Defining Your Galilee Moment

Jesus Loves Individual by Danny Hahlbohm (Flickr)

“Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for the reason for your hope.” 1 Peter 3:15.

I have found that faithfully keeping a spiritual journal keeps me always ready for any opportunity to share my conversion story and ready to convey the compassion and mercy of God to others.

To know our faith story, we need facts and clarity about our faith life. For example, what was that first defining moment when you knew that God was real, that he loved you? That’s the most important experience. Focus on the God-moment that changed you.

What’s a Galilee moment?

One approach that helps many people define the God-moment in their faith story is described in Pope Francis’s homily on the Easter Vigil, 2014. He referred to Jesus after his Resurrection telling his disciples to return to Galilee where they first gave their lives to him. Jesus first proclaimed the Gospel in Galilee, and there he called the disciples:

After John had been arrested, Jesus came to Galilee proclaiming the Gospel of God: “This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the Gospel.” As he passed by the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting their nets into the sea; they were fishermen. Jesus said to them, “Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Then they abandoned their nets and followed him. (Mark 1:14–18)

After Jesus’ death on the Cross, at what they thought was the end of everything they had hoped for, the angel in the Resurrection story instructs the followers of Jesus, reminding the women what Jesus wanted them all to do after his death:

And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe; and they were amazed. And he said to them, “Do not be amazed; you seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen, he is not here; see the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him, as he told you.” (Mark 16:5–7)

Pope Francis made two points with reference to these passages. First, “To return to Galilee means above all to return to that blazing light with which God’s grace touched me at the start of the journey.” To “return to Galilee” also means

[Renewing] the experience of a personal encounter with Jesus Christ who called me to follow him and to share in his mission. . . . It means reviving the memory of that moment when his eyes met mine, the moment when he made me realize that he loved me.

My Galilee Moment

I was baptized when I was one year old in my grandmother’s Protestant church and grew up going to Sunday School, Vacation Bible School, and youth group. I sang in the choir and helped out in the nursery.

At fifteen, I quietly committed my life to Jesus at a mountaintop youth retreat. I remember still the smoky campfire, the prayers and songs we shared around it, and the youth minister directing us to spread out into the trees and think about our relationship with God. As I walked through the woods, I quietly sang the words William Young Fullerton wrote to the tune of Danny Boy, “I Cannot Tell.” I found a grassy spot and sat down under a tree. The verses tell the story of Jesus’ birth and death for our salvation, and the jubilation of his returning as the Savior of the world. For the first time, I recognized that the undercurrents within me signaled the presence of Jesus living in my heart. Speechless, I stopped singing my favorite hymn to focus on him.

He gently made known his life in me through the gift of unexplainable joy that gushed from deep within me and filled me up. At that moment I knew God was real and loved me personally as my Savior.

As his love swept through me, I knew he was the only one who loved me like no one else ever could. In that life-changing God-moment of joy, I was overwhelmed with love for Jesus and committed my life to him.

I returned to the campfire, holding in my heart this glorious secret between Jesus and me. When the youth minister asked us to share what we had experienced, no one said a word. Not even me. I sat alone and still, my eyes down, waiting for the rush of emotion coloring my face to subside. I kept silent at the most important moment of my spiritual life, and for decades afterward—not because I didn’t believe my experience of Jesus’ love was real but because I wasn’t ready to share it. I didn’t know how.

I now know that sharing that Galilee moment surely would have encouraged my family and my teen friends. And helped me grow stronger spiritually through the family crises before and after my father’s death three years later.

Since this personal encounter with Jesus, my Galilee moment, I’ve encountered Him uncountable times. each of which always brings me back to the first defining moment when I knew that God was real, that he loved me!

What is your Galilee moment where you first met Jesus? Who can you share it with?

(© 2021 Nancy Ward)