Luke 2:41-52

Why does Christ’s full humanity and divinity matter to you?
In this story we see a number of things about Jesus that help us flesh out our understanding of who He is.
Hypostatic union: one person, two natures. Jesus is fully God and Fully man.
Here we see the only recored story of Jesus as an adolescent in scripture. It is a fairly mundane story really. Not super exciting, and really not a lot going on. but it is significant for us in a number of ways. One of which is that we see from a young age that Jesus is aware of Who He is, and we see a bit of a broader narrative of the divinity of Jesus. If you will notice, as Luke unfolds, we have other people recognizing Jesus’ “special” place in the plan of salvation. and now, we see Jesus stepping into this role and recognizing it himself.

Ways Jesus’ divinity is shown: “I am in my Father’s house” The wisdom displayed by a 12 year old.

Ways Jesus’ humanity is shown: He was submissive: He submitted to his mother, who received her authority from Him Colossians 1:15-20, he was learning: asking questions of the teachers that He created. Hebrews 5:1-10

Why does this matter for Theophilus and us?
Because the divinity and humanity of Jesus, is very confusing, and incredibly important to our faith. He must have both human and divine natures to fully atone for sin. All humans inherit their human nature from their parents, but they also inherit their sin nature. Because Jesus was begotten of God, He did not inherit a sin nature. He was not the first to be made that way, Adam was also made without a sin nature, but when he and Eve disobeyed God, they then acquired a sin nature that then was handed down through the generations, and is on full display in your life and mine… He was able to remain sinless amidst all kinds of temptation… not to show us it could be done, but so that He could be the spotless lamb. He was also divine in nature which fulfilled God’s covenant with Abraham when He said basically, “I will uphold both sides of this covenant.” NO person could be the sacrifice for sin except the God-man.
This matters because if you think you can obey your way into heaven, you are wildly mistaken. Because you were born with a human nature that had inherited the sin nature you will continue to fight that sin nature all your life, and you might win sometimes, but you will lose a lot. but, because of what Jesus did with His divine and human nature, becoming sin for us, we can receive His reward and enjoy eternal life. You have to see your primary problem with sin as a nature problem, you don’t need to be a better person, you need to be a new person. You must throw yourself completely at the mercy of Jesus, and trust in His work, not your own.
This also matters because there are people in progressive streams of Christianity that deny that Jesus’ death and resurrection is substitutionary atonement, and say that Jesus was merely an example for us to follow in our lives. We must have the knowledge and understanding to see those arguments and not allow them to color our thinking about Jesus’ role, or our abilities.
So what should our response be? Christians should worship. Non Christians repent and trust in Jesus.