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The Nativity
Joseph was a
carpenter in Nazareth, a small town in the land of Israel.
He was betrothed to marry Mary, who also lived in Nazareth.
Shortly before his marriage Joseph had a strange dream. In it he saw an angel of the Lord, who came
down from heavens and spoke to Joseph.
The angel told him that after his marriage, Mary would have a son, sent
by the Lord to save His people from their sins. And the angel said that the
child should be called Jesus.
Now in those days, Israel was part of the Roman
Empire, ruled over by the Emperor Caesar Augustus. Soon after Joseph and Mary were married, the
Roman Emperor commanded all the citizens of the empire to return to their own
towns, so their names could be listed in a census. This would show how many people lived in the
empire, under Roman rule.
Both Joseph and
Mary were descended from the Family of King David, so they returned to their
home town of Bethlehem,
King David’s birthplace. When they reached
Bethlehem, the
town was filled with people who had come in from the countryside, to be listed
by the Romans. Even though Mary was about to give birth, they couldn’t find any
place to stay in Bethlehem. Finally hey found lodging in a stable, where
cattle were kept. And there the baby was
born. They had no crib for Him so He was
laid upon hay in a manger, which is the trough from which the cattle eat. On the night of the baby’s birth some
shepherds were tending their sheep in the field near Bethlehem.
Suddenly a great light shone upon them, and an angel of the Lord
appeared. They were frightened by the vision, but the angel said to them:
“Be not afraid;
for behold I bring you news of great joy, which shall be to all people; for
there is born to you this day in Bethlehem, the city of David, a Saviour who is
Christ the Lord.” Then the angel told
them how to find the child: “You will find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes
and lying in a manger.”
Then they saw
the sky was filled with angels, and heard them singing: “Glory to God in the
Highest. And peace on earth, good will toward men.” Then the angels
disappeared. The shepherds immediately
set out toward the town. When they found
Mary and Joseph with the babe lying in a manger, they repeated the message they
had heard. Everyone was amazed. Mary, who had also been told by God of the
great mission of her son, said nothing.
But she thought deeply about these strange and wonderful happenings.
THE
WISE
MEN COME
After Jesus was
born, Joseph and Mary stayed on in Bethlehem,
because they didn’t want to travel with the newborn baby. One night, soon after the birth, three
strangers appeared in the little town.
They were richly dressed and it was clear they didn’t come from anywhere
near Judea.
They had come from a land far to the east. They were men of great learning and wisdom,
and had spent many years studying the stars and the mysteries of the world. One night they had seen a new and magnificent
star shinning in the sky. They knew what
it meant-that a great king was born in the world and that the star would lead
them to the newborn king.
The wise men
decided to follow the star, so they might see this king and learn what He meant
to this world. Their journey was long
and hard. At last they came to the land of Judea.
Thinking that everyone in the land would know of the newborn king, they
asked, “Where is He that was born the king of the Jews? In the east we have seen His star; and we
have come to worship Him.” But no one
they had met knew anything about a new king; they knew only that Herod still
ruled the land under the Roman governor.
Word came to
Herod that these three impressive visitors were asking about a new king. He was worried, because he knew that he was
not well liked by his people. He called
the priest and the scribes, the men who studied and taught the things that were
predicted in the Bible, and asked them what the prophets had predicted about a
new king coming to Israel. They told Herod that it was predicted that
“out of Bethlehem in the land of Judah
shall come forth one who shall rule my people.”
Herod was frightened. He called
for the three Wise Men and told them to find the child, so that he might also
come and worship Him. But, of course,
Herod was lying; he wanted to find the baby in order to destroy Him.
The Wise Men set
out and soon found the star again, shinning high in the heavens above the road
to Bethlehem. They followed it to the stable where Jesus
was born. When they saw the child they
knew at once that this was the one they had sought. They knelt before Him and presented gifts of
gold and of rare perfumes called frankincense and myrrh, which were used at
that time for religious ceremonies. The
same night, God warned the Wise Men in a dream not to return to Herod but to go
back to their own land by a different road.
Thus Herod did not find out where Jesus was.
The coming of
Christ had long been predicted among the Jews, but they believed He would be
the Saviour only of His own nation. The three Wise Men were the first men outside
of Israel
to know that Jesus had come for all men, and they were the first to see Him.
THE PRESENTATION
AT THE TEMPLE
It was a rule
among the Jews that the first boy child born to a family was to be taken to the
Temple in Jerusalem. There his parents would make an offering to
the Lord, to show that the child belonged to the Lord. When Jesus was forty days old, Joseph and
Mary brought Him to the Temple. As an offering Joseph brought a pair of young
pigeons to place upon the alter of the Temple.
Living in Jerusalem at that time
was a very holy man, a man whom the Lord had spoken to directly. His name was Simeon, and he was very old, but
the Lord had told him that he would not die until he had seen the Christ, or
Saviour, whose coming had been predicted in the Bible. One day the Spirit of the Lord urged Simeon
to go to the Temple. He went, and was there when Mary and Joseph
came with the baby Jesus, to present their offering. When Simeon saw the child, the Lord let him
know that this was the Christ who had been promised. Simeon took Jesus in his arms and gave thanks
to the Lord for letting him see the Christ: “Lord, now let thy servant depart
in peace, according to thy word: For my eyes have seen thy salvation, which
thou hast prepared before the face of all people; A light to lighten the
Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.”
Then Simeon
blessed Joseph and Mary. He also told
Mary some of the things the future would hold for her son and for her. He told her of the greatness her son would
attain, but he added that sorrow, like a sword, would pierce her heart.
