Reminders of God

This is the message given in the United Methodist churches of the Wheatland Parish on Sunday, July 19, 2015.  The Bible verses used are Luke 2:41-52.

            We’re continuing our sermon series on Mary, the mother of Jesus.  At this point, Mary and Joseph are back in Nazareth.  They’re back home, raising Jesus just as they’re supposed to.

            Every year, though, they have to make that trip from Nazareth to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover.  That was just what good Jewish people did back then, at least if they lived within a reasonable distance from Jerusalem.  You may recall that’s why Jesus went to Jerusalem in the last week of his life on earth—because it was the Passover.

            So, Mary and Joseph and Jesus go to Jerusalem.  Jesus is twelve years old at this point.  They celebrate the Passover.  Everything goes fine, the Passover ends, it’s time to go home.  Our reading describes them as traveling in a group, sort of like a caravan.  That’s what people did back then.  So, Mary and Joseph set out with everyone else in the caravan.  They don’t know exactly where Jesus is, but there’s nothing unusual about that.  They figure he’s around somewhere, with his relatives or his friends or somebody.  They’re not worried about it.

            They travel for a day.  And then night comes, and they start looking for Jesus.  And they cannot find him.  I can imagine them going from family to family, getting more and more frantic.  “Have you seen Jesus?  Have you seen Jesus?”  And each time, the answer is no.  No one’s seen him.  He’s not there.  He must have somehow been left behind.  He must be back in Jerusalem.

            Can you imagine how they felt?  Not unless you’ve experienced it, probably.  Those of you who have kids, has any of them ever gotten lost, even for just a little while?  How did you feel?  Probably pretty panicked.  Where is he?  What could’ve happened to her?  You start frantically calling out their name.  You start trying to figure out where they might be.  If you’re on the road, you start backtracking, trying to think when the last time you saw them was.  Where could they be?  What if they got kidnapped?  What if they got killed?  I imagine all kinds of things are going through your mind when you have a child that gets lost.

            I imagine all those things were going through the minds of Mary and Joseph.  And oh by the way, this is not just any twelve-year-old boy who’s lost.  It’s the boy who’s supposed to grow up to be the savior of the world.  God has specifically chosen you to raise this special child.  And what did you do?  You went and lost him!  What if you can’t find him?  Is the chance for salvation lost?  Is God going to strike you down and send you to hell for messing this up? 

Well, there’s nothing for it but for them to go back to Jerusalem and start a search.  Now, it took them a day to get to where they were, so I assume it took them a day to get back to Jerusalem, too.  So that’s two days that Jesus has been missing.  And Jerusalem was not a small town.  The information I saw said that, in Jesus’ time, it had about sixty thousand people in it.  That’s roughly the size of Rapid City.

            So, imagine trying to find one twelve-year-old boy in a town the size of Rapid City.  Talk about looking for a needle in a haystack.  And of course, this was two thousand years ago.  There was no communications technology.  You could not put out an amber alert.  You could not even put his picture on a milk carton.  In fact, you did not even have a picture you could show anyone.  All you can do is go house to house and give a description of him, a description that probably fits a thousand other twelve-year-old boys.

            No one can help you.  You want to tell them to keep an eye out and let you know if they see him, but how are they going to do that?  It’s not like you have a cell phone they can call.  They don’t know where you’ll be.  You probably don’t know where you’ll be.  All you can do is go to the next house, and the next, and the next, hoping desperately that someone will have some kind of information that will help you find Jesus.

            We’re told that three days passed.  That makes five days since Jesus was lost.  Is he finding something to eat?  Is he finding somewhere warm to sleep?  Is he even still alive?  Mary and Joseph had no way to know.  All they can do is keep looking.

            And finally, they go to the temple courts.  We don’t know why they went there.  Did they have reason to think Jesus was there?  Did they go there to pray?  Did they think maybe the rabbis could help them?  Was it just the next place to look?  We don’t know.  But they go there, and there’s Jesus.  And he’s fine.  He’s sitting there among the teachers, listening and asking questions.  And everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers.

