Third Sunday in Ordinary Time – 21st January 2024
Jesus is beginning his public ministry and so he starts to call people to follow him. Jesus always made a point of meeting and calling people wherever he found them. He met and called Matthew the tax collector when he was counting his money. He met and called the woman when she came to the well for water.
In the gospel this Sunday Jesus meets people while they are doing their ordinary daily work of fishing and mending their nets on the sea shore. They were not on their knees praying in the temple or the synagogue. Jesus called these men by their own names, so he must have seen them before and known them. Today in the same way, Jesus continues to call us by our name. In the Old Testament, there are two beautiful pieces of scripture through which God says, ‘I have called you by your name, you are mine’ and that ‘I have written your name on the palms of my hands.’ This is how personally and intimately God knows and loves each of us.