There was also
in the Temple a
woman named Anna, who spoke with God. She spent all her time praying. And the
Lord also revealed to her that the baby Jesus was the Saviour who had been
promised. She too gave thanks to the
Lord, and told the other people in the Temple
that the Redeemer had come. And so it
was that a few people who kept close to God knew Jesus was the Son of God. But to the rest of the people He was merely
the son of a carpenter named Joseph, who came from Nazareth.
However, there
was one other man in Israel
who believed that Jesus was no ordinary child.
This was the cruel King Herod.
When Herod heard that the three Wise Men had returned home, without
bringing him word of the child they called a king, he was furious. In His anger and fear he did a terrible
thing. He gave orders to have all the
children in Bethlehem,
of two years old and under, killed. By
doing this he felt sure that he would eliminate the Christ Child. But God had already warned Joseph of Herod’s
cruel plans. So Joseph took Mary and the
infant, and fled into Egypt,
where Herod had no power. It was there
the family stayed until King Herod died.
After Herod’s
death, Joseph set out to return to Bethlehem. But upon learning that Herod’s cruel son
Archelaus ruled that part of Israel,
Joseph decided to go back to Nazareth,
where he and Mary had grown up. There,
in the land of Galilee, Jesus grew to manhood, working
with His father as a carpenter.
JESUS
AND THE
TEACHERS
The family of
Jesus was very devoted in observing the religious ceremonies of their
people. In those times, as today, a most
important festival of the Jews was the Passover. This is the time when thanks are given to God
for leading the Jews out of Egypt,
where they had lived in bondage as slaves.
Every year
Joseph and Mary traveled all the way from Nazareth
to Jerusalem, the capital city, to celebrate the
Passover in the Temple. Most people made the trip together, in
groups, because the travel in those days was hard and dangerous. At the end f the Passover, the large caravan
of friends and relatives set out to return to Nazareth.
Jesus was by this time a strong, capable boy, unusually thoughtful, so
His parents did not watch over Him all the time. He did not always travel with them, but often
walked with friends or relatives in the caravan. Joseph and Mary thought nothing of it when
they did not see Him during the first day on the road. But when the caravan stopped for the night
and Jesus did not appear for supper, they searched the camp for Him. When they discovered that no one had seen Him
that day, they returned to Jerusalem
as fast as they could.
For three days
the worried parents went about the city looking for their son. Finally they found Him. He was sitting in the Temple, surrounded by the wisest teachers and
scholars in the country. And they were
discussing the most serious ideas of religion with the twelve year old
boy. When these smart men heard the
answers Jesus gave to their difficult questions, they were astonished at the
boy’s knowledge and understanding.
Joseph and Mary were also astonished when they saw their twelve year old
son surrounded by learned men, and holding their interest. Mary was upset, as any mother would be. She told Jesus how anxious they had been
looking for Him, and she asked Him why He had caused them so much worry.
Jesus seemed surprised
that they did not know where he was.
“Did you not know that I would be in my Father’s house?” He asked.
His parents did not really understand what He meant, although Mary knew
deep down in her heart that Jesus would have to leave them one day, to carry
out God’s plan. And she and Joseph
realized, that day in the Temple
that this was no mere boyish disobedience.
Jesus went back with His parents and did everything they asked of Him,
without question. And He remained with
them in Nazareth,
working as a carpenter with Joseph.
THE
BAPTISM
Among the
Hebrews in those days there appeared from time to time men who were known as
prophets. They talked to the people as
if they were speaking directly for God.
When Jesus was about thirty years old, a prophet named John was
preaching to the people to give up their evil ways, because God was soon to
appear on earth. When people came to him
to repent their sins and live a better life, John baptized that bad things were
washed away. They were made clean and
ready for a better life. So he was known
as John the Baptist; that is, the one who baptizes.
John was related
o Jesus and their mothers had known each other many years before. But John and Jesus had never met, for John
had spent most of his life in the wilds of the desert, seeking to learn about
God. He dressed as a man of the
wilderness in rough clothes of camel’s hair and leather. Many people came to be baptized by John in
the River Jordan. Jesus heard of John and
He traveled to the Jordan
and asked John to baptize Him. When John
saw Jesus he knew that here was the Son of God.
He realized that standing before him was the very one he had preached
would appear among them.
John did not
feel he could baptize Jesus. He did not
think he was worthy even to carry Jesus’ shoes.
John asked Jesus to baptize him instead.
But Jesus replied that it was proper for John to baptize Him. John knew that this was the greatest day of
his life. It was the moment for which he
had prayed, all those days in the wilderness, when he strived to learn what God
wanted him to do. This was the day for
which he had been preparing himself for.
So John baptized
Jesus, and when Jesus came out of the water a wonderful thing happened. The sky seemed to split apart and a beautiful
dove came down and settled on Jesus. At
this moment the people heard a voice from heaven. The voice said: “This is my beloved Son, in
whom I am well
pleased.”
THE
TEMPTATION
Jesus was about
thirty years old when He was baptized.
Before then no one knew him as anything more than a carpenter. The Bible tells us nothing of His life from
the time when He was twelve and spoke with the wise men in the Temple, until the time He came to John to be
baptized. But we know that He was being
prepared to do God’s work, to reveal the love of God to men.
But before He
was to begin teaching, He had to go through one final intensive period of
preparation. After his baptism, the
spirit of God directed Jesus to go into the desert and live there alone: to
pray and to think through how He would carry His message to all men. So deep and serious was His concentration in
that bare and lonely land, that He took no thought of eating and drinking. And for forty days He had no food or
drink. But though He was the Son of God,
Jesus was also a man of flesh and blood.
