax them with ignorance, or, at least, forgetfulness of his having a Father in heaven, whose business he came to do on earth; and which they should have thought in their own minds he was now about, and so have made themselves easy. The business that Christ came about was to preach the Gospel, and which he afterwards performed with great clearness and fulness, with much power, majesty, and authority, with great constancy and diligence, with much concern for the souls of men, arid with great awfulness; and in which he took great delight, though he went through many dangers and risks of life; as also to work miracles in proof of his deity and Messiahship, and for the good of the bodies of men, and in which he was very assiduous, going about every where doing good this way: but the main, and principal part of his business was, to work out salvation for his people, by fulfilling the law, making reconciliation and atonement for their sins, and obtaining eternal redemption: this was a business which neither angels nor men could do; was very toilsome and laborious, and yet he delighted in it; nor did he desist from it until it was accomplished: and this is called his Father's business, because he contrived and assigned it to him; he called him to it, and sent him to perform; he enjoined it to him as man and mediator, and the glory of his perfections was concerned in it, and secured by it: and it was a business that Christ must be about, be concerned in, and perform, because he engaged to do it from all eternity; and because it was the will of his Father, which must be done, and was necessary in order to show himself dutiful and obedient; and because it was foretold in prophecy again and again and promised that it should be done; and because it could not be done by another. Now our Lord's conversing with the doctors, and which was a branch of his prophetic office, and was, no doubt, with a view to the good of the souls of men, and nothing less than miraculous, was a show, a prelude of, and a sort of an entrance upon the business he came about.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv49–50 Why sought ye me? - He does not blame…
Why sought ye me? - He does not blame them for losing, but for thinking it needful to seek him: and intimates, that he could not be lost, nor found any where, but doing the will of a higher parent.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv48, 49, 51 Verse 48. Why hast thou thus dealt with us?]…
Verse 48. Why hast thou thus dealt with us?] It certainly was not his fault, but theirs. Men are very apt to lay on others the blame of their own misconduct.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv48, 51 Luk 2:48-50. And when they saw him they were…
Luk 2:48-50. And when they saw him they were amazed — The clause, thus rendered, signifies, that Joseph and Mary were amazed when they saw him, but it may be translated, They who saw him were amazed, namely, not his parents only, or chiefly, but others. In this sense Dr. Campbell understands it, as suiting better the scope of the passage. “His parents,” says he, “may be said to have had reason of surprise, or even amazement, when they discovered that he was not in their company; but surely, to them at least, there was nothing peculiarly surprising in finding that he was not amusing himself with boys, but was in the temple, among the doctors, discoursing on the most important subjects. I may say justly, that to them who knew whence he was, there was less ground of amazement at the wisdom and understanding displayed in his answers than to any other human being. Again: it appears to be the intention of the evangelist, in this passage, to impress us with a sense of the extraordinary attainments of our Lord in wisdom and knowledge, even in childhood, from the effect which the discovery of them produced on others. All in the temple, who, though they did not see him, were within hearing, and could judge from what they heard, were astonished at the propriety, the penetration, and the energy they discovered in every thing he said; but those whose eye-sight convinced them of his tender age were confounded, as persons who were witnesses of something preternatural.” His mother said, Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us — Why hast thou put us into such fear for thy safety? Why hast thou given us such occasion for anxiety and distress? Thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing — Being not only troubled that we lost thee, but vexed at ourselves for not taking more care of thee. The word οδυνωμενοι, here rendered sorrowing, is expressive of the most racking anguish, and is often applied to the distress and pains of a woman in travail; it has therefore been rendered, with great concern — with inexpressible anxiety and distress. And he said, How is it that ye sought me? He does not blame them for losing, but for thinking it needful to seek him; and intimates that he could not be lost nor found anywhere but doing the will of a higher Parent. Wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business — His words imply, that they had no reason to be angry with him for leaving them without their knowledge, nor even to be grieved on that account, since they might have understood by his miraculous conception, and the revelations which accompanied it, that he was not to continue always with them, but was to employ himself in the business of Him who really was his father. The original expression here used, εν τοις του πατρος μου δει ειναι με, is ambiguous, and is translated by Dr. Waterland and many other learned men, following the Syriac version, Knew ye not that I must be in my Father’s house; a translation which the words will very well bear; and, so understood, the reply of Christ will signify, that though they thought him lost, yet he was at home; he was in his Father’s house, Joh 2:16; and that, in staying behind at Jerusalem, he had not left his true Father. “It is to be remembered,” says Dr. Doddridge, “that this is the first visit Christ had ever made to the temple since he was a child in arms; and it is no wonder, therefore, that the delight he found there inclined him to prolong it.” How happy those children who, like the holy Jesus, love the house and ordinances of God, and thirst for the instructions of his good word! They understood not the saying — Christ having expressed himself in a somewhat concise and ambiguous manner, his parents did not fully comprehend his meaning; either because they now doubted his being the Messiah, or because they had few just conceptions of the end for which the Messiah was to come into the world. It is observable that Joseph is not mentioned after this time, whence it is probable he did not live long after.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv48–51 Why hast thou thus dealt with us? - Why…
Why hast thou thus dealt with us? - Why hast thou given us all this trouble and anxiety, in going so far and returning with so much solicitude?
