Christ at home.
I. THE WONDROUS IN EVERY-DAY LIFE. When they heard him in the synagogue they were "much struck," Mark says. Where did all this wisdom come from? So does the parent wonder at the sayings of the child. "Where did he get such thoughts?" The boy goes from the village, and soon comes back to astonish the gossip, with his broad views of life and his easy and confident manners. Experience is full of these surprises. Nothing is more astonishing now than the empire which the Child of Nazareth sways in the world of thought and conduct.
II. THE JEALOUSY OF HOME-GROWN GREATNESS. The people of Nazareth stumbled at Jesus. So are our thoughts under the tyranny of custom. If one should tell us that our little son or brother was great, we should find it hard to believe. 'Tis want of faith in the living God, who works wherever, whenever, howsoever he wills. Beware of that narrow egotism which even now may be shutting us out from light and beauty, divinity and blessedness.
III. THE MOST INVINCIBLE OF OBSTACLES IS THE WILL OF MAN. How deep was the truth of the saying, that against stupidity even the gods fight in vain! There was sarcasm in the saying of Jesus (verse 4). Often has it been repeated. He "wondered at their want of faith." Full of faith and love himself, 'twas hard to understand the want of response to it. "He was not able to do any work of power there." Ask, when the business of the kingdom does not seem to be going forward (except on a small scale, verse 5), whether the cause may not be want of wish, want of will, want of prayer.—J.