Advent- Thirty Days of Jesus: Day 9, The Child Grew

By Elizabeth Prata

We are still in the section of verses from the Bible depicting the prophecy of Jesus’ coming, His arrival, and His early life before ministry. With two more days after today to go, then we shift into looking at Jesus Himself, His earthly ministry, and the different aspects of Himself that He displayed.

John MacArthur preached on Jesus’ brother James in a sermon called James: The Brother of Our Lord. In it, JMac discusses the early home life of Jesus and contrasts it to the rest of Jesus’ siblings. From the siblings’ point of view, especially the focus of James, what was it like to grow up with literally a perfect brother? The venerable theologian proposes this:

“I don’t know how many times Joseph and Mary said this, but they must have said it more than they ought to, “Why can’t you be like your brother?” which doesn’t really help either.”

LOL.

There are not many verses recounting the childhood and pre-ministry life of Jesus, but there are a few. Here is one:

Further Reading

What happened during Jesus’ childhood?
Other than Luke 2:41–52, the Bible does not tell us anything about Jesus’ youth. From this incident we do know certain things about Jesus’ childhood. First, He was the son of parents* who were devout in their religious observances. As required in the law, Joseph and Mary made the yearly pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover. When Jesus was 12 years old, they brought Him along on the trip to celebrate the Feast with them. Luke paints a picture of a typical boy in a typical family of that day.

Why doesn’t the Bible say much about Jesus childhood?
Both Matthew and Luke speak about the birth and infancy of Jesus, but share little concerning other details of His early life. Why not?

The boyhood of Jesus
Although the boy Jesus was gifted with a wisdom far beyond His years — a wisdom which was His because He was the Son of God, yet He lived much as other boys lived, doing the tasks that were given Him by His parents and being subject to them in all things.

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