Thy father - Joseph was not the “real” father of Jesus, but he was “legally” so; and as the secret of his birth was not commonly known, he was called his father. Mary, in accordance with that usage, also called him so.
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Sorrowing - Anxious, lest in the multitude he might not be found, or lest some accident might have happened to him.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv49–51 I must be about the things that are my…
I must be about the things that are my Father’s? By these words he shewed, that not St. Joseph, but only God, was his father. (Witham)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv49–50 about my Father's business--literally, "in" or "at My Fathers,"…
about my Father's business--literally, "in" or "at My Fathers," that is, either "about My Father's affairs," or "in My Father's courts"--where He dwells and is to be found--about His hand, so to speak. This latter shade of meaning, which includes the former, is perhaps the true one, Here He felt Himself at home, breathing His own proper air. His words convey a gentle rebuke of their obtuseness in requiring Him to explain this. "Once here, thought ye I should so readily hasten away? Let ordinary worshippers be content to keep the feast and be gone; but is this all ye have learnt of Me?" Methinks we are here let into the holy privacies of Nazareth; for what He says they should have known, He must have given them ground to know. She tells Him of the sorrow with which His father and she had sought Him. He speaks of no Father but one, saying, in effect, My Father has not been seeking Me; I have been with Him all this time; "the King hath brought me into His chambers . . . His left hand is under my head, and His right hand doth embrace me" (Sol 1:4; Sol 2:6). How is it that ye do not understand? (Mar 8:21).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv49–51 49. How is it—The first word of Jesus’s utterance…
49. How is it—The first word of Jesus’s utterance on record. It exhibits even in this his childhood the characteristics of his style of discourses even in his later years. Especially do we find those characteristics which belong to the discourses preserved by John, and which are by rationalists pretended to be John’s own composition. We find the same parabolic force, which conceals the meaning under the figure; for the moment not understood, yet so remembered as to be understood hereafter.
How is it that ye sought me?—Why did ye not come directly here? Where else could I be than in this holy, blessed spot? Strange that so beautiful a gush of childlike holy joy, at the delightfulness of his present place, should be interpreted into an expression of disrespect to his parents!
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Wist—Knew.
My Father’s business—There seems to be a strong reason for giving this the meaning assigned by many scholars, Know ye not that I must be in my Father’s house? Why seek me? There is one sole blessed place suitable for me, and where I might be expected to linger. Yet both the terms house and business come in fact to the same thing. If he was in his Father’s house it must be on his Father’s business. If on his Father’s business where but in his Father’s house?
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv48–51 48. they were amazed] The “people of the land,”…
48. they were amazed] The “people of the land,” such as were the simple peasants of Galilee, held their great teachers in the deepest awe, and hitherto the silent, sweet, obedient childhood of Jesus had not prepared them for such a scene.
Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us?] Rather, My child, why didst thou treat us thus?
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have sought thee sorrowing] Rather, were searching for thee with aching hearts.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv48–51 (48)Behold, thy father and I have sought.—The latter clause…
(48)Behold, thy father and I have sought.—The latter clause expresses a continuous act, We were seeking thee; and our Lord uses the same tense in His answer.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv48, 49, 51 Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold,…
Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing. Mary"s words have in them something of reproach. Joseph, it is noticeable, stands evidently apart; but the mother, strangely as it would seem at first, associates him in "thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing." Had she, then, forgotten the past? Who but Mary could have repeated this sacred memory of her mistake, and of the Boy"s far-reaching answer? What forger could have imagined such a verse?
