Lost and Found

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0:00God's good. I'm glad to see you all again today. We're continuing our sermon series in the Gospel of Luke. Last week I circled back to the first four verses of Luke to give us a kind of a proper introduction to Luke. Now we're picking up back where we left off, right after the infancy narratives. This today, this is the only account in the whole Bible we have of Jesus's childhood. Pretty interesting. In it, he speaks. So that means that these words here are the words of Jesus at his youngest that we have in the whole Bible. And it's interesting what he says.

0:43So an afternoon in 2017, a Sunday afternoon, I was coming home from a meeting in the West End in Richmond. I was driving through Interstate 64. It had just finished raining pretty heavily about an hour earlier. And the skies were clear, but the roads were wet. And I rounded, I was in the leftmost lane, driving the speed limit, yes. And I was in the leftmost lane and I rounded a corner and I saw and then hit a patch of water. And I hydroplaned. Because I had been turning, I didn't jerk the wheel or anything, but because I was turning, my car started to drift this way. And I ended up backwards.

1:26And then I skidded into the ditch, which was really wet. But the wet ground kind of slowed my car down. And praise God, I didn't hit any cars. I didn't hit, it didn't even hit a guardrail or anything. I was, you know, I came to a stop. I got out of the car. Next thing you know, a cop was there. Um, so, uh, there's a picture that I put in here. I went back and found it. Grayson, could you put that up? It looks bad. It tore off the front bumper, but I was fine. Um, we even got the car fixed.

1:58Um, I'll never forget that moment when I started hydroplanning. It was an immediate, unmistakable, tangible loss of control. You, you, you could feel it in the steering wheel. You knew at one moment that the tires were connected to the road. The next moment they were not. And at the same moment that I lost control, I had a new feeling. Control was gone. The feeling that was now there was a pit in my stomach. I was really nervous. Um, praise the Lord, nothing happened that day other than some repairs to the car. I did get a ticket. Turns out if you, if you, if you can't get your car out of where it got stuck, when something like this happens, you're going to get charged with reckless driving, no matter what else happened. So, um, yeah, but I couldn't get it out, as you can tell. I got a ticket, but I was fine. But that moment where I lost control, there was so much anxiety in me. Now, a different kind of experience happens to Mary and Joseph in this passage. Deep anxiety. They've lost control. Um, they too feel helpless. They feel that danger is really close by. And then Jesus speaks a word to them. Twelve-year-old Jesus speaks a word to them. It's a word of reassurance to them in their worry and their anxiety. That's what we're talking about today. So, turn with me to Luke 2, verses 41 through 52. Let's pay attention to God's word today. God's word is true and it's faithful and it's reliable. You can build your life upon it because God gave it to us. It's in, it's in your bulletin. It's also behind me on the screen. Now, his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast

3:47of the Passover. And when he was 12 years old, they went up according to custom. And when the feast was ended, as they were returning, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. His parents did not know it. But supposing him to be in the group, they went a day's 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. After three days, they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. And when his parents saw him, they were astonished. And his mother said to him, son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress. And he said to them, why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my father's house? And they did not understand the saying that he spoke to them. And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom, in stature, and in favor with God and man.

5:10Pray with me. Lord, your word is truth and light. We ask you, Lord, by the power of your spirit to make it truth and light. In our hearts, Lord, productive truth and light that brings us to new knowledge, but also new ways of feeling, new ways of acting, new ways of trusting you, God. Will you please do this work in our hearts? Call us to you. Remind us how faithful and reliable you are. Jesus, we pray this in your name. Amen. Today's sermon is called Lost and Found. Here's the big idea here. We find rest from our distress in the obedient son. Rest from our distress in the obedient son. Let's talk about the distress of Mary and Joseph. If you were a Jew living at the time of this passage, you would probably travel to Jerusalem once a year no matter where you lived. You might go more often than that, but at least once a year. That was the expectation for faithfulness among the Jewish people. Verse 41 says Mary and Joseph were doing this every year, faithfully. This trip was a big ordeal. It was an 80-mile trek from Nazareth to Jerusalem. Jerusalem was kind of up in a, it was slightly up in a mountain, so you had to go up a mountain to get there. It would take three to four days to do. Some of the roads that they would have traveled were notorious for muggings, so you would travel in groups. You would take a whole community, your town, or extended, at least extended family, relatives, neighbors, acquaintances. You would travel together for safety. So they were traveling together. They would return home together. Verse 42 says that one year they made this trip and Jesus

