Luke 2:39

Luk_2:39-52

Now His parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the Passover

The life of Jesus

I.

JESUS CHRIST IN HOME LIFE. And He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them.

1. We see Him settling down to the relationships of home. But Jesus Christ was perfectly content in the home circle. He did not complain of its narrowness and confinement. For He did not judge life by its magnitude, but by the principle which animates it; He did not judge life by its conspicuousness; but by the spirit which inspires it. The tiny speck on the lady-birds wing is as round a circle as that of the world. The sphere which a tear makes is as mathematically perfect as that of yonder sun. It makes not the slightest difference in the real merit of a book whether it is printed in large or small type; in either case the meaning is precisely the same. Some people seriously object to the privacy of home--the type is too small to please their fancy; they must act their part on the public stage, in the corners of the streets, and in the synagogues--they dearly love a large type. But the Saviour spent thirty years in the privacy of home, and never once complained of its narrowness and obscurity.

2. We are further taught that He faithfully discharged the duties of home--the duties which devolved on Him as a son in the family. Each memberof the family has its respective services to perform, and harmony always depends upon the right adjustment, the proper balancing, of distinct interests. He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them. He might have been wiser than they; but superior knowledge does not justify insubordination.

3. And the context shows that in all this He was doing His Fathers work. Wist ye not that I must be about My Fathers work? And if home life were not an integral department of that work, it would have been utterly impossible for Jesus Christ to have submitted to it. But home life is a Divine life, a type, possibly, of the inner life of the Godhead. The Bible represents God as a Father, it describes Him as having a family, it sets Him forth as having a home. Home life is a Divine life, and by serving it we do Gods work.

II. JESUS CHRIST IN SOCIAL LIFE.

1. Here we see Him settling down to the relationships of society, and that the most corrupt society in the whole world. Nazareth would have ranked among the choicest towns of Palestine; but its inhabitants were notorious far and near for their impiety, recklessness, and heathenism. Every prospect pleases, and only map is vile. Strange that God should choose depraved Nazareth to be the dwelling-place of His Son for thirty years 1 We would have imagined that a select and secluded spot would have been chosen where He would have been kept from all contact with sin, and where He would have been partitioned off from other children, and thus secured against the contagion of evil. But that was not Gods idea of holiness. Glass-house virtue He did not covet. For the dove to keep her wing pure and unsullied amid the free air of heaven is not so very difficult--indeed the difficulty is to soil it; but to keep it white and clean amongthe pots is quite another matter, and harder far to accomplish. From early infancy Jesus Christ had to face vice; from the outset He had to grapple with sin. His virtue must be sinewy, manly, tried, and triumphant. Earthly parents may here learn a very precious lesson: not to put too much confidence in glasshouse virtue--it generally withers on its first exposure to the rude winds of the world. Children may be ruined in one of two ways: either by being permitted to visit all kinds of wicked places and witness all manner of obscene spectacles without let or hindrance; or by being kept too strictly aloof from all society and guarded too narrowly against the approach of other children, for when the protection is withdrawn, as withdrawn it surely must be, and they are left to fight for themselves, they will almost necessarily succumb to the first assault of temptation. And conservatory children may be very pleasing to look at so long as they are under shelter; but the first storm will make a sad havoc among their branches. Let children learn from the first how to defend themselves against physical and moral foes alike.

2. We further learn that He discharged with the utmost fidelity the duties of society, the duties that devolved upon Him as a citizen of Nazareth. He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and there, adds the evangelist very significantly, He grew in favour with God and men. I confess to a strong liking for the phrase that He grew in favour with men. He knew what it was to luxuriate in the golden opinions of His neighbours. And let none of you, young people, despise the favour of men; to please society is not altogether an unworthy aim. Favour with God must precede favour with men. He grew in favour with men. This supposes that He was studious of the little proprieties of every-day life. There are men who cling with indomitable tenacity to the fundamental verities; rather than relax their hold of them, they will go cheer fully to the stake to die. But they are culpably regardless of the little politenesses of social intercourse--they never grow in favour with men. They remind one of a rugged granite rock, firm, solid, and white under the meridian light; but no flower grows in its clefts, no snowdrop or foxglove, no primrose or daisy, softens the untarnished hardness. They are men of strong principles, but of ungracious disposition; they never grow in favour with men.

3. And in leading the life of a citizen the context shows He was doing the work of God. Wist ye not that I must be about My Fathers business? If there is a must in it, it is evident He cannot leave it; and that in going down to Nazareth He continued to be about it. The truth is, society is a Divine institution; and in serving it we do Gods work. Jesus Christ lived in

Nazareth to realize the Divine idea of a citizen, to reduce to actuality, to embody in a life, the thought as it existed in the Divine mind. Men had to see the perfect life acted out before their eyes. He was not of the world--not of it in its way of thinking, not of it in its way of feeling, not of it in its way of living; not of it, yet in it. Anti as He was, so are we--placed in the midst of society, and yet of a Divine citizenship. The highest ideal of Christian life is city life. Ye are a city set on a hill. The life of innocent humanity was a garden or rural life. The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and put man there. It was a free, simple, country life. But ye are come to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and your life henceforth must be city life.

III. JESUS CHRIST IN INDUSTRIAL LIFE. He went down with them, and came to Nazareth.

1. By thus entering into industrial life He shows that work may be made sacred.

2. He further shows that work is not incompatible with the highest religious attainments.

3. By following a trade, He further showed that the highest purpose of work is not fortune but discipline. I suppose we cannot all get on in this world of ours, and my text reminds us of another who worked very hard, who followed His trade diligently, but did not get on very well except towards Gethsemane, Calvary, and the grave. He can sympathize with you; He stands by your side, ready to share your burden; He stoops, He bends; may you have the grace to roll it on His shoulders! What is Christianity? God bending beneath and bearing aloft the burden of the world. If work does not better your earthly condition, it will improve your heart; if it does not add to your fortune, it will considerably augment your manhood; if it will not bring you affluence in this life, it will help to qualify you for a more abundant entrance on the rich, profound life on yonder side the grave.

IV. JESUS CHRIST IN HIS RELIGIOUS OR TEMPLE LIFE.

1. The context shows us that He was in His Fathers house, and that whilst there the blessed and glorious truth of His Sonship dawned upon Him. All rich natures, all deep and fertile natures, feel an attraction towards Gods temple. There is so much mystery appealing powerfully to the worshipful faculty, so much solemn grandeur subduing the heart and carrying it captive, such sublimity and loftiness in the service of the temple, though outwardly it be but a barn, that it gives ample scope for the imagination. Hence all rich, poetical natures find their proper food and their appropriate atmosphere in the service of Gods house.

2. He was in the Temple, asking and answering questions. His mind thirsted for knowledge. But as Christ was free from sin, His insight was quicker, clearer, deeper than ours. An intellect twelve years old free from sin will astonish intellects fifty years old tainted by the disease. The water-lily, growing in the midst of water, opens its leaves, expands its petals, at the first pattering of the shower, whilst other flowers in the same neighbourhood are quite insensible to the descent of the raindrops. Why? Because reared in water, it has quicker sympathy with rain. And so with the Lily of our Humanity: His soul, planted, as it were, in the midst of the ocean of omniscience, rejoiced in knowledge with a quicker and more refined sympathy than has ever been witnessed before or since in the history of our race.

3. Observe, further, His total absorption in His Fathers work. Wist ye not that I must be about My Fathers business? Literally, in My Fathers business. Not about it, but in it. (J. C. Jones.)

