“Who is Jesus to you?”

Billy Lansdale, one of our KidsMin leaders, posed that question to a room full of 6th graders on Sunday morning. We heard some serious, funny, and maybe slightly heretical answers come from them. But this question really got me thinking. Who is Jesus to you? Who is Jesus to me? And why does it matter?

If you had asked me that question before Sunday, “prophet” would’ve taken me a while to get to. It’s just not one of the words that people (or at least that I) use to describe Jesus very often. But, as we saw Sunday, the role of prophet is one that has a huge impact on the way we see Jesus. In the Old Testament, prophets  typically weren’t very welcomed people. They were whistle blowers. They were the ones who would call out God’s people on turning away from him. And no one really enjoys being called out on sin. They brought God’s word of wrath and destruction unless there was repentance.

Jesus filled this role in a different way. He still brought God’s word to his people, but it was a different word. It wasn’t a word of wrath. It wasn’t a word of destruction. It wasn’t a word of suffering. It was a word of grace, forgiveness and life. It was a word welcoming all who would receive it to a life of hope.

Today, reach out and take hold of that message of life. May it be a message that leads you and me to live a life that speaks of God’s love for us.