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Sep 23, 2025 18:00pm

Walking Through Luke: The Boy Jesus

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Have you ever gotten lost?

Getting lost as a little kid can be scary, especially in big crowds. I remember once, my uncle and his girlfriend took my brother and me to a carnival when we were both very small. He attached special lights to our jackets to keep track of us so they could find us in case we got lost. Thankfully, that never happened, but it might have been the first time I realized there was a possibility that I could end up on my own, separated from an adult who could protect me.

When I was 20, my parents, siblings, and I went to Arizona to visit my extended family for Christmas. While we were there, they decided we would all go to the zoo at night because the zoo was having a special Christmas light show after hours.

Getting out in Phoenix late in the evening was an exciting experience. I grew up there, but my family moved away when I was seven years old, so I didn’t get to experience much of the city in a way that stuck with me into adulthood. This was a unique opportunity. When we arrived at the zoo, all 17 of us—two grandparents, three aunts, and one of their husbands, one uncle and his girlfriend, three cousins, two parents, three siblings, and myself—headed up to the entrance. We were an entourage that probably looked like the Children of Israel heading out of Egypt.

I stopped to take a picture of a light display on the outside of the zoo. It took less than a minute, but when I turned around, all 16 of my relatives were gone. I walked up to the ticket booth to check, but they weren’t there. So—thankful for the modern technology of the cell phone—I called my dad and asked where he was. He said they had already gone inside the zoo—without me. I hurried inside, found them, and made a big deal about how no one out of the entire family of 16 had noticed I was missing. Somehow, I ended up being the one at fault. For the rest of the night, they kept joking about making sure I was close by and didn’t wander off.

Luke 2 is a chapter usually discussed in relation to Christmas. We know all about Jesus’s birth, but what happened between that and when He started His ministry as an adult? We don’t see much of that part of His life, but what we do see of it is found in Luke. Luke is a unique Gospel. In his writing, he consistently focuses on Jesus’s ministry to society’s outcasts. Time and time again Jesus focuses on those society declares unlovely. This includes sinners, tax collectors, sick people, Gentiles, and Samaritans. Luke even highlights the women who followed Jesus, more than Matthew, Mark, or John—a rarity for those days. The latter portion of Luke 2 focuses on Jesus as a child, and children in those days were also paid little attention, making this another remarkable inclusion by Luke.

Jesus and His parents were in Jerusalem for the Passover (2:41). Jesus was twelve years old, and He went with His parents for this annual holiday. This was a major event for the Jewish people, and they would travel in massive caravans from their hometowns to Jerusalem. Often, the men would walk ahead and talk with each other, while the women would take up the rear and gather together, along with the children. Because Jesus was 12, He was young enough to be considered a child but old enough that He might have been more comfortable walking with the men. Perhaps this explains why, as Mary and Joseph set out to return to Nazareth, neither one realized Jesus was missing.

But this wasn’t an accident. Jesus remained where He was with intention. He didn’t do it as some kind of preteen rebellion. He was caught up in the teaching of the Word. We don’t know His motivations; maybe He didn’t notice Mary and Joseph leaving, or maybe He saw them leave the temple but thought they’d come get Him before they began the journey home. What we do know is that this was a simple mistake on the part of His parents. Jesus never did anything troublesome, nor was He in danger.

What was Jesus doing during that time? What was He doing when they found Him? He was asking the teachers questions. Already, He had supernatural knowledge of the Bible and a deep wisdom that confounded these teachers. Jesus was devoted to and intrigued by the teachings of His Father’s Word. This venture in the temple was preparing Him for His ministry, both in the absorption of knowledge and in the practice of teaching even those who were already filled with knowledge about the law.

Mary and Joseph were perplexed and apparently frustrated when they found Him. But Jesus was amazed that they had not known where to look, because already as a child, He was aware that He had to be about His Father’s—God’s—not Joseph’s—business. From the time He was a child, Jesus was devoted to the mission to which God had called Him.

This reveals the truth of Jesus’s identity as the Messiah and the Son of God. He did not become the Son of God as an adult; He already held that status even as a child. And just like we should strive to imitate His adult life, we can also learn from His behavior as a child. He was submissive to His parents (v. 51), devoted to learning God’s Word (v. 46), and dedicated to God’s will (v. 49). These are all attributes we should share, and which Jesus shows we can exhibit even at a young age. If you are a young adult—or are raising one—it is essential to realize that following God is not a choice that has to wait for adulthood. A child or teenager can make God’s business their own while they’re still young. Those teachings will not leave them as they grow.