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv48–50 Son, why hast Thou thus dealt with us?
Luk_2:48
Son, why hast Thou thus dealt with us?
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Perplexity in presence of mystery
This question of the mother of Jesus reveals an experience of the human heart which is very common, which is most common in the best hearts and those who feel their responsibility the most. The Virgin Mary is the perpetual type of people who, entrusted with any great and sacred interest, identify their own lives with that interest and care for it conscientiously; but who, by and by, when the interest begins to manifest its own vitality, and to shape its own methods, are filled with perplexity. They cannot keep the causes for which they labour under their own care. As His mother asked of Jesus, so they are always asking of the objects for which they live, Why hast thou thus dealt with us? Such people are people who have realized responsibility more than they have realized God. Just as Mary felt at the moment when she asked this question, that Jesus was her Son more than that He was Gods Son, so there is a constant tendency among the most earnest and conscientious people to feel that the causes for which they live and work are their causes more than that they are Gods causes, and so to experience something which is almost like jealousy when they see those causes pass beyond their power and fulfil themselves in larger ways than theirs. For such people, often the most devoted and faithful souls among us, there must be some help and light in this story of Jesus and His mother. (Phillips Brooks, D. D.)
A parents wonder
The first and simplest case of this experience is that which comes nearest to the circumstances of our story. It comes in every childhood. It comes whenever a boy grows up to the time at which he passes beyond the merely parental government which belonged to his earliest years. It comes with all assertion of individual character and purpose in a boys life. A boy has had his career all identified with his home where he was cradled. What he was and did he was and did as a member of that household. But by and by there comes some sudden outbreak of a personal energy. He shows some disposition, and attempts some task, distinctively his own. It is a puzzling moment Mike for the child and the parent. The child is perplexed with pleasure, which is almost pain, to find himself for the first time doing an act which is genuinely his own. The parent is filled with a pain which yet has pride and pleasure in it, to see his boy doing something original, something which he never bade him do, something which perhaps he could not do himself. The real understanding of that moment, both to child and parent, depends on one thing--upon whether they can see in it the larger truth that this child is not merely the son of his father, but is also the son of God. If they both understand that, then the child, as he undertakes his personal life, passes not into a looser, but into a stronger, responsibility. And the parent is satisfied to see his first authority over his son grow less, because he cannot be jealous of God. It is a noble progress and expansion of life when the first independent venture of a young man on a career of his own, is not the wilful claim of the prodigal, Give me the portion of goods that falleth to me, but the reverent appeal of Jesus, Wist ye not theft I must be about My Fathers business? (Phillips Brooks, D. D.)
Divine as well as human education
Who is there of us that is not aware that his soul has had two educations? Sometimes the two have been in opposition; sometimes they have overlapped; sometimes they have wholly coincided; but always the two have been two. Our own government of ourselves is most evident, is the one which we are most aware of, so that sometimes for a few moments we forget that there is any other; but very soon our plans for ourselves are so turned and altered and hindered that we cannot ignore the other greater, deeper force. We meant to do that, and look! we have been led on to this. We meant to be this, and lo! we are that. We never meant to believe this, and lo! we hold it with all our hearts. What does it mean? It is the everlasting discovery, the discovery which each thoughtful man makes for himself with almost as much surprise as if no other man had ever made it for himself before, that this soul, for which he is responsible, is not his soul only, but it is Gods soul too. The rex-e-lation which came of old to the Virgin Mother about her Child--not your Child only, but Gods Child, too; yours, genuinely, really yours, but, behind yours and over yours, Gods. That is the great revelation about life. When it comes, everything about ones self-culture is altered. Every anticipation and thought of living changes its colour. It comes sometimes early and sometimes late in life. Sometimes it is the flush and glow which fills childhood with dewy hope and beauty. Sometimes it is the peace which gathers about old age and makes it happy. When ever it comes it makes life new. See what the changes are which it must bring. First, it makes anything like a bewildering surprise impossible. When I have once taken it into my account that God has His plans for my souls culture, that these plans of His outgo and supersede any plans for it which I can make, then any new turn that comes is explicable to me, and, though I may not have anticipated it all, I am not overwhelmed, nor disturbed, nor dismayed by it. I find a new conviction growing in my soul, another view of life, another kind of faith. It is not what I had intended. I had