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READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:
1 Kings 8:6-13
Romans 12:1-5
- St. Luke 2:42-52
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ. (Eph 1)
Who speaks to you on this the Sunday after His Epiphany from His Gospel heard today, saying:
Can you answer Jesus's question appropriately? As in, in a way that God wants? No. Thus, we find Jesus answering for us. He does so, not with philosophical ramblings, but with His Body. Yes He is preaching and teaching, but He purposefully locates that preaching and teaching in the Old Testament Temple, later with the Apostles, and then further reveals that it is His Body, the New Testament Church.
Whenever we are struggling with God’s Word or God’s actions in our life, we must always ask this question of ourselves: did Jesus create a Church? Yes. And in that Church, which is on earth, Romans 10 plays out: “For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, ’How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!’” (v.13-15)
We call this the Preaching Office, in Article 5 of the Augsburg Confession:
“That we may obtain this faith”, the Faith, “the Ministry of Teaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments was instituted. For through the Word and Sacraments, as through instruments, the Holy Ghost is given, Who works faith; where and when it pleases God, in them that hear the Gospel, to wit, that God, not for our own merits, but for Christ’s sake, justifies those who believe that they are received into grace for Christ’s sake.”
We “condemn the Anabaptists and others who think that the Holy Ghost comes to men without the external Word, through their own preparations and works.”
In today’s Gospel, Jesus reminds us of this fact in our church. He is not running away from His parents, just to brag that God is His Father and He doesn’t have to listen to them. Neither is He forsaking His earthly duties for some self-absorbed mission from God. He purposefully and simply leads us out of our world of false idols and selfishness to His Church of holiness.
So you seek Jesus? You won’t find Him in His Temple anymore, as His parents did. You must employ the only thing that He has left behind: His written Word. Yes His Word. The only place in the world where God reveals His only Son and the salvation found in Him alone. The only reason you seek Jesus is because of His Word, previously spoken to you.
Do you seek Jesus in His Word? You learn more about Him, pray to Him, and study His Word to deepen your relationship, but do you find Him? When even His parents couldn’t find Him?
So you seek Jesus in His Word and He preaches it today. His parents stop to ponder their own personal experience and miss Him. They say to themselves we’re with family so we’d stick with family. Why wouldn’t our son? Personal experience betrays them.
They only look for Him in the Temple because A) they remember their Habakkuk 2:20, “the Lord is in his holy temple” or B) someone told them. Either way, they don’t find God in what they’re doing but what He is doing. And He does His work among the things of His Father: the incense for prayer, the showbread of the presence, the Altar, the Blood, the Holy of holies, and the Ark. All of which scream, God in man made manifest.
Repent! The Gospel doesn’t stop there. It keeps going. Jesus leaves the Temple with His folks. He tears Himself away from the teachers and goes home. God leaves the Temple to go back to His life with His family. Who is His family? “whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother” (Matt 12:50), answers Jesus.
Jesus does not desire to be caught where He does not want to be caught. He was in the Manger, so cute, but He left. He was in Egypt, but He left there too. He was in His home, but left for the Temple, only to go back again. He was wandering around the Middle-East performing miracles and good works and signs, but He left that too.
He suffers, dies, and resurrects and ascends to locate Himself in all places with His Body. And He is in all places at once, but He has promised to be in certain places for you. For when you seek Jesus in His Word, you find Him. You find Him by hearing Him preached to you and believing.
What He preaches is the forgiveness of sins, which He leaves in the hands of His Apostles to “forgive and withhold”. Therefore His Word preached leads to the Sacraments, in which He has promised to work for you, through means.
Where these means and promises are gathered around is the place where Jesus, today, wants to be found: His Church. In other words, Seek Jesus in His Word, His Word leads to the Sacraments, and the Sacraments lead to His Church.
You may have heard the pithy bumper sticker saying that says, “No Jesus, no peace. Know Jesus, know peace.” Well we can do better than that today and instead say, “No Church, no Jesus; know the Church, know the Jesus.”
Dr. Luther puts it this way in a Christmas sermon of his:
“The Christian church retains now all the words of God in her heart and ponders them, compares them with one another and with the Scriptures. Therefore he who would find Christ must first find the Church. How should we know where Christ and his faith were, if we did not know where his believers are? And he who would know anything of Christ must not trust himself nor build a bridge to heaven by his own reason; but he must go to the Church, attend and ask her.
Now the Church is not wood and stone, but the company of believing people; one must hold to them, and see how they believe, live and teach; they surely have Christ in their midst. For outside of the Christian church there is no truth, no Christ, no salvation.” (AE 11:144)
So now we can answer Jesus. When He asks, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house”, we can answer with confidence. First, we say that we were looking for Him because His Word says to look for Him, that He possesses all things in heaven and on earth, and that He has promised every blessing. In that Promise of salvation through the God-man Jesus, we know our seeking is not in vain.
Second, since we have heard His Word say He would be in His Father’s house, literally “among His Father’s things”, then we boldly seek His House and say “I have entered His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise, for here I see the things promised in the Word and here I touch and handle things unseen, because of that promise”.
You have found Jesus. You hear Him preached to you, as He promised, from His Word alone, and nowhere else. You hear and believe and commune. For unlike the Ark from our Old Testament reading, which held nothing but stone, the Ark of the Church of Christ holds flesh and blood. Preaching leads to the Body and Blood of Christ.
