Wednesday of the Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Today's Mass Readings

When the Holy Family returned from Egypt after the death of Herod, they left Egypt and settled in the town of Nazareth. So, Jesus grew up in that town. In today’s Gospel, Jesus returns to his hometown after having spent some time in his public ministry. Since Jesus grew up there, the people of the town knew him and his family. In particular, they note that he is the carpenter. This is interesting because, in parallel passages in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus is called the son of the carpenter. This implies that Jesus learned the trade of carpentry from his foster father Joseph, and then practiced this trade himself until he began his public ministry.

Also interesting is how the townspeople respond to Jesus’ preaching. We might expect that they would be proud of the hometown young man, and hang on to his every word. However, the opposite is true. They cannot accept him in his new role of preacher of the Gospel. They cannot accept him in his new role, and so they cannot accept the content of his preaching either.

The problem is that they know him, and because they know him, they put him in a box of expectations. And when he begins to act outside of that box, they cannot accept him. The lesson for us is that we too know Jesus and his Gospel. However, Jesus is alive and active in each of our lives, guiding and shaping each of us every day to live more in harmony with the Gospel. However, we, like the people of Nazareth, might become satisfied with what we know of him, and so be unable to accept the new thing that he is trying to teach us.

We should never become complacent and think that we know all we need to know about Jesus and his Gospel. Rather, we should recognize that as long as we are in this life and in this world, we are unfinished and we have more that we need to learn. We can be sure of this because if we ever get finished and know everything, Jesus will come and take us home to Heaven. More likely he will come for us before we are finished. We should begin each day with the assurance that we have more to learn about Jesus and his Gospel and be open to what he teaches us each day.

Reflection by Fr. Aquinas Keusenkothen, OSB