You! Yes, I mean you! Jesus is asking you: “Who do YOU say that I am?” He’s not looking for the answer you learned at your Mama’s knee or the Catholic catechism answer. Nor does he want what the books say or the bumper stickers, or the easily accessible Internet.
Jesus made his first question easy – who do people say that I am? The disciples parroted back what they’d heard others say, but Jesus pushes them to move to what they are hearing within their own being: “But you, who do you say that I am?” Like the disciples, each of us must answer the question for ourselves based on our own lived faith experience AND God’s word revealed in the privacy of our lectio-moments of intimate conversation with God.
How we answer Jesus’ question “Who do you say that I am?” has everything to do with who WE are. In some ways our answer says as much or more about us than who Jesus is to us. It reveals how we live and what we stand for. It guides our decisions, and determines the actions we take, the words we speak. We need to constantly remind ourselves: It’s not what people look at, it’s not what we say. It’s what people hear, how they interpret, what they remember.
In some sense there is no “once and for all time, finally and forever” answer to Jesus’ query: “Who do you say that I am? We are constantly engaging his question and in so doing, we not only discover Jesus anew. We discover ourselves anew.
During the coming week you are invited to look into a mirror (real or imaginary) and turn the question around. Ask Jesus: “Who do you say that I am? Why do you love me so much?”
~Reflection by Sister Roberta Bailey, OSB
Have a good week! Be safe from the coming storm and pray for folks who may not be so fortunate.
