Redemption

 

Redemption

By J. Prescott Johnson, Ph.D.

Northwestern University

 

Professor Emeritus of Philosophy

Monmouth College (IL)

 

 

 

This document has been created by employing and editing, with selection and rephrasing, the original language of the book, In The Days of His Flesh, to make it more accessible to contemporary readers.

 

Chapter 1

The Wondrous Birth

 

St. Paul equally affirms the pre-existence of Jesus.  Affirmed a generation after the death of Jesus.  Many who knew him still survived.  Jesus himself advanced the claim of his pre-existence.

 

His birth unique.  His name is the same as Joshua (Jehovah is salvation).  A month later went to Jerusalem for the offering of purification.  Simeon blesses Jesus.  Wizards from the East worship him.  Herod seeks to destroy the child.  His parents take their child to Egypt.

 

Jesus was born betwixt April & October.

 

Chapter 2

The Silent Years

 

“Very dear the Cross of shame

Where He took the sinner’s blame,

And the tomb wherein the Saviour lay,

Until the third day came;

But he bore the self-same load,

And He went the same high road

Where the carpenter of Nazareth

Made common things for God.”

—-Walter C. Smith

 

Galilee was the fairest region of the Land of Israel.  Jesus’ education began at home.  At the age of six years He was sent to the elementary school, where he studied the Midrash.  He followed his father’s occupation: carpentry.  On one occasion he was found sitting at the feet of the Rabbis in the house of the Midrash at Jerusalem.  In AD 8, when he was twelve years old, he went with his parents to Jerusalem to attend the the feast of the Passover.  He was left behind when his parents returned home. At the end of the first day, they returned to Jerusalem and found him with the Rabbis, listening to them and asking question. Amazing his parents by his intelligence.  His mother gently chided him because of his absence.  He replied: ”Why is it that ye are seeking me?  Did ye not know that it is in my Father’s House that I ought to be”?  That is the earliest saying of Jesus.  From this time on he owned to natural kinship.

 

The next eighteen years he worked as a carpenter.

 

Chapter 3

The Messiah’s Call

 

 

Now, when the eighteen years have passed, a great prophet, whose name is John, has appeared, spending his days in the wilderness of Judea.  At the age of thirty, God spoke to him: “The lion hath roared: who will not fear?  The Lord God hath spoken: who can but prophecy?”  A mighty revival occurred.  The location was the very same place at the river Jordan, where Israel had in the long-ago past entered the Land of promise.  And now the door of the Kingdom of Heaven was opening.

 

John’s preaching produced a profound impression.  It dealt with the themes of sin and judgment, repentance and forgiveness.  Among those who heard the prophet were John, the brothers Andrew and Simon, and Philip, all from Galilee, and Nathanael from Cana.  Then another visitor appeared:,it was Jesus.  His arrival occasioned no remark, since he seemed no different from the rest.  He presented himself for baptism.  And now it was evident that he was different.  He evinced neither guilt or fear.  After his baptism he stood praying, and “behold, the heavens opened and the Spirit of God as a dove descended upon Him; and, behold, a Voice out of the heavens: ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased.’”  Now all who heard the voice realized that Jesus Was the Messiah, since the Son of God was a title for the Messiah.

 

Chapter 4

 

The Messiah’s Temptation

 

“Saviour, breath forgiveness o’er us;

All our weakness Thou dost know;

Thou didst tread this earth before us,

Lone and dreary.

Faint and weary,

Through the desert thou didst go.”

–James Edmonston

 

It was now time for Jesus to abandon his private life and address himself to his mission.  He went to the desert, and for forty days pondered the work that he was destined to accomplish.  He ascended a mountain, from which he saw his native land, spread out before him, and the gleaming minerets of the sacred capita.  This was the world he had come to redeem.  He thought about the best way to accomplish this.  He realized that it he could not be a general of an army that would overthrow the tyranny of Rome.  It must be a better deliverance.  It must come from the kingdom of the Messiah.  “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me; because the Lord hath anointed Me to preach good tidings unto the meek; He hath sent Me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”  Knew that this was his mission, and, further, that it was a path of service and sacrifice.

 

Chapter 5

The Messiah’s Manifestation Unto Israel

 

The Pharisees and Sadducces sent a deputation to interview John the Baptiat and ascertain what he claimed to be.  He received them with courtesy and frankness.  “Who art thou?” they asked.  He told them that he was neither the Messiah, nor the prophet.  He was not the ancient prophet returned to life.  “What are you, then?”, they asked.  “I am,” he answered, “a voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord.’  I baptize in water, but in the midst of you standeth One whom ye know not, even He that cometh after me, whose sandal-strap I am not worthy to unloose.”

