Punchlines (part 2)
June 26, 2022
We hope this guide will help you take the good news you hear today into your daily lives.
In today’s passage from Luke, we find a twelve-year-old Jesus staying behind in Jerusalem to learn from the teachers in the temple court. After 3 days, Jesus asks his anxious parents: “Why were you searching for me?” He could ask us the same thing: why and where do we search for Jesus?
Scripture and Notes
Every year Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem for the Festival of the Passover. When he was twelve years old, they went up to the festival, according to the custom. After the festival was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it. Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends. When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him. After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.”
“Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand what he was saying to them.
Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But his mother treasured all these things in her heart. And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man.
Luke 2:41-52 (NIV)
Lectio Divina: Why were you searching?
Lectio Divina is a way to read, or listen to, scripture slowly. It invites us into God’s presence so that we may be transformed, not simply informed. We believe that reading scripture prayerfully allows us to hear the Spirit give voice to God’s word to us in this particular moment in time.
Read Luke 2:41-52, which can be found above (or in your own Bible), slowly. Read aloud if you can.
Listen for a word or phrase that stands out. What is it? Record it in a journal or on a piece of paper.
Read the passage a second time. Locate yourself in the story. What do you experience?
Read the passage a third time. Do you sense an invitation from God? A challenge to respond to?
Read the passage a final time, resting in God’s word and love for you.
Reflect, if you like, on the following: Why and where are you searching for Jesus? Do you trust that the Risen Christ is always with you? Why or why not? Do you find yourself looking for something other than Jesus?