            We’re told that “When his parents saw him, they were astonished.”  Were they astonished at what he was saying, at his questions and his answers?  Or maybe they were simply astonished that they’d found him!  After five days, they found him!  And he was alive, and he was okay, and everything was going to be all right.  And Mary says to Jesus, “Son, why have you treated us like this?  Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.” 

That’s written really matter-of-factly.  But I’ll bet Mary did not say it matter-of-factly.  There had to be all kinds of emotions going through her.  Joy and anger and relief and frustration and happiness and I don’t know what-all.  Mary probably did not know whether to laugh or to cry.  She did not know whether to hug Jesus or to smack him for putting them through all that.  Maybe she did both, who knows.

Jesus answers here, “Why were you searching for me?  Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?”  But of course, Mary and Joseph did not know what that meant.  And Jesus went back to Nazareth went them.  And life went on.  And Mary and Joseph continued to raise Jesus, and he eventually grew into a man. 

But we’re told one other thing here.  It’s the same thing we were told after the shepherds left the stable.  We’re told, “his mother treasured all these things in her heart.”

Mary may not have understood all the things that were going on.  In fact, she may have understood very little.  But she knew that somehow, these things were all important.  She knew they meant something, even if she did not know what.  She knew God was involved in them.  So she remembered them.  And she thought about them.  Maybe someday she’d understand what they meant, or maybe she never would.  But she knew they were important, and she knew God was involved in them, and she was not going to forget them.

I think most of us have times like that in our lives.  Not every day.  Most days just go on as they do, calmly and unremarkably, just like most of the first twelve years of Jesus’ life did.  But every once in a while, something happens that we know is significant.  We may not know why it’s significant, but we know it is.  We know it’s something important.  We know it means something, even if we don’t know what.  We know God is involved in them.  And so, we make sure we remember them and think about them.  Maybe someday we’ll understand what they mean, or maybe we never will.  But we know they’re important, and we know God is involved in them, and we’re not going to forget them.

One of the things that times like this are, I think, is that they’re reminders that God is active in our lives.  God is active in our lives all the time, of course.  God never leaves us or abandons us.  But when these special times come, these important times, these that are important even though we don’t understand why, we become more conscious of God’s presence in our lives.  And those times, those reminders of God’s presence, carry us through and help us keep believing and keep trusting in those times when we have trouble feeling that God is with us.

Mary had a huge responsibility, raising the Son of God.  There had to be a lot of times when she wondered if she was doing things right.  Every mother, and every father, probably goes through that.  But when you’re raising the Son of God, you probably feel it even more.  You think, am I doing this right?  Is God pleased with me?  Is that the decision God wants me to make?  Am I messing this whole thing up?

It’s then, I think, that these things that Mary treasured in her heart came back to her.  She remembered the angel Gabriel talking to her.  She remembered the visit from the shepherds.  She remembered finding Jesus in the temple.  And those things reminded her that God was with her, even if she did not feel God right then.  And they helped her know that God was always with her, and God would help her, and things would turn out the way they were supposed to turn out.

God is always with us, too.  You and I will have times when we have trouble feeling God’s presence.  We’ll have times when we wonder if we’re doing things right.  We’ll have times when we wonder, am I doing okay?  Is God really pleased with me?  Am I living the way God wants me to live?  Am I messing this whole thing up?

That’s when we need to remember those reminders God has given us.  That’s when we need to remember those significant times, those important times, those times when God is involved.  Those things remind us that God is with us, even if we don’t feel it right at the moment.  They help us know God is always with us, and God will help us, and things will turn out the way they’re supposed to turn out.

            God was with Mary.  God is with you.  And God is with me.  We don’t always understand what things mean.  And maybe we never will.  But God is involved in them.  And if we trust God, things will turn out the way they’re supposed to turn out.