When he had completed His preparation and was ready to return to the
world, He realized that He was weak with hunger. So it was then, when Jesus was at His weakest
and His desires, such as hunger and thirst, were the strongest, He was tempted
by evil.
After forty days
in the desert without food, the spirit of evil, Satan, came to Jesus to test
the strength of His spirit. First Satan
said: If you are the Son of God, why don’t you turn these stones into bread so
that you can eat? Jesus knew that all
things were possible to God, but He knew that His power was given to Him not to
help himself, but only for others. He
said to the evil spirit: “It is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but
by every word of God.”
Then the evil
spirit led Jesus to Jerusalem, the holy city,
and placed Him on a high tower of the Temple. There he urged Jesus to show the people that
He was the Son of God by throwing Himself from the tower. “For”, as Satan pointed out to Jesus, “it is
written in the Bible that God shall give His angels charge of you and in their
hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.”
But Jesus new
that this would be wrong, for it would be done not to please God, but to show
him-self before men and test the power of God when He had not been commanded by
God to do this. He answered Satan: “It
is written, ‘you shall not tempt the Lord your God.” That is, one must not do anything simply to
test the power of God.
Then Satan tried
to appeal to Jesus by the promise of power in the world. He took Jesus to a very high mountain and
caused to appear to Him a vision of all the kingdoms of the world and all the
glory that the ruler of the world could have.
He offered to make Jesus King of all the world, saying “all this I will
give to you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Jesus had heard enough. His spirit had not been weakened by all the
temptations Satan could show Him.
“Be gone Satan!
Jesus said, “for it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him
only shall you serve.’”
When Satan found
that Jesus would not listen to him, he left.
Then angels came from God and gave Jesus food and drink and all that He
needed. Satan would seem to have been
beaten, but the Bible does not say that he went away forever; it tells us he
departed to wait for another time to tempt Jesus.
THE
CALLING
OF THE DISCIPLES
When Jesus came
out of the desert after His forty days of talking with God and after His
turning away the temptations of evil, He was ready to bring His message to
men. He did not gather crowds around Him
and begin teaching. He began with
personal conversations with a few men who became interested in Him.
One day as Jesus
walked near the River Jordan, where John the Baptist was teaching. John saw Him
pass by and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God.”
Two of the men standing there realized that John meant that this was the
Christ whose coming John had preached.
The two young men started up the path after Jesus. Jesus saw them coming and stopped and asked
them, “What is it that you seek?” They
asked where Jesus was staying so that they might come and talk with Him. And Jesus replied, “Come and see.” So the men went with Jesus. They were fishermen from the Sea of Galilee who had come to hear John the Baptist
teach. One of them was called Andrew.
Andrew spent the
entire day talking with Jesus and learning from Him. He went away from this meeting certain that
he had met the Son of God and the King of Israel. All the Jews of that time, even simple
fishermen like Andrew, knew that the Bible foretold there would come a man of
God- a man who would save their people from sin and restore them to union with
God. They believed, too, that He would
be King of their nation.
Andrew brought
his brother Simon to meet Jesus. Jesus
saw him coming and without waiting to be introduced to him said, “So you are
Simon, son of Jona?” Then Jesus gave him
a new name. “You shall be called ‘the
Rock,’ He told Simon. So from that time
on Simon was called Simon Peter, or Simon the Rock. The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. On the
way He met another Galileean named Philip.
Jesus said, “Follow me.” Such was
the sense of power in Jesus that Philip immediately joined Him. Philip had a friend, Nathanael, who came from
a town not far from Nazareth,
where Jesus had grown up. When Philip
told Nathanael about Jesus, Nathanael, who did not think much of Nazareth, remarked, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip did not argue with him. “Come and see,” he said, knowing only that
Jesus could convince Nathanael.
When Jesus saw
Nathanael approaching he remarked, “Here is an Israelite indeed, in whom there
is no guile.” Nathanael was
surprised. “How did you know me? he
asked. “Before Philip called you,” Jesus
replied, “when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.” Nathanael did not understand how Jesus could
have seen him when he was miles away.
Immediately he believed what Philip had told him of Jesus. “Teacher,” he said, “you are the Son of
God! You are the King of Israel!” Jesus gently reproved him. “Because I said to
you I saw you under the fig tree, do you believe? You shall see greater things than these. You will see heaven open and the angels of
God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”
Later Jesus
found John with his brother James mending their nets in their boat with
Zebedee, their father. He called them,
and they left their father in the boat with the hired servants and followed
Him.
Jesus now had
six followers traveling with Him. Andrew
and Simon Peter, who were brothers; John and James, who were brothers; and
Philip and Nahanael. These men were called Disciples, which means students.
THE
REJECTION AT
NAZARETH
Jesus wanted to
bring His message of God’s love to His own people in Nazareth.
He had always attended the synagogue, and when He returned He went to
worship with His fellow townspeople there on the Sabbath. The news of the wonderful works He had done
spread through the town. The Temple was crowded with
people who had known Jesus as a simple carpenter, and they wondered what He
might be like, now that He was said to be a prophet and a miracle worker.
Jesus stood up,
as was the custom, to show that He wanted to read from the Bible. He was handed the book of the prophet
Esaias. He opened the book, and found
the place where it was written:
“The spirit of
the Lord is upon me, Because He has anointed me to reach good news to the
poor. He has sent me to proclaim release
to the captives, And recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those
who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.
He closed the
book, returned it to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of the congregation was fixed on Him. Jesus spoke: “Today this scripture fulfilled
in your hearing.” The people were
astonished. This was a serious and great
claim, almost frightening. That these
words of the Holy Bible applied to Him, Jesus; that the inspired prophet Isaiah
had been writing about the simple carpenter of Nazareth! “Where did this man get this wisdom
and these mighty words?” they muttered.