Next day Jesus appeared at Bethany.  He was confident of his redeeming mission.  Then John, gazing upon him. cried: “Behold, the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world.”

 

During the next two days Jesus met five of his future disciples: One was Peter, One was Andrew, and the other was John.  They asked Jesus where he would spend the night.  “Come,” he answered, and you will see.”  They slept that night in the open, with no covering but their cloaks.

 

Chapter 6

The First Miracle

 

They were in the house of the bridegroom.  He was not rich man, for he had no slaves.  The occasion was the wedding ceremony.  There was no more wine in the house.  Mary spoke to Jesus of the situation.  “Woman,” He said, “what have I to do with thee?  Mine hour hath not yet come.”  He had a premonition of that hour when he would perform the sacrifice of redemption.  He knew his final hour, a fateful hour and also an hour fraught with glory.

Jesus ordered that the water pots be filled with water.  “Draw some now,” he said, “and carry it to the master of the feast.”  It was water in the jars, bit wine in the flagons.  When the master tasted the wine, he pronounced it the best wine he had ever tasted.

 

Chapter 7

At the Passover

 

After the marriage Jesus did not return to Nazareth.  He bade farewell to his home and kindred and went to Capernaum, where he joined his disciples.  Mary and his brothers went with him. The city become the seat of his ministry.

He soon left Capernaum in order to participate in the Passover.  On his arrival he went to the temple.  There he he drove out the commercial people.  “Make not my Father’s house a market-house,” he cried.  The authorities then confronted Jesus, saying “What sign showest thou unto us, forasmuch thou doest these things?”  The sign he gave consisted in the words: “Break up this shrine and in three days I will raise it again.”  What he referred to was his death and resurrection, although it was not so apprehended by his hearers.

In order to resolve their perplexity, the authorities sent Nicodemus to make further inquiry.  He was a rabbi and a member of the high court of the Sanhedrin.  He met Jesus at nightfall.  “Rabbi,” he said, “we know that Thou art a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs which thou doest, unless God be with him.”  Jesus brushed the question aside, and brought Nicomedus face to face with a more serious concern.  “Verily, verily I tell thee, unless one be born anew, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.”

The declaration amazed Nicodemus.  He was puzzled.  He replied: “How can a man be born when he is old?  Can he go a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”  “Verily, verily I tell you,” he said, “unless one be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of Heaven.”  It was an allusion to the Baptist’s great word: I baptize you in water unto repentance, hut He that cometh after me shall baptize you in the Holy Spirit.”  The statement has profound meaning: It is a double cure: repentance and sanctification.  It is a full salvation.  Jesus then made a parable of the operation of the Holy Spirit.  “Marvel not that I said to thee” ‘Ye must be born anew.’  The wind bloweth where it will, and the voice thereof thou hearest, but knoweth not whence it cometh and where it goeth.  So is everyone that is born of the Spirit.”

Nicodemus was only the more puzzled.  “Can these things come to pass?” he asked.  “Art thou the teacher of Israel, Jesus responded, “and recognisest not these things?”  The seed had been sown in Nicomedus’ heart and it soon bore good fruit.

 

Chapter 8

Among The Samaritans

 

 

The feast over, Jesus let the Galilean worshipers depart and tarried with His disciples in Judea.  There he meditated and communed with His Father, consecrating Himself afresh to the work that had been given him to do.

Suddenly Jesus left Judea and went northward.  After two days or traveling, He and His disciples reached the town of Sychar, which was on the southern slope of Mount Ebal.  There He came upon a well, called Jacob’s Well.  A Samaritan woman, an outcast of society, soon appeared with an empty pitcher.  He asked her if she would give him a cup of water.  The Jews and the Samaritans hated each other.   The woman spoke to Jesus: “How dost thou, though thou be a Jew, ask drink of me, though I be a woman?”  “If,” replied Jesus, “thou hadst known ‘the gift of God’ and Who it is that saith to thee ‘Give Me to drink,’ thou would have asked Him, and He would have given thee living water.”  The people of that day called water, that precious boon, “the gift of God”; and “living water” meant water from a running spring.  “Sir,” she answered, “thou hast nothing to draw with, and the pit is deep; whence hast thou the ‘the living water’?  Art thou greater then our father Jacob, who gave us the pit and himself drank from it and his sons and cattle?”  “Everyone,” replied Jesus, “that drinketh of this water will thirst again; but whosoever that drinketh of the water that I shall give him, shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him will become within him a well of water springing up into life eternal.”  “Sir,” the woman said, “give me this water, that I thirst not neither come all the way here to draw.”

