“And they took offense at Him.” (Mark 6:3 NIV)
Jesus was preaching in His hometown. And at first, His fellow Nazarenes were amazed. His words were filled with wisdom. His miracles were powerful. But then the townspeople tired to reconcile the Messiah in front of them with the boy they knew as the carpenter’s son. They couldn’t make sense of it, so they rejected Him completely.
The Nazarenes refused to stay in the conversation. They did not bring their questions to Jesus. They didn’t seek first to understand and then be understood. They were just offended at Jesus being something different than what they expected. The text tells us they missed out on miracle because of their lack of faith in Him, but what’s more, they missed out on relationship with Him. Offense hardened their heart to friendship with God and the salvation offered therein.
I think there may be a modern-day application here. Today we are terribly offended, aren’t we? All of social media is up in arms, cancel culture is ripping down statues and reputations as though they can be rebuilt in a day. People are abandoning facebook and friendships over opinions and politics and conspiracy theories. Everyone is offended and relationship is crumbling. What if we were to learn from the mistake of the Nazarenes and stayed and listened instead? Listening doesn’t mean we agree. It means we care enough about the speaker to keep our heart open.
“Listening is where love begins.” (Fred Rogers)
What saddens me about Nazareth is that Jesus’ childhood friends and community members didn’t love Him enough to listen. I look at my Facebook feed and I see the same sort of lovelessness. Believers, we can do better. Listening doesn’t mean agreeing. Listening means loving enough to want to understand, assuming that our perspective and experience is neither complete or paramount.
How would the townspeople of Nazareth have been transformed if they had only listened when they didn’t understand or agree? What miracles might have taken place within their city gates? What truth and hope did hometown people miss because they closed their hearts to the carpenter’s son?
Keep your heart open today, my friends. Listen with the intent of understanding, with the motive of love. Try to remember that so much of today’s details are temporary but the souls entangled are eternal. Choose loving well over being right.
“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:34-35 NIV)
Lord, help us keep listening, even when we don’t like what we hear and we don’t understand where the speaker is coming from. Help us value one another enough to strive towards love. Give us enough wisdom and peace in these strange times to offer these rare gifts to others. Help us represent You well as we wait on Your return. Amen.