Luke chapter 2, starting in verse 41, this is God's word, eternally true. Speaking of Jesus, every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of the Passover. When he was 12 years old, they went up to the feast according to the custom. After the feast was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they weren't aware of it. Thinking that's in their company, they kept Avalon 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 court 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 people saw him, when his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, Son, why be treated 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 then. Now let's respond and thank the Lord using that written response you have on the bottom left of your bolts in there. The Word of the Lord, let's pray together. Our God of Father, we are grateful to you for your Word, we're grateful to you that you've given it to us to teach us about you and about how we can live. We ask that you teach us now, Spirit grant us illumination of this Word that it would come to light, that it would make sense. Jesus preached to our minds and hearts. Speak to us through your Word now, we ask in Christ's name. I just made a big spill up here, so I'm going to dry off this water from here before I ruined the pulpit. And so hang on just a second, we're ready. Our gospel left in this morning is called Misunderstanding Jesus. We don't want to misunderstand Jesus, but what we do, and that's what this passage is about. This passage communicates something to us real clearly, and it's like a big funnel or a big wedge. You start out when you're in any, I was an English major in college, and I went and studied Bible theology, and you learn that when someone's telling the story, when there are some things that don't really, that aren't as crucial to the story, it's just summarized by the author. And then these 10 years passed, about that important. This passage here we have this morning starts out and it says something general. Every year Jesus' parents went to the Passover celebration, and then it narrows down. Now, when Jesus was 12 years old, they went and keeps narrowing, talks about what was going on, and now his parents started going back. And all of a sudden in narrows and narrows and narrows, eventually you don't have a summary of 12 years or a summary of a week-long event, you have conversation. And as we read, it takes as long as when it actually happens. And this passage is all funneled down to a focal point of this conversation, the short couple of lines between Jesus' parents and Jesus. And then after that funnel, after that focal point, there was this short conversation between Jesus' parents, what it actually quoted here, Luke for us summarizes the significance of this. Now, a couple of things we see from this passage. First of all, if you're following along your outline, first of all, God is a Jesus' savior, God and man. Luke wants to be very clear to us who Jesus is. And this is part of what gets misunderstood. Jesus' savior, God and man. This passage has much to us about the person in the purpose of Jesus. What is Jesus' purpose? What does this passage reveal to us? What did Jesus intend to accomplish? Why was he here? Verse 49, look there. And Jesus said to them, why were you searching for me? Didn't you know? Literally, had you not known? Had you not come to an understanding of this prior to now when I'm 12 years old? Haven't you come to an understanding yet based on past events, past things you were told and seeing me grow up? Haven't you come to an understanding yet that I must be in my father's house? Among his things, among the stuff in the business and the work of my father doing his work. So Jesus' purpose was to do God's work and questions his parents not knowing that. Why should they have known it? Well, we've been through the first couple of chapters of Luke. Mary had an angel come to her and say, you were conceived by the Holy Spirit. So she knew, Mary knew, and then certainly she told Joseph, that Jesus' father was God. Joseph knew it because he knew he wasn't the father. Why should there have known all the shepherds to be Mary and Joseph, that the angels and the fields that said to them, that a Savior had been born, who is Christ the Lord? The shepherds had been told by the angels, a Savior had been born and that this Savior would be the cause of people on whom God's favor rests, rested having peace. Peace to those on whom God's favor rests because the Savior's child is born. We're told when the shepherds go into the stable, or the cave, whatever it was, where Mary and Joseph were, as they set the baby Jesus in the manger, that the shepherds recounted to Mary and Joseph all that the shepherds or all that the angels had said to them. So we know that Mary and Joseph heard that Jesus had come to be a Savior. He had come to be the means through which God could grant peace to those who need a desire to grant his favor. So what should Mary and Joseph have understood about Jesus' purpose? It was he was to be a Savior. That's a blank if you haven't filled that in yet, Jesus' purpose to be a Savior. Now, who was Jesus? And who is Jesus? We learned about that in this passage. We learned that Jesus was and is God. First of all, Jesus, that's your aim. Jesus was and is God. His God, from birth, we saw it in the Holy Spirit conception. He's God even as a young boy. There's some that came in the way in hundreds of them. In the 1900s, he said, you know, Jesus didn't know he was the Savior and he wasn't God's son until God made him his son at the point of his baptism. And he said, this is my beloved son, my beloved son, in whom I will please. But we see from Luke here, he refutes all that. And he says, no, Jesus is God's son from his conception. If it's conceived by the Holy Spirit, God is literally his father. Jesus' first words in Luke's gospel are recorded here. We see them in