Luke 2:29-46

²⁹“Now, God, I can die happy and quiet, just like you promised me,

³⁰because now I can see the one you promised to send. People in every tribe will see him, and he will save them.

³²He will shine like a light for people that are not Jews, showing them new things about you, God. And he will get everyone to respect your people, the Israel nation.”

³³Joseph and Mary heard the things Simeon said about Jesus, and they were surprised.

³⁴Then Simeon asked God to be good to them, and he said to Mary, “This kid is going to ruin a lot of people in Israel, but he will help a lot of others. He will point people to God, but they won’t understand, and they will argue against him.

³⁵In that way they will show everyone what they really think. And Mary, later you will be real sad. It will hurt, like somebody is stabbing you with a big knife.”

³⁶While Joseph and Mary were talking to Simeon, a very old woman called Anna came along and saw Jesus, and she thanked God for him. She called out to all the people close by and told them about Jesus, that he was the one they were waiting for, and she said that God sent him to help the Jerusalem people. Anna’s father was Phanuel, and he belonged to the tribe called Asher. She was 84 years old. A long time before this Anna was a young married woman for 7 years, but then her husband died. After that she stayed in God’s ceremony house all the time, telling the people God’s words. She prayed all the time, in the day time and at night, and often she didn’t eat any food because she was praying.

³⁹After that, Joseph and Mary finished doing everything their law said they had to do. Then they went back home, to Nazareth, in Galilee country.

⁴⁰And the baby started to grow big and strong, and he got wise too. And God was good to him.

⁴¹The Jewish people have a ceremony every year called Passover. Every year Joseph and Mary went to Jerusalem for that ceremony.

⁴²When Jesus was 12 years old they went to Jerusalem, like they always did, and they took Jesus with them.

⁴³After the ceremony finished they started to go north, back to their home in Nazareth. They were with a lot of other people going north, and they thought Jesus was somewhere in that mob. They thought, “He will come to our camp when we stop, at sundown.” But Jesus didn’t come to their camp at sundown. He was still back in Jerusalem. Mary and Joseph looked for him among their relatives and all that mob camping on that road,

⁴⁵but they couldn’t find him. So they went back to Jerusalem and looked for him there.

⁴⁶They looked for him for 3 days, then they found him in God’s ceremony house. He was sitting with the teachers there. He was listening to what they were saying, and he was asking them questions.