“Is not this the carpenter’s son, a carpenter himself? Is not His mother called Mary? Are not His brothers James and Joseph and
Simon and Judas? And are not all His
sisters with us? Where then did this man
get all this?”
Jesus realized that they could not understand
that He who had lived among hem could be the Son of God. He told them: “Truly I say to you, no prophet
is accepted in his own country.” And he
told two stories from the Bible to make the point clear to them. Both were stories of prophets who had made
miracles. His point was that in both
cases the Lord had sent the prophets not to their own people, but to outsiders,
for their own people would not have accepted them. This made the people in the synagogue very
angry. They may have felt that Jesus was
saying that they were not as good as the people in other towns. Certainly they were sure He had no right to
claim to fulfill the prophecy of the Bible.
The people
seized Him and led Him out of the city to the top of a high and dangerous
cliff, preparing to push him over the cliff.
Somehow His calm, fearless manner was such that no one wanted to make
the first move. He walked quietly
through the crowd and down the road, leaving them standing in confusion. No one wanted to pursue Him.
Sadly Jesus went
down from the hills to the city of Capernaum, on the shore of the Sea of
Galilee, and there he taught in the synagogues, and the people listened.
The
Woman At
The Well
John the Baptist
continued to preach and baptize followers after Jesus had become widely known
through the country. As Jesus gained
more followers, John had less, but he continued to preach that Jesus was the
Christ, while he was no more than “the voice of one crying in the wilderness”
to prepare people for the message of Jesus.
John was a
fearless preacher who condemned sins wherever he found them, no matter how
powerful the sinners might be. He even
preached against King Herod (the son of the Herod who was king when Christ was
born). He attacked the sin’s of Herod’s
wife Herodias and she demanded that Herod have John killed. Herod feared the
truth that John spoke and refused to kill him. But to satisfy his wife and
perhaps to protect John from her hatred, he had John imprisoned.
Jesus had been
teaching in and around Jerusalem in Judea. When He heard that John had
been imprisoned in Galilee, He set out for that country. Between Judea
and
Galilee, in the mountains, there was a country called Samaria and the
people living there were
called Samaritans. The people of Galilee, Judea
and the other places where Christ preached were Jews, and they worshiped
the
same God. But they had different forms of worship and their Bible had
only the
first five books of the Old Testament. They did not regard the prophets
as
speaking for God.
Because of these
differences, there had grown up much bad feeling between the Samaritans and
Jews. Most Jews traveling from Judea to Galilee usually went way out of their
way to avoid passing through Samaria.
But Jesus struck out straight across the mountains of Samaria. One morning during this trip Jesus
stopped, very tired, beside a famous old well. This well had been dug by Jacob,
the ancestor of all the Israelites centuries before, and was called Jacob’s
well.
Jesus was
thirsty, as well as hungry and tired, but he couldn’t get water from the well
without a jar and a rope to pull it up with. His disciples had gone into a
nearby village by the name of Sychar to buy food. As He waited, a Samaritan
woman came to the well with her jar to draw water. Jesus asked her for a drink.
She could tell from the way He was dressed and the way He spoke that He was a
Jew. “How is it,” she asked surprised, “that you a Jew ask me for a drink, a
woman of Samaria?
Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.” Jesus answered her. “If you knew the
gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would
have asked him, and He would have given you living water.”
The woman said,
“Sir, you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where do you get that
living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this well, and
drank from it himself, and his sons, and his cattle?” Jesus said to her,
“Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again, But whoever drinks of the
water that I shall give him, will never thirst; the water that I shall give him
will become in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.” The
woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come
here to draw.”
Then Jesus told
the woman of things she had done in her life, which no stranger could have
known. The woman was deeply impressed and felt this man must have powers known
only to God. She asked Him whether the Samaritans were right in worshiping God
on the mountain as their fathers had done, or whether the Jews were right and that
Jerusalem was
the place where men should go to worship God. Jesus replied: “Woman, believe
me, the hour is coming when ye shall neither on this mountain, nor in the Jerusalem worship the
Father. The hour is coming, and is now here, when true worshipers will worship
the Father in spirit and in truth… God is spirit and those who worship Him must
worship Him in spirit and truth.”
And the woman
understood that Jesus was saying that a temple was not necessary o worship God,
and that He could be worshiped anywhere by those who love His spirit and
understand His truth. The woman at the well then said to Jesus: “I know that a
Messiah is coming, He who is called Christ, and when He comes He will show us
all things. And Jesus said “I that speak to you am he.” It was then that the
Disciples returned from the town with food, and the woman left her water jug,
and went into the town. She told the people: “Come see a man that has told me
of all that I have ever done. Can this be the Christ?” And the people left the
town, and went to see Jesus at the well. Meanwhile the Disciples offered Jesus
the food they had bought. But Jesus had forgotten about food. “My food,” He
told them, “is to do the will of Him who sent me, and to finish His work.”
The Samaritans were
so impressed with the woman’s words that when they found Jesus at the well they
asked Him to stay and teach them about God. He stayed for two days, and many
more believed in Him when they heard His words
Traveling And Teaching
So far as we
know from the Bible, Jesus spent most of His life in the little town of Nazareth, working quietly
as a carpenter with His earthly father Joseph. He was in full manhood when He
traveled from His native village to be baptized by John the Baptist, and only
three years elapsed from that time until His death. During this brief time all
His great teaching was accomplished. In those few years During His thirties, He
spoke the words that most of the world, two thousand years later, still seeks
to live by.