“Go,” said Jesus, “call thy husband, and come here.”  “I have not a husband,” she said.  “Well saidst thou: ‘I have not a husband, for five husbands hast thou had, and now he whom thou hast is not thy husband.  This is true that thou hast said.”  She was amazed.  She wondered how Jesus could know this.  “Sir,” she stammered, “I perceive that thou art a prophet.  Our fathers in yonder mountain worshiped; and ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where it is necessary to worship.”  “Believe me woman,” Jesus answered, “that there is coming an hour when neither in yonder mountain nor in Jerusalem will ye worship the Father.  Ye worship what ye know not, we worship what we know; for salvation os of the Jews.  But there is coming an hour, and it now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father seeketh such for His worshipers.  God is a Spirit, and they that worship must worship in Spirit and truth.”  “I know,” the woman said, “thay the Messiah is coming.  When he hath come, He will declare unto us everything.”  “I,” Jesus replied with startling emphasis, “am He–I am talking to thee.”

Just as Jesus made that great announcement, the disciples, who had done their errand in Sychar, appeared.  The marveled that he was talking with e woman.  Then Jesus, his weariness and hunger forgotten, sais “I have food to eat whereof ye know not.  My food is to do the will of Him that sent me and finish his work.”  The woman then said to the people of the town: ”Come, see a man that told me all that I have done.  Can it be that this is the Messiah?”

The people hastened to Jesus.  He then said to the disciples:”It is yet four months and the harvest cometh.  Lo, I say unto you, lift up your heads and behold the fields that they are white for harvest.”  Then Jesus spoke these words, encapsulating the purpose of his ministry: “Already he that reapeth receives wages and gathering fruit to life eternal, that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together.  And herein is the saying true: ‘He that soweth is one and he that reapeth is another.’  I have sent you forth to reap that whereon ye have not labored.  Others have laboured, and ye into their into their labor have entered.”

The people then said to the woman: “It is no longer because of thy talk that we are believing.  For we have heard for ourselves, and know that this in truth is the Saviour of the World.”

 

Chapter 9

Settlement at Capernaum

 

“Clear silver water in cup of gold,

Under the sunlit steeps of Gadara.

It shines–His Lake–the Sea of Chinnerth–

The waves He loved, the waves that kissed His feet

In many blessed daya.  Oh, happy waves:

Oh, little, silver happy Ses, far=famed,

Under the sunlit steeps of Gadara!”

Sir Edwin Arnold.

 

Jesus bade farewell to the Samaritans and and proceeded northward.  The Galileans who had been with Jesus at the Feast had spread hia fame throughout the country.  He reached Capernaum, the headquarters of his future ministry, In the evening a stranger arrived in the city.  His young son was sick of a fever.  The father implored Jesus to heal his son.  Jesus did not go to Capernaum to heal the son.  Instead he said to the father: “Go thy way, thy son liveth.” On his way home, he received the news that his son was well.

When Jesus came to Capernaum he joined some of his disciples, who were there.  They were John, Peter, Andrew, and Philip.  The people of the city gathered around him.  He preached to them: “The time hath been fulfilled, and the Kingdom of Heave hath drawn nigh.  Repent and believe in the Gospel.”

 

Chapter 10

The Lord’s Choice of His disciples

 

“In simple trust like theirs who heard,

Betide the Syrian sea,

The gracious calling of the Lord,

Let us, like them, without a word,

Rise up and follow Thee.”–Whittier.

 

Jesus needed disciples to assist him in his work, and also to carry on his work after he no longer lived on earth.  Ha had earlier chosen four men of Capernaum: Simon, Andrew, John, Philip, and Nathanael.  They often engaged in their old employment as fishermen.  One morning Jesus was down by the water-side where the fishermen beached their boats.  The people had gathered to hear him speak.  Jesus got into a boat owned by Simon and Andrew bade Simon to push him a short distance from the shore.  There he sat and discoursed to the multitude ranged along the sloping beach.

Some time later he said to Simon “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a haul.  This they did, and the nets were full with fish.  Then Jesus said to Simon: “Henceforward thou shalt be a catcher of living men.”

 

Chapter ll

In the Synagogue of Capernaum

 

“‘Was it,’ the Lord then said, ‘with scorn ye saw

The old law observed by Scribes and Pharisees?

I say unto you, see ye keep the law

More faithfully than these’”–Matthew Arnold.