Who speaks to you on this the Sunday after His Epiphany from His Gospel heard today, saying:
“Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I
must be in my Father's house?”
Can you answer Jesus's question appropriately? As in, in a way that God wants? No. Thus, we find Jesus answering for us. He does so, not with philosophical ramblings, but with His Body. Yes He is preaching and teaching, but He purposefully locates that preaching and teaching in the Old Testament Temple, later with the Apostles, and then further reveals that it is His Body, the New Testament Church.
Whenever we are struggling with God’s Word or God’s actions in our life, we must always ask this question of ourselves: did Jesus create a Church? Yes. And in that Church, which is on earth, Romans 10 plays out: “For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, ’How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!’” (v.13-15)
We call this the Preaching Office, in Article 5 of the Augsburg Confession:
“That we may obtain this faith”, the Faith, “the Ministry of Teaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments was instituted. For through the Word and Sacraments, as through instruments, the Holy Ghost is given, Who works faith; where and when it pleases God, in them that hear the Gospel, to wit, that God, not for our own merits, but for Christ’s sake, justifies those who believe that they are received into grace for Christ’s sake.”
We “condemn the Anabaptists and others who think that the Holy Ghost comes to men without the external Word, through their own preparations and works.”
In today’s Gospel, Jesus reminds us of this fact in our church. He is not running away from His parents, just to brag that God is His Father and He doesn’t have to listen to them. Neither is He forsaking His earthly duties for some self-absorbed mission from God. He purposefully and simply leads us out of our world of false idols and selfishness to His Church of holiness.
So you seek Jesus? You won’t find Him in His Temple anymore, as His parents did. You must employ the only thing that He has left behind: His written Word. Yes His Word. The only place in the world where God reveals His only Son and the salvation found in Him alone. The only reason you seek Jesus is because of His Word, previously spoken to you.
Do you seek Jesus in His Word? You learn more about Him, pray to Him, and study His Word to deepen your relationship, but do you find Him? When even His parents couldn’t find Him?
So you seek Jesus in His Word and He preaches it today. His parents stop to ponder their own personal experience and miss Him. They say to themselves we’re with family so we’d stick with family. Why wouldn’t our son? Personal experience betrays them.
They only look for Him in the Temple because A) they remember their Habakkuk 2:20, “the Lord is in his holy temple” or B) someone told them. Either way, they don’t find God in what they’re doing but what He is doing. And He does His work among the things of His Father: the incense for prayer, the showbread of the presence, the Altar, the Blood, the Holy of holies, and the Ark. All of which scream, God in man made manifest.
Repent! The Gospel doesn’t stop there. It keeps going. Jesus leaves the Temple with His folks. He tears Himself away from the teachers and goes home. God leaves the Temple to go back to His life with His family. Who is His family? “whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother” (Matt 12:50), answers Jesus.
Jesus does not desire to be caught where He does not want to be caught. He was in the Manger, so cute, but He left. He was in Egypt, but He left there too. He was in His home, but left for the Temple, only to go back again. He was wandering around the Middle-East performing miracles and good works and signs, but He left that too.
He suffers, dies, and resurrects and ascends to locate Himself in all places with His Body. And He is in all places at once, but He has promised to be in certain places for you. For when you seek Jesus in His Word, you find Him. You find Him by hearing Him preached to you and believing.
What He preaches is the forgiveness of sins, which He leaves in the hands of His Apostles to “forgive and withhold”. Therefore His Word preached leads to the Sacraments, in which He has promised to work for you, through means.
Where these means and promises are gathered around is the place where Jesus, today, wants to be found: His Church. In other words, Seek Jesus in His Word, His Word leads to the Sacraments, and the Sacraments lead to His Church.
You may have heard the pithy bumper sticker saying that says, “No Jesus, no peace. Know Jesus, know peace.” Well we can do better than that today and instead say, “No Church, no Jesus; know the Church, know the Jesus.”
Dr. Luther puts it this way in a Christmas sermon of his:
“The Christian church retains now all the words of God in her heart and ponders them, compares them with one another and with the Scriptures. Therefore he who would find Christ must first find the Church. How should we know where Christ and his faith were, if we did not know where his believers are? And he who would know anything of Christ must not trust himself nor build a bridge to heaven by his own reason; but he must go to the Church, attend and ask her.
Now the Church is not wood and stone, but the company of believing people; one must hold to them, and see how they believe, live and teach; they surely have Christ in their midst. For outside of the Christian church there is no truth, no Christ, no salvation.” (AE 11:144)
So now we can answer Jesus. When He asks, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house”, we can answer with confidence. First, we say that we were looking for Him because His Word says to look for Him, that He possesses all things in heaven and on earth, and that He has promised every blessing. In that Promise of salvation through the God-man Jesus, we know our seeking is not in vain.
Second, since we have heard His Word say He would be in His Father’s house, literally “among His Father’s things”, then we boldly seek His House and say “I have entered His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise, for here I see the things promised in the Word and here I touch and handle things unseen, because of that promise”.
You have found Jesus. You hear Him preached to you, as He promised, from His Word alone, and nowhere else. You hear and believe and commune. For unlike the Ark from our Old Testament reading, which held nothing but stone, the Ark of the Church of Christ holds flesh and blood. Preaching leads to the Body and Blood of Christ.
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