NOTES for Luk 2:49

The twelve-year-old Lord Jesus, who remained in the Jerusalem Temple, answers the sorrowful question of His Most Pure Mother by speaking of His Father's House. This is the House in which He must be. This thought may have served as the basis for the revelation of the Book of Proverbs: "Wisdom has built her house..." The evangelist draws two pictures at once: the teachers and scribes marvel at Jesus' wisdom, while His parents, troubled, search for Him through the city. His answer to His Mother resembles a riddle: where else should a boy be but in his father's house? A person should live at home. Already then the Lord begins to reveal to people His origin and calling: He is God's Wisdom and God's Son.

But there is another important aspect of this event. The Lord speaks of the House belonging to His Heavenly Father; in our language this is what is called "fatherland." And when we read that His fatherland is heaven, should we not ask ourselves where our fatherland is? Not the territory where the people who gave us birth live, but fatherland in a deeper sense. Where we are from, and where is the home we could call our eternal dwelling. Trying to find an answer to this question, we understand that thanks to the Incarnation of the Son of God, His fatherland becomes ours as well, and through Him we acquire an eternal Home.