You can listen to this reflection here. Today's gospel reading is here.
I wonder if we would have as vivid a sense of Jesus’ humanity if the Gospels never showed him to us as an adolescent, seeking his independence, schooling a bunch of adults, giving his parents some “lip.” Only Luke tells this story, and we rarely hear it in church, but it gives us our only picture of Jesus before he turns up at the Jordan at the age of 30 as a full-fledged adult about to embark on God’s mission. Here we see a tantalizing glimpse into how that mission may have been unfolding in him.
This vignette takes place at Passover, when Jesus’ family go to Jerusalem with friends and relations to celebrate the holy days. When they start their return journey, Jesus stays behind without telling anyone; his parents assume he’s with others in the entourage and for a full day no one notices he’s not with them. Frantic, his parents return to Jerusalem and search high and low for three days and where do they find him?
After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. 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.’ He said to them, ‘Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?’
Only a teenager could so blithely ignore the emotional turmoil of his family, arrogantly sure he is right. “What’s wrong with you guys? Didn’t you read my mind?” (I kind of hear him say these words in the voice of Sheldon Cooper from The Big Bang Theory..) But of course this is Jesus, son of God and son of Mary – so in a sense he is right, just stating facts.
I wonder how those words landed on his parents. They must have held all those prophecies about their firstborn in their hearts all these years, perhaps hoping they would never be realized. Did those words, “My Father’s house” strike fear into Mary’s heart, pain into Joseph’s? Luke says only, But they did not understand what he said to them. Then he went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them. His mother treasured all these things in her heart.
Mary had to do a lot of treasuring things in her heart, the gifts as well as the ache and anxiety about when that sword would pierce her heart. But it appears that after this incident, things returned to normal in that household in Nazareth. Jesus increased in wisdom and in years, and in divine and human favour, had friends, went to parties and weddings, and presumably took up a position in his earthly father’s business. Until he took his position in his heavenly father’s business.
That is where we will meet him next in the Gospels.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