7:07was 12. This is an important age, especially for a young Jewish boy. When a young Jewish person reached 13, they'd be responsible for practicing their faith on their own. So 12 was like the culmination year, the year of the most instruction as they're getting prepared to really take ownership of their faith and the practice of it for themselves. This wasn't specified in the Bible anywhere, but it was just a tradition that it evolved. This tradition grew into what we now know as bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs. I'll just point out that Juliet Bat is 13 today, and you know, we might be having a bat mitzvah after this if she were Jewish, but... So H12 is a culmination of instruction in the scriptures before beginning to walk in God's ways and his commandments. Jesus and his family, this trip would be very, very, very important to Jerusalem. It'd be another opportunity for him to see all the sacrifices, the feasts, to learn about these things, their meaning, their purpose.

8:15Now the end of the feast comes, they pack up to return home, but the text says the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. Uh-oh. His parents did not know it, but supposing him to be in the group, they went a day's journey. Now there could have been dozens of people in this caravan. They probably wouldn't be staying in family units because they knew each other. As is natural, even today, men might gather together to talk, women might gather together to talk, the children might be playing together, children might be going back and forth on the journey between the two groups. It'd be natural to assume, I think we've all done it from time to time, you know, Mary assumes that Joseph has Jesus, and Joseph assumes Mary has Jesus, but then they realize that he's not there. When they have traveled a day away, to about 20 miles from Jerusalem. This is, um, the text says they began to search for him among their relatives and their acquaintances, and when they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem searching for him.

9:19So now they have to travel a whole day back. This is the part of the story where you might wonder, isn't this the plot of Home Alone? Big group of people traveling, a young boy assumed to be with the others, is left behind, all the family get far away, realize that he's not there, and then have to return looking. I mean, it's the same story. The only thing that John Hughes added was the wet bandits and the booby traps and everything. Um, so they, there they are, back in Jerusalem looking for Jesus, frantically searching for Jesus. It's one thing to lose your keys. It's another thing to lose your child. Something else memorable happened to us in 2017. Nikki's parents took the four of us on a trip to Disney World. And one day we were in the Magic Kingdom, and Nikki was with her parents and her sister, and I was with the girls, Cadence and Bree. And I looked at them and I said, let's go find mom and the rest. So I think they're this way. And so I, I walked, I got, I mean, I swear it was no further than from here to the back of the auditorium. And I glanced to my left and I saw Cadence and I glanced to my right and nothing. Where's Bree? I looked around, nothing. I took Cadence back to where we had just been. I looked around, nothing. I, I kept retracing my steps back and forth this distance, looking farther and farther away, scanning the crowds. I just kept, I knew that eventually I would just spot her and it would all just stop. Nothing. So I made the phone call that no dad wants to make

11:10to their wife. I can't find Bree. Nikki contacted a park employee while I kept looking. Eventually I met up with Nikki and we just waited. Finally, we got a call from a Disney park employee. Bree had been found. You can check in with her to get the rest of the story from her perspective, but basically once she realized she was separated, she found a Disney employee who asked her, well, do you know your parents' numbers? And she, she knew Nikki's number. So they called Nikki and we were reconnected.

11:48Tears, relief, got, yeah, got a free pass on a, on a, you know, the whole family went on a roller coaster. We got to skip a line. They really, really want you to have a good time when you're at Disney. So that time of searching and waiting and waiting was just agony. We felt helpless. We felt danger was looming. We were anxious and I felt responsible. You know, it was on me. How could I have let that happen? Looking back, I think it was, I think it was about 15 minutes that we were waiting. Nikki thinks it was more like 30. Mary and Joseph, it was three days. Days of worry, of anxiety, trying not to imagine the worst. They didn't immediately find him when they got back to Jerusalem. Where could he be?