 

One Sabbath day Jesus went to the Synagogue.  He preached a sermon.  It was “The Sermon on the Mount.”  It made a profound impression upon the audience. “They were astonished ay his teaching; for he was teaching them as one that had authority, and not as their Scribes.”

“Think not,” he began, “that I came to pull down the Law or the Prophets.  I came not to pull down but to complete.  For verily I tell you, until the heave and the earth pass away, a single iota or a single tip shall in no wise pass away from the Law until everything come to pass.”

“Therefore,” he continued, “Whosoever shall unloose one of these commandments, even the least, and teach men so, least shall he be called in the Kingdom of Heaven.  For I tell you that, unless your righteousness exceed that of the Scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.”

 

“Ye have heard that it was said to them of old: Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever killeth shall liable to the judgment.’  But I tell you that everyone that is angry with his brother shall be liable to the judgment; and whosoever shall say to his brother: ‘Raka!’ shall be liable to the Sanhedrin; and whosoever shall say ‘Thou fool!’ shall be liable to the Gehenna of Fire.”

“Ye have heard,” Jesus continued, “that it was said” ‘thou shall not commit adultery.’  But I tell you that every one that eyeth a woman with the intent to lust after her hath already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

He followed it up with a counsel: ”If thy right eye snare thee, tear it out and fling it from thee; for it is expedient for thee that one of thy members be destroyed and not the whole body flung into Gehenna.”

 

Chapter 12

A Mission Through Galilee

 

“To Thee they went—the blind, the dumb,

The palsied, and the lame,

The leper with his tainted life,

The sick with fevered frame.”—E.H. Plumpter.

 

Leaving the Synagogue, Jesus went home with Simon Peter, accompanied by James and John.  They found that the mother of Peter’s wife was stricken with malaria.  The anxious friends appealed to Jesus, and he approached the couch and rebuked the fever.  The cure wa instantaneous and complete.

While it was still night, Jesus left the house, and on the uplands behind the house knelt in prayer.  In the morning the rest of the household missed him.  The disciples were informed of his absence, and they began a search for him.  When the found him, they remarked: “They are all in quest of Thee.”  Jesus then resolved to leave Capernaum and tour through Galilee.  “Let us go elsewhere,” he said, “into the adjoining towns, that there also I may preach.  For it was in order to this that I came out here.”

In the course of his mission through Galilee, a leper came to him and knelling before him cried: “Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst cleanse me.”  “I will,” he said, “be cleansed.”  And instantly his flesh became sound and sweet.

 

 

Chapter 13

The Gathering Storm

 

“From thence read on the story of His life,

His humble carriage, his unfaulty ways,

His canker’d foes, His fights, His toil, His strife,

His pains, His poverty, His sharp assays,

Through which He past His miserable days,

Offending none, and doing good to all,

Yet being maliced both of great and small.”

Edmund Spenser.

 

The rulers had become alarmed by Jesus’ popularity, and resolved to keep watch over him.

There was a centurion in the army Herod Antipas, and though a gentile, he was well disposed to the Jewish people.  He had a slave who was stricken with paralysis.  The elders of the Synagogue volunteered to intercede with Jesus on his behalf.  A company of four men approached thr Synagogue, carrying a light couch wheron the helpless paralytic lay.  Using an opening in the roof of the house, they lowered the couch and placed it at the foot of Jesus.  Jesus saw his case greeted him, sating “Courage, child! Thy sins are forgiven.”

The Pharisees and Rabbis thought that Jesus had committed a grievous sin.  “Why, they muttered, doth this fellow talk thus?  He is blaspheming.  Who can forgive sins except God alone?”  He turned upon them and demanded: “Which is easier—to say ‘Thy sins are forgiven,’ or to say ‘Arise and walk’?”  Jewish theology required that until one was absolved of sin healing was not possible.

 

Chapter 14

The Offence of Befriending Sinners

 

“A great sinner, when converted, seems a booty to Jesus Christ: he gets by saving such an one: why then should both Jesus lose his glory, and the sinner lose his soul at once, ane that for want of an invitation:”—John Bunyan.

 

It was now open war between Jesus and the rulers.  They now set themselves against Him, seeking to discredit His conduct or speech, in order to bring Him within the grasp of their Law or discredit with the multitude.  They were offended by the fact that he associated with the outcasts of society, particularly the tax-gatherers.

When Jesus was at Capernaum, he spied a tax-gatherer, whose name was Levi, seated at his table.  “Follow Me.” he said, And Levi immediately obeyed and joined the band of disciples. The Pharisees were outraged, and accosted Jesus, saying “With the tax-gatherers and sinners he is eating and drinking.”

