It’s right in front of your face!

AM Psalm 78:1-39 • PM Psalm 78:40-72
2 Samuel 7:18-29 • Acts 18:12-28 • Mark 8:22-33

In our reading from Mark today, Jesus asks His apostles, “But who do you say I am?” Mark in his gospel has spent the first eight chapters showing us who Jesus is. Mark has taken us through a whirlwind of rejection, challenges, miracles, and teachings and now at the halfway point in his gospel he asks us, “who do you say Jesus is?” Peter tells us, “You are the Messiah” or “You are the Christ”. Great! Jesus is the Christ, but these apostles have no idea who the Christ is.

The Christ they expected was the king, the warrior that was going to save Israel from all invaders and reign over them forever. They saw Jesus as a teacher but did they even really see what was right in front of their faces? That the Christ really did stand right there in front of them?

Like the cured blind man in our gospel that could not see clearly at first, so too the apostles can see Jesus but they can not see the Christ that stands right in front of their faces.

Sometimes we have no clue that Christ is standing right in front of us because maybe He was not what we expected. We do not see the Christ clearly. Oh, we see Jesus, and we talk about Him a lot. But do we see the Christ clearly? The blind man saw Christ clearly on the second try. Mark spends the next 8 chapters of his gospel telling us who the Christ is. So, do we see who Christ is? Do we see Him clearly? We need to get to know the Christ that is Jesus. Because he is right in front of your face.

It is through Jesus we see the Christ, the Messiah. This is the Risen Christ that through the Holy Spirit continues to live among us. He lives in us and in each other. We can see Him clearly, for Christ is in disguise as our daily lives. We see Him clearly in the world around us. We just have to see what is right in front of our face.

Written by Chris Schaefer

...who is trying really hard to see what is right in front of my face every day and twice on Sunday!