The training of Jesus Christ

Observe, then, just where the real difficulty lies: it lies not in the fact of growth; it lies in the fact of incarnation, or the Divine birth itself. For the distance between the Babe of Bethlehem and the Man of Nazareth is infinitely less than the distance between man and God. But Christs growth, be it carefully observed, implies no sort of imperfection. It is no sign of imperfection in a peach tree that it does not bear peaches in spring. And this growth does not seem to have been marked by anything striking. Had it been, the presumption is that his biographers would at least have hinted it. The very silence here of the evangelists is thrilling, for it brings the Divine Man within the range of our human sympathies and affections, thoroughly identifying Him with our average humanity. He grew up, as grows His own kingdom, without observation. Wist ye not that I must be in My Fathers house, about My Fathers business? All these years the heavenly Plant has been unfolding, and now appears the first blossom.

1. There was the school of home. I do not refer here to the lessons consciously taught by parents so much as to the lessons unconsciously taught by the home institution itself. We are trained for the celestial home in the school of the terrestrial, learning the heavenly sonhood in the exercise of an earthly, the universal brotherhood in the sphere of a personal. Home--that is to say, true home--is the best soil for the germination and growth of large, solid, abiding character. Christs stay of thirty years beneath His mothers roof is an eternal glorification of the home institution.

2. There was the school of subordination. Loyalty is the mother of royalty.

3. There was the school of toil. There is no reason for supposing that Joseph and Mary were especially poor, and therefore that Jesus was brought up in absolute poverty. Ah, how this educates Him for sympathy with what must ever be the preponderating class of humanity, the working-class.

4. There was the school of society. No desert education was His, like that of His forerunner, John the Baptizer. He must feel the quickening, broadening, rounding power of society.

5. There was the school of isolation. What though He was brought up in society? Society comprehended Him not. Even His brothers, sons of His own mother, did not believe on Him. For the foundations of character are laid in moral solitude. Mans grandest victories are, and ever must be, won single-handed.

6. There was the school of the synagogue. Every day in the week, and three times every Saturday or the Jewish Sabbath, Jesus went to the synagogue, where He saw a model of the ark of the covenant, and the scrolls of the sacred books, and joined in the prescribed prayers, and listened to the reading of the two lessons--the one from the law, the other from the prophets.

7. There was the school of providence. Daily providence was His daily teacher.

8. There was the school of nature.

9. There was the school of routine. Doubtless it was the same unbroken, monotonous routine of family and workshop and synagogue, week after week, month after month, year after year. The frequent and tedious drill is the best preparation for the battle paean.

10. There was the school of delay. During those long thirty years Jesus doubtless often yearned to enter at once upon His glorious mission as the Christ of God and the Saviour of men. Not that enterprise and courage and energy are not praiseworthy. They are most noble traits. But there is such a thing as prematurity, and prematurity is apt to mean failure. This lesson of patience is especially needed in our times and land. It is an age of swift things, morally as well as physically. Young man, patiently abide your time. There is no heroism like the heroism of patience, no majesty like the majesty of self-confluence.

11. There was the school of temptation. And temptation is not only essential to character-disclosing, temptation is also essential to character-building.

12. There was the school of experience. For there is no education like the education of personal experience. Nothing can take the place of it: neither wealth, nor genius, nor splendid opportunities, nor indomitable will. And as in nature, so in morals: the slower the crystallization, the more perfect and abiding. And all this was as true for the Christ as it is for you and me. Such is the story of the home-life of the Divine Man. As that Greater than Solomon was rearing that temple nobler than Moriahs, no stroke of hammer, or axe, or any tool of iron was heard.

No workmans steel, no ponderous axes rung,

Like some tall palm the noiseless fabric sprung,

The great lesson, then, of the home-life at Nazareth is this: Every-day life our training-school for heaven. (G. D. Boardman.)

First Sunday after Epiphany

But let us now direct our attention more particularly to the youthful Saviours visit to the Temple, as narrated in this days Gospel.

1. It appears from this record, that his parents were punctual and regular in their attendance upon the appointed services of religion. They were poor. They also lived very far away. By actual experiment, I found it two days and a half hard riding, upon active horses, from Nazareth to Jerusalem. But they found no excuse in these things for failing to be present in the holy city when the feast of the Passover came round.

2. It appears that, as soon as Jesus had reached His twelfth year, these pious parents took Him with them on their annual visit to the sacred city and Temple. At any rate, they took Him with them, an example which it would be well for all parents to note and follow.

3. It appears that this visit of the young Saviour to the holy city and Temple was the means of an enlarged and astonishing spiritual awakening to Him. Mind left to itself stagnates and fails of proper fruitfulness. The quickening spark needs to be applied to kindle it into living flame and power. New subjects were thrown in upon His human intellect. A new world opened to His soul and seized upon His heart, already in holy and peaceful harmony with the deepest underlying Spirit of all. It was not a conversion, for He needed no converting. It was not the implantation of the new life; for He never was dead to holy things. But it was the opening of His human faculties, the quickening of their activities, to grasp the objects which were to fill and enlist His powers, which marked the commencement of that higher consciousness and ampler realization of the truth, in meek and zealous obedience to which He from that time forward went forth, and which was the active principle of all His subsequent life and deeds as the Redeemer el the world. Brethren, will any one look these facts in the face and say, that there is no use for children to come to the temple of God! I know of a boy, who, at fourteen years of age, walked a series of miles from his home, to a strange place, to see a synodical convention. He started out in the morning, and returned at night, without partaking of a meal during his absence, and repeated the same on the day following. And from what he saw and heard during those two days, there was formed in his heart the purpose to devote himself to the gospel ministry. That purpose he also carried into effect, against the dissuasion of his bishop, the disapprobation of his father, and all the disadvantages of the absence of pecuniary resources. That contact with the assembled ministers of the Church, brought about by no particular object save to gratify a general desire for information, and without having spoken a word to any of them, touched a cord, and awoke a feeling, which gave shape and direction to his whole after life. And that boy is your preacher to-day! Nor can you know what living seeds of transforming power, and fruitfulness in virtue and grace, may be planted by a single visit of a youth to the temple of God! See to it, then, that your children are early brought into connection with all the ministrations of the sanctuary.

4. It also appears from this record, that even the pious Joseph and Mary expected much less from this carrying of the youthful Jesus to the temple, than actually occurred. Ah yes, there is often more going on in the hearts of children than their parents, who know them best, suppose or believe. The purest waters are those that run deepest under ground, before they show themselves; and there may be much more in our children, and in the very line of our most anxious desires, than we would for a moment think of ascribing to them.

5. Finally, it appears from this record, what that was which from earliest youth most powerfully absorbed Christs feelings and attention, and what in His view is the proper thing supremely to enlist and engage the young. How is it that ye sought Me? wist ye not that I must be about My Fathers business? He had relations in heaven paramount to all relations of kindred and blood on earth. (J. A. Seiss, D. D.)

The early years of Christ

Conceiving of Him then, as in a transition from childhood to manhood, as in a process of training for the highest of works, we ask what lessons are to be gathered from His silent years?

