II. The sweet 'must' of filial duty.

'How is it that ye sought Me?' That means: 'Did you not know where I
should be sure to be? What need was there to go up and down
Jerusalem looking for Me? You might have known there was only one
place where you would find Me. Wist ye not that I _must_ be
about My Father's business?' Now, the last words of this question
are in the Greek literally, as the margin of the Revised Version
tells us, 'in the things of My Father'; and that idiomatic form of
speech may either be taken to mean, as the Authorised Version does,
'about My Father's business,' or, with the Revised Version, 'in My
Father's house.' The latter seems the rendering most relevant in
this connection, where the folly of seeking is emphasised--the
certainty of His place is more to the point than that of His
occupation. But the locality carried the occupation with it, for why
must He be in the Father's house but to be about the Father's
business, 'to behold the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in His
Temple'?

Do people know where to find us? Is it unnecessary to go hunting for
us? Is there a place where it is certain that we shall be? It was so
with this child Jesus, and it should be so with all of us who
profess to be His followers.

All through Christ's life there runs, and occasionally there comes
into utterance, that sense of a divine necessity laid upon Him; and
here is its beginning, the very first time that the word occurs on
His lips, 'I must.' There is as divine and as real a necessity
shaping our lives because it lies upon and moulds our wills, if we