Yesterday, Today, and Forever

by Maria Von Trapp

  It must have been a most picturesque sight at this Damascus Gate because all the traffic going north, all the Galileans and the strangers from Trachonitis and Abilene, Damascus, and as far as Antioch would organize into caravans there. As they left the gate they would sing one of the psalms of the Hallel. Again, it is worth pondering about what Mary and Joseph may have been thinking about — and what had happened to Jesus? He may not have known until the very morning of this day when He was ready to join His caravan that the will of the Father was otherwise. As we shall see later, the will of the Father was everything and all. “For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me” (John 6:38).

  This is now a great mystery, why the Father retained the Son in the temple. Did He want to give Him three days of vacation, so to speak, and allow Him to dwell in His presence as a human being in the closest way possible in those days, in the temple? We don’t know. We can only ponder and wonder. We can want to know. We can ask the Holy Ghost, who, as our Lord promised, would someday explain everything to us. Everything — what a word! Until that day we just have to assume that the Father wished Jesus to stay in the temple, and Jesus stayed without notifying Mary and Joseph. This adds to the mystery. Why bring all this anxiety on those good people, who had done nothing all these years but try to be the best possible keepers of the treasure entrusted to their care? Until the Holy Ghost explains this better to us, we just have to take what is written in Holy Scriptures: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, says the Lord” (Isa. 55:8).

  Then came that crucial evening when the caravan would stop over again in Beeroth. That was arranged on purpose. In case somebody had forgotten something or somebody was left behind, it would not be too hard to catch up with the caravan. And now comes the moment when Mary, who hadn’t seen her boy for a full day, eagerly went over to find Joseph and her child. Joseph, on the other hand, was as eager to see his family and be reunited with them for the evening meal as was customary in those caravans where the men and women traveled separately. Seeing each other, the one question they must have asked simultaneously and most anxiously was, “Where is Jesus?” And the horrified answer, “I don’t know. I thought He was with you.” What a terrible moment! The very next thing to do would be to look all over the caravan, but nobody had seen Him. Nobody knew. The only conclusion therefore was that He must have been left behind in Jerusalem. They would turn around immediately and go back.

  Some books suggest that on the first day Mary and Joseph traveled as far as the overnight stop and on the second day they traveled back to Jerusalem. I don’t think so. How could they have closed an eye? How could they have waited an unnecessary minute?

  Years ago we were traveling in our big bus on a concert tour somewhere in New Hampshire, heading north. Some time in the afternoon I turned around from my seat and said, “Lorli, tell me, have you …” and then I noticed that the seat where Lorli always sat was empty. I turned all the way around and got up and looked, and sure enough, she was not in the bus. Now eager talking and guessing started. The driver stopped. We had been driving for quite a number of hours with no rest. The last stop had been somewhere in Massachusetts, on the highway, to get a map of New Hampshire.

  Lorli was then a young child, maybe about as old as Jesus when He stayed behind in the temple. She must have slipped out unnoticed when we stopped at that gas station and now — where was she and what had happened to her meanwhile? All the stories of kidnapping and gangsters stood out in my mind and imagination can turn into your worst enemy at such times. Of course, we called the police, but the State Police of New Hampshire couldn’t do anything in Massachusetts, and we had to go back all the way. Finally we found her at the police headquarters listening in rapt attention to the stories of some of the highway patrolmen.

  Just from this little anecdote I know Mary and Joseph would turn around immediately. It was the time around full moon and the road would be light enough. This way back would be an ordeal when we think of all the caravans emerging toward the north, and Mary and Joseph worming their way through them. One very anxious thought must have troubled them most, the same thought which bothered us so much when we had turned around in the bus. Perhaps Lorli had gotten a ride in some car and we might miss her on the highway. So what if Jesus were amid the crowd constantly passing in the other direction? Finally they came to Jerusalem, having traveled 16 miles, maybe not having eaten and probably near collapse.

  The first place to go would be to their last night’s lodgings. We don’t know, however, whether they stayed with acquaintances or whether they camped in one of those innumerable white tents which were scattered all over the countryside outside the walls of Jerusalem. Then I am sure Mary and Joseph went straight to the temple. At this point it will really come in handy that we have spent so much time on the temple previously, so that we know about those huge halls and stairways and galleries and cloisters, and we know that at this time about 200,000 people were milling around with all the noise of the Orient. Of course, they would ask the different members of the temple police whether they had seen their boy. Oh — they had seen so many boys, but they didn’t remember the boy.