I. We shall conclude that GOD QUALIFIED HIS SON, BORN OF A WOMB, MADE UNDER THE LAW, FOR HIS FUTURE OFFICE, BY THE TRAINING OF THE FAMILY STATE. And was subject to His parents. The family state, we cannot doubt, was most happily devised, according to the original plan of uncorrupt human nature, not only for the preservation and physical welfare of the child, but also for the development of all the higher qualities of man. It is the beginning and the condition of society. He who passes out of its healthy training into the larger circle of fellow-citizens or fellow-men, has a foundation already laid for all social sympathies, for the conception of human brotherhood, for the exercise of good will in every form. It is also the condition of, and the preparation for, all law. The dependent being, trained up in it to listen to higher authority and wisdom, to give up self-will and practice self-control, becomes fitted for the loyal life of the citizen, and for obedience to God. Thus it was meant, according to the primaeval plan, that the infant mind should be disciplined in the family for a life of law and of love--law which should lead the soul up to the great central Lawgiver of the universe, and, love, which should embrace the brotherhood of souls, and God, the Father of all. His soul was fitted for its work by entering into the great relations of humanity.

II. JESUS PASSED THROUGH THE DISCIPLINE OF A LIFE OF HUMBLE INDUSTRY. Is not this the carpenter? Here we have two things to notice, the discipline of a life of industry upon the Son of Man, and the influence of the lowly position which He thus assumed among His brethren of mankind. We must conceive, then, that during these years of labour as a carpenter, the Son of Man had time, even amid His work, for noble and holy thoughts. Nor ought we to lay out of account the patience which sedulous manual labour would bring along with it. I may add, that the helpfulness of our Lord in His calling tended to strengthen the principle of helpfulness to mankind, or of unwearied benevolence. But the patient helpfulness of Jesus, as He did His work well in and for the family, inured His holy mind to the hard toils of that glorious life of love, in which we learn, on one occasion, that He had not time so much as to eat bread, and gave Himself up to works of mercy so earnestly that His friends thought Him mad. What other training could have equally encouraged His unwearied devotion to the hard, slow work of doing good? But the obscurity of the sphere in which Jesus moved, aided the graces of His character, such as meekness and lowliness, and also enlarged His power of usefulness. Here we notice only the last particular, leaving the others for future remark. It is often thought to add to a mans power among men, if he is born in a high place, and commands the respect of mankind as well by his ancestry and station, as by what he is. But the power to act upon men, so far as it depends on feeling with them, and being felt with by them, is generally abridged by position above the major part of mankind. Hence it is, that those monarchs who have risen from the people can know them better, and come closer to their admiration and their hearts, than such as have inherited the throne. Hence, too, those reformers are likely to be most successful, who add to other advantages that of a lively interest in and comprehension of the great mass of men, which their birth and early education has encouraged. The son of the miner, at Eisleben, with his homely, earnest peasant-soul, and his manly courage, was fitter to attract and mingle with his countrymen, was better able, when his mind had become enlarged by study, to spread the Protestant Reformation, than if he had been the son of an Emperor of Germany, or one of the princes of the empire. Such a personage, if he could have understood and preached the gospel, would have found that a gulf was fixed between him and his people.

III. THE SILENT YEARS AT NAZARETH ENABLED HIM TO MEDITATE LONG AND DEEPLY ON THE SCRIPTURES. A striking characteristic of our Lord, from the first moment of His public ministry onward, is His reverence for and familiarity with the Scriptures. Here, then, in this sequestered village, away from the emptiness of Pharisaical learning, and from Sadducean scepticism, He was reared on the Divine Word in its simplicity, was fortified by it against temptation, studied its promises of a coming Messiah, and became ready to apply it to the varying circumstances of practical life. He trained mankind through the Jews; He made His Son a Jew that He might build up on the old foundation the new truths of a religion for the world; and in order that Jesus Himself might be trained up for this work He chose this simple method of placing Him alone with the ancient Scriptures, away from human teachers and comments, that the pure truth of God might fill His mind.

IV. The life of retirement which Jesus led at Nazareth WAS FITTED TO NOURISH SOME OF THOSE MEEK AND UNPRETENDING GRACES OF CHARACTER WHICH SHONE BEYOND COMPARISON IN HIM. I name first patience, or willingness to wait until the right time was come. The same discipline which perfected the patience, perfected also the calmness of Jesus. His obedience grew, through His years of waiting, deeper and heavenlier became His calmness. This discipline of His still years gave strength also to His retiring spirit, or modesty. I only add, that the retirement of Nazareth was fitted to nourish simplicity of feeling and character. It has been made a definition of a wise and pure life to live according to nature. The simplicity and honesty of the man Christ Jesus were, no doubt, nourished and perfected in a simple, godly family, in a simple village, away from much of the gloss and falsehood which abounded in Judea. We might conceive of Divine wisdom taking just the opposite method of calling it forth, that of placing Jesus in close neighbourhood to formal and false Pharisees, so that His education should consist in loathing the characters which He should see around Him. That strength would come from such a discipline we cannot doubt; and yet the other plan, which was in fact chosen, seems the best for a harmonious perfection of the whole character, and especially for the predominance of the gentler virtues, ( T. D. Woolsey, D. D.)

The personality of Jesus

The Man in germ, the personality in the making, we see but once, yet the once is almost enough. The Child has come with His parents to Jerusalem. The city, the solemnities, the Temple, the priests, the sacrifices, the people, have stirred multitudinous new thoughts in the Boy tie becomes for a moment forgetful of His kin, conscious of higher and Diviner relations, and seeks light and sympathy where they were most likely to he found--in the Temple and with the doctors. It is an eminently natural and truthful incident. The Ideal Child, wise in His innocent simplicity, seeks the society of simple but learned age, feels at home in it, wonders only, when sought and found, that it could be in His mothers mind other than it was in His own. The light that streams from the question, Wist ye not that I must be among My Fathers matters, in His house, in search of His truth, mindful of His purposes? illumines the Youth and makes Him foreshadow the Man. For He, who as Boy, was anxious to be absorbed in His Father and His Fathers affairs, became as Man the conscious abode of God. Here, indeed, emerges the sublimest and most distinctive feature of His personality. In Him, as in no other, God lived; He lived as no other ever did in God. Their communion was a union which authorized the sayings, I and the Father are one; He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father. His consciousness was full of God, was consciousness of God. (Principal Fairbairn, D. D.)

Glimpses of the Divine Childhood

This beautiful and only glimpse of the Boyhood of our Saviour is full of interest. It enables us to behold Jesus on this memorable occasion through the medium of others feelings. We can often more vividly represent to ourselves a scene, and take in its meaning, when we are told what thoughts and feelings it stirred in the minds of actual spectators. By simple and natural touches the story before us fixes our thought upon Mary and others, but especially upon the mother, and the changing feelings of her heart during these few days. By the side of Mary, then, let us first approach, and study the behaviour of the Divine Child, so perplexing at the time to her, so charged with significance in the reflection of after-days, and now so full of light and holy beauty to all disciples of Jesus and students of His life.

1. The story opens with a powerful stroke of pathos. A child is lost! A mothers heart is thrown into agony. Several details left to be filled up by the imagination. Caravan had set out early in morning. A large group of relatives and friends of Joseph and Marys house amidst the throng. Taken for granted that Jesus was among them until night began to fall, and it was time for Him to come to His parents tent to rest. Nightfall made the discovery all the more terrible. Let us picture to ourselves the state of His mothers mind during those three weary days that followed--perhaps not to the Temple that Joseph and Mary first bent their steps. Narrative seems to hint that they were quite at a loss to imagine where the Child was. At length, however, in the course of their search, their steps are directed to the Temple. There were connected with the sacred edifice a number of halls or class-rooms, where the Rabbis met and instructed their scholars. Amongst these Rabbis there arose from time to time true and weighty moral teachers, who directed attention to something more important than the curious mystical speculations and interpretations which form so large a part of the Talmud. Of these the most famous was Hillel, whose memory was quite fresh, and whose influence was still great in the Temple schools. There is little doubt that our Lord recognized a true spirit in this eminent Rabbi; and it has been shown that there are striking points of resemblance between their teachings. To that school Jesus went, and taking His seat among the scholars, proceeded to put His questions, and to listen to the teachers answers; for this was the customary mode of instruction in the Jewish schools; and a great part of the rabbinical books consists of the answers to such questions.