determined that as long as I lived I would believe something very different from this which I now feel rising and taking possession of me. It seems at first as if my soul had been disloyal to me, and had turned its back faithlessly upon my teaching. I appeal to it, and say, Soul, why hast thou thus dealt with me? And it answers back to me, Wist ye not that I must be about my Fathers business? Did you not know that I was Gods soul as well as your soul? This is something which He has taught me. Then again, the true man will have one great purpose in living, and only one. He will try to come to harmony with God, to perfect understanding of what God wants and is trying to do. Let me not be trying to make one thing out of this soul of mine while He is trying to make entirely another! As Mary went back with her Son, realizing, out of His own mouth, that He was not only her Son, but Gods; as she settled down with Him to their Nazareth life again, must not one single strong question have been upon her heart, What does God want this Son of His to be? O let me find that out, that I may work with Him. And as you go into the house where you are to train your soul, realizing, through some revelation that has come to it, that it is Gods soul as well as yours, one strong and single question must be pressing on you too--What does God want this soul of mine to be? O, let me find that out, that I may work with Him. And how can you find that out? Only by finding Him out. Only by understanding what He is, can you understand what He wants you to do. And understanding comes by love. And love to God comes by faith in Jesus Christ. (Phillips Brooks, D. D. )
Christs strange dealings with His people
The words may usefully remind us that the dealings of the Lord Jesus with those who sincerely love and serve Him are often very strange. Not only does He try them by ordinary troubles, such as loss of health and loss of friends, but sometimes He takes away from them all spiritual comfort, and leaves their souls dark and disconsolate. Once they had joy and peace in believing, but they have it no longer now. Perhaps it is that they have grown lukewarm and self-sufficient, and He withdraws Himself from them for a time, to make them seek Him with greater earnestness. Where this is the case, people must go on seeking till they find. The dryness and hardness of our minds in prayer may be a sore distress to us, but we must not give over praying: we must be content to seek Him sorrowing. Where we cannot pray as we would, we must pray as we can. We must not faint, but determine to make ourselves heard at heavens gate. And then it shall be but a little, and we shall find Him whom our soul loveth. And when we have found Him, we must be careful to hold Him, and not let Him go. One who knows the Saviours love, and lives in habits of holy intercourse with Him, must, as it were, keep His eye upon Him constantly by Christian watchfulness and an effort to realize His presence everywhere. Let such an one lose Him by wilful disobedience, or careless self-indulgence, or by relaxing in prayer and in the effort to believe, and there will be nothing but sorrowing till He is found again. Most merciful is it of God, when we are living without Christ, to hedge up our way with thorns, to make conscience uneasy, worldly pleasures unsatisfactory, and even religious exercises disappointing and irksome. Anything is wholesome, however bitter, which drives us to His side, and keeps us there. (Dean Goulburn.)
The manliness of Christ
There is something at first sight wilful indeed, possibly courageous, but not manly, in a boy of twelve staying behind his parents in a strange city without their knowledge or consent; something thoughtless, almost ungracious, in the words of reply to Marys question. The clue to this apparent divergence from the perfect manly life is given with rare insight and beauty in Mr. Holman Hunts great picture--at any rate, the face and attitude of the boy there seemed for the first time to make clear to me the meaning of the recorded incident, and to cast a flood of light upon those eighteen years of preparation which yet remained before He should be ready for His great work. The first sight of Jerusalem and of the Temple has stirred new and strange thoughts within Him. The replies of the doctors to His eager questionings have lighted up the consciousness which must have been dimly working in Him already, that He was not altogether like those around Him-the children with whom He used to play, the parents at whose knees He had been brought up. To the young spirit before whose inward eye such a vision is opening all human ties would sink back, and be for the moment forgotten; and, when recalled suddenly by the words of His mother, the half-conscious dreamy answer, How is it that ye sought Me? &c., loses all its apparent wilfulness and abruptness. And so, full of this new question and great wonder, He went home to the village in Galilee with His parents, and was subject unto them; and the curtain falls for us on His boyhood and youth and early manhood. But, as nothing but what is most important and necessary for understanding all of His life which we need for our own growth into His likeness is told us in these simple narratives, it would seem that this vivid light is thrown on that first visit to Jerusalem because it was the crisis in our Lords earthly life which bears most directly on His work for our race. If so, we must, I think, allow that the question, once fairly presented to the boys mind, would never again leave it. Day by day it would come back with increasing insistency, gathering power and weight. (Thomas Hughes.)
