Friday – 4th Week of Lent
Gospel – John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30
Do You Know Jesus?
Basilica of Annunciation, Nazareth

He was born in an obscure village
The child of a peasant woman
He grew up in another obscure village
Where he worked in a carpenter shop
Until he was thirty
He never wrote a book
He never held an office
He never went to college
He never visited a big city
He never travelled more than two hundred miles
From the place where he was born
He did none of the things
Usually associated with greatness
He had no credentials but himself

The people in today’s Gospel are angry. This guy Jesus claims to be the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God! That can’t be!  He’s just a carpenter’s son from a backwater village in Galilee. He can’t possibly be the Messiah that we are waiting for!  We KNOW Him!  We KNOW who He is!  Or maybe they only think they know Him!

So the question has to be asked – do we know Jesus?  Really know Him?  Or is He just a passing acquaintance?  Someone we turn to only in times of need or desperation?   How? When? To really know someone, I think, demands time and effort and commitment. How often do we spend time with Him in conversation, in prayer, in meditation? Is it enough? If not, when do we start? Spend some time with Him today and tomorrow and tomorrow……

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