Jesus said: “Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” Luke 2:49 (NKJV)
TOPIC: Jesus was a man on a mission.
BACKGROUND: At age twelve, Mary and Joseph traveled to Jerusalem with Jesus to observe the Passover. After several days of searching, they found him with the teachers in the temple. Only Luke records this incident.
It is interesting to note that in Jesus’ first recorded words, we realize he came to earth with a purpose. His mission was already before him. He was to be about the business of his Father in heaven. John 6:38 echoes that very theme. “I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me.” In John 4:34 he also explains that his mission was “to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.”
We might ask what that work was. Jesus answers that question during his conversation with the tax collector, Zacchaeus. When questioned why he would spend time at the house of a “sinner” Jesus replied, “The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost” (Luke 19:10). In a similar situation at Matthew’s house, Jesus responded to the same question, “I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners” (Matthew 9:13). Jesus came not to avoid sinners but to show them love and compassion for their souls. Jesus sailed across a lake to minister to a demon-possessed gentile. He went to a well to preach to a Samaritan woman. He met late at night with a Pharisee, and he sat in the homes of prostitutes, tax collectors, the socially outcast, and sinners.
Jesus accomplished his mission. In the Upper Room he told the Father, “I have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do” (John 17:4). Today the Church continues to carry out his mission to search for the lost coin, the wandering sheep, and the lost son. How thankful we are that he loved us so much that he sought us too!
PRAYER THOUGHT: by Katherine S. Burr
O let me tell it once again, the story of His love,
Who came to seek and save the lost, and guide them safe above.
THE AUTHOR OF HEBREWS WRITES ABOUT JESUS: “Christ died to rescue those who had sinned and broken the old agreement. Now he brings his chosen ones a new agreement with its guarantee of God’s eternal blessings!” Hebrews 9:15 CEV
From At the Feet of Jesus by Reynold R. Kremer