The Mother and Son
There has descended into Marys humble home a treasure too great for heaven itself to contain. What wonder if she fails to understand the value of this Divine Son; if she wholly mistakes the meaning of His absence? What wonder if she applies to His case the common-place rebuke, Thy father and I have sought Thee sorrowing? Nay, but we may be told it was inexcusable in one who remembered the marvels of His birth, and all that then occurred, to chide Him for resorting to the Temple, and to be astonished that He sat with doctors and heard and questioned them. Twelve years of meek obedience in common household tasks and duties had passed since His birth. Miracles, which are meant to witness to doctrines, were not, we may be sure, performed to startle the carpenters humble family, and she had forgotten in some measure the significant tokens of the past, and the dutiful boy was to her the future carpenter, the support of her age, the inmate of her home, or of some frugal home like hers, to the end, and the air of authority sat easy upon her, for her right had not been disputed. But other rights asserted themselves now. The light within Him breaks forth now from behind the Tell of flesh. How is it that ye sought Me? Wist ye not, &c. Other claims and ties supersede, or soon shall do so, the calm family life. He shall dwell with that Father who, in His baptism, His transfiguration, His death, will attest that this One is the Son of God. He shall seek for brethren and for children in all whom the ties of a common faith in His Father unite to Him. His work shall not be with the axe and hammer in Josephs workshop, but it shall lie in turning souls from darkness to light, from death to life, from the power of Satan unto God. What wonder if the mother after the flesh cannot at once train her ear to the full compass of this new revelation. She will acquiesce, but not till she has painfully learned the plan of God in the life of battle with all forms of evil, which He shall lead, in the face of Satan and his host, where she is not; where she shall be met, if she venture into its sphere, by words of strangeness, Woman, what have I to do with thee? (Joh_2:4). Some have entertained angels unawares; but the King whom angels serve is a sojourner under her roof; she has to unlearn the speech of a mother, and learn that of a worshipper of the adorable Son of God and her Redeemer. She must cease to command and to admonish, and kneel with the rest of us before the Cross that was raised for all our guilty race alike. (Archbishop Thomson.)
Sorrow for grieving a mother
When Garibaldi saw any one looking at his mothers picture the tears started into his eyes. He felt remorse at having, by his adventurous life, been a source to her of cruel anxiety. He believed in the power of her prayers to preserve him from the effects of his own temerity, and on the field of battle, or in the storm at sea, he never lost courage, because he thought he saw her kneeling before God and imploring for him the Divine protection.
A mothers solicitude
The parents of Robert Moffat were both pious, and his mothers heart was set upon his knowing from a child the Holy Scriptures. When about to leave Inverkeithing, in Fifeshire, where he was in service in the Earl of Morays gardens, for a situation in Cheshire, she earnestly besought him to promise, before going, that he would read the Bible every day, morning and evening. Sensible of his own weakness, and of, perhaps, his boyish disinclination, he parried the question. But at the last moment she pressed his hand. Robert, she said, imploringly, you will promise me to read the Bible, more particularly the New Testament, and most especially the Gospels--those are the words of Christ Himself; and then you cannot possibly go astray. There was no refusing then; it was the melting hour. Yes, mother, he answered, I make you the promise. He knew, as he remarked in relating the circumstances, that the promise, once made, must be kept. And oh, he added, I am happy that I did make it! (Hand and Heart.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv49–51 49. How is it that ye sought me? Did…
49. How is it that ye sought me? Did ye not know that I must be in my Father's house? That is, in the temple, where they did find him. They ought to have come there at once. These words are the first in which he reveals his consciousness of his supernatural birth.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v49
Luke
THE BOY IN THE TEMPLE
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Luk 2:49.