Though His
message was for all the world, during His lifetime Jesus spoke mostly to His
own people. He never preached in any of the great Roman cities, which were the
centers of power in His time. He traveled almost continually throughout the
lands where the people of the Old Testament had spread- lands that we now
simply call The Holy Land. Many times He crossed the great inland seas, such as
the Sea of Galilee, by boat; and He may have
ridden donkeys or camels from time to time. But mostly He and His Disciples
walked. Along hot and dusty roads, over rugged mountains, they walked with
little thought of where they were to sleep or what they were to eat.
Most of the
teachings were in mall towns, and in some of these, such as Capernaum, Jesus spent a good deal of time.
And when He returned to His own village
of Nazareth He was
rejected by His former neighbors. He journeyed to Jerusalem for the Passover celebrations three
times during His ministry. Though He traveled extensively, Jesus did not seek
out people to teach. Frequently, He retired to the mountains or the desert to
be alone with God, or confined His teaching to His Disciples. But wherever He
went among people, they sought Him out. His fame spread from Galilee, where He
called His first Disciples and began His teaching, throughout all the Roman province of Syria, which included the Jewish
kingdoms.
Romans and other
outsiders in this area knew of Him, and some came to believe in Him during His
life. And yet it was not until He had been rejected by His own people that the
world beyond the Holy Land came to know of
Jesus and His message of God.
Cana's
Wedding Feast
When Jesus went out to teach in the world, He did not forget
His Family and His Friends. He lived a simple and rugged life, spending long
times alone in the desert. But unlike John the Baptist He was not a lonely
hermit.
After He
returned from His trips in the mountains or desert, He went out among the
people. Because He knew He must teach His message to all mankind. All kinds of
people liked to be with Him, because of His great love for all men, He was a
wise counselor and warm friend. And we know from His first miracles that He
wanted those around Him to be happy. During the time of His great teaching,
Jesus preformed many miracles. All of them were meant to awaken people to the
great truth He was bringing from God. For Jesus felt that performing a miracle,
an act made possible only by God’s divine will, He would show the world Gods
great authority over the Universe.
But sometimes
Jesus seemed unwilling to perform miracles. He did them only when He needed to
show God’s power, and when someone needed help. Of coarse the people were
impressed by His miracles, and talked of them to others. And many, who came
only to see the miracles, heard the message of Jesus and through Him came to
know God.
Shortly after
Jesus met His first followers He was invited to a wedding in a town of
Cana near His home in Nazareth. In those times, as today, a feast
always followed the wedding, and Jesus attended it with His mother,
Mary.
Before the feast was over, all the wine had been used and there was none
left
for the guest. Jesus’ mother knew that He had the power to do anything,
and she
said to Him: “They have no wine.”
Jesus tried to
explain to His mother that it was not yet time for Him to show the power of God
in Him by performing miracles. But Mary knew that Jesus would help His friends,
and provide wine for them so that the feast could continue. So she said to the
servants: “Do whatever He tells you.” Six stone jars were standing nearby, each
big enough to hold twenty or thirty gallons. Jesus told the servants: “Fill the
jars with water.” They filled them, and Jesus said: “Now draw some of the water
out of the jars, and take it to the steward.” The servants were amazed when
they saw that the water that they had placed in the jars had turned to wine.
But they did as Jesus said, and took the wine to the steward. When the steward,
(the man hired to run the wedding feast) tasted the wine he, too, was amazed.
And he told the bridegroom: “Every man serves the good wine first; and when the
men have drunk freely, then pour the wine. But you have kept the good wine
until now.”
The Great
Catch Of Fish
Four of Jesus’
first followers were fishermen. They were the brothers of Andrew and John, and
two other brothers, Philip and Peter. These men fished in the Sea
of Galilee, a huge inland lake. In the land around the Sea of Galilee
Jesus attracted many who wanted to hear His
message. He was especially popular in the town of Capernaum. One day when He was staying there
He went out to the lake. He was followed y a great crowd of people who had been
eagerly waiting to hear Him speak and perhaps hoping they would see a miracle.
On the shores of the lake were two boats, one of which belonged to Simon Peter
and Andrew. The other was operated by the brothers James and John and their
father Zebedee. The fishermen were working on their nets on the shore.
Jesus wanted all
in the crowd to see and hear Him, so He stepped into the boat of Simon Peter
and his brother Andrew. He asked them to push it out into the middle of the
lake, so the crowd gathered on the shore would not be pressed around Him. The
fishermen sent the boat into the lake and Jesus spoke to the people from the
boat, as they stood on the beach. When Jesus had spoken, and the people had
gone, He saw that the fishermen had not caught any fish on their last trip. He
told Simon Peter to take the boat out into the deep water and let down his nets
for fish. Simon Peter replied that they had fished all night without catching
anything. But he knew that whatever Jesus told him to do would be the right
thing, so they rowed to the middle of the lake.
They put out
their nets and soon felt the powerful tug of fish in them. They tried to pull
in the net and found that it was so full that they could not pull it up. They
called to James and John in their boat nearby to help them. The four men
pulling with all their might finally got the net up to the boat and loads of
fish came pouring into it. There was so much fish that both boats almost sank.
This was a catch such as there had never been seen from the lake. Simon Peter
was overcome with amazement at the sight. He realized that Jesus had powers he
could not understand. He fell at the feet of Jesus and said: “Depart from me,
for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” Peter felt that he did not deserve such a gift
from God, and could not walk with the Son of God. But Jesus said to him: “Do
not be afraid. Henceforth you will be fishers of men.” And Simon Peter
understood that Jesus meant he should leave his fishing and join Him in helping
to spread His word to other men. When they got back to the land, all four
fishermen abandoned their nets and their boats. They went with Jesus, to earn
from Him, and to help Him teach others.