this passage. And Jesus says, verse 49, didn't you know that I had to be in my father's house? He makes a claim here to be the son of God. Not just the child of God, like those who believe are. But the son of God, Jews didn't speak in Jesus' day of God being my father personally. It was unheard of. They spoke of God being our father. They spoke about God and our Lord and our father. But no one personally spoke of God being his father personally. But Jesus did because Jesus was God's very own son. We see that Jesus allegiance to his true father, God. And so he stays in his father's house. We see Jesus' claim here, my father's house is not in Nazareth. Joseph, I appreciate you. And you've been my adoptive father. But my birth father, who in fact has never left me, is the father of God. So Jesus is God. But we also learned here, secondly, that this is your being. And Jesus was also in addition to being fully God. He was fully man and his fully man, even as a young man at this time. And part of being a man and being Jewish. He obeyed the law. He went to the feet of the pants over in Jerusalem, the Jewish capital. And we read in verse 51, he was obedient to his parents. He did all it was required in the law. And you're out when we speak of Jesus' act of righteousness. That is, Jesus as a man actively obeyed all the laws of God. And he obeyed all those laws perfectly in our place. I was your blank there in our place. Part of the significance of Jesus being fully man, in addition to being fully God, is as a man, he perfectly obeyed the law. He never sinned. And so as a result, we're told in the New Testament. Paul tells us that Jesus' righteousness, his perfect obedience to the law, God credits to us who believe. So that we are credited with righteousness. We're told that in heaven, all that are there are clothed in robes of righteousness. As we look at our own lives, we say, that's not a robe that I've made, that's not a robe that I've bought. That's a robe that's been given to me. And that robe of righteousness has been given to me by God. And that righteousness itself, the fabric of it, is Christ. And it has been given to me. And we see here in this passage that even as a young boy, last week we looked at Jesus' parents, even when Jesus was an infant. His parents obeyed the law so that Jesus went through all the right things according to the law. And then as a young boy, he fulfills the law as well. And so we learn here that Jesus is fully God and fully man. Secondly, we see big truth here in this passage. Perhaps the main truth in this passage is that God is getting across that this morning. That Jesus is misunderstood. Jesus is misunderstood. Jesus is Savior. He's God and man. And in all these things, he's misunderstood. Because Jesus, this is your aid, because Jesus was misunderstood, he was put to death. There's three consequences we're going to talk about this morning about Jesus being misunderstood. Because he is misunderstood this, because he's misunderstood the death, and then one third thing. Because he is misunderstood, he's put to death, may and Joseph misunderstand the person and the purpose of Jesus. And if they misunderstood, having been given all the special revelation they were given, from angels, from the shepherds who had talked to angels, from people like Simeon and Anna, that we spoke about last week or the week before, all these special messages to them from God through agents. Then we're clued into the fact that we need nothing about Jesus' life at this point. We've never heard of Jesus before. We would be clued in right now that Jesus is in for it. He's got to be misunderstood by other people. If he was misunderstood by Joseph and Mary, he's going to be misunderstood by everybody else too. So Jesus goes along in his life and people don't understand they came there to forgive the sins of his people. And so his people, rather than embracing him, reject him. People don't understand that he is God. And so when he makes claims of being God, people get angry and call him a blasphemer. And because of these claims, his own people hands him over to the Roman government to be crucified. Can you imagine today with all the conflict that's going on in Palestine or Israel? The ancient Israel that Jesus walked is occupied by two people today, Muslims who are known as Palestinians. And Jews, Israelis. And that's what all the conflict is about. They both claim that the land should be rightfully theirs. Can you imagine today if Israelites would hand over one of their own to the Palestinians and say, here, kill this person? Of course not. But this is what happened in Jesus' day. Jesus was handed over to the Romans who were military invaders into Israel. They were occupying their land militarily and they handed one of their own over to the Romans to be crucified. So much was Jesus misunderstood. So much had he offended them based on this misunderstanding that they handed him over to be put to death. And because Jesus was misunderstood, he was put to death. But also being because Jesus was misunderstood, you today expect unbelief. Expect unbelief. If Jesus was misunderstood in the age that people were given direct revelation about him, where angels were appearing, where he was doing miracles that expect unbelief today. Know that's powerful, the course. And God says to you, when you see this, don't be shaken. Don't be disturbed. Don't let this shake you. Don't be thrown by it. Don't be thrown by the presence of so many people who reject Christ. Or for most people who are just indifferent to him. Don't let that be a surprise to you. Don't say, boy, that's out of the norm. Don't let that discount to you the truth that you know to be true of Jesus being God and man and Savior. There are many common misunderstandings today of who Jesus is. You probably have all had conversations with people or heard conversations with people where they talk about who they think Christ is