A number of spurious gospels have come down to us, which are full of stories, most of them absurd and some of them worse, about the infancy of Jesus Christ. Their puerilities bring out more distinctly the simplicity, the nobleness, the worthiness of this one solitary incident of His early days, which has been preserved for us. How has it been preserved? If you will look over the narratives there will be very little difficulty, I think, in answering that question. Observing the prominence that is given to the parents, and how the story enlarges upon what they thought and felt, we shall not have much doubt in accepting the hypothesis that it was none other than Mary from whom Luke received such intimate details. Notice, for instance, ‘Joseph and His mother knew not of it.’ ‘They supposed Him to have been in the company.’ ‘And when they,’ i.e. Joseph and Mary, ‘saw Him, they were astonished’; and then that final touch, ‘He was subject to them,’ as if His mother would not have Luke or us think that this one act of independence meant that He had shaken off parental authority. And is it not a mother’s voice that says, ‘His mother kept all these things in her heart,’ and pondered all the traits of boyhood? Now it seems to me that, in these words of the twelve-year-old boy, there are two or three points full of interest and of teaching for us. There is-
I. That consciousness of Sonship.
I am not going to plunge into a subject on which certainly a great deal has been very confidently affirmed, and about which the less is dogmatised by us, who must know next to nothing about it, the better; viz. the inter-connection of the human and the divine elements in the person of Jesus Christ. But the context leads us straight to this thought-that there was in Jesus distinct growth in wisdom as well as in stature, and in favour with God and man. And now, suppose the peasant boy brought up to Jerusalem, seeing it for the first time, and for the first time entering the sacred courts of the Temple. Remember, that to a Jewish boy, his reaching the age of twelve made an epoch, because he then became ‘a son of the Law,’ and took upon himself the religious responsibilities which had hitherto devolved upon his parents. If we will take that into account, and remember that it was a true manhood which was growing up in the boy Jesus, then we shall not feel it to be irreverent if we venture to say, not that here and then, there began His consciousness of His Divine Sonship, but that that visit made an epoch and a stage in the development of that consciousness, just because it furthered the growth of His manhood.
Further, our Lord in these words, in the gentlest possible way, and yet most decisively, does what He did in all His intercourse with Mary, so far as it is recorded for us in Scripture-relegated her back within limits beyond which she tended to advance. For she said, ‘Thy father and I have sought Thee sorrowing,’ no doubt thus preserving what had been the usual form of speech in the household for all the previous years; and there is an emphasis that would fall upon her heart, as it fell upon none other, when He answered: ‘Wist ye not that I must be about My Father’s business?’ We are not warranted in affirming that the Child meant all which the Man afterwards meant by the claim to be the Son of God; nor are we any more warranted in denying that He did. We know too little about the mysteries of His growth to venture on definite statements of either kind. Our sounding-lines are not long enough to touch bottom in this great word from the lips of a boy of twelve; but this is clear, that as He grew into self-consciousness, there came with it the growing consciousness of His Sonship to His Father in heaven.
Now, dear brethren, whilst all that is unique, and parts Him off from us, do not let us forget that that same sense of Sonship and Fatherhood must be the very deepest thing in us, if we are Christian people after Christ’s pattern. We, too, can be sons through Him, and only through Him. I believe with all my heart in what we hear so much about now-’the universal Fatherhood of God.’ But I believe that there is also a special relation of Fatherhood and Sonship, which is constituted only, according to Scripture teaching in my apprehension, through faith in Jesus Christ, and the reception of His life as a supernatural life into our souls. God is Father of all men-thank God for it! And that means, that He gives life to all men; that in a very deep and precious sense the life which He gives to every man is not only derived from, but is kindred with, His own; and it means that His love reaches to all men, and that His authority extends over them. But there is an inner sanctuary, there is a better life than the life of nature, and the Fatherhood into which Christ introduces us means, that through faith in Him, and the entrance into our spirits of the Spirit of adoption, we receive a life derived from, and kindred with, the life of the Giver, and that we are bound to Him not only by the cords of love, but to obey the parental authority. Sonship is the deepest thought about the Christian life.
