Years ago, when we remodeled our bathroom, my three-year-old daughter asked if she could help me paint.

So I handed her the paintbrush.

She did exactly what you’d expect. 

Paint dripped everywhere. Random brushstrokes. X’s and O’s on the wall that you can still see today.

Then she asked if she could finish the job.

I took the paintbrush back.

I thought about that when I read Sunday’s Gospel.

Jesus asks his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?”

Peter nails it: “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

And then Jesus says something strange:

Don’t tell anybody.

Jesus takes the paintbrush back.

Because Peter has the right answer, but he doesn’t yet understand what the answer means.

Peter thinks “Messiah” means power, victory, liberation.

But Jesus is about to teach him that Messiah means a cross. Sacrifice. Suffering. Love.

Peter knows the word.

He just doesn’t know how to paint with it yet.

And, truthfully, I find something comforting in that.

Because I’ve been following Jesus for a long time, and I’m still discovering places where the Jesus I thought I knew isn’t quite the Jesus I meet in the Gospels.

This is part of following him.

We stay close. We keep listening. We keep learning. And little by little, Jesus fills in the picture.

Maybe faith isn’t about finally getting Jesus all figured out.

Maybe it’s about staying close enough to keep discovering who he is. And trusting that, along the way, he’ll keep teaching us how to paint.