Jim Batterton - That night, January 9, 1989, I paced around my room. All of the memory verses I had ever learned were racing through my mind. I knew I really needed to be saved, and as I became increasingly more upset, I was realizing that I really didn’t know how to be saved...
Memory Verse: Luke 2:49 Memory Verse Text: I must be about My Father's business.
Point 1: The Saviour was here - He had come unto His own people and His own things - yet Mt 2:14 was made a stranger to His own people and made to dwell in a strange land. Even when God tells Joseph to return they dwell in Nazareth again - a place despised because it was poor and inhabited by many gentiles. Point 2: The Feast - that is, the Passover in Jerusalem. His parents were devout and sought to obey God's instruction to His people by attending the Feast. God never intended Passover to be forgotten. Who would know more about it than the One who was the true Passover Lamb? Point 3: After the feast and all it's deep meaning - his parents left behind the One who was the True Center of the Feast. He is the Center of another gathering though. The Rabbis ask and receive answers. They are amazed even after 3 days at His understanding! Point 4: Parents come seeking Him. Though there is much delay - they who truly seek Him, find Him. The Lord Jesus at 12 (when a young Israeli was to take on responsibity) tells them who His Father is and reminds them that He has more important business and yet in spite of it all and the fact that He truly knows far more than they, he goes home and is subject to them. In all things, He did that which was becoming as a man under the law.
Notes: Point 3 - how easy it is for us - to be occupied with the things of God and yet to go on with our lives without Him near.
This Sunday School Curriculum guide is part of a 254 Sunday School Lesson Book available at www.gospelhall.org. See the Downloads Section of the site for a complete copy.
Jim Batterton
