290 BOYS OF THE BIBLE.

ing years!—if they could have foreseen that the Lord of the
‘Temple was indeed in their midst! ;

How sorrowful, and yet how glad, was Mary when she
found her darling boy! And perhaps she was not a little proud
when she saw how greatly interested these great teachers
were in all the boy was saying. Touching him gently on the
shoulder, with a look full of tenderness, but half reproachful,
she said:

‘““My child, why dost thou treat us thus? See, thy
father and I were seeking thee with aching hearts.”

And in the wonderful answer Jesus gave, we have the
first recorded words of the Redeemer of men.

“Why is it that ye were seeking me? Did ye not
know that I must be about my Father’s business?”

It may be that we shall never sound the fathomless
depths of meaning in these words. But we may understand ~
them well enough to hold them precious and to realize that
the first secorded words of Jesus, strike the keynote of his
glorious life. From this hour of sacred consecration in the
Temple, to that solemn hour, when amid the awful gloom of
Calvary, Jesus uttered the cry, “It is finished!” Jesus was
ever about his Father’s business.

And now Jesus returns to Nazareth. For eighteen or
nineteen peaceful years, he works and prays, and prepares
himself for the sublime destiny that awaits him.

The first recorded words of Jesus are good words for
boys to take as the motto for their lives—“I must be about
my Father’s business.”

God has a “business” for us all. For Joseph and for
David, for Jeremiah and Ezekiel, for Daniel and his friends,
and for every boy who reads these pages. Our lives are
ours for happy, holy service; our hearts for gentle, loving