and what its significance was. I remember in college I was in a class. There was a required class here to take a religion class. And I took a class called portraits of Jesus. And in that 10 week course, we studied scripture for the first two weeks. And then the remaining eight weeks, we studied what all these other people had said Jesus was, what their portrait of Jesus was. And one guy said this and one guy said that and they all left the biblical text. They all left what these witnesses of Jesus said Jesus was. And they said, well, Jesus was really a Marxist or Jesus was really a feminist or Jesus was for liberation in South America or what have you, all kinds of different portraits of Jesus. And you'll hear those things that you operate in today's society. But don't be surprised by that. So that's exactly not only what those who shouted crucify him experienced misunderstanding, but marrying just of themselves misunderstood who Jesus was and what his purpose was. Now something happened this past Monday that the whole nation was surprised about. That is for anyone who follows football. Ohio State, my team, lost to the University of South Carolina, who was like going 11 or own 10 last year. And this year they were six and three going into the game or something like that. Now, Ohio State's a perennial powerhouse that were ranked way up and it's somewhere in the low teams, I think. And they lost to South Carolina who wasn't even in the top 20, a dismal program for years and years. And there was great surprise expressed on Monday as this 24 to 3 or 24 to 6 score came through. And though I didn't see the game, I saw the scores coming through and I wasn't surprised. So I'm from Columbus, Ohio. And I'm still connected with people from Columbus, Ohio. And I know that Ohio State over the last 13 years, despite a history of being 50, 50 when they play Michigan, has been two 10 and one when they play Michigan. Even though they've been ranked higher, there's just been most of those years. I know that Ohio State goes to ball games and they've been three and eight. And so the next day of the coach was fired and all the people in Columbus said Amen. My mom called on Monday and she said, well, it's a good day in Ohio. And I didn't know what she's talking about, but I said, oh, it's a Cooper get fired. Yeah. But I wasn't surprised because I had inside information because I was a person from Columbus. I knew the records and I knew Ohio State did in ball games. I knew that they were never mentally prepared or barely ever mentally prepared when these big games came along. Despite all the talent they have in the NFL, same thing here. There are very few people. That is, there are just a few believers in this world that have inside information that have been granted understanding from God as to who Jesus is, as to what his purpose was to be a savior for all who believe. And so from there, it's like nationally, he didn't understand when Ohio State lost. It's the same way when you and I interact with people who aren't believers, we don't understand. Yeah. You know, other people don't know how Jesus is God's son, that he was born of the Virgin Mary by a conception of the Holy Spirit that he came to be a savior for all who believe. So because Jesus was misunderstood in his day, expect unbelief today. That's normality. A third consequence of Jesus being misunderstood, God's message to us is be humble with non-believers, be humble with non-believers. Since we see here, Mary and Joseph misunderstand Jesus' purpose and person after all the special revelation they have been given, God says to you, be humble. When we see Mary and Joseph disbelieve, it brings up a legitimate question. What gives? How could they have misplaced? Why don't they understand? When Jesus says, I must have been about my father's business, why didn't they say, oh, of course, he's God's son. He's a savior. He's a savior. He's starting to do these things. He's starting to be about God's business. Okay, forgive us for reviewing you, Jesus. Instead, what's the comment? Verse 50, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. This causes us to look at ourselves and be humble. The question that comes to us is why have we believed? From your outline there, why have I believed? If Mary and Joseph didn't understand this even though they had heard from angels and people who had talked to angels, why have I believed? They had greater revelation than I did. More direct than I did, we ask ourselves. Well, it comes down to Ephesians 2 and Sunday School this morning. We were talking about this. Ephesians 2 reveals to us that from Adam, remember in the Garden of Eden, God said, if you either fear this tree, surely on this day you will die. And Adam and he did die on that day. They died spiritually. And their ears spiritually reclosed and their eyes spiritually were blinded. They were blind and they were deaf and their hearts were darkened. And that's the way we are. David said, we are conceived in sin. And because of that sin, we don't understand. We don't see and understand the kingdom of God when it's presented to us just like Mary and Joseph. But fortunately Ephesians 2, Paul tells us while we were dead and deaf, when our ears couldn't hear, when our eyes couldn't see, we were dead and lifeless. God made you alive. Paul writes, that's a blank there for you. God made me alive. Ephesians 2, it was not that you were smarter than Joseph and Mary. That's another blank. You weren't smarter than Joseph and Mary. You weren't more spiritual than them. Probably none of us were as spiritual as Mary was. Or some of these people that we've read about, Simeon and Anna and Zechariah and Elizabeth. Probably none of us compared to them really in terms of our righteousness and day to day living. We weren't smarter, we weren't more spiritual. That's not why we believed. We believed simply because God gave us spiritual life. Jesus explained to the