McClelland (T. C), The Mind of Christ, 21.
MacDonald (G.), The Hope of the Gospel, 40.
Maclaren (A.), After the Resurrection, 193.
Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, xxviii. (1882), No. 1666
Talbot (E. S.), Some Aspects of Christian Truth, 208.
Thome (H.), Notable Sayings of the Great Teacher, 63.
Tymms (T. V.), The Private Relationships of Christ, 55.
Wilberforce (B.), New {?) Theology, 38.
Christian World Pulpit, Ivi. 292 (C. S. Home); Ixxxii. 388 (J. E
Eattenbury). Church of England Pulpit, xxix. 73. Church Pulpit Year Book, 1910, p. 18. Churchman's Pulpit : First Sunday after the Epiphany, iii. 439 (G
Prevost). Expositor, 2nd Ser., viii. 17 (R. E. Wallis).
Always at Home.
And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be in ray Father's house?— Luke ii. 49 (R.V.).
Few passages in the Gospels exhibit more vividly the mysterious combination of the natural and supernatural, the Divine and human, in our Lord, than the brief narrative in St. Luke from which the text is taken, and which tells us all that we know of our Lord from His infancy to the commencement of His ministry. Though this single incident is the only instance in which the veil is lifted by which those thirty years or so of His life are covered, it is sufficient to cast a clear and bright light upon the whole of that period, and to reveal to us the spirit in which He was living ; and it will be found also to illustrate the manner in which those who would fain be of service to God and to their fellows should prepare themselves for such tasks.
1. The first point that strikes us in the narrative is the evidence
it affords of the perfect naturalness and simplicity by which our
Lord's life at this period is marked. The picture of His tarrying
behind in Jerusalem, Joseph and His mother not knowing of it,
but going a day's journey, supposing Him to have been in the
company, exhibits Him as living a free and trustful life, like other
children, mixing with those of His own age, and in affectionate
intercourse with His parents' kinsfolk and acquaintances. The
perfect freedom from anxiety about the child shown by the
conduct of Joseph and Mary at the outset implies an absence of
any unusual strictness or formality in their relations with Him.
It is a piece of child-life such as might have been seen in any
other affectionate and pious Jewish household attending the feast
at Jerusalem. Perhaps more suggestive still of the absence from
our Lord's character, at this period, of any of those unnatural
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io6 ALWAYS AT HOME
features which characterize apocryphal accounts of His childhood is the fact of Joseph and His mother seeking for Him, for three days, in every place but that in which He was at last found — in the ordinary homes and haunts of children, as it would seem, and not in circles devoted to learning or pious meditation. His question, indeed, in answer to their remonstrance, implies that they might have known more of His character than this. " Son," said His mother, " why hast thou thus dealt with us ? behold, thy father and I sought thee sorrowing." And He said unto them, " How is it that ye sought me ? wist ye not that I must be in my Father's house ? "
That Mary's thoughts were not at once directed to the Temple is a striking illustration of the absence — if the word may be used for the purpose of contrast — of unusual professions or pretensions in our Lord's ordinary conduct. His parents seem to have expected Him throughout to do as other children did, and to be found where other children were ; and even when He gave them the explanation just quoted "they understood not the saying which he spake unto themi." Nor did He even then pursue any special or unusual way of life. The fascination exercised over Him by His Father's house, and by this interview with the great teachers of the law, did not divert Him from the ordinary paths of a child's or a young man's life ; but " he went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them " ; and He in- creased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.
0 happy pair of Nazareth,
Who saw the early light Of Him who dawned upon the world
As dawns the day on night.
Within their home they saw the Child
That lived the perfect love, A love like that which rules the heart
Of the great God above.
His childish voice and kindly tone,
His pure and patient face, His tender mercies shown to all,
With never-ceasing grace;
ST. LUKE II. 49 107
The way He bore His youthful cross,
The reasons for His tears, The kind of things which gave Him joy —
Unchanged through growing years, —
At home and in the playground throng,
They saw these heavenly ways, And grew increasingly to speak
With words of reverent praise.
That simple, lovely, wondrous life
Betrayed itself from heaven ; He was the Child that should be born,
The Son that should be given.
He grew in stature and in praise,
By honest hearts adored, Till in that home where He was born