2. Here, then, a scene opens before us in the Temple school which is impressed upon us as a very remarkable one. We are invited to look upon it through the eyes of the bystanders, who, we are told, were filled with wonder and astonishment. But what was so astonishing 7 What was it that made this Child the focus of every gaze--that drew upon Him the profound attention of bearded sages, of venerable brows, that awakened the curiosity of young and old? Not, probably, the fact that a Boy of twelve was to be found in such a place and occupation; for at that age He would be regarded by the Jews as a son of the law. It was the extraordinary intelligence of His remarks and replies, His understanding, i.e., His mental grasp, His insight into things.

3. Joseph and Mary coming in were likewise amazed at the scene. In their case the wonder seems more difficult of explanation; and it is instructive to ponder the fact for a moment. Is it not often so, that parents or relatives are blind to that which is most significant in their children? Joseph and Mary must have been aware of the great destiny promised to Jesus; they could not possibly have forgotten all the Divine marks that were attached to His birth and infancy. And yet they were astonished when His destiny began to unfold itself before their eyes. Must we not all reproach ourselves with some such fault? Our eye rests so strongly on the outward, the circumstantial side of life that our interest is drawn away from the real and spiritual.

4. The contrast of the calmness of the Child with the astonishment of those around Him deepens our impression of the meaning of the scene. Why did ye seek Me? Did ye not know that I must be about My Fathers business? or, in My Fathers house? Where should you have expected to find Me, but in this chosen and beloved spot? This sense seems to us natural, suggestive, appropriate. If we take the phrase in the wider sense, a meaning is yielded only less suggestive. But either way a profound devotion to God and to His kingdom is expressed in the language of the Divine Child--an absorption in these high thoughts as all-commanding and supreme over ordinary relations and affections. His words were not understood, we are told, by those nearest to Him in earthly relation. There was in their idea of life no key to unlock the enigma of this mysterious Child. But the words were deeply treasured and pondered over in the mothers heart, till Divine Providence, gradually unclosing this bud of Heavenly growth grafted on an earthly stock, into a flower of immortal beauty, brought the long-hidden meaning of the scene to light.

5. Thus early, then, we behold our Saviour in His Divine and native relations to His Father, and to the kingdom of spirit; thus early we trace the signs of His indelible consecration to the service in which He was to spend His days and to shed His blood, and through which He was to rise to be spiritual and universal Lord. But what a completeness it gives to the picture, and how are we touched on the side of our human affections when we read that Jesus went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them. Supremacy of His relations to His heavenly Father did not mean the forgetting or ignoring of lower relations.

6. Turn a parting glance at the scene, and read it, no longer by the light of others eyes, but by the light which the Holy Spirit has given us through the word of the gospel. Let us be thankful for the ministry of children. All that is simple and innocent, inquiring and truth-loving in them, should remind us of the Divine Child and of His ministry to our souls. When tempted to lose ourselves in the materialism of the age, or in the busy cares or pleasures of the present world, let us think of Him as, in the Temple, He seems with uplifted finger to be saying, I was born to other things! And so may grace be given us to follow Him, that we may be brought in the fellowship of the Spirit into childhood to God, and to dwell in the heavenly Temple of our Father, to go no more out for ever. (E. Johnson, M. A.)

Nazareth

Travellers tell us that the spot where Jesus grew up is one of the most beautiful on the face of the earth. Nazareth is situated in a secluded, cup-like valley amid the mountains of Zebulon, just where they dip down into the plain of Esdraelon, with which it is connected by a steep and rocky path. Its white houses, with vines clinging to their walls, are embowered amidst gardens and groves of olive, fig, orange, and pomegranate trees. The fields are divided by hedges of cactus, and enamelled with innumerable flowers of every hue. Behind the village rises a hill five hundred feet in height, from whose summit there is seen one of the most wonderful views in the world--the mountains of Galilee, with snowy Hermon towering above them to the north; the ridge of Carmel, the coast of Tyre, and the sparkling waters of the Mediterranean to the west; a few miles to the east, the wooded, cone like bulk of Tabor; and to the south the plain of Esdraelon, with the mountains of Ephraim beyond. The preaching of Jesus shows how deeply He had drunk into the essence of natural beauty and revelled in the changing aspects of the seasons. It was when wandering as a lad in these fields that He gathered the images of beauty which He poured out in His parables and addresses. It was on that hill that He acquired the habit of His after-life of retreating to the mountain-tops to spend the night in solitary prayer. The doctrines of His preaching were not thought out on the spur of the moment. They were poured out in a living stream when the occasion came, but the water had been gathering into the hidden well for many years before. In the fields and on the mountain-side He had thought them out during the years of happy and undisturbed meditation and prayer. (J. Stalker, L. A.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Luk 2:39-40. And when they — Namely, the parents of Jesus; had performed all things according to the law — Which they made conscience of doing, that they might fulfil all righteousness; they returned into Galilee, &c. — Full of admiration, doubtless, at the glorious testimonies that were given to their child; to their own city Nazareth — Which was the place of their usual residence, and where this blessed infant passed the days of his childhood and youth. And the child grew, &c. — In bodily strength and stature; and waxed strong in spirit — The powers of his human mind daily improved; filled with wisdom — By the light of the indwelling Spirit, which gradually opened itself in his soul; and the grace of God was upon him — That is, the peculiar favour of God rested upon him, even as man.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

§ 13—JESUS RETURN TO NAZARETH, Luk_2:39-40. Mat_2:1-23.

39. Performed all things… returned… Nazareth—Between the finishing of the rites and the return to Nazareth most interpreters insert the entire narratives of the Magi, Herod, flight into Egypt, and return.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

THE HOLY FAMILY RETURN FROM EGYPT

19-23, & Luk 2:39-40. “And Herod having died.” We do not know how long they remained in Egypt, but evidently the period was brief. Scarcely has the wail of the slaughtered infants died away on the air of Bethlehem till the cruel old king, becoming quite ill, goes to Jericho, where he had a palace and a pool, that he may avail himself of the sanitary warm baths for the recovery of his health. Even there he slays Antipater, his only surviving son by his first wife, Mary Anne, whom he had slain, with her other two sons, Alexander and Aristobulus; this dark crime only preceding five days his own exit to meet God and enter upon the awful retributions of eternity. “Behold, an angel of the Lord appears to Joseph in a dream in Egypt: Arise, take the young child and His mother, and go into Israel, for those seeking the life of the young child are dead. And he, rising, took the young child and His mother, and came into Israel. And hearing that Archelaus rules over Judea in the room of Herod his father, he feared to go thither.” Archelaus, being the only surviving son of Herod, received the government nominally by inheritance. We must remember that after the battle of Actium, which left Augustus Caesar sole proprietor of the Roman Empire, which had conquered the whole world, consequently no king in any country could reign till he went to Rome and received his crown at the hand of the emperor; consequently, immediately after the death of Herod, Archelaus went away to Rome, a long and perilous journey for those times, in order that the emperor might crown him king of the Jews. Now it is a simple fact that the emperor positively refused to crown him, so that Archelaus was really never king of Judea. On the contrary, the emperor sent Coponius to Judea, in the capacity of proconsul, thus dismantling the kingdom, and turning it into a Roman province, no longer having its own king, but simply a governor, sent out by the Roman emperor, to rule that country as a Roman province. Now why did this transition take place at this peculiar time? Why, it was a fulfillment of prophecy, which says, “The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, till Shiloh [i.e., Christ] comes.” Now do you not see this wonderful fulfillment of prophecy? Augustus Caesar had crowned Herod king of the Jews, and why not now crown Archelaus, and let the Jews have their kingdom, instead of reducing them to a state of vassalage by taking away their kingdom, and making them a Roman province? The solution is plain. Shiloh had already come, and the scepter had departed from Judah. Though the Roman emperor knew nothing about these prophecies nor their fulfillment, yet arbitrarily taking the bit in his teeth, he proceeded, undeviatingly, literally to fulfill the prophecies. So are wicked worldly people this day fulfilling the prophecies with astounding accuracy.

