Jesus as a Boy Part 1
Long before there were any people, before there was even a world or sun or stars, there was God. God has always been and God will always be. There has never been a time when God was not living, and there will never be a time when He is not living. We say God is eternal. This means that He never had a beginning, and He will never have an ending. Jesus is God’s Son. He is eternal also. In the Bible when you see the “Word” it is another name for Jesus, it starts with a capital because it is a proper name. God caused the Bible to be written to tell us of His love, so the Bible is called the word of God.
Jesus came to show us what God is like so He is called the Word. When we call Jesus the Word, we mean the One who is eternal, and who came as God’s Word to show His heart to man.
Have you ever wondered about Jesus as a boy, if He knew what it was to run and play games, go to school and have work to do around the home? Sometimes a boy or girl does not have a mother or father of his own or must be separated from his own family, but God provides him with others to look after him or her so that makes up their family.
Joseph brought Mary and the baby Jesus to a house in Bethlehem to live. While they were living there, wise men who had seen the star in the east and had come a long journey found them and brought rich gifts. Joseph was a poor man and these gifts were God’s provision for the care of Mary and her little Son. God told Joseph in a dream that the wicked King Herod would try to kill the baby, and that he must take Mary and the baby Jesus to Egypt where they would be safe.
The Bible does not tell us how long they were there, but it may have been for several years. Jesus was no longer a baby but quite a boy, playing in the sun and getting brown and strong. After the wicked king died, an angel came to Joseph again and told him that it was safe to go back to their land. So the little family took the long journey back to the land of Palestine. They settled in the town of Nazareth where they had lived before.
The home in Nazareth was a poor one in which everyone helped. We know that brothers and sisters were born into the family (Mark 6:3) though there was a difference. The brothers and sisters had the same mother, Mary, but there father was Joseph. Both Mary and Joseph knew and could not forget that Jesus was the Son of God and sent for a special purpose.
There were at least four brothers and two sisters, so it was a large family. Jesus was the big Brother, and no doubt He spent many hours looking after the little ones in the home. There were schools connected with the synagogues in which the boys were taught the Old Testament Scriptures. On the Sabbath day they went to the synagogue to worship and have classes, something like our Sunday school today.
Joseph was a carpenter, and Jesus must have spent many hours in the carpenter’s shop learning to work with His hands. When He was a grown man, people sometimes called Him a carpenter, Mark 6:3. So you see His life as He was growing up was made up of the same things as ours - family, school, friends, work, play, church. The Bible tells us very little about these growing up years, but it helps us to know that Jesus grew up as other boys grow, only with this difference, Luke 2:40 says “And the child grew and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon Him.”