We know very little of Jesus’s upbringing. The only glimmer is found in Luke when he describes Jesus remaining at the temple engrossed in scholarly talk with great scholars. Today we might read that Joseph and Mary were arrested for abandoning their son for several days, or the opposite. Jesus and Mary like true helicopter parents deciding their child is a prodigy and leaving him in the hands of others to raise their child so he can become a world famous scholar without a clue what the real world is like.
Neither happened. Many sermons are written about Jesus’s famous words after being chewed out by Mary: “Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” Rightfully so.
But perhaps we should also look at the next verse where it is said that, “Then he went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them.” (Luke 2:51).
His parents wanted their son to live a normal childhood, learning about the real experiences of life and how ordinary people coped. Jesus too knew he wasn’t sent to be a great scholar of worldly renown. He wasn’t on the earth to obtain laurels and accolades. He chose to be obedient and humble. It wouldn’t be his last act of humility either.
In those few verses we learn all we need to know about Jesus’s early life. We also may have been given a glimmer into the world of parenting.
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