Jesus sees you where you are.

Jesus knows your heart and mind.

He finds the shadows and illuminates those darkened places. His light exposes, reveals, clarifies, purifies, and drives away the gathered darkness. 

Jesus looks for the best, for what he wants for you, what he has wanted for you from ages past before the world began. He knew you then. He knows you now. He sees all you can become by his grace, with his mercy, shaped by his holy hands and perfect purpose. 

Jesus located and called out Nathanael’s integrity. 

He did not mention Nathanael’s skepticism.

What treasures are at the heart of who you are that Jesus would call out to you and others? How would he celebrate you?

Jesus was no dour, sarcastic, legalistic, spiritual bully. He found Nathanael’s best and put it on display. He took that best and made it better. The light of his life drove the shadows away from Nate’s very essence. 

Again, who are you at your heart? What is your highest and best characteristic? Jesus knows, and he wants to begin there as he blesses this world through you.

The name Nathanael means “God has given.” It is similar to Nathan and Jonathan. These names have a common root meaning “to give.” God had given Nathanael integrity. He was trustworthy and dependable. He was like Jesus in this regard. What a starting place for something special!

Again, there at the core, where you are at your best, what is your defining characteristic? That’s where Jesus wants to begin shaping you into all you can be by his grace and with his mercy. 

No star is ever lost we once have seen,
We always may be what we might have been.
(Adelaide Procter, “A Legend of Provence,” from The Poems of Adelaide A. Procter (Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1864), p. 191. 

You, at your best, can begin right now.

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I will be what I might have been.

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Our Father, take us where we are and lead us where you want us to be. Shine your light on what you have given. Make it glow. May we reflect the light of your life and love to everyone we meet today. Amen.