It’s not every year that we get two Sunday’s to revel in the celebration of Christmas. More often than not, we just get one Sunday before we’re off to the season of Epiphany. It’s like that Christmas dinner that took hours to prepare and that was over and done with in under 20 minutes. So today we’re thankful for some time to savor and enjoy the Christmas season.
We’re not given very many details about Jesus’ childhood in the gospels. We’re told about His conception by the Holy Spirit, the humble circumstances of His birth by the virgin Mary and the visitation of the shepherds.
We meet Him again at 8 days old, when He is circumcised and named. And again at 40 days old at the Temple for Mary’s purification and His presentation.
Sometime after that, we’re really not sure how long, there’s the visitation of the Magi and then the flight to Egypt and return to Nazareth. And now He’s 12 years old accompanying his parents to the annual Feast of the Passover. My, don’t the kids grow up so quickly.
The distance from Nazareth to Jerusalem was about 65 miles – about the same as from here to Bangor. On foot it would be a three or four day journey for the average family. When it came time for one of the annual festivals such as this one, families would travel together in caravans. The children would play together along the way, the women would talk about their children and the men would talk about the Patriots, or something like that. There was also safety in numbers.
The festival of Passover lasted a week. Luke says, “and when the feast was ended, as they were returning.†No doubt the same caravan that traveled together to Jerusalem also traveled together back to Nazareth.
Luke doesn’t tell us how it happened that they went a whole day’s journey before Joseph and Mary realized that Jesus wasn’t with them. Luke gets his information for his gospel by interviewing first hand participants. Most likely, he gets the details of this episode from Mary. He either never thought to ask her how such a thing could have happened, or decided to leave that part out as a courtesy to Mary. Continue reading