NOTES for Luk 4:24

What is said in this verse is indubitably true: each of us can remember his relationship with his most immediate family. Why is it so? May be because we have illusions? We think that a prophet must be extraordinary, even a superman, while God bestows the gift of prophecy to common people. If we don’t know closely the person to whom God bestows the gift of prophecy, then he is for us extraordinary and we are ready to agree that he is a prophet, but what happens when it turns out that this person is close to us, is familiar to us - is there anything abnormal in him that makes him not to be a prophet? Voila! We take easily for prophecy any sorts of ideas coming from outside, but we laugh and let moldy our prophets in camps, we even expel them sometimes out of the country. Is it not an absolute hearing also a gift? But this gift completely doesn’t depend on us - whether we accept it or not - it exists - while the gift of prophecy seems to not exist if it is not heard and received. Oh that’s great, since prophets seldom talk about things that please us, isn’t it?

But here is the main question: what should we do? The answer must be sought in the Gospel. We are summoned to love – our neighbor and stranger, seeing in each the character of God, and this means secret cannot be apprehended till the bottom. So, everyone should be amazing for us, and God might say something very important for us through anyone.