James Nisbet Commentary - Luke 2:49 - 2:49

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James Nisbet Commentary - Luke 2:49 - 2:49


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

A DIVINE NECESSITY

‘Wist ye not that I must?’

Luk_2:49

Our thoughts go out to Him Who is the founder and pattern of our religion, and the use He made in His life on earth of His opportunities of worship in God’s special house of prayer. His first recorded words, indeed, were spoken in self-defence in the house of prayer. The force of the question is altogether independent of its ending. Whether we prefer, with the revisers, ‘In My Father’s house,’ or the Authorised Version, ‘About my Father’s business,’ in either case appeal is made to necessity. The boy Jesus is surprised that His mother should have sought Him in such anxiety when He had tarried behind in the Temple, and in anticipation of criticism as being wayward and troublesome urges that He had only been doing what He was obliged.

Both these points are worth our careful attention.

I. His character for obedience was established.—As they had trained Him, so He was, and even when His conduct seemed disobedient their general experience of Him ought to have prevented misjudgment.

II. Paramount as are the claims of the home and the narrower, more intimate circle, there are times when these must yield to something higher which the intellect fails to define, though the conscience cannot evade.

—
Rev. Dr. C. R. Davey Biggs.



A CONDITION OF LIFE

‘Wist ye not that I must be about My Father’s business?’

Luk_2:49

The lessons to be drawn from this incident are sufficiently obvious. Work is a condition of life. It is in itself one of its most ennobling conditions, raising us as it does into closest union with God, Who is ever still and yet ever active.

I. The work that God has given us.—The first thing we must be absolutely sure about is that our work is the work God has sent us into the world to do. Christ makes no difference between sacred and secular. The broad line often drawn between the two is misleading and fictitious. So it is as necessary for you as it is for me and my brother clergy to be quite sure that the work we are engaged in is the Father’s work. This truth should help us in our choice of work, and, may I add, in our choice of work for our sons and our daughters. It ought to help us also in our choice of partners for life. For man God has provided a helpmeet; but how shall a Christian woman be a helpmeet in work which is not the Father’s?

II. To be done in the Father’s way.—We must be trying to do the work in the Father’s way, as did our Lord in obedience to His will, with diligence and sustained effort. Sloth is one of the seven deadly sins, and it is the deadliest of all deadly sins because it is the mother of all the rest, and a very prolific mother too. Self-control, punctuality, obedience to the rules of the establishment we are in, consideration for others, promptness in the performance of our duty, doing the best for those who are set over us because we are trying to do the best for Him Who is over us and them: thus and thus alone can we look up to the Father’s face.

III. Work with disinterestedness.—Our work must be done with disinterestedness. The terrible moral defect of commercial dishonesty pervades all conditions of life, and it strikes at the very root of doing the Father’s work in His own way, and for the greater glory of God. If only on each morning as we go to our various works we would realise that we are bent upon the Father’s work, that we have to do it in His way and for His glory, how much will the example of even one among us be able to do towards the purifying of what, I fear, is a very trough of iniquity!

IV. Work for eternity.—We need to remember that we are working for eternity. Obstacles will appear, difficulties will manifest themselves; but if only we are assured that we are doing God’s work and trying to do it in His way, for His glory, then we may be quite sure these difficulties will be overruled for our good, and we shall be enabled to persevere.

—
Rev. Canon C. E. Brooke.

Illustration

‘Weak and imperfect men shall, notwithstanding their frailties and defects, be received, as having pleased God, if they have done their utmost to please Him. The rewards of charity, piety, and humility will be given to those whose lives have been a careful labour to exercise these virtues in as high a degree as they could. We cannot offer to God the service of angels; we cannot obey Him as man in a state of perfection could; but fallen men can do their best, and this is the perfection that is required of us; it is only the perfection of our best endeavours, a careful labour to be as perfect as we can. But if we stop short of this, for aught we know, we stop short of the mercy of God, and leave ourselves nothing to plead from the terms of the Gospel. For God has there made no promises of mercy to the slothful and negligent. His mercy is only offered to our frail and imperfect, but best endeavours, to practise all manner of righteousness.’

(SECOND OUTLINE)

THE PURPOSE OF LIFE

The first recorded utterance of our Lord is precious, because it tells so much about the after life of Him Who spake it.

I. It strikes the keynote of His life.—It foretells what He had come to do, and how He would do it. It is a revelation of character as well as a promise of future conduct. He came not to be idle, but to work.

II. It tells of the dignity of the life He was to live. It was His Father’s business, and His work was not only His duty but His delight. To please His Father must needs be His one aim and endeavour.

III. It tells the spirit in which He lived and worked.—‘I must.’ He was determined, brave, resolute. He must do it, whatever the cost might be.

IV. We may learn the true purpose of life for which God has intended us. Each has a work to do for God for which we must give account. There is a niche for each of us to fill. If we leave the work undone it will not be done at all.

Bishop C. J. Ridgeway.

Illustrations

(1) ‘To do our “Father’s business” here

In humble reverence and fear,

Meekly upon His will to wait

In little things as well as great,

Contented in our lot to rest,

’Tis thus the Christian serves Him best.’

(2) ‘Always be about your Heavenly Father’s business. Remember that you are a Christian, whatever you are about; and in your most common actions you can be improving in the great concern of your soul. “Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” ’