Do You Know Him?

An Everyday Stewardship Reflection for the 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time 2017

Sometimes when I ask one of my children about who they were with or about a classmate at school they answer me with, “You don’t know them.” Apparently, since I do not know him or her personally, I do not need to know the person’s name. I may not know this person but I do know that they exist in the everyday life of one of my children. If my child doesn’t share with me anything about their friend or classmate, I can only assume he or she has no great impact on my sons or daughter’s daily life. Of course, sometimes the response I get is simply my teen being a typical teen.

Has Jesus had a significant impact on your life? Do you know Jesus personally? If someone asked you about him what would you say?

My children respond the way they do to me because they are still young and immature. However, some of adults are immature as well: immature in faith. We shy away from any discussion of God in our lives and we rarely share our faith. Most days we will not be asked the question, “Who is Jesus?” But we will be in situations where we are being called to share a little bit about ourselves. If Jesus has truly changed our lives and we never seem to want to share something about him with others, they may as well assume that he has had no real impact on us. On the other hand, if we are mature disciples in Jesus Christ, I suspect that others can’t help but know about the great friend we have in him.