“Being warned in a dream, he departed into the regions of Galilee. Having come, he dwelt in a city called Nazareth; in order that the word spoken by the prophets may be fulfilled, that He shall be called a Nazarene.” (Isa 11:1.)

The village of Nazareth was so obscure and insignificant as never so much as to receive a mention in all the Old Testament Scriptures. It was proverbial for ignorance and poverty, so that the maxim obtained, “No good can come out of Nazareth;” thus illustrating the universally patent fact that this world is upside down, human estimation all wrong, and the very opposite of the Divine and true. Though Nazareth in human estimation was the most worthless place on the earth, it has come to the front, more celebrated and honored than all the time-honored metropolises on the globe. The same is true of the people. Examine all history. Those who have risen to true eminence have emanated from utter obscurity; while the high-born, as a rule, dwindle into insignificance, never amounting to anything. I did so much enjoy my sojourn in Nazareth, happily reached by Jewish and Christian enterprise, now quite flourishing, with a population of seven thousand. How I did enjoy walking through the house where Jesus dwelt thirty years; visiting Joseph’s carpenter-shop, where He labored with him at the work-bench; and the old synagogue, where He actually worshipped the God of Israel thirty years! The primitive Christians were called “Nazarenes.”

“And the little child grew and became strong in spirit, being filled with wisdom; and the grace of God was upon Him.” (Luk 2:40.) No wonder the body of Jesus grew and symmetrically developed with rolling years, as He had no physical infirmities, superinduced by the fall. Consequently He never had any sickness to impede His growth, His physical life throughout being like that of Adam before the fall, perfectly healthy, natural, and free from all ailments of any kind. This conclusion follows as a legitimate sequence from the very fact that He took our nature, without sin and its consequence; i.e., without infirmity. His spiritual development was truly marvelous, from the simple fact that His intellect was perfectly clear and cloudless, never muddled, nor confused, nor in any way thrown off its equilibrium. His affections were perfectly pure, and never contaminated by anything vile. His memory was perfect, so that He never forgot anything, while His judgment was infallible, even while in childhood. Hence He was actually filled with the true wisdom of God peculiar to the heavenly state; while the grace of God, not only filled, but crowned Him.

William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Luk_2:39. Ναζαρέτ] therefore not in the first instance again to Bethlehem. Of the Magi, of the slaughter of the children, of the flight to Egypt, Luke has nothing. They belong to quite another cycle of legend, which he has not followed. Reconciliation is impossible; a preference for Luke, however, at the expense of Matthew (Schleiermacher, Schneckenburger, Sieffert, and others), is at least in so far well founded, as Bethlehem was not, as Matthew reports (see on Mat_2:23, Rem.), the original dwelling-place of the parents of Jesus, but became the birth-place of the latter on occasion of the ἀπογραφή. If Bethlehem had been the original dwelling-place, it was natural, considering the Davidico-Messianic tendency of the legend, that no change should be made under these circumstances. But, in opposition to the bold assumption of the more recent exponents of the mythical theory,[57] that Jesus was born in Nazareth, so that both the earlier residence of the parents at Bethlehem (Matthew) and their journey thither (Luke) are held to be the work of tradition on the basis of Mic_5:1 (but only Matthew bases his statement upon this prophecy!), see on Matt. l.c. Even de Wette finds this probable, especially on account of Joh_7:42, comp. Luk_1:46 ff., where John adds no correction of the popular view. But to infer from this that John knew nothing of the birth in Bethlehem is unwarranted, since the tradition of Matthew and Luke, agreeing in this very particular, certainly suggests the presumption that the birth at Bethlehem was generally known among the Christians and was believed, so that there was not at all any need for a correcting remark on the part of John.

[57] See also Weisse, Evangelienfr. p. 181 f., who holds that the reference to the Lords place of birth by the name of Bethlehem is to be understood πνευματικῶς. Schleiermacher, L. J. p. 56 f., leaves the birth-place altogether doubtful; holding that the question is wholly indifferent for our faith, which remark, however, is inappropriate on account of the prophetic promise.

REMARK.

As the presentation of Jesus in the temple bears of itself in its legal aspect the stamp of history, so what occurred with Simeon and Anna cannot in its general outlines be reasonably relegated to the domain of myth (see, in opposition to Strauss and B. Bauer, Ebrard, p. 225 ff.), although it remains doubtful whether the prophetic glance of the seers (to whose help Paulus comes by suggesting, in spite of the remark at Luk_2:33, communications on the part of Mary; and Hofmann, p. 276, by the hypothesis of acquaintance with the history of the birth) expressed itself so definitely as the account about Simeon purports. The hypothesis that Luke received his information from Annas mouth (Schleiermacher, Neander) hangs on Luk_2:36 f., where Anna is so accurately described, and consequently on so weak a thread, that it breaks down at once when we take into account the lesser degree of vividness and fulness of detail in the narrative of what Anna did.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Luk 2:39-40 . Return to Nazareth . πόλιν ἑαυτῶν , their own city, certainly suggesting that Nazareth, not Bethlehem, had been the true home of Joseph and Mary.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Nothing is more difficult than to fix the precise order in which the visit of the Magi, with the flight into and return from Egypt (Mat 2:13-23), are to be taken, in relation to the circumcision and presentation of Christ in the temple, here recorded. It is perhaps best to leave this in the obscurity in which we find it, as the result of two independent, though if we knew all, easily reconcilable narratives.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 39. They returned into Galilee] But not immediately: for the coming of the wise men, and the retreat of Joseph with his family into Egypt, happened between this period of time, and his going to Nazareth in Galilee. - Bp. PEARCE. But it is very likely, that as soon as the presentation in the temple, and the ceremonies relative to it, had been accomplished, that the holy family did return to Galilee, as St. Luke here states, and that they continued there till Herod's bloody purpose was discovered to them by the Lord; which probably took some time to bring it to its murderous crisis, after the departure of the magi. After which, they fled into Egypt, where they continued till the death of Herod; and it is probable that it is of a second return to Nazareth that St. Matthew speaks, Lu 2:23.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

(39) They returned into Galilee.—Filling up the narrative from St. Matthew, we have to insert after the Presentation, the visit of the Magi, the massacre of the Infants, and the flight into Egypt. It seems probable that St. Luke was not acquainted with St. Matthew’s narrative, nor St. Matthew with St. Luke’s. Each wrote from what he heard, or found in previous existing narratives, more or less incomplete, and hence cannot readily be brought into harmony with the other. Here the parents return to Nazareth as their own city. In St. Matthew the return appears to be determined by their fears of Archelaus. It is possible that, though previously domiciled at Nazareth, they may have thought of settling at Bethlehem, and were deterred from doing so by the cruelty of Herod and his son.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

