What did Jesus Christ do from age 12 to about age 30?

 

                                 Christ will return in red apparel for his "Second Coming."

  

JESUS Christ didn't begin his preaching of the gospel, at least to large groups, until he was about age 30. (At age 12 he had shown in the Temple that he was already an astounding person.) So, what did Christ do for about 18 years?

   The Scriptures don't contain details on that.

  (In fact, I think some accounts were originally in the New Testament on Christ's missing 18 years, but were taken out by corrupt Christians over the centuries.) 

  Elder Bruce R. McConkie stated in his "Mortal Messiah" book series:

"We cannot doubt that the youthful Jesus . . . was himself now beginning to teach and to testify. HIS FORMAL AND LEGAL MINISTRY cannot begin for another eighteen years. For the time being he is to go back to Nazareth and be subject to Joseph and Mary. He is to mature and grow in the Spirit and find favor with God and man. HE IS TO PARTAKE OF THE NORMAL LIFE OF JEWISH MEN, DOING WHAT THEY DID, ENJOYING THE FAMILIAL ASSOCIATIONS THAT WERE PART OF THEIR CULTURAL, and gaining all the experiences he would need for the arduous hours of his formal ministry." (Volume 1, pages 378-379).

  Now according to Alfred Edersheim's, Sketches of Jewish Social life in the Days of Christ, 1876, Elder McConkie writes the following: "Men married at sixteen or seventeen years of age, almost never later than twenty; and women at a somewhat younger age, often when not older than fourteen. THESE AGES APPLIED TO ALL, Joseph and Mary included" (p. 223). 

  So, Jesus undoubtedly got married in his teens. Perhaps raising his family (yes, with children) was his primary focus for those missing years. 

 Joseph Fielding Smith wrote: "The Lord doesn't reveal all His truth to men . . . We are often asked if Christ was married. If you say yes, you get into a heap of trouble. I've got a habit of saying the scriptures don't tell us and let it go at that . They wouldn't understand it if you tried to tell them . . ." (Joseph Fielding Smith, President of the Twelve, An Address to Seminary and Institute Faculty, August 28, 1954, The Origin of Man, p. 23). 

   The Jews would NOT have listened to Christ at all, if he was not married. That was the Jewish way.

  Also, for one who was baptized to fulfill all righteous, does not the command in Genesis to "multiply and replenish the earth" also apply to him?

  Yes, there are key questions remaining -- who were his wife or wives? Who were his children and what happened to them?

  As difficult as a successful marriage can be, it is comforting to know that Jesus was married and had children too. That way he is certainly the ultimate example to us.

Journal Keeping: A Hit And Miss Practice! A 'Diary' Is Better!

I don't know how many hundreds of times I've heard it said in the LDS Church: "Keep a journal!"
The huge problem here -- that practice rarely works.
That's because we are victims of habit and only writing in a journal occasionally means one of two things: you either never write in it, or your rarely write in it.
Even when you do write in it, it is usually so far after some event or experience that you can't recall all the details.
The solution?
Do what I've done for more than 40 years -- keep a diary.
Now I don't mean those pocket size store bought diaries. I mean a full looseleaf size tablet or binder.

                                                   One of my typical Diary/journals


Write in it every day and you miss nothing. Some days it might be a few lines, others many lines or a half page or so.
That way it becomes a habit and your actually do it, like brushing your teeth -- I write in my diary/journal (what it really is) 99 percent of the time on that exact day. The other 1 percent I still catch up and thus it captures 100 percent of my life.
If I want to know what happened 10, 20, 30 or even 40 years ago, I can find it in my diary/journal.
My handwriting was gotten worse over the years, but besides leaving accounts of my good and bad experiences in life for posterity, writing it down helps me cope with adversity better and helps me know where I've been.
These diary/journals have also settled arguments over events over the years and even fill in gaps in my memory.
If I re-read most entries, even those 40 years ago, the accounts usually help me recall that exact day.
I don't have a photographic mind, but these diary/journals do spark and enhance what memory I do have.
So, try it, or you'll leave what my Great-Aunt Iris left my mother, a 200 page "journal" with just two pages written on-- because there was no established habit for her to keep writing in it.
All those blank pages .....

NOTE: This article and all of the NighUntoKolob blog are NOT an official website of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They are the author's conclusions and opinions only.