Baby jesus in the temple

The angel of the lord had said
to Mary: "When your child
the Son of God on high,
come to be born, you will name
him jesus.

The prophets had foretold this
centuries beforehand: one day God
would send a savior, they had
named him Messiah, "the consecrated
of the Lord ." The name christ means
the same as Messiah:
that is why jesus was also later called Christ.

jesus was Mary's first son, and
Hebrew law stated that the firstborn
son belonged to the firstborn
son belonged to the Lord. So in a
certain sense the child had to be
bouht back from the Lord, by an
offer to exchange two doves or two
wild pigeons.

For this reason, forty days after
her son's birh, Mary and her hus-
band Joseph took Jesus to the templ-
ple of the Lord in Jerusalem, and
they also took two turtle doves to of-
fer up to the lord.
Inside the temple they met a man
who was called Simoen. He was a

good man, and all his life he had
tried to pleasethe Lord. Simeon re-
membered the words of the
prophets, and he anxiously awaited
the day when the Lord would send
the Messiah.
And the lord had promised him
that before he died he would know
the joy of setting his eyes on the
long awaited Messiah.
The day that Mary and Joseph
took Jesus to the temple,Simeon
also felt inspired to go to the house
of the Lord and when he saw the that this was the Messiah.
So he picked the infant up, and
thanking the Lord with all his hearth,

he said "Now Lord , you can let me,
your servant ,go in peace , as you
have promised, because my eyes
have seen the savior that you have
sent.
You have placed him before all
the peoples of the earth, like a loght
which illuminates all nations and all races of men and gives glory to your
people, Israel."
Mary and Joseph were amazed to
hear these words. simeon blessed
them and then turned to the mother
of the child, He will be a sign
from God, to reveal the entention
many people,thos intention which
are kept hidden in their hearts. And
for you Mary, a sword will plerce
your soul."
With these mysterious words,
simoen meant that in the future ,
Jesus was to be accepted by a part
of the Jewish people, while the
other part of his people would reject
him.
Those who would accept him, be-
lieve in him, and love him, would saved and go to heaven, while those
who refused him would be ruined.
As for Mary, she was to suffer upon
seeing her son refused: she was to suffer upon
seeing her son refused: She was to suffer as if she had been pierced by
a sword.
That same day, in the temple,
Mary and Joseph met a woman
name Anna. she was very old,
eigty-four, and since being
widowed she had dedicated herself
to God; se love for him with prayers
and sacrifices.
When shesaw te child, Anna,
too, understood who he was; and
so, like Simoen, she gave praise to God, and spoke of the child to all
those who awaited the coming of
the Messiah.
this was not te only time that
Jesus' parents took him bto the tem-
ple in Jerusalem.

Every year Joseph, with his wife,
Mary, went to Jerusalem for the
feast of Passover, and they took
Jesus with them.
When he was twelve years old it
happened that, when the feast was
over and Joseph and Mary were traveling with a large number of other pildrims, the men divided from the women, as was the custum. During
the first day of their journey they
didnot did not realizethat Jesus was missing Joseph thoughthe was with
Mary and the other children, and
Mary thougth he was with the group
of men.
It wasn't till evening that they real-
Ized Jesus was missing. so they imme-
diately left the others and returned to
Jerusalem.
After searching for three days they
found him in the temple, busy talk-
ing with the elders and teachers,
who were amazed at his intelligence
and the things that he knew.
Then his mother said: "You have
made us very worried!" But Jesus
answered: "Why are you looking for
me? Didn't you knew tht his fa-
ther was not Joseph, as everyone
believed, but God himself.