12:47Is he safe? What is he going through? And if that weren't bad enough, they had been chosen by God for this special role. The earthly parents of the promised one, right? They're saying to themselves, we've lost the Messiah. They'd be feeling guilt, shame. Everyone in the caravan knew at this point what had happened. The sense of failure. We had this job to do and we blew it. They forgot what the angel Gabriel told them, which is God will give him the throne of his father David and he will reign forever. And his kingdom will never end. Those are sure promises from God about this child.

13:39Just out of their head, gone. The shepherds, Simeon, many people had told them, this is what God has told me about this child. God will work redemption through him. But all they could think of was their missing son. Their sense of duty, their loss of control. And that's what drove their frantic search, their anxiousness. That's what happens to us when we lose control, when we feel responsible, but we can't change the outcome. We're just waiting for something. We're anxious. Let's talk about the reassurance that Jesus gives. Mary and Joseph finally find Jesus. He's not in a dark alley. He's not in someone's house. He's not in the back of a van. He's in the most prominent and public place in all Jerusalem. He's been hiding in plain sight, so to speak. They found him in the temple, the text says.

14:44And he wasn't being held hostage. He wasn't scared. He wasn't getting into trouble. He wasn't even bored. He was sitting among the teachers, listening to them, asking them questions. He was busy studying and discussing the scriptures and their meaning with these adults. This was no ordinary child. Everyone around was beginning to realize that. There was something about Jesus that caught people's attention. All who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. The insight that he had, even as a child, to the scriptures, the questions that he asked. Something's going on with him. He's different. Now, his parents see this and they're overwhelmed. I'm sure they're not thinking about how proud they are of their kid dialoguing with these teachers. This is not where they expected them to be. This is not what they expected them to be doing. They're probably relieved, but also frustrated, right? As any parent would be. It's been days, and instead of trying to reconnect with us, you're sitting here talking about the scriptures. I imagine how I would feel, let's say, back at Disney World, if we were frantically looking for Bree, and then all of a sudden we saw her walking out of Space Mountain, saying to somebody, that was awesome. Let's do it again. All the anxiety, all the sense of failure and the shame and the worry that they've been feeling over the last few days, it all comes to the surface. And Mary scolds Jesus. Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been

16:27searching for you in great distress. Now, Jesus's response is the key to this entire passage. We have to dive in here and base our understanding of the whole scene based on what he says, okay? It's important to know Jesus is not being flippant, he's not being dismissive, he's not being sassy to his parents. He's caring for them. He's caring for them. He's compassionate towards their anxiety, towards their worry. He offers them reassurance by reminding them who he is. That's the best and, at this point, the only reassurance that he offers them. Why were you looking for me?

17:18Did you not know that I must be in my father's house? Now, Jesus isn't asking, why did you come after me? Why did you want to see me again? He's not asking that. He's asking, why were you panicked?

17:35You should know where I would be. God is my father and I must be in my father's house, in my father's presence. This word must, in verse 49, the Greek word is day. Sometimes it's translated necessary. You're going to see the word must or necessary in your English Bible as we go through Luke. Luke uses this word day as a signal. When Jesus says it, he's about to tell you what his mission is, what his purpose is. And that's what he does right here. I must be in my father's house.

18:11It's interesting, the word house is not actually in the Greek. It's just implied. I must be among my father's business, in my father's affairs, in my father's presence. All of those things are implied.

18:29Jesus is not being a little scamp here, okay? He's not Macaulay Culkin. He's not off getting into trouble or indulging some kind of childish whim. He is seeking his father. Mary and Joseph's distress, their franticness, their aimless searching, it was because they forgot who their son was. He's the son of God, and he wants to be with the father. He loves the father, and he wants to follow and obey the father with whatever the father wants him to do. That's Jesus's mission. That's what keeps him true. The father is his north star. As an adult, Jesus says this. Here's a slide coming up here.

