“Inevitably, though, a search for Jesus turns out to be one’s own search. No one who meets Jesus ever stays the same.” Phillip Yancey – The Jesus I Never Knew
I wonder what it would have been like to meet Jesus. Don’t you? What would it have been like to meet Him and talk with Him? There are plenty of people in the Bible who got to meet Jesus. Many people, after having just met Him, dropped everything and became His disciples. Often the people who met Jesus were healed or forgiven. For many, their lives were changed forever. Some, however, weren’t healed, some walked away from Jesus disappointed, some even wanted to kill Him.
I often wonder… “What would happen if I met Jesus in person today?”
Of course, I have the benefit of being on the other side of a vast span of time and countless people speaking to the unparalleled importance of Jesus of Nazareth. I have the Bible spelling out His significance. I have a 21st Century perspective that unequivocally points to Jesus as the Son of God. If I met Him, I would know all of this. I would know how important He really is. I would know who He really was!
Yet I still wonder… Would all of this knowledge and time make my encounter with Jesus that much different than those who met Him when He walked the Earth?
Every day I have the opportunity to have an encounter with Jesus. He might not be physically in front of me, but the reality is I am invited to have a real relationship with Jesus Christ. That is something available to me and even with all this time and countless stories of people who messed up their own encounters with Him, I still find myself repeating the same mistakes and patterns of people who met Him in the Gospels.
This week we are going to look at stories of those encountered Jesus. Pay attention to their reaction to Jesus. Pay attention to Jesus’ reaction.
Also realize that Jesus wants to meet you this week.
You are on this mission trip for many reasons, but as Jesus tells Martha after she complains to Him about her sister sitting at His feed, “you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed…”
Remember the one thing that is needed this week… Jesus.
Introduction to the 2016 Mission Discovery Devotional
