The Ultimate Gift

In today’s Gospel Lesson, Jesus returns to Nazareth, His childhood home, for the first time since His public ministry began. His reputation has preceded Him. His fellow villagers have heard accounts of His revolutionary teachings and His astonishing miracles. Now, here He is, in the flesh, back home again, teaching in the local Synagogue. And the villagers “were astonished” when they hear Him. “Where did this man get all this?” they ask. “What are these miracles that are being worked through Him? What is this wisdom that has been granted Him?”

One of the astonishing things about God is the way He continues to reveal Himself to us. The God who is the Source of our life and the only Source of our wholeness of life does not hold Himself aloof. In astonishing ways, He comes to us, again and again, to ignite our souls with the power of His infinite love as we strive in the Apostle Paul’s words, “to walk in newness…