Power for Abundant Living

Believing:Faithand Fearout honour, save in his own country, and in his ownhouse. And he did not many mighty works there becauseof their unbelief [apistia]."Luke 2 contains one verse of Scripture that formany years I was not able to understand.Luke 2:42:And when he [Jesus] was twelve years old, theywent up to Jerusalem after the custom of thefeast.I knew that according to Jewish law, a boy becamea man, going through Bar Mitzvah, when he was thirteen.But Jesus was taken to the temple when He wastwelve. I could not understand it so I considered thatthere might be a mistake in the text. I looked in everycritical Greek text that I could find and checkedevery other source I could think of; but I never foundJesus to be thirteen when He went to the synagogue.Every text concurred on the age of twelve. Finally Icame across an old piece of literature which explainedthat according to ancient Jewish law when a boy wasconceived illegitimately, this child was brought to thetemple at the age of twelve instead of thirteen.This explains why Jesus could not communicatewith the people in His own hometown. They thoughtthat a child conceived illegitimately certainly could57