(Audio)
The saying goes that familiarity breeds contempt. This appeared to be true in the case of Jesus returning to his native place of Nazareth, and then, to the eyes of his neighbors at least, taking center stage and acting like a big shot.
They said, “Where did this man get all this?
What kind of wisdom has been given him?
In terms of response, they seemed to hovering somewhere between being impressed and being dismissive. On the one hand Jesus astonished everyone who heard him with his words. But on the other, this was Jesus, the one they knew, who had grown up in their midst. In their eyes there was just no chance that he was now a great teacher or healer. Even if something about him now seemed impressive, and his words astonishing, knowing what they knew, they assumed it must have been a trick. They let their preconceptions based on Jesus' past guide their interpretation of the present encounter, rather than reality.
Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary,
and the brother of James and Joseph and Judas and Simon?
They thought they knew Jesus, but the only knew something of his humanity. They even appeared to make a veiled insult by referring to his mother without mentioning his father Joseph. In insulting him in this way they unintentionally did recognize his divine origin without realizing it. Jesus would later say, "blessed is the one who takes no offense at me" but these individual "took offense at him". He tried to provoke them to reconsider by stating that many of the prophets had had this experience, where it was precisely in the places that they were the best known that they were the least respected. Jesus was the culmination of the rejection of all of the prophets and so it made sense that he would also experience this.
So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there,
apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them.
The people of Nazareth had previously been astonished at the words of Jesus, but now Jesus was amazed at their lack of faith. He did, after all, have the right to expect faith from them, them above most others. After all, those who knew him and had been in any kind of relationship to him ought to have been the most willing to give him a fair hearing with an open mind. But fortunately, this largely negative response was not reflective of everyone. He was still able to cure a few people, no doubt planting seeds that could change the prevailing attitude about him in the future.
We too have an issue where familiarity leads us to make assumptions, preventing us from hearing from God is trying to tell us hear and now. It is probably easier to learn a lesson from Father Mike Schmitz or Bishop Barron than our local pastor, even though the later is more likely to have an anointing meant specifically for us.
Let us learn from Jesus to not grow discouraged by trials. They are God opening pathways of growth. Let us press on, seeking "peace with everyone, and for that holiness without which no one will see the Lord" so that no one be deprived of the grace of God. This means we must be motivated to make sure we have no blind spots so that Jesus can reach us when and how he desires.
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