39. Between this verse and the last come the events narrated by St Matthew only—namely the Visit of the Magi; the Flight into Egypt; and the massacre of the Innocents. It is difficult to believe that either of the Evangelists had seen the narrative of the other, because the primâ facie inference from either singly would be imperfectly correct. They supplement each other, because they each narrate the truth, though probably neither of them was aware of all that has been delivered to us.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And the child grew,.... In body, in strength, and in stature; which shows that it was a true body Christ assumed, and like ours, which did not come to its maturity at once, but by degrees:

and waxed strong in spirit, or in his soul; for as he had a true body, he had also a reasonable soul; the faculties of which were far from being weak, they were exceeding strong, and appeared stronger and stronger every day; his understanding was clear, his judgment solid, and his memory strong and retentive, his will, and the desires of it, were to that which is good, and his affections cleaved unto it. The Persic and Ethiopic versions read, "was strengthened in", or "by the Holy Spirit"; with the grace and gifts of it; but the former sense is best,

Filled with wisdom; and knowledge as man; for this is to be understood, not of his essential wisdom as God, nor of those treasures of wisdom and knowledge, which were hid in him as mediator, to be dispensed to his church; but of his created and natural wisdom, as man; in which he increased gradually, as his body grew, and the faculties of his soul opened under the influences of his deity, and the power of his Spirit,

and the grace of God was upon him; which designs not the fulness of grace that was in him, as mediator, for the supply of his people: but either that internal grace which was bestowed on his human nature, even the various graces of the Spirit of God, and which flowed from the grace of union of the two natures in him; or rather the love and favour of God, which in various instances was in a very singular manner manifested to him.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

39 And when they had performed all things according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own city Nazareth.

Ver. 39. According to the law of the Lord] This is often recorded of them in this chapter, that they observed the law exactly, to their singular commendation. The law is to be kept as the apple of one’s eye, Pro 7:2. Count nothing little that God commands. It is as much treason to coin pence as twenty shilling pieces. And they were commanded not to eat of the blood, as ever they looked for God’s blessing.

They returned into Galilee] After they had first fled down into Egypt, Mat 2:12-23.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

They returned into Galilee - Not immediately, but after a time. Luke has omitted the flight into Egypt recorded by Matthew; but he has not denied it, nor are his words to be pressed as if he meant to affirm that they went immediately to Nazareth. A parallel case we have in the life of Paul. When he was converted it is said that he came to Jerusalem, as if he had gone there immediately after his conversion Act 9:26; yet we learn in another place that this was after an interval of three years, Gal 1:17-18. In the case before us there is no improbability in supposing that they returned to Bethlehem, then went to Egypt, and then to Galilee.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

If the wise men, mentioned Mat 2:1, had been with Herod before this time, it is more than probable that Herod would have made an end of Christ at this time, therefore certainly it was after this time. Luke saith nothing of what we have Mat 2:13-15,19-23, of Joseph going into Egypt upon the admonition of the angel, nor his coming back; but both Matthew and Luke agree in their dwelling at Nazareth, which he calleth

their own city, for there Joseph dwelt, Luk 2:4. How after this the wise men came to find him at Bethlehem, Mat 2:1-12, the Scripture hath not told us. It is very idle for any to say Joseph dwelt there, for then he would not have taken up his inn there, nor been put to such a stress as to have his wife bring forth in a stable; besides, it is apparent from Luk 2:4 and this verse, and from Mat 2:23, that he dwelt at Nazareth. God, who ordered the motion of the wise men, and their instructions to be sent to Bethlehem to look for Christ, could easily find Joseph some business to be done there at that time, whether some business of his trade, or some visit to his friends, we cannot say.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

And when they had performed all things according to the Law of the Lord. Another note, which tells us of the rigid obedience which Mary and Joseph paid to the Law of Israel, under which they lived. Marcion, the famous Gnostic heretic (second century), who adopted this Gospel of St. Luke, to the exclusion of the other three, as the authoritative Gospel for his sect (the Marcionites), omitted, however, all these passages of St. Luke"s narrative in which the old Mosaic Law was spoken of with reverence. They returned into Galilee, to their own city Nazareth. To complete the story of our Lord"s early life, we must insert from St. Matthew, before this return to Nazareth, the visit of the Magi, and the flight to and return from Egypt. It is probable even if the Gospel of St. Matthew, as we have it, was not then written that these details, the visit of the Magi and the flight into Egypt, were facts already well known to those whom this Gospel was especially designed to instruct.

Vers. 39-52. The childhood and the waiting-time.

Before the age of twelve, nothing is told. In modern biographies, all kinds of traits, incidents, forecasts of the man in the child, are mentioned. The Apocryphal Gospels fall in with this custom. God"s thoughts are not our thoughts. The child-life of "the Lord"s Christ" is thoroughly simple. A bright-eyed boy, learning to read the Scriptures at his mother"s knee, running out and in to shop and cottage, and joining sometimes in the innocent pastimes of the hillside, taking at night his little quilt from the ledge surrounding the wall of the house, and laying himself down in peace and sleeping, such, we may conceive, was the life of the holy Child. Thoughtful, wise, gentle, yet full of a nameless "grace and truth;" for (ver. 40) "he grew and waxed strong, filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was on him." The incident which alone breaks the silence is connected with his twelfth year, the completion of which was an important hour in Jewish history the hour of transference from pupilage to a certain measure of responsibility. At that age Jesus, "a son of the Law," is taken by Joseph and Mary to Jerusalem. The journey, the caravans of pilgrims, the incidents of the way, the three nights" halting, and then the sight of Jerusalem with its temple shining in the sun, we can imagine what all this must have been to the exquisitely sensitive soul of the Child! And the week"s stay in the capital what bursting of thoughts! what tides of inspiration! Let us dwell on the first recorded word of Jesus his reply to his mother (ver. 49), when she and Joseph found him among the doctors. Regard it as the word of sanctified boyhood as the awakenment to the consciousness of

(1) the supreme relation of the life;

(2) the supreme interest of the life;

(3) the supreme necessity of the life.

I THE SUPREME RELATION. "My Father." We may infer, from the fiftieth verse, that now for the first time this word had passed from his lips.

"Thy father and I," said Mary. Quietly but distinctly comes the intimation of the Fatherhood an intimation in which we can trace the disengagement. "Nay, not he whom I have honored, and honor, as earthly parent, but he to whom I am truly bound he who is, who only is, my Father." And a great, solemn hour it is when the feeling of a personal, individual relation to the Eternal dawns on the consciousness. In earliest years the child-nature is enfolded in others. The first crisis of the life is when it begins to realize that it cannot merely be led; that it has a place and calling of its own; that it must think and will, instead of only reflecting the thought and volition of those who have shaped its path. Here there is a parting of the ways one way being towards a self-will, which has "torment" in it for the youth as for others, and which, unless corrected and disciplined by sharp experience, will bear the soul into hurtful alliances, will prove "a hewing out of broken cisterns which hold no water;" the other way being that of Divine grace, the acceptance of a higher rule and guidance, the learning of the great name Duty in the greater, the supporting Name of God, the response of the heart to a love and righteousness which asks its yes, the witness of the eternal Spirit with the human that the Boy is the Son of God. Who will not anxiously endeavor so to direct the mind, in the period when it is most susceptible of all right influences, as that the transition from childhood to youth shall be marked by a new glance upward, a loving and earnest "My Father"!

