“If I tell you about earthly things and you do not believe,
how will you believe if I tell you about heavenly things?”

JOhn 3:12

John 3:7b-15

Reflection

Jesus continues speaking to Nicodemus, asking him how he will believe heavenly things if he does not believe what Jesus tells him about earthly things. He further says that no one has gone up to heaven except the Son of Man who came down, and just as Moses lifted the serpent in the desert, so too must the Son of Man be lifted up.

Jesus’ divine nature is again revealed in this Gospel, for he refers to himself when telling Nicodemus that only the Son of Many has come down from heaven. We know that Jesus is God, and we believe in him, yet it is understandable why Nicodemus displayed a skepticism that Jesus calls out.

Our inner skeptic sometimes causes us to question Christ and our faith. Jesus challenges us, though – if we don’t believe earthly things he tells us, how can we believe heavenly things? We must pass from base knowledge about life to spiritual knowledge, wherein we can encounter Jesus in a profound way. Yet if we don’t trust him in the small things, it will be more difficult to believe him when it comes to larger situations. Jesus asks us to trust him and believe in him – how can you do this better?

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Saint of the Day

St. Lydwine: 1380 – 1433

“Mindful of the crown foreshown her, she begged the Lord with much urgency that in His compassion He would deign so to work with her that that crown might be perfectly completed.” St. Lydwine of Schiedam Virgin, by Thomas a Kempis