Luke 2:39-40

     Luke makes no mention of the flight to Egypt.  He merely states that Mary and Joseph did everything that was required in the law and then returned to Nazareth, in the region of Galilee.  He follows this with a statement that, basically, Jesus grew up and was a particularly promising child.
     Although Luke may have been writing more specifically to a Gentile audience, he doesn't forget where Jesus began.  Mary and Joseph were Jewish peasants.  (There was once a Christmas card with Mary on it, labeling her the world's favorite Jewish mother.)  
     Joseph and Mary seem to have been careful in their following of the law, giving the appropriate sacrifices, making their proper trip to Jerusalem, as every Israelite was expected to do.  In fact, as the next scripture will indicate, they did even more.  Mary and Joseph came every year to Jerusalem for the Passover, something that could not have been easy to accomplish.  Neither would Jesus later scorn traditional aspects of religious observance.  He simply made clear the message that they were to be practiced for the right reasons.  
     When they had accomplished the rituals and sacrifices, the family returned home to Galilee.  Perhaps for the Gentile readers, this would have had less emotional impact than for Jews living in Israel.  Galilee was considered back country and the Galileans had accents other Israelites disliked.  Nazareth had such little respect in the popular opinion that people asked, disparagingly whether it was even possible for anything good to come from there.  It is significant that ancient, non-Christian references don't mention it.  In other words, Luke sets Jesus squarely into a town that was unknown to the Gentile world and considered unimportant and lacking promise in the Jewish opinion.  Yet, there, growing up in that quiet backwater, was this child who would eventually shake the foundations of the world.  

    There is an old story that a Jewish teacher was once asked why on earth God would bother talking to Moses from a lowly thorn bush.  The teacher's answer?  Perhaps to teach us that God is everywhere, including lowly thorn bushes!

In what quiet places of the world might God be working today to change the world?

In what quiet places of your own heart and soul might God be active to change your life?

In what way can the individual and the church grow with wisdom?