The Boyhood of Jesus
Luke 2: 41-52
Jesus’ visit to Jerusalem as a twelve-year-old boy is the only account of His boyhood found in the four gospels. The purpose is to transition into Yeshua’s ministry by demonstrating His exceptional spiritual growth. The account reveals His two themes. The first theme is Jesus’ growing awareness of His unique relationship with God the Father. This theme climaxes in Luke 2:49 when Jesus announces that He stayed in the City of David because He had to be in His Father’s house. Although Yeshua continued to be in submission to His human parents (Luke 2:51), His obedience to His heavenly Father surpassed all earthly commitments. The second theme is Jesus’ growth in wisdom, as revealed in His dialog with the Jewish rabbis in the Temple (Isaiah 11:2). Consequently, Yeshua demonstrated His messianic credentials at an early age.189
The scarcity of the records of the silent years in Nazareth stands in stark contrast to the high state of physical, mental and spiritual development that we find in Yeshua when He began His public ministry. We are left largely to conjecture as to how He must have exercised His gifts of teaching and preaching during the years of His youth. Ultimately, we must conclude that He not only interacted with the current issues of His times, but, that He had given long hours of meditation to the great theme that became the core of the message of His public ministry. Many a time, He must have climbed the stony path that led to the hilltop above Nazareth, and remained for hours in meditation and prayer. When He emerged on our horizon in His ministry at a wedding in Cana (to see link click Bq – Jesus Changes Water Into Wine), it was with the full splendor of spiritual power.190
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