  Now they must have gone out searching through the narrow streets for a whole day and a whole night, both weary to exhaustion. Joseph may have remembered another time when he saw Mary “drooping with fatigue”; and Mary felt the sword turning in her heart mercilessly. She hadn’t had any warning. Never, never had Jesus caused them any anxiety or any trouble. Out of the blue sky had this cruel surprise come; and — was this the end? Would she never see Him again? Had He vanished out of their lives? Had He been kidnapped by some who had perhaps found out His identity or had He been kidnapped and sold as a slave like Joseph of old? Nothing had been revealed to her. She was not prepared, so her imagination must have run wild as that of every anxious mother in such a situation does. Where was He? What had happened to Him?

  On the Sabbath and especially on high feasts, the members of the Sanhedrin had established a custom of scattering throughout the temple and giving instructions on the Scriptures to the people. They would seat themselves on a stool, the people at their feet. They would take a text of the Holy Books and start explaining it. After they had finished, there would always be a discussion. The people would eagerly ask questions and listen attentively to the answers, wisdom dropping from the lips of their venerated elders.

  In those days the rabbis may have singled out a special boy by the very questions He asked. They must have been delighted by the understanding this youngster showed and by the beautiful manners He displayed, the modesty, humility, courtesy, and, in addition, the highest intelligence they had ever found among their own pupils. At the end of the first and second days the rabbis, after having spent their time with the people, may have commented among themselves on this boy; and on the third day they came together in a group enjoying the boy. “After three days, they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions; and all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers” (Luke 2:46–47).

  Again and again Mary and Joseph must have tried the temple, but the hour had not yet come, as it will be said several times in His life later. He must have been concealed from their eyes in the throng and they did not see Him. One the third day, however, the Holy Ghost led their steps over to where Jesus was sitting in the midst of the teachers of Israel. When they saw Him so calm and so matter-of-course, the first thought they had must have been, He has not been lost. He must have stayed behind knowing what He did. “And when they saw him they were astonished.” This we can well imagine. Never had they seen Him like this before: this new light in His eyes and a new dignity surrounding Him, which was somehow mirrored in the faces of the venerable old teachers, who treated Him almost as an equal. Mary and Joseph waited until they had finished and then His mother said to Him: “Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have bee
n looking for you anxiously” (Luke 2:48).

  Here we see Mary in a very special light. Later in His life it would happen that when our Lord’s best friends got an inkling of who He really was, they would somehow withdraw in awe and refuse to let Him humble himself. So we see John the Baptist exclaim, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” (Matt. 3:14). And when our Lord was about to kneel down before Peter in order to wash his feet, Peter would refuse most excitedly, “You shall never wash my feet” (John 13:8). And the Baptist and Peter had at that time only a fair idea of who Jesus really was.

  Mary, however, knew it all the time. Humanly speaking, she must have felt from the very beginning like saying, “My Lord and My God, how could I ever act as authority over You? You must command me, not I You.” It is always attributed to the humility of John and Peter that they acted the way they did; but we have to say that Mary’s humility far outreached theirs. All these years she was obligated to accept services from her child, who also was her God, and to instruct Him and command Him. Now we see her ask Him a question which sounds almost like a reproach. Every well-brought-up Jewish boy, upon hearing this, would get up and apologize humbly. Jesus did not, but answered, “How is it that you sought me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” (Luke 2:49).

  Of all the things which happened in those heart-rending days, the words, “Did you not know?” must have been the worst, because they somehow implied that they should have known or could have known. Well — all we can say is, if Jesus himself could grow in wisdom and grace before God and men, He who was God at the same time, how much more is this true of Mary and Joseph who, after all, were only human. Both of them knew the secret mystery of this child, but still they did not quite understand the word that He spoke to them. This must have been the first manifestation of His being the Son of the Heavenly Father. With great tact, Jesus at first does not contradict when Mary says “Behold, your father and I have been looking for you anxiously,” but then He immediately refers to God as His Father, the only one He would accept.

  As He was the child in the family, Mary had a certain natural claim on Jesus — and Jesus does not deny it. Very soon He will prove how highly He regards that, but right now He has to inform them about His heavenly vocation. On a later day He will say, “He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me” (Matt. 10:37). “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life” (Mark 10:29–30).

  These were the first words spoken by Jesus as the Son of God and the Son of Man, which were written down in the Gospels. They seem almost like the title to His life story, because in His entire life He will do nothing else but be about His Father’s business.

  More than 1,900 years have passed since, and nobody has fully grasped the depths of these words, “Did you not know ...?” Luke informs us that Mary and Joseph “did not understand the saying which he spoke to them…. and his mother kept all these things in her heart” (Luke 2:50–51). A life full of pondering and contemplating on these and all His words will make Mary advance and grow to such an extent that never again will He have to say, “Did you not know …?”

  Chapter 12

  The Carpenter

  In the good old times when the craftsmen were the backbone of every country, and every village and every small town had its own blacksmith, tailor, shoemaker, tanner, and, of course, carpenter, young boys between 12 and 14 would be taken on as apprentices. They had to learn the craft from scratch. When an apprentice had learned how to handle all the tools and he did not spoil anything any more, he advanced to the next stage, journeyman. That meant that he was working side by side with the master for a number of years until he was good enough to start his own workshop. Then he had to make his masterpiece, with which he showed all his skill.

