Perhaps because I have recently released custody of 2016, I continue to think in terms of “last” things or sayings about “last” — I heard a mother tell her 2-year-old that he was “standing” on her last nerve. While I had never heard that said before, I knew exactly what she meant.

The liturgy of this Sunday takes a break from the Gospel of Matthew and substitutes a reading from the Gospel of John. The setting is the ministry of John the Baptizer.

There are two parts to this Gospel reading. The first part places Jesus in Galilee in northern Palestine. Galilee was his homeland and the major location of his ministry in the Gospels of Mark, Matthew, and Luke.