Are We There Yet?
BRIEF SUMMARY: Becoming an adult in our faith journeys mean taking responsibility for the way of life Jesus modeled for us.
Sermon for December 30, 2012 (Christmas 1) based on Luke 2:41-52
Rev. Kathryn Ransdell
An almost 4-year-old asked his mom on the way to church, "How many times until I grow up?"
It's interesting that from such a young age, most kids begin to dream about what life will be like as a grown-up. It is not easy being a little person in this world, going through the entire day being told what to do and when to do it. Get-up. Get dressed. Go to school. Eat dinner. Take a bath. Go to bed.
Just imagine if adults were told when and how their days would unfold. Revolt! The particularly intense desire for independence would rise-up and demand freedom and justice for all, well, at least for adults.
Returning to the four-year-old's question, there is a bit of a crisis in our society today around this idea of what makes a person an adult.
Different cultures hold different answers. Author Katherine S. Newman, in her book, Boomerang Kids, Anxious Parents, and the Private Toll of Global Competition, highlights how Americans see adulthood as a "process of self-discovery" and Europeans see it as "a station defined by the way one relates to others.”
Perhaps the measurements for granting status as an adult are shifting. The 1950s pattern for establishing yourself as an adult went something like this: high school, then college, then first job and marriage, then buy a house, then have 2.5 kids.
The current economic picture doesn't allow for the story to unfold like this any longer. Many college graduates face months of unemployment before landing a first job. Marriage is happening later, and later, with many couples waiting until their late 20s or early 30s to marry. Buying a house is becoming somewhat more elusive for college graduates who find themselves leaving school with a significant student loan debt. As for having kids, moms in their 30s and beyond have raised the average age of mothers from 21 in 1970 to 25.1 in 2008.
In this kind of environment, it is no wonder that many adults find their adult-children moving back home. This cultural trend has led adult-parents to seek advice on what to do in these situations, so articles like one published in The New York Times March 9, 2012, "Rules for when the chick returns to the nest" are becoming more common.
In the Jewish culture, a coming-of-age-ceremony known as the Bar-Mitzvah (boys) are Bat-Mitzvah (girls) ties the designation of adulthood to a specific age. Boys go through this ritual at age 13, while girls go through it at age 12. From this ritual, there is an understanding that they are now responsible for their actions.
In general, do you think 13-year-old boys, or even the most mature 12-year-old girls, responsible for their actions? If you've ever spent time with junior high kids, then you might have some things in common with Mary and Joseph in today's Scripture.
Jesus is 12-years-old when the family makes the pilgrimage to Jerusalem for Passover. This is something they did every year, which means there was familiarity to the experience. Dad stresses over getting the car packed while Mom makes sure she didn't forget anything. The oldest brother tries for a window seat while the baby in the family whines for the other window, leaving the middle child, once again, stuck in-between.
Are we there yet?
There is familiarity while away, like going to the same vacation spot every year. Unpack the car, settle into the cabin, unpack your stuff, and begin the celebrations. When the vacation time is over, time to repack. Everyone is tired. Grumpy. It was a great experience, and, it is great that it is now over. Time to go back home and enter normalcy once again.
Something happens on the way home. One-day into the return trip, someone asks, "Where's Jesus?" He must be in someone else's car. A flurry of cell phone calls and consistent, "No, he's not with us," grows into an all-out panic. Turn the car around. Drive as fast as you can. Get there. And finally, there he is...
A mixed emotion emerges within parents in moments like these. When you find the child who was lost, there is an immense wave of relief that mixes with a surge of frustration that the child would get themselves lost in the first place.
Jesus meets his parents who are in a very human place with a very divine understanding: "Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?"
After 13 long years, Mary hears from her son what others, human and divine, have been telling her. First the angel announced it to her before Jesus was born. Then, her also pregnant, cousin Elizabeth celebrated with her. Next, some unknown shepherds knocked on the door of the stable shortly after his birth. When he was only 8 days old, two strangers, one a devout Jew and the other, a widow prophetess, in the temple said amazing things about this boy.
They said amazing things about this boy. Mary tucked these stories deep into her heart as any parent does. No matter how old a child gets, parents look at the person and yet see the child whose diapers needed changing, knees needed bandaging, and tears needed drying.
The story of Jesus' childhood as told in the Gospels comes to an end in these verses, as we don't meet Jesus again until the next chapter, when he is 30-years-old, which coincidentally, seems to be the age when people begin to get their acts together, aka, becoming an adult.
After the external voices of anticipation and the recognition by strangers, Jesus articulates his purpose with clarity and conviction. "I must be in my Father's house."
"I must be..." The English word "must" is derived from the Greek word, "dei," meaning implying a sense of necessity. This word, dei, though is from the root word, "deo," which means to literally bind, or chain, two things together.
"I am literally bound to my Father's house."
On this Sunday, the next to the last day of the year 2012, let us examine where this past year has taken us. How much of it did we live on purpose? How much of the year came from a place of clarity and conviction? We will enter a new calendar year in two days. How much of this new year will we live on purpose?
And what a blessing it is that we are entering another calendar year! We began 2012 with stories of a Mayan calendar that predicted the end of the world in December 2012. Look's like we are all still here.
The world is still here. And, the world needs a church that works on purpose, with clarity and conviction.
"Do you think the world is better today than it was 2,000 years ago?" This was a question always asked by the great philanthropist Stanley S. Kresge, founder of K-Mart. His former pastor from First United Methodist Church in Detroit, Dr. William Quick, recounted this question in a sermon preached to a group of seminary students on the last Sabbath of the second millennium. Dr. Quick believed that the answer to this was yes, the world is better off, because Jesus and his teachings lie behind all efforts of social reform.
It was Jesus who put an end to slavery.
It was Jesus who elevated the status of women.
It was Jesus who sanctified childhood.
It was Jesus who conferred on us our liberty.
It is Jesus who will push us to equal marriage and civic rights for gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and transgendered persons.
It is Jesus who will bring about financial, lending and credit reform.
It is Jesus who will teach us that we only have one earth and instead of wanting more, Jesus will teach us what we really need is less.
It is Jesus who will whisper our purpose for 2013, and it will be Jesus, who will plant in our hearts and minds the clarity and conviction this world so desperately needs.
It is Jesus who has given us a new way of life, a new standard of conduct, and a new power for living.
Are we ready to accept this responsibility?
Are we ready to be forgiven, so that we might forgive others?
Are we ready to receive God's peace, that we might be at peace with others?
Are we ready to elevate the status of those considered unworthy, as we have been elevated?
Are we willing to live with a different standard of conduct, a different power, and a different way of life?
In other words, as Christians, are we ready to grow-up and take responsibility for Jesus' actions?
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