On the following
Sabbath they went with Jesus to the synagogue, and Jesus spoke to the people
and tried to teach them. But the people were surprised at His teachings,
because the scribes in the synagogue taught only what had been written before,
as Jesus taught as one who spoke directly for God. He did not need the support
of words others had written.
Jesus
Calms The Storm
When large
crowds of people came to hear Jesus speak, He could always tell how much
the
people who were listening to Him could understand. He knew that many
came not
to learn, but hoping to see a great miracle performed. And He always
knew when
to send them away, or to leave them. One day He had been teaching by the
Sea of Galilee, when He decided it was time to leave the
crowds. So He got into a boat and asked His disciples to head for the
other
side of the sea. Jesus took the opportunity of the long boat trip to
rest. He
lay down in the stern of the boat and fell to sleep.
Suddenly the sky
darkened, and a wind began to blow. It grew so fierce that great waves rose in
the lake, rocking the little boat. As the storm grew worse even the hardened fishermen
were frightened. They felt sure the boat would be destroyed. Terrified they
woke Jesus up, and shouted to Him over the howling wind: “Master, don’t you
care if we all are drowned?” Jesus looked at the raging sea. Then calmly He
said to the waves: “Peace… Be still.” The wind suddenly stopped blowing, the
sea flattened out, and the boat lay still on the calm water. He turned to His
Disciples and asked them: “Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?” The
fishermen looked at each other and said: “Who then is this, that even the wind
and sea obey Him?”
Many times Jesus
did such things before His disciples, not to demonstrate power, but to teach
them that they must not worry about themselves, but rather believe and trust in
God.
The Feeding
Of
The Muliltude
Jesus had sent His followers out to preach in His name in
the villages surrounding the Sea of Galilee.
And when they returned, they were followed by thousands who had heard the
message. The multitudes had come to seek Jesus out, to hear Him teach and to be
healed of sickness. Jesus often wanted to escape from the crowds, to have time
to teach His Disciples. One day He and His Disciples got into a boat and set
out to a lonely spot where they could be together and not be disturbed, eat a
little, rest and talk. But those who saw them leave called to the others, and a
great crowd ran around the lake. They got to the other side ahead of the boat
carrying Jesus and His followers.
Jesus took pity
on the people who were so eager to be with Him, so He taught them and healed
those who were sick and asked for His help. They were far away from the
village, and Jesus had not eaten all day, neither had the great multitudes that
had followed Him. One of the Disciples’ suggested that Jesus should send the
people back to their homes to eat. But Jesus replied: “You give them something
to eat.” And the Disciple asked: “Shall we go back to the village and buy bread
for the crowds, so that they can eat?” Jesus said: “How many loaves and fishes
do you have?” He said: “Five loaves and two fishes.”
Jesus turned to
the crowd, and told them to sit down on the grass in groups of fifties and
hundreds. Then He took the five loaves and two fishes. He looked up to heaven
and blessed the food. Then He broke the loaves and gave them to the Disciples
to set before the people: and He divided the fishes among them all. Everyone in
the great crowd ate and was satisfied. Indeed they could not even finish all of
the food. There were twelve baskets of bread and fish left over. Thus from the
five loaves and the two fishes five thousand people had been fed.
Jesus Walks
On The Water
After
the thousands who had followed Jesus across the lake had been fed from
the five loaves and two fishes, Jesus sent them away, though they were
ready to proclaim Him as their king. He also told his Disciples to get
in the boat and go back across the lake without Him. They did not want
to leave Him, but they obeyed.
Jesus
then went up into the hills beyond the lake to pray alone. As the
Disciples were crossing the lake a strong wind blew up and they had to
row harder to keep from being blown back to the shore where they had
started. Then one of them looked up from his oar and pointed out across
the water. There was a ghostly figure walking past their boat, walking
on the water as if it was dry land. They were terrified and they cried
out. But it was Jesus, and He spoke to them. “Take heart,” He said, “It
is I; have no fear.” Then Peter spoke up and said, “Lord, if it be you,
let me come to you walking on the water.” Jesus told him to get out of
the boat and walk toward Him. Peter found too that he was walking on the
water. Suddenly he was afraid. He forgot his faith in Jesus and
immediately he began to sink. He cried out, “Lord, save me!”
Jesus
reached out His hand and caught hold of Peter, lifting him up. “Oh man
of little faith,” He said to Peter, “why did you doubt me?” Jesus took
Peter back to the boat and got into it with the Disciples. Immediately
the wind stopped blowing and they rowed on across the lake. When they
got to the other side, the people recognized Jesus and brought the sick
for Him to heal. Everywhere He went, sick people were brought to Him and
those who even touched the hem of His garment and believed were made
well.
The
people had not forgotten the feeding of the five thousand from the few
loaves and fishes and many sought Jesus out hoping the miracle would be
repeated. But He explained to them that they must not seek merely for
bread, “but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of
Man will give to you…”
The Casting Out Of The
Money Changers
Jesus
was faithful to the religious observances of His people. He attended all
the ceremonies that marked the great events of the Jewish nation. An
important day is the Feast of the Passover. This celebrates the freeing
if the Jews from their slavery in Egypt. Every year all who were able
traveled to the Temple in Jerusalem for this feast. Not long after Jesus
had called His first Disciples and shortly after he had done the
miracle of changing water into wine, He traveled to Jerusalem for the
Passover.
It was
the practice for the people to offer gifts of sheep and cattle and doves
upon the altar as recognition that they were God’s children. Since many
traveled from far away they did not bring the animals with them, but
bought them in Jerusalem. Those who sold the animals for the sacrifices,
and those who changed the money of the travelers had come to set up
their shops within the Temple itself. The Temple looked more like a
market place than a place to worship God.
