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We have heard of a custom, kept up by some good men, of choosing, each New Year's morning, a word or a sentence which should be their motto for the twelvemonth they had commenced. But Jesus of Nazareth seems to have made this choice once for all early in His career. He has recorded it; and we now ought to give it a full recognition as the prevailing and controlling principle of His wonderful life; "Wist ye not...?"

I. THIS CONCERNS OURSELVES ONLY SO FAR AS WE ADMIT HIM TO RE THE MASTER AND MODEL OF OUR EXISTENCE. If it be true, as we so often assert, that the Christian life is merely Christ's life imitated and reproduced, then His motto is ours also. We write it up over our doorway; we make it the seal of our correspondence; we emblazon it upon our carriage panels; we engrave in on our plate; we stamp it upon our coin; even the ring on our finger, and the buckle on our shoe's latchet, bears the same inscription and device. Each devout and true Christian, that is, gives himself and signs himself over unto God.

II. Hence, here is a TEST OF THE GENUINENESS OF OUR RELIGION.

III. There is an EMPLOYMENT FOR SUCH A MOTTO in the interpreting of one's occupation in life. Many a man works in his vocation, without looking on it as a "calling" at all. Remember, your business is not yours only, but your "Father's" too.

IV. This motto likewise will serve admirably to exhibit what is THE EARLIEST NEED OF A SOUL disturbed with the discovery of its sins and exposure. Write across any merely moral and correct life this saying of Jesus. It will make you think of the line in red ink merchants sometimes print on their cards when they have changed their address; it is on the card, not in it. A worldly life requires not regulation only, but regeneration. The change must be radical. It is not the twist of the threads, but the threads which make the fabric of the character wrong.

V. This motto will settle what are one's SAFE RELATIONS TO THE WORLD AROUND. The line must be drawn at the point where the world yields wholly to the "Father's business."

VI. Right here comes the decision, also, concerning the PROPRIETY OF QUOTING CHURCH MEMBERS FOR PATTERNS. The imperfections of others are no excuse for oneself. Being a Christian does not consist in proving other people to be hypocrites. The motto of Jesus says nothing about church members' business, but the "Father's."

VII. This motto will show, in like manner, THE REASON FOR SUCH SORE DISAPPOINTMENTS AS WE SOMETIMES EXPERIENCE, when those who promise well for a while fall away suddenly into sin. They have only been living a surface life of dependence on self. Their purpose has gone no higher than mere conduct. Whereas the end of Christian life in all its outgoings is Jesus Christ Himself. Wealth is gained that the owner may use it for Christ. Learning is acquired in order to teach our fellow-men about Christ. Out from the plane of human history springs one mysterious life, the model of all worthy existence. There it stands in the Scriptures out against the clear sky, visible to a hundred generations. The pattern of our life is found in the characteristics of that: the motive of our life is to be found in the love we bear for that: the corrective of our life is to be found in laying it alongside of that: and the stability of our Christian life is to be found in the unfailing help it receives from that. We are held up from falling, not by our hold upon Jesus' hand, but by His hold upon ours; we love Him because He first loved us; united to Him we can be sure He will sustain us in temptation.

VIII. This saying will AID US IN ESTABLISHING OPEN ISSUES wherever we are. Compromises are an invention of the devil. Keep up the boundaries between good and evil. On the one side is right, on the other is wrong; on the one peril, on the other safety; on the one truth, on the other falsehood; on the one those who are of the world, worldly, on the other those who are about the "Father's business."

(G. S. Robinson, D. D.)

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KJV: And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?

WEB: He said to them, "Why were you looking for me? Didn't you know that I must be in my Father's house?"