For this week’s message, I am looking at the story of Jesus’ extra days at the temple in Jerusalem at age 12.<\/p>\n\n\n
I am focused on the explanation He gives his earthly parents when they return to Jerusalem in a panic. Mary scolds Him a bit – in true motherly fashion – “Why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.”\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
Jesus picks up on the word “father” and uses it to reference Someone quite different from Joseph: “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?”<\/p>\n\n\n
Interestingly, this is the first recorded instance of Jesus calling God His “Father” and the last mention of His human father, Joseph.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
Since last summer, on a daily basis, I have been intentionally following Jesus’ lead in addressing God as He taught us: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.”\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
I stop and linger over that word, Father<\/i>. I suppose most of us could spend a lifetime meditating on God’s fatherly love for us and never exhaust all that He intends for us to understand.<\/p>\n\n\n
But in reading the story of Jesus at the temple, I am struck that I have only ever seen one side of “Father”: God’s warmth toward us …<\/p>\n\n\n
But it also expresses our obligation to Him as His sons and daughters.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
Because in the end, a father is someone who loves me and<\/b><\/i> asks me to do things.<\/p>\n\n\n
As a son, I love my father and <\/b><\/i>I do the things he asks me to do.<\/p>\n\n\n
When I pray to “my Father in heaven”, it should call to mind not only His love for me but also my obligation to do what He asks of me.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For this week’s message, I am looking at the story of Jesus’ extra days at the temple in Jerusalem at age 12. I am focused on the explanation He gives his earthly parents when they return to Jerusalem in a panic. Mary scolds Him a bit – in true motherly fashion – “Why have you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5259"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5259\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5260,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5259\/revisions\/5260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}