When
Jesus saw this He decided to rid the Temple of the money changers and
the sellers of animals. He took some rope and made a whip out of it.
Swinging this whip He moved among the buyers and sellers. There were
many of them and He was but a single man, but the sense of power and
truth in Jesus was so strong that the mob fled in panic. Jesus drove out
all the animals and tipped over the money of the money changers. Then
He said to them: “Take these things hence; make not my Father’s house a
place of buying and selling.”
When
those who watched had recovered from their surprise at this powerful
stranger, they approached Him and asked Him what He could do that would
show them the authority by which He had acted. Jesus replied, “Destroy
this Temple and in three days I will raise it up.” They pointed out to
Him that it had taken forty-six years to build the Temple, and they did
not understand how He could rear it up in three days. Jesus was talking
of a time to come, when He would be killed. The Temple of His body would
be destroyed, but in three days He would rise up again. Later when
Jesus was crucified, His Disciples remembered what He had said on this
day, and understood what He meant.
While
He was in Jerusalem, Jesus performed miracles that brought many people
in the Capital to believe that He was indeed The Son of God.
The Firm
Foundation
When
Jesus spoke to the people He did so in simple terms, so that they could
easily understand Him. He talked of real things that they knew from
their own daily activities, such as planting and reaping grain, tending
sheep, or building a house. At the end of His greatest sermon Jesus
sought to impress His listeners with the choice before them- either
heeding God’s truth or ignoring it. And to illustrate it clearly to
them, He told them the story of rock and sand.
“Therefore
whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them,” He said’ “I
will liken him into a wise man who built his house upon a rock. And the
rains descended and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon
that house. And it fell not; for it was founded upon a rock. “And
everyone who heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them not, shall be
likened unto the foolish man, who built his house upon sand. And the
rains descended and the rains came and the winds blew and beat upon that
house. And it fell; and great was the fall of it.”
And the
people understood His simple illustration. Because they knew that the
rain could wash away sand and leave a house without foundations, that
such a house must collapse. But the house built on a rock cannot be
washed away by the rains. The foundations stay strong, and the house
weathers the flood.
The
wisest in the crowds who listened to Jesus knew, then, that He meant
that their lives must be built upon the rock of truth. Because although
it may be easier to build on sand, only the rock will stay firm when the
storm of troubles comes. And we ourselves know that this is indeed
true.
The Sower
The
message that Jesus brought to the world was so new and so different from
anything people had known before that even His Disciples sometimes had
trouble understanding Him. But Jesus wanted to reach not only the
educated and wise, but everyone, including those who thought about
little else but their day to day problems. To move all people to think
about God and the message of love He brought from God, Jesus taught the
people by means of stories which they could easily understand. These
teaching stories are called parables.
The
first parable that is reported in the Bible is about a farmer and is
called the Parable of the Sower. In those days, some plants, such as
wheat, were planted by sowing or scattering the seeds upon the ground.
Jesus told the people of a farmer who was sowing seed. As he sowed, some
of the seed fell beside the road where the ground was trampled down.
People walking on the road stepped on the seed and destroyed the new
plants. Some of the seed fell where the soil was thin because there were
rocks under it. These seeds grew quickly, but late in the summer when
the sun was hot, they dried up. There was not enough soil to hold the
moisture for them. Some seeds fell where weeds were growing and these
seeds could not get started. But some of the seeds fell into rich earth
which the farmer had prepared. They grew and produced far more grains of
wheat than had been planted as seed.
The
Disciples were not sure of the meaning of this story. When they were
alone with Jesus they asked Him. And He explained the Parable of the
Sower to them, so they could truly understand its meaning. Jesus told
His Disciples that in the parable He Himself was the sower, the one who
spoke God’s words. The seeds, He explained, were the words that He
spoke. The seeds that fell by the roadside were His words heard by
people who did not really listen, and the truth was quickly taken away
from them by the evil forces of life. The seeds that fell on the shallow
and rocky ground were His words heard by those that responded to them
with joy and excitement, but who had so little depth of thought and
feeling that they were soon distracted by other interest. The plants
died before they could bore grain.
The
seeds that fell among the weeds and thorns were His words heard by those
whose lives were so crowded by the little problems of living.
could not think of new ideas, and just went on worrying about their
petty affairs. But the seeds that fell on the fertile ground were His
words heard by those who listen, who care, who take the truth into their
hearts and keep it alive. Through them the seeds will bear beautiful
grain.
THE LOST SHEEP
Jesus
traveled far and wide throughout the land of Israel with His Disciples,
touching every part of that ancient kingdom as He preached the word of
God and ministered to the sick and needy. Always as He went, the word of
His wondrous message of love and of His great miraculous deeds went
before Him. On every side He was met by great multitudes eager to see
and hear this new prophet.
After
Jesus had toured the rest of the country, He turned His attention to
Perea, that part of Israel east of the Jordan River, which He had not as
yet visited. But before Jesus went Himself to Perea, He sent seventy of
His followers ahead of Him to prepare the people. He sent them out in
pairs with the same commands He had given the twelve Disciples when He
sent them though Galilee. He said, “I send you first as the lambs among
the wolves. See that you carry no bag or purse for food and only the
shoes that you are now wearing. Go only to the villages, preaching to
the people and healing the sick. Tell them, “The Kingdom of God is
coming.”
When
all was prepared, Jesus went into the land of Perea to continue His
ministry. The seventy chosen followers had spread the word of His coming
to every village, and at each He was greeted by great crowds of people.