  Unfortunately, these things are dying out so fast that our children will only know about them through books. This is the beginning of the end for every country. Coming from a country in Europe where the crafts are still at their height and good craftsmen greatly esteemed, we all missed them very much when we came to America. The first years in New York and Philadelphia were not so bad. We were used to the fact that in the elegant Kaerntnerstrasse in Vienna you didn’t see craft shops with the master working in the window either, but when we moved up to northern New England, that’s when we started worrying. We found out that the blacksmith in Stowe, who was a great artist in his craft, just couldn’t find an apprentice. The same thing has happened to Mr. Stafford, the wonderful tinsmith, to Ben our town cobbler, and that’s about all the crafts we have left. The young boys of this generation are not interested in learning a craft. Sometimes you find a rich boy who takes up a craft for a hobby; but that’s not the right thing. He doesn’t have to live from his handiwork, so he will not put his whole heart into it.

  When the Son of God became a man, what did He choose to be? A carpenter. Not as a hobby, but to make a living.

  At first He was apprenticed to Joseph, the carpenter. He started out by learning to use the tools, by doing little easy jobs, but mostly by watching the master. At 16 or 17 He was already working steadily with His foster father, being at least as good as he, if not better; because we can be sure that the Son-of-God-made-man was not only of high intelligence, filled with the greatest wisdom of mind and soul, but He also had the most skillful hands.

  “And he went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them. ... And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature, and in favor with God and man” (Luke 2:51–52). We are now setting out to explore the famous “hidden life,” which already is much less hidden to us because we know so much about His first 12 years. We see them get up at sunrise and go to sleep at sunset, a practice absolutely unknown to modern man. But oil and candles were expensive, and theirs was a life of frugality. We see the two men working either in the work shop or somewhere on a building according to the words of Genesis 3:19: “In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread.” Paul will later declare firmly: “If any one will not work, let him not eat” (2 Thess. 3:10). The holy family submitted fully to this plan of God. We see the woman of the house working all day long to do all her housework, heavy and light. She also had her craft, spinning and weaving.

  We see Jesus grow up, and when we want to find out what He did in those long 18 years in Nazareth, we finally see that He prayed, He obeyed, and He worked; and not only He alone, but all three of them.

  They prayed; we can find their daily prayers, we can find out how they observed the Day of the Lord. They must have recited the hymns, prayers, and psalms contained in Holy Scriptures, and during many hours of their working day their thought dwelt on the hidden meaning of what their lips had recited. That’s what they did when they were pondering.

  They obeyed: “And Mary said, ‘Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word’ ” (Luke 1:38), and: “Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” (Luke 2:49). These words uttered by Mary and Jesus give a deep insight into their life of constant obedience to the Father. From Joseph we know how promptly he reacted each time an angel came. Theirs was a family life of obedience to the will of God.

  Books and books and books have been written on family life. Our magazines and newspapers are full of alarming articles on the danger of family life crumbling in our days. Psychiatrists, psychoanalysts, and psychologists are busy in research to answer the question “why.” Little do they seem to know that this question was answered two thousand years ago by a few words in the Gospel of Luke. There we see the Heavenly Father making this tremendous new foundation, the Christian family, when He sends His Son to the small home in Nazareth. It is absolutely impossible to medi
tate too much on the hidden life. Just watching Jesus, Mary, and Joseph in their daily routine will do something for us. There is our model, and there is our only remedy. As the saying from the old country has it: If there are more mothers like Mary and more fathers like Joseph, there will be more children like Jesus.

  Maria von Trapp — storyteller, singer, and spokesperson for the Trapp Family Choir.

  Chapter 13

  The Son of Man

  When later Jesus would come to the synagogue in Nazareth in order to preach there, the people would ask, “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary?” (Mark 6:3). A son would only be spoken of in this way if the father were dead. Another time some relatives of Jesus wanted to bring Him home. They would never have interfered if the father of the house had been living. And when our Lord gave His mother into the care of John, His disciple, then it is definitely sure that Joseph, her husband, was dead. Through tradition we learn that Joseph died when Jesus was 18 years old. If this is really true, then Jesus and Mary must have gotten a legal guardian, usually one of the relatives, to take care of their affairs until the Son would be 20 years old.

  There have always been references to the happiness of Joseph’s death because he died in the presence of Jesus and Mary. When we think that Jesus would later break out in tears and cry at His friend’s tomb — how much more would He have shown His grief when His foster father died, he who was so much nearer and dearer to Him than Lazarus. When the dying Joseph saw the tears in the eyes of his Lord and God and understood that they were shed for him — we can understand that his was a happy death.