It was an entirely new thought when Jesus spoke to His disciples of their Father in heaven. It was a thrilling novelty when Paul bade servile worshippers realise that they were no longer slaves, but sons, and as such, heirs of God. It was the rapture of pointing to a new star flaming out, as it were, that swelled in John’s exclamation: ‘Beloved, now are we the sons of God!’ For even though in the Old Testament there are a few occasional references to Israel’s King or to Israel itself as being ‘God’s son,’ as far as I remember, there is only one reference in all the Old Testament to parental love towards each of us on the part of God, and that is the great saying in the Psa 103:13: ‘Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him.’ For the most part the idea connected in the Old Testament with the Fatherhood of God is authority: ‘If I be a Father, where is Mine honour?’ says the last of the prophets. But when we pass into the New, on the very threshold, here we get the germ, in these words, of the blessed thought that, as His disciples, we, too, may claim sonship to God through Him, and penetrate beyond the awe of Divine Majesty into the love of our Father God. Brethren, notwithstanding all that was unique in the Sonship of Jesus Christ, He welcomes us to a place beside Himself, and if we are the children of God by faith in Him, then are we ‘heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ.’
Now the second thought that I would suggest from these words is-
II. The sweet ‘must’ of filial duty.
‘How is it that ye sought Me?’ That means: ‘Did you not know where I should be sure to be? What need was there to go up and down Jerusalem looking for Me? You might have known there was only one place where you would find Me. Wist ye not that I must be about My Father’s business?’ Now, the last words of this question are in the Greek literally, as the margin of the Revised Version tells us, ‘in the things of My Father’; and that idiomatic form of speech may either be taken to mean, as the Authorised Version does, ‘about My Father’s business,’ or, with the Revised Version, ‘in My Father’s house.’ The latter seems the rendering most relevant in this connection, where the folly of seeking is emphasised-the certainty of His place is more to the point than that of His occupation. But the locality carried the occupation with it, for why must He be in the Father’s house but to be about the Father’s business, ‘to behold the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in His Temple’?
Do people know where to find us? Is it unnecessary to go hunting for us? Is there a place where it is certain that we shall be? It was so with this child Jesus, and it should be so with all of us who profess to be His followers.
All through Christ’s life there runs, and occasionally there comes into utterance, that sense of a divine necessity laid upon Him; and here is its beginning, the very first time that the word occurs on His lips, ‘I must.’ There is as divine and as real a necessity shaping our lives because it lies upon and moulds our wills, if we have the child’s heart, and stand in the child’s position. In Jesus Christ the ‘must’ was not an external one, but He ‘must be about His Father’s business,’ because His whole inclination and will were submitted to the Father’s authority. And that is what will make any life sweet, calm, noble. ‘The love of Christ constraineth us.’ There is a necessity which presses upon men like iron fetters; there is a necessity which wells up within a man as a fountain of life, and does not so much drive as sweetly incline the will, so that it is impossible for him to be other than a loving, obedient child.
Dear friend, have we felt the joyful grip of that necessity? Is it impossible for me not to be doing God’s will? Do I feel myself laid hold of by a strong, loving hand that propels me, not unwillingly, along the path? Does inclination coincide with obligation? If it does, then no words can tell the freedom, the enlargement, the calmness, the deep blessedness of such a life. But when these pull in two different ways, as, alas! they often do, and I have to say, ‘I must be about my Father’s business, and I had rather be about my own if I durst,’ which is the condition of a great many so-called Christian people-then the necessity is miserable; and slavery, not freedom, is the characteristic of such Christianity. And there is a great deal of such to-day.
And now one last word. On this sweet ‘must,’ and blessed compulsion to be about the Father’s business, there follows:
III. The meek acceptance of the lowliest duties.
‘He went down to Nazareth, and was subject to them.’ That is all that is told us about eighteen years, by far the largest part of the earthly life of Christ. Legend comes in, and for once not inappropriately, and tells us, what is probably quite true, that during these years, Jesus worked in the carpenter’s shop, and as one story says, ‘made yokes,’ or as another tells, made light implements of husbandry for the peasants round Nazareth. Be that as it may, ‘He was subject unto them,’ and that was doing the Father’s will, and being ‘about the Father’s business,’ quite as much as when He was amongst the doctors, and learning by asking questions as well as by hearkening to their instructions. Everything depends on the motive. The commonest duty may be ‘the Father’s business,’ when we are doing manfully the work of daily life. Only we do not turn common duty into the Father’s business, unless we remember Him in the doing of it. But if we carry the hallowing and quickening influence of that great ‘must’ into all the pettinesses, and paltrinesses, and wearinesses, and sorrows of our daily trivial lives, then we shall find, as Jesus Christ found, that the carpenter’s shop is as sacred as the courts of the Temple, and that to obey Mary was to do the will of the Father in heaven.
