1 John 4:19 - 5:4 / Luke 4:14-22
To have all eyes looking at you intently is really something that can be quite unnerving.
In the first place, it is never that easy to capture people's attention. Even when we are engrossed in a movie, we still can get distracted somehow.
So was it something you said, or something you did that made all the people in the room fix their eyes on you?
When Jesus took the scroll on that day in the synagogue, and read from the prophet Isaiah, and then rolled back the scroll and sat down, all eyes in the synagogue were fixed on Him.
What Jesus read was not something new. The people had heard it before, many times even. But why were they looking intently at Him as if they heard it for the first time and seemed so engaged by it?
Because Jesus read with conviction, He was speaking about Himself, and what He read He will go about accomplishing.
When we read the Bible, what kind of conviction do we have? Do we read the Word of God with reference to ourselves?
Like in the 1st reading when it says: Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ has been begotten by God. And anyone who has been begotten by God has already overcome the world.
Just as the Scriptures speak about Jesus Christ, so too the same Scriptures speak about us if we believe in Jesus, and we too must do what He did.
The world will look at us and wonder who we are. But by our faith we will overcome the world by following Jesus to do what He did.