II Further, NOTE THE SUPREME INTEREST OF THE LIFE. It matters not whether we read "about my Father"s business" or "in my Father"s house;" the idea is the same that the irresistible attraction of the Son is the affairs which connect him with the Father. At twelve years of age the business was "hearing and asking questions." There is nothing forced or forward in the holy childhood. The "understanding and answers" are pronounced wonderful. But the Boy is only the "son of the Law;" he is not yet the Doctor. By-and-by he will be. Later on, he will be called to drink the bitter cup to suffer and die. But everything in its right order. The life will evolve out of the principle that, in all, the Father"s will is to rule, the Father"s mind is to be read, the Father"s kingdom is to be promoted. Here, surely, there is a suggestion as to the idea which should dominate in the education of the young. At home and at school, all culture, all training, should be associated with a higher reference; the boy, the girl, should feel that the life is among the heavenly Father"s things. The sense of responsibility to him for the nature, and the opportunity of improving the nature, should be laid deep in the character. More than this, the generous instincts of youth should be supplied with a fitting aliment. Too often they run to seed because the intelligence was not enlisted in objects which formed a definite interest to the mind. Let young people be taken to their Father"s house; let Church services recognize their place and part; let them be invited to a share in the hopes and the activities of Christ"s cause. Plant them in the courts of the Lord, "in their Father"s things.

III Once more, OBSERVE THE SUPREME NECESSITY OF THE SPIRIT OF THE LIFE IN THE BOY JESUS. "Why hast thou thus dealt with us?" asks his mother reproachfully. "How is it that ye sought me?" is the rejoinder; "wist ye not that I must be where and as you find me?" We note the surprise in the answer. It is the flashing forth of a something, a secret, in the childhood which the mother had not noticed, so simple, so obedient, had the Child been. To the Boy, so full of the glories and solemnities of the Father"s house, it seemed strange that they had not recognized whose he was that they had not understood the obligation inlaid in the life itself. And when the constraint of God"s love is acknowledged, when the soul awakes to the vision of the Father and the Father"s business, the spell of Christ"s "I must" is irresistible. We come on it again and again in the course of the ministry. It was the law of the spirit of the life. And the same law operates in every one who is of the truth. In that sweet bondage stands the soul"s perfect freedom: "I must work the works of him that sent me;" "I must be about my Father"s business." Then, in perfect naturalness, yet with marvellous boldness, comes forth the first self-revelation of the Lord. Joseph and Mary understood it not. How often is the young heart, aroused and astir in consequence of a higher call, misunderstood, misjudged! Mary did not comprehend, but she sympathized; she loved and prayed. Type of the true mother, "whose eyes are homes of silent prayer." The sense of the higher sonship only enforces the obligations of the lower. In the higher love all other loves endure. "This is love," says St. John, "that we walk after his commandments after "the first commandment with promise, Honour thy father and mother." There is nothing lovelier in the human life of Christ than the renewed acceptance of the restraints of home. "He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them to them, with the narrow round of their daily care and concerns; and he with the great thoughts glowing in his breast, and the kingdom of his Father opening to his gaze. Mark:

1. What self-repression belonged to the time in Nazareth! We see the Son taking the place in the carpenter"s house a few years later than the visit to the temple; Joseph apparently is removed by death from the headship of the house. Is it beyond the probabilities of the case that he performed the part always a touching one of the eldest son and brother supporting the mother to whom he is subject, and guiding the younger members of the family? Nothing is left undone, and he who thus learned obedience to duty leaves an example which serves as a beacon-light both to youth and age.

2. How this time consecrates labor and poverty! He wrought at the common things; in them he could see his Father"s things, and do all as part of his Father"s business. The truth receives a new radiance that "work is the girdle of manliness." Faber sings truly"Labour is sweet, for thou hast toiled; And care is light, for thou hast cared. Let not our works with self be soiled, Nor in unsimple ways ensnared.

3. How emphatic is the lesson on the fruitfulness of silence suggested by this time! Between twelve years of age and thirty the Son of God was content to wait. The public life lasted for three years; he waited for thirty years. A great disproportion, we might say; but God"s ways are not our ways. All the while he was growing in wisdom. As his bodily strength was compacted and matured, so was his mental; for in all things he was made like to his brethren, He studied his Father"s Word and his Father"s works. Nature disclosed to him her hidden meanings and beauties; he thought, he prayed., he lived, by the Father. The results of the long silence were evidenced in the exquisite parables of later years, in the wisdom which none could resist, in the authority which separated his doctrine from that of the scribes. The accumulated capital was great; when he went forth in the power of the Spirit he only drew the interest. Are we not, in these days, in too great haste both to be wise and to be rich? Do we not speak too soon as well as speak too much? Carlyle only apprehends the significance of Nazareth when he reminds us that in silence all great thought and work are done. We need more than "flashes of silence." Think, think of Jesus silent so long. Stier exclaims, "Oh what gracious words may have issued from his lips during those eighteen years which are not recorded! But the words which, by the Father"s ordination, he was to testify to the world were sealed up till his hour was come. Then, one after another, bursts forth each as it were a deeper stream from the long pent-up fountains of eternal wisdom and truth!"

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Here we see the truth and reality of Christ’s human nature: he grew as we do, from infancy to childhood, from childhood to youth and manhood. To his divine nature no accession or addition could be made, for that which is infinite cannot increase. The Deity was infinite in Christ, so was not the humanity, but capable of additions: and accordingly as Christ grew up in the stature of his body, the faculties of his mind increased, through the grace and power of God’s Spirit upon him.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [XV. Brought to Nazareth].