But as always there were enemies of Jesus among the crowds, who did
their best to discredit Him. These were mainly the Pharisees and Scribes
who were overzealous in their strict adherence to the laws of the
Jewish faith. Jesus’ commonsense approach to the laws and the worship of
God angered them, and they did everything they could to turn the people
against Jesus.
The
crowds that came to hear Jesus were composed of many kinds of people.
There were farmers and fishermen, trades-people, shepherds, publicans,
the Pharisees and Scribes, and even Roman soldiers. But most of the
people were good and faithful to their religion, but there were some the
Pharisees called “sinners” who were not permitted to worship in the
temple because of their misdeeds.
Jesus
was concerned with both the good and the bad, and in one of the villages
of Perea the Pharisees tried to use this against Him. These enemies of
Jesus said to the people, “Look, this man likes to have sinners come to
see Him, and He even eats with them.” Jesus answered with a parable that
is called “The Lost Sheep.” What man of you,” He said, “who has one
hundred sheep and one of them is lost, and would not leave the other
ninety-nine and go look for the one that is lost? And when he finds it
says to his neighbors, “be glad with me; for I have found my sheep which
was lost.’ “Even so,” Jesus said, “there is joy in heaven over one
sinner who had turned to God, more than over ninety and nine good men
who do not need to turn from their sins.” The Pharisees and Scribes were
unable to answer, and the people realized through this parable that
Jesus came more to seek sinners and the needy of the word, than those
who thought themselves too good to need His help.
The Good Samaritan
On one
occasion Jesus taught another lesson with one of His parables. As we
know Jesus often answered questions with parables, those stories that
taught truths in such ways that the listeners’ belief in their own
righteousness was often shaken.
One day
a scribe, a man whose job was to copy and teach the Bible, asked Jesus,
“Master, what can I do to have everlasting life?” Jesus had been
teaching the way to ever lasting life and the scribe wished to test him.
Jesus replied,” What is written in the law?” You are a reader of the
Bible; tell me what it says.” The scribe, of course, was ready with the
answer from the Old Testament. “You shall love the Lord your God with
all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength, and
with all your mind; and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The
scribe had answered his own question, which was what Jesus had wanted
him to do, but he was unsatisfied that Jesus had not engaged him in an
argument, so he asked, “And who is my neighbor?”
Jesus
knew that to Jewish leaders such as this scribe, the most hated people
were the Samaritans, a nation of people who shared many of the Jewish
traditions, but ad their own forms of worshiping God. To make His lesson
particularly clear, Jesus told the scribe the parable of the Good
Samaritan.
One
day, said Jesus, a Jew, traveling the lonely road from Jerusalem to
Jericho, was attacked by robbers, stripped of his clothes and beaten
nearly to death. Shortly afterward a priest, a countryman of the
victim’s passed by, and when he saw the wounded man, crossed the road
and hurried away. Then another man of a priestly family, the Levites,
came along, and he, too, scurried by on the other side of the road. Then
came along a Samaritan, a man who could hardly be expected to help in a
land where he was hated; but the Samaritan stopped and treated the
man’s wounds, and put him on his own donkey and took him to an inn.
There he left money for the man’s care and told the innkeeper if more
was needed, he would pay on his return trip.
Then
Jesus asked the scribe,” Which one of these three was neighbor to the
man who had been attacked by the robbers? ” And the scribe, impressed by
the story, answered, “He that showed mercy on him.” “Go then and do
likewise, said Jesus. Thus the scribe learned that a neighbor is not
just one who lives nearby, but anyone in the world who has love in his
heart-that all men of good will are neighbors.
The Unjust Steward
While
traveling in Perea, Jesus told the people many of the parables which
were later recorded in the New Testament. And while in Perea, Jesus
again told His Disciples of what was to come to pass in Jerusalem in a
few weeks time. He said that all that the prophets had said about the
Son of God would come true in Jerusalem; that He would be made prisoner,
mocked, spit upon and beaten and then killed. But on the third day, He
told them, He would rise again. These words the Disciples found hard to
understand or believe, but they could readily understand the simple
truths of the parables He told. One of the last stories He told while
traveling in Perea was the parable of the Unjust Steward.
There
was a certain rich man, Jesus said, who had trusted the management of
his estate to a steward. This was a common practice of the day. And the
steward enjoyed almost complete authority in the handling of his
master’s business. But such freedom had led this steward into constant
temptation to cheat his master, and one day he was discovered. The rich
man sent for him and said, “What is this I hear about you? You shall
soon give up your place and be my steward no more.”
The
steward became desperate when faced with the loss of his job ad thought
to himself, “What shall I do? In a few days I will lose my place and I
am too weak to work in he fields and too ashamed to go begging door to
door.” But he was a very clever man and figured out a scheme that would
win him friends that would take care of him when he would have to leave.
His plan was simple. He sent for the men who were in debt to his master
and asked them, “How much do you owe my master?” I owe him a hundred
measures of oil,” the first debtor said. The steward said to him, “Pay
him only fifty measures.” Then the steward tore up the old note and made
this man a new one for the lesser amount. To the other he said, “How
much do you owe him?” And this one answered a hundred measures of
wheat.” The steward then tore up his note and made him a new one saying,
“Pay him for only eighty measures.”
When
the rich man learned of how his unfaithful steward had further cheated
him he marveled and said, “He is a clever thief and a skillful swindler
and takes good care of himself.” Jesus, although he did not approve of
the stewards action, told those listening that the master’s admiration
was not unfounded, and pointed out the lesson that many people will
often work harder to preserve and increase their worldly gains than they
will to safeguard their spiritual interest.
Amen!
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