Familiar difference
Jesus and disciples came from a familiar place. The meal they had shared was something they knew all about. As children they would have shared the very same thing year in and year out. They would have been a part of it, learned their history through it and known why they were participating in this celebration. Does that sound...dare I say rather familiar? Years of doing the same over and over again? However now, there must have been a bit of the unfamiliar when Jesus began to speak of a new covenant, his body and his blood. An experience, familiar, but now beginning to feel a little different. Their expectations would have been, we are going to do something we have done so many times before. We will do what is normal, expected and we know what it’s all about, we know what to say and do... But they were about to learn something new. Something that would change their lives forever.
And the different in the familiar was going to continue… let’s read some more verses.
v 1-2a When he had finished praying, Jesus left with his disciples and crossed the Kidron Valley. On the other side there was a garden, and he and his disciples went into it.
2 Now Judas, who betrayed him, knew the place, because Jesus had often met there with his disciples.
Now we know the outcome here. We know the circumstances that are about to unfold but listen to the words again.
v 1-2a When he had finished praying, Jesus left with his disciples and crossed the Kidron Valley. On the other side there was a garden, and he and his disciples went into it.
2 Now Judas, who betrayed him, knew the place, because Jesus had often met there with his disciples.
In the very place where they were at ease. The place where they expect rest, safety, to be themselves. In a place where nothing would disturb them something was about to happen.
GOD IN THE FAMILIAR was about to change things? Now you might wonder well wasn’t it Judas, the guards, the authorities that were doing the changing. And to look at it being blind to faith and God’s spirit, you would not see it any other way. “The little guy gets stuffed by the man” or “wrong place wrong time” but that is the ignorance of familiarity, without faith. Knowing the story without really knowing.
However can we also be blind at times? Over familiar with the normal, the expected. Can we not see God in the familiar, our familiar at Home, work, on our street, in our relationships, within church.
Not see what the Holy Spirit is doing in our family, friends, colleagues, within HG’s. It doesn’t have to be as dramatic a situation or end point, but it still doesn’t mean nothing can or will happen in the familiarity of our lives.
Today tells us that… this is exactly what can happen. Something different… in the familiar and that difference…. is God.