About His Father’s Business

When Jesus was 12 years old, His parents took Him to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover. This was the custom of the Jews for the families to go up once a year to offer gifts and praise to God. Many of Joseph and Mary’s kinfolk traveled with them to go to the feast making it a great time for family and “catching up”. After their time at Jerusalem was finished, they began the long trip back to their homes, again, traveling together. When they had gone a day’s journey out from the city, they began looking for Jesus among the relatives, and, to their horror, discovered that He was not with them! Can you imagine what they must have been feeling? Think of traveling with your children to Chicago or New York for a family reunion and driving a day home before realizing that Johnny wasn’t riding with Uncle Bob, but that you had left your young child alone in the city!

Of course, Joseph and Mary frantically hurried back to Jerusalem to seek their son. They spent three days searching for Him! How desperate they must have been feeling, not to mention guilty and ashamed. I’m sure that after that long a time they were beginning to feel like something terrible might have happened to Him, and that they might not see Him again. I know I would have been. That’s when they finally found Him. He was sitting in the temple in the midst of the doctors of the law, listening to them teaching, and asking them questions. His mother said to Him, “Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? Behold thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing.” It was the normal mother’s reaction. Today it would sound like, “How could you do this to us? Your father and I have been frantic!” Jesus’ response was matter-of-fact: “How is it that ye sought me? Wist ye not (didn’t you know) that I must be about my Father’s business?”

I shudder to think how many times I have been caught up in the busyness of life, in activities, and even in religious things; and lost sight of the Son. I think I am still walking with the Lord, but I am missing His nearness, sensing the absence of His presence. It’s like the wife who is riding in the car with her husband saying, “When we were going together you always sat close to me when we went places, and now we’re on opposite sides of the car – don’t you love me anymore?” The husband just looked at her and quietly said, “I’ve never moved.” Dear ones, it isn’t Jesus who moves away from us.

Jesus is the one constant in my life, and I will always find Him in the same place - about His Father’s business. I may move away by filling my life with things and find that the gulf between the Son of God and me just grows wider. What’s even more frightening is that I can even be religious and still miss what the Father has for me to do. Jesus’ parents attended the feast, made their prayers and sacrifices, and thought that they had fulfilled the extent of their religious duty; but there was so much more for them.

Don’t lose sight of the Son. Stay close to Him – don’t let Him out of your sight! If, however, you discover that He is no longer close, simply go back to where He always is found - about His Father’s business. When you discover what is important to God, you will also find His presence and you, too, will be about your Father’s business.

“And when they saw him, they were amazed: and his mother said unto him, Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing.

And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business?”

- John 2:48, 49