disciples and his parables when they said, you know, what's the story with these parables? He said, people don't understand them and they don't understand them because they're hearing. They don't understand their deaf to them only through having spiritual life. And we understand spiritual things. Paul writes, that's a spiritual man who understands spiritual things and that the natural man apart from God's spirit can only understand natural things and not the supernatural. It's kind of like you ever read the paper or you're reading something and it's go long someone comes in and you're in the middle of an article and someone starts to talk into you. Now if you're lighter than me, you quit reading and you then talk to the person. But if you're like me, you kind of keep reading. And you know, they're talking and they're talking and you say, you know, your mind hears the cadence and you know when to say, but you're not listening, nothing's registering about what they're saying. And if they say, are you even listening to me? We have to, we have to, that's you never have to say that to me. Are you even listening to me? We have to replay the tape of the last two sentences in our mind because they haven't registered yet. So we stopped reading and maybe we say, okay, she just said, yeah, you're talking about this. That's what's going on when the gospel is being preached across this world. There are some people who are reading the paper, so to speak. And they hear the words. They, audibly, it's going in the ears and in their heads, but they don't understand. It's not registering. It's not registering that they have sin and that that's an offense to God and that they stand under God's wrath and need some self to that. They need some healing or a resolution to that problem of their separation with God. And so when they hear that Jesus is a savior, it doesn't mean anything. Okay, great. That's neat. You know, okay, I'm going to die. I like that. But it doesn't register inside. I'm sure many of you remember, those of you who have come to this point of believing, you remember maybe the point where registered for you, maybe you were five, maybe you're 23 or 43 or 53 or 57. And all of a sudden maybe it heard about Jesus all your life up to that point and all of a sudden it made sense. And you realize, I'm in trouble. My sin has consequences. It's separation from God and God is rightly wrathful against me. And I need a savior and Jesus is offering salvation to me. Yes, I'll take it. And you understood for the first time I remember my own life and it made great for the first time understanding why Jesus died. The sin of mine, he died for. So I wouldn't have to die and be separated from God for eternity. Now, the consequence of understanding this, that all who have come to believe has come to believe not because they're smarter, but because God has made them alive. What's the consequence for us in day to day life? The consequence is that we treat other people with humility. We look at others, don't believe. We don't judge those. That's your blank there. We don't judge those who haven't believed because I'll just read off your bolts in here. I would not have believed the part from God's granting me years to hear and to understand the gospel. This causes me to walk in humility. We say and we see an unbeliever. You know what? I wouldn't have believed apart from God giving me life. There's nothing I've done that's better than this person over here who hasn't believed. And so I treat that person with humility. Just like I would have treated Mary and Joseph with humility. Very Wilson writes, I was on duty when my emergency squad was dispatched to rescue me and trapped in a doghouse, trapped in a doghouse in his backyard. The man had tried to teach his dog how to use the new Lux quarters that he had just bought for the dog by crawling in himself. Now this man's head was stuck in that trap door and he couldn't get it unwashed. While the crew worked at this man on the doghouse, this emergency squad person said, I chatted with the man. He told me, love to watch those TV shows about emergency squads responding to people stupid but funny incidents. And with a straight face he asked me, do you ever get any calls like that? We as believers are not as smart as we think. We haven't believed because we're smart, we're like this man with our head caught in the doghouse. And like he needed the emergency squad to come and to get us out, we've been at the absolute mercy of God to send the Savior for us. We've been at the absolute mercy of God to grant us life so we would understand that Jesus is a Savior for us so we could embrace Him in faith. Let us pray. Our God and Father, we are grateful to you. Jesus, we are grateful to you for coming to this earth. You knew you would be misunderstood even by your parents. You knew that people wouldn't understand that you were God and that they would not worship you but rather people would reject you and hand you over to evil men to have you crucified. And you still came for the joy that was set before you of saving us from our sins. For the joy that was set before you of burying our sins on a cross that we might have eternal life, the forgiveness of sins, through what you've done for us. We worship you and acknowledge you as God, Jesus. And we are grateful to you for coming to this earth, taking upon human flesh after having made all things that are you took upon human flesh, lived the perfect life in our stead. And now you've made us alive. You've granted us understanding of the gospel, given us the ability in our spiritual life that you've given us to embrace you, to have faith in you that our sins are forgiven and eternal life is granted to us. For this we are grateful. Help us to grow in our understanding of this and help us to grow in an increasing depth of love for you as we have seen the greatness of your love for us, rescuing us spiritually dead people. Amen.