XV. THE CHILD JESUS BROUGHT FROM EGYPT TO NAZARETH. (Egypt and Nazareth, B. C. 4.) aMATT. II. 19-23; cLUKE II. 39.

a19 But when Herod was dead [He died in the thirty-seventh year of his reign and the seventieth of his life. A frightful inward burning consumed him, and the stench of his sickness was such that his attendants could not stay near him. So horrible was his condition that he even endeavored to end it by suicide], behold, an angel of the Lord [word did not come by the infant Jesus; he was "made like unto his brethren" ( Heb_2:17), and being a child, "he spake as a child" ( 1Co_13:11), and not as an oracle] appeareth in a dream to Joseph in Egypt [Joseph had obeyed the command given at Mat_2:13, and God kept the promise contained therein. God ever keeps covenant with the obedient], saying, 20 Arise [Happy Joseph! his path was ordered of God. Let us also seek such ordering. "in all thy ways acknowledge him, And he will direct thy paths-- Pro_3:6] and take the young child and his mother, and go into the land of Israel [The phrase "land of Israel" originally meant all Palestine, but during the period of the kingdom of the ten tribes it was restricted to their portion of the country. After the captivities and the return of Judah from Babylon the phrase resumed its original meaning, and hence it is here used to include all Palestine. As Jesus was "not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" ( Mat_15:24), it was fitting that he return thither from Egypt]; for they ["They" is doubtless the plural of majesty; though it may include others unknown to us, who were employed by him or advised him] are dead [How prophetic the words! Christ's enemies die, but he lives on. How innumerable this host of opposers! Persecutors, oppressors, infidels, critics, literatures, [53] organizations, principalities, and powers, a vast and motley array of forces, have sought the life of Jesus, have made a great noise in the world, and died away in silence. Pharoahs, Neros, Diocletians, many a Charles, Torquemada and Bloody Mary have come up and gone down, but the king of Israel lives on] that sought the young child's life. 21 And he arose and took the young child and his mother, and came [The length of his sojourn in Egypt is uncertain. It is variously estimated at from two weeks to more than seven months] into the land of Israel. 22 But when he heard [Joseph heard this on entering Palestine. As he knew of Herod's death by revelation, and hence before any one else in Egypt, there was no one there to tell him who succeeded Herod] that Archelaus [By his last will and testament Herod divided his kingdom among three of his sons, and Augustus Cæsar consented to the provision of this will. Archelaus, under the title of Ethnarch, received Judæa, Idumæa, and Samaria; Antipas, under the title of Tetrarch, received Galilee and Peræa; and Philip, under the title of Tetrarch, received Trachonitis (with Ituræa), Batanæa, and Auranitis. Each of these sons bore the name of Herod, like their father. Augustus withheld from Archelaus the title of king, promising it to him "if he governed that part virtuously." But in the very beginning of his reign he massacred three thousand Jews at once, in the temple, at the time of the Passover, because they called for justice upon the agents who performed the barbarities of his father's reign. Not long after this a solemn embassy of the Jews went to Rome, and petitioned Augustus to remove Archelaus, and make his kingdom a Roman province. After a reign of nine years, Archelaus was banished to Vienne, in Gaul, where he died in A. D. 6. After him Judæa had no more native kings, and the scepter was clean departed from Judah. The land became a Roman province, and its governors were successively Quirinius, Coponius, Ambivius, Annius Rufus, Valerius Gratus, and Pontius Pilate] was reigning over Judæa in the room of his father Herod [These words sound like an echo of those employed by the [54] embassy just referred to, for it said to Augustus concerning this man, "He seemed to be so afraid lest he should not be deemed Herod's own son, that he took special care to prove it"], he was afraid to go thither [As Matthew has spoken of Joseph residing at Bethlehem (and he did reside there for quite awhile after the birth of Jesus), the use of word "thither" implies that Joseph planned to return to that town. Mary had kindred somewhere in the neighborhood ( Luk_1:36, Luk_1:39, Luk_1:40), and doubtless both parents thought that David's city was the most fitting place for the nurture of David's heir]; and being warned i of God in a dream [God permitted Joseph to follow the bent of his fear. Joseph's obedience shows him a fit person for the momentous charge entrusted to him], { cthey returned ahe withdrew [From the territory of Archelaus to that of Antipas, who was a man of much milder disposition. As the brothers were on no good terms, Joseph felt sure that in no case would Antipas deliver him and his to Archelaus] into the parts of Galilee [It means "circuit." It is the northern of the three divisions of the Holy Land. Its population was very dense, and was a mixture of Jews and Gentiles. Hence all Galilæans were despised by the purer Jews of Judæa], 23 and he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth; ctheir own city [This town lies on a hillside, girt in by fifteen higher hills. It is a secluded nook. Here Jesus grew up in obscurity till he reached his thirtieth year. Here he spent about nine-tenths of his earthly life. Sweet humility! Lowliness is as rare and precious a virtue as pride is a plentiful and repugnant vice] athat it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophets [Matthew uses the plural, "prophets," because this prophecy is not the actual words of any prophet, but is the general sense of many of them. We have noted three kinds of prophecy; this is the fourth kind, viz.: one where the very trend or general scope of Scripture is itself a prophecy], that he should be called a Nazarene. [The Hebrew word netzer means "branch" or "sprout." It is used figuratively for that which is lowly or despised ( Isa_17:9, Eze_15:1-6, Mal_4:1). [55] See also Joh_15:6, Rom_11:21. Now, Nazareth, if derived from netzer, answered to its name, and was a despised place ( Joh_1:45, Joh_1:46), and Jesus, though in truth a Bethlehemite, bore the name Nazarene because it fitly expressed the contempt of those who despised and rejected him.]

[FFG 53-55]

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

39. They returned into Galilee. Luke omits the stirring events that lie between the visit to the temple and the return to Nazareth, possibly because they are so fully given by Matthew. See Matthew, chapter 2. Their own city Nazareth. The old home of Joseph and Mary, now to be the home of Jesus until he was thirty years of age; a mountain village in southern Galilee.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

Connecting Statement:

Mary, Joseph, and Jesus leave the town of Bethlehem and return to the city of Nazareth for his childhood.

they were required to do according to the law of the Lord

This can be stated in active form. AT: "that the law of the Lord required them to do" (See: Active or Passive)

their own town of Nazareth

This phrase means they lived in Nazareth. Make sure it does not sound like they owned the town. AT: "the town of Nazareth, where they lived" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)

increasing in wisdom

"becoming more wise" or "learning what was wise"

the grace of God was upon him

"God blessed him" or "God was with him in a special way"

translationWords

law

Galilee

Nazareth

wise

grace

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

39. Between this verse and the last come the events narrated by St Matthew only—namely the Visit of the Magi; the Flight into Egypt; and the Massacre of the Innocents. It is difficult to believe that either of the Evangelists had seen the narrative of the other, because the primâ facie inference from either singly would be imperfectly correct. They supplement each other, because they each narrate the truth, though probably neither of them was aware of all that has been delivered to us.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

39.] Certainly the obvious inference from this verse is, that Joseph and Mary returned from Jerusalem to Nazareth direct. But it is only an inference, and not the assertion of the text. This part of the gospel history is one where the Harmonists, by their arbitrary reconcilements of the two Evangelistic accounts, have given great advantage to the enemies of the faith. As the two accounts now stand, it is wholly impossible to suggest any satisfactory method of uniting them; every one who has attempted it has, in some part or other of his hypothesis, violated probability and common sense. But, on the other hand, it is equally impossible definitely to say that they could not be reconciled by a thorough knowledge of the facts themselves; and such an assertion, whenever made, shews great ignorance of the origin and course of oral narration. How many things will a relator say, being unaware of certain important circumstances outside his narrative, which seem to preclude those circumstances? How often will points of time be apparently brought close together in such a narration,—between which, events most weighty to the history have occurred? The only inference from these two accounts, which is inevitable, is, that they are wholly independent of one another. If Luke had seen the Gospel of Matthew, or vice versa, then the variations are utterly inexplicable; and the greatest absurdities of all are involved in the writings of those who assume this, and then proceed to harmonize. Of the dwelling at Nazareth before the Nativity, of the circumstances which brought Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem, of the Presentation in the temple, Matthew’s account knows nothing; of the visit of the Magi, the murder of the Innocents, the flight to Egypt, Luke’s is unaware. In all the main circumstances of the Conception and Nativity they agree, or are easily and naturally reconciled (see further in note on Joh 7:42).

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

39. ἐτέλεσαν “Brought to a close, accomplished”; especially of executing what has been prescribed: 12:50, 18:31, 22:37; Act 13:29; Rom 2:27; Jas 2:8. See Joh 19:28, which illustrates the difference between τελέω and τελειόω. Syr-Sin. here inserts “Joseph and Mary” as nom. to “accomplished.” Why not “His father and His mother” (ver. 33) or “His parents” (ver. 43), if that text was framed to discredit the virgin birth?

Ναζαρέτ. Lk. appears to know nothing of the visit of the Magi. It would have suited his theme of the universality of the Gospel so well, that he would hardly have omitted it, if he had known it. In that case he was not familiar with our First Gospel From Mat 2:11 we infer that the Holy Family, after the Purification, returned to Bethlehem and there occupied a house (τὴν οἰκίαν). The parents may have thought that the Son of David, born in, Bethlehem, ought to be brought up there. Thence they fly to Egypt, a flight not mentioned in the authority used by Lk.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Nazareth. See on Mt 2:23.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.