Parenting - Luke 1-2

 Luke 2:40 (ESV)

And the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom. And the favor of God was upon him.

The above verse is speaking about the time immediately after Jesus birth.   After his birth there was a time of his circumcision (8 days after his birth) and then another 33 days for the mother, Mary, to be purified.  So, this statement is about a month and one-half after Jesus birth.   We don’t read again about Jesus, until the next verse, where we read that every year Jesus is taken to the Temple of Passover, but Luke starts with Jesus’ 12th year arriving in the Temple to unfold His life.  From this 40 day visit to the 12th year visit, we know nothing about Jesus, except what we read in the above text.   

What we read is that Jesus’ formative years provided that he would be growing in strength, wisdom and in the “favor” (the Greek word for “grace”) of God.   The natural growth process takes care of Him growing “strong.”  We have no belief that Jesus possessed super-human strength.    However, the fact that Luke, through the power of the Holy Spirit, tells us He grew in wisdom and in grace, we see that God provided something in the life of His Son, that flowed from God’s amazing grace.  This is the point of practical truth for all parents.   Nothing happens in the life of a child, no matter the parent’s skills, style or sense of knowledge of parenting.   Mary and Joseph were first time parents.  They had no parenting classes and no parenting books to read.  They had little interaction with their own parents, at least what we read in Scripture.  They had no “church” support.  Because Jesus was a wanted “man,” immediately after His birth they moved around, meaning the family structure was not there to help raise Him.  Mary and Joseph were alone as parents.  Not just with a baby boy, but with the very Son of God; the creator of the universe.  Their utter dependence for raising Him was not their skills, it was by faith in the “favor” of God - God’s grace - on their lives.  No child is ever raised by parents for good, because of the awesome skills of the parent. Any good that comes into and out of a child’s life is from the power of God’s favor upon that child.  Period!!   That does not take away the responsibility of the parent to teach the child God’s Word, to pray over the child and to interact with the child about spiritual things.  The key is to rely upon these things, to allow God to use those tools to shower the child with His amazing grace.   The number one responsibility of a parent is to create avenues for God’s grace to be unfolding in the child’s progressive walk with God.  The only way for a child to grow in the right way, is through the “favor” of God - through His amazing grace.