19:20The son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the father doing. For whatever the father does, the son does likewise. I seek not my own will, but the will of him who sent me. He never strays from his father's will. As a child, he came to the temple to draw near to his father and learn. Jesus is always where he should be. Really, it was Mary and Joseph who were lost. They were the ones lost that day. Even though they were searching for him, they were doing so without faithfully remembering who he was. You can't search for Jesus and not bear in mind who he is. Jesus invites them, now that you've found me, let me tell you, let me remind you who I belong to. I love my father. I must be about my father's business. Rest in that. Rest in who I am.

20:30Friends, so many things make us anxious. It's not just losing the steering in your car or losing your kid at Disney. Let's take it off those red flag emergency situations for a second. I'm not here to chastise you. Jesus is not here to chastise you about getting panicked if you lose your kid at Disney World. Let's talk about the other situations that lead us into anxiety, where we feel a loss of control, where we feel like there's an outcome, but we don't want a bad outcome that's ahead, and we want to steer around it, but we're not sure that we can. Estrangement from family. Job insecurity. Ongoing health issues. Unanswered prayers. Unmet longings. Unreconciled relationships. Conflict. When you wonder, how can I handle all this? Who sees me? Who notices me? What will happen? That's the space that I'm talking about, that Jesus speaks into. And he says, there is rest for your anxiety. There's rest in me. Jesus is inviting you, just like he invited Mary and Joseph, to rest in who he is, starting there with who Jesus is. You can't control the future, but you know the one who does.

22:06He is faithful. He is powerful. He is loving. He shows us this by being the obedient son to his father. It's good news for us today that he is who he says he is, and that he acted this way in this passage, the obedient son. It's good news for us that he obeys his father. Let me tell you why. Look at how the passage ends. He went down with them to Nazareth. He went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. Jesus hadn't done anything wrong in going to the temple.

22:48And even though he's God's son, he was put under the authority of his earthly parents. So he returns home with them. Now this is not just a happy ending to the story. Luke didn't just put this here to kind of resolve the tension that you feel at him getting lost, or really Mary and Joseph getting lost, and then their little conversation there in the temple. This is not just a period mark. This is not just a happy ending. Luke is telling us something. His mission is to obey his father, remember? Jesus came to die in the place of sinners, but first Jesus has to fulfill God's law. Every part of God's law he has to be obedient to. Look at this passage from Romans, by the one man's obedience, the many were made righteous. He can't be a sacrifice for sin without first perfectly keeping all of God's commandments. And what is the fourth commandment? Anybody know?

23:51Honor your father and mother. So he says, God is my father, but yes, I've been put under your care. So I'm going home with you to live submissively. He did that for you and me, who break God's law. That's why it's good news that he's the obedient son. That's what he is calling Mary and Joseph to trust in. I'm going to fulfill my mission. I'm going to stay true to the father. And it's for your sake. It's for your sake. Jesus honors his earthly parents to fulfill the mission that God sent him for. And he is going to keep obeying his mission until it is completely finished, no matter what the cost is. When the time came for his arrest, beatings, his death on the cross, Jesus cried out before all that happened to the father for strength. And he says this, not my will, but yours be done. Again, the obedient son, he gave himself as a ransom for many. His allegiance to the father, it's for our benefit. That's what we rest in. That's why we can trust him. This is why his words are comfort to Mary and to Joseph and to any of us that are struggling with anxiety, struggling with worry, struggling with an uncertain future. Rest in Christ, the one who will obey for your sake, the one who did obey for your sake, to completely fulfill the father's laws and his commandments so that he could die in your place.

25:44The perfect sacrifice for sin. Jesus is the obedient son. He's calling you today to lay down your anxiousness and to rest in his love for you. The love for you, which took him to the cross. The love that he has for the father. Pray with me. Lord, thank you for obeying your father. And Lord, just as you spoke tenderly to Mary and Joseph, I know that you speak tenderly to us now. You don't shame us for the anxiety that we feel, the worry that we feel. But you do call us to rest. You call us out of it into a greater sense of trust in who you are. Lord, we praise you today that you said long ago, you must be in your father's house. It was that alignment with your father, Jesus, that took you to the cross so that you could fulfill the work that you were sent to do, which is for our blessing and our benefit. Lord, help us to rest in you today. Give us rest from our worry, from the anxiousness that we feel. Jesus, we pray this in your name. Amen.