If you had the chance to have Jesus as your neighbor, would you give up your current neighborhood and move next to him? I have been praying with this question for some time. It arises from my longing to love and to be loved, and to recover what it means to be fully human. In our fractured world, Jesus seems like the perfect neighbor—one who could teach us again how to love, how to forgive, and how to live without fear or judgment. After all, we are created in the image of God; love is not optional to our humanity—it is its fulfillment.
When we look at the world around us, that image often feels obscured. We drift from day to day amid uncertainty. What dominates our public life is not love but anger and suspicion. Violence, war, mass protest, and displacement no longer shock us; they have become normalized. We grow weary of counting the dead, and compassion fatigue sets in. In such a world, the desire to live next door to Jesus feels not only appealing but necessary.
The Gospel interrupts our imagination. Jesus does not invite us to relocate in order to find him. He tells us instead that he is already here. The doctrine of the Incarnation affirms that God has chosen not to remain distant but to dwell among us in human flesh. In Matthew 25, Jesus makes this vital claim clear: “I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” Christ identifies himself not with the powerful or the secure, but with the vulnerable. He binds his presence to the neighbor in need.
To encounter Christ, then, is not a matter of geography but of vision. We need new eyes, formed by faith, to recognize his presence. Jesus smiles at us in the face of a child. He weeps in the immigrant who fears what tomorrow may bring. He is in the poor, sick, grieving, and of course, the forgotten. The neighbor becomes a sacrament of Christ’s presence.
In caring for one another, we participate in the mission of Christ in the world. We do not only serve Jesus; we encounter him. The Christian life, at its core, is a call to love the neighbor not as a moral obligation, but as a theological act—an encounter with the living Christ. As we look after one another, Christ looks after us.
So perhaps the question is not whether we would move to live next to Jesus, but whether we are willing to recognize him where he already stands. Where do you see Jesus today?
Sunday
From the E-Crier of January 22, 2026. Subscribe to the weekly newsletter.