What a blessed transformation that would make of all lives! The psalmist long ago said: ‘One thing have I desired of the Lord, and that will I seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life.’ We may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of our lives. We may be in one or other of the many mansions of the Father’s house where-ever we go, and may be doing the will of the Father in heaven in all that we do. Then we shall be at rest; then we shall be strong; then we shall be pure; then we shall have deep in our hearts the joyous consciousness, undisturbed by rebellious wills, that now ‘we are the sons of God,’ and the still more joyous hope, undimmed by doubts or mists, that ‘it doth not yet appear what we shall be’; but that wherever we go, it will be but passing from one room of the great home into another more glorious still. ‘I must be about my Father’s business’; let us make that the motto for earth, and He will say to us in His own good time ‘Come home from the field, and sit down beside Me in My house,’ and so we ‘shall dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v51 The return to Nazareth:
The return to Nazareth:
v. 51 And He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them; but His mother kept all these sayings in her heart.
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v. 52. And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man.
A period of approximately eighteen years is covered in this simple statement of the evangelist. Although He had given His parents evidence of a greater and higher calling, He yet went with them as an obedient son. He was subject to them. In His complete fulfillment of the Law for our sakes He willingly subjected Himself to every commandment and rendered a perfect obedience, in order to atone, also in this respect, for the sins of the children. Note: Mary’s method of keeping the words she could not understand, of mulling over them continually, of preserving them fresh in her memory, deserves a wide imitation. Meanwhile it is recorded that the growth of Jesus was normal, both mentally and physically. His state of humiliation was so perfect that not only His body was subject to the general rule of nature, but also His mind. He continued His studies eagerly and gladly, He stored up a large fund of knowledge. Note: There was no sowing of wild oats in the sinless Christ. But the best and most excellent growth was that in spiritual matters. He grew in the favor, in the good will of both God and men. He lived His life in full accordance with the precepts which He learned, He put His full trust in His heavenly Father and gave evidence of this in a life of love, the most perfect example for the young men and women of all times.
Summary.Jesus is born at Bethlehem, visited by the shepherds, given the name Jesus at His circumcision, presented to the Lord in the Temple, where Simeon sings his beautiful hymn, seconded by the prophetess Anna, and visits Jerusalem at the age of twelve years.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv48, 51 When they saw him
When they saw him
"When Mary and Joseph found Jesus"
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why have you treated us this way?
This was an indirect rebuke because he had not gone with them on the way back home. This caused them to worry about him. AT: "you should not have done this to us!" (See: Rhetorical Question)
Listen
This word is often used to show the beginning of a new or important event. It also can be used to show where the action begins. If your language has a phrase that is used in this way, consider whether it would be natural to use it here.
Why were you searching for me?
Jesus uses two questions to mildly rebuke his parents, and to begin to tell them that he had a purpose from his heavenly Father that they did not understand. AT: "You did not need to be concerned about me" (See: Rhetorical Question)
Did you not know ... business?
Jesus uses this second question to try to say that his parents should have known about the purpose for which his Father sent him. AT: "You should have known ... business" (See: Rhetorical Question)
about my Father's business
Possible meanings are 1) Jesus meant these words literally, to indicate that he was doing the work that his Father had given him, or 2) these words are an idiom that indicate where Jesus was, "in my Father's house." Since the next verse says that his parents did not understand what he was telling them, it would be best not to explain it more.
my Father's business
At age 12, Jesus, the Son of God, understood that God was his real Father (not Joseph, Mary's husband). (See: Translating Son and Father)
translationWords
amazed
God the Father
word
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv49, 51 2:49 Didn’t you know that I must be in…
2:49 Didn’t you know that I must be in my Father’s house? Jesus was aware that his greatest loyalty belonged to his Father in heaven.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.