Jesus heard them, and said to them: “They that are strong have no need of a physician, but they that are ill.”  Then he continued: “I came not to call righteous men but sinners.”  Then he added a stern rebuke: “Go ye, and learn what this meaneth: “It is mercy that I desire and not sacrifice.”

 

Chapter 15

                        The Offence of Sabbath-breaking

 

“It is better to plough upon holy days than to do nothing, or to do viciously.”—Jeremy Taylor.

 

One Sabbath Jesus and his disciples were traveling along a path that led through the midst of a corn-field.  The grain was ripe.  The disciples were hungry and they plucked some corn and ate it.  Some Pharisees saw this and recognized in it their opportunity.  It was not a theft, sit was permitted by the Law.  “When,” it is written, “thou comest into the standing corn of thy neighbor, thou mayest pluck the ears with thy hand; but thou shalt not move a sickle unto thy neighbour’s standing corn.  The offence was that this was done on the Sabbath.

The Pharisees approached Jesus.  “See,” they cried, “what they are doing on the Sabbath—a thing not allowed.”  He faced them: “Did ye never read what David did when he had and hungered, himself and his company?  How he entered into the House of God and ate the shew-bread.”

On another Sabbath Jesus healed a man’s withered hand.  Only when a person’s life was threatened dis the Law permit healing.  But the man’s life was not in danger; thus it was a breach od the Law.  Then Jesus demanded of his enemies: “Is it allowed on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?”

“What man of you will there be be who shall have one sheep, and, if it fall on the Sabbath into a pit, will not lay hold on it and lift it?  How much then is a man better than a sheep?  Therefore it is allowed on the Sabbath to do well.”

The Pharisees had no reply.

 

Chapter 16

The Pool of Bethesda

 

“The Father worketh hitherto,

And Christ, whom I would serve in love and fear,

Went not away to rest Him, but to do

What could be better done in heaved than here,

And bring ao all good cheer.”

—Walter c. Smith

 

 

At the close of the first year of His ministry, Jesus went to Jerusalem to keep the Passover feast.  During His sojourn in the city he was watched.  The Sanhedrin had found him guilty of blasphemy because he forgave sin, which, they said, was a usurpation the divine prerogative; above all, unseemly association with the outcasts, of neglect fasting; above all, of laxity in the  matter of Sabbath observance.

There was by the Sheep Gate s pool that had medical qualities and which was known as Bethesda.  The name means “House of Mercy.”  During His sojourn at Jerusalem Jesus visited Bethesda on the Sabbath Say and found there a throng of sufferers.  He noticed a man who had been paralyzed for 38 years, as the result of his riotous life.  “Wilt thou be made whole,” Jesus asked.  “Sir,” the man answered, “I have no man to put me into the pool.”  “Rise,” Jesus said, “lift the man and walk.”  The man obeyed instantly.  He left the pool perfectly healthy and walked to his home.

The rulers noticed him as he walked.  They challenged him for violating the Sabbath.  “And who is he that made thee whole,” they asked.  He could not tell.  Soon the man walked to the Temple.  Jesus spied him and said: ”See, thou hast been made whole.  Sin no more, lest something worse happens.”

The man then went to the rulers and told them that it was Jesus that had made him whole.  The rulers then accosted Jesus.  Jesus answered: My Father even until now is working, and I am working.”  God never ceases from His beneficent work, on the Sabbath even as on other days.  Therefore when Jesus performed that work of mercy on the Sabbath, He only emulated His Father.

 

Chapter 17

The Twelve Apostles

 

When the Feast was over, Jesus returned to Capernaum and resumed His ministry.  His popularity had significantly increased.  “They were falling upon Him,” says Mark, “that they might touch Him, as had plagues.”  It was impossible to preach amid such wild confusion.  He asked His disciples to keep a little boat that he might get in it, and pushing out from the shore, employ it as a pulpit.  The enthusiasm of the multitude had so increased that rulers had declared open war upon Him.

He chose as disciples twelve men. First were the two brothers, Peter and Andrew.  Next came other two brothers, James, the son of Zebedee, and John.  Then Philip and Bartholomew were chosen.  Next Thomas and Matthew were added to the group.  Judas Iscariot was then chosen.  James, the son of Alphæus was added to the group. Then Last come another Simon, the Zealot, and Thaddæus.

 

Chapter 18

The Ordination of the Twelve

 

After a long night of prayer, Jesus called he comrades about Him and ordained them.  After a discourse with them, he congratulated them.  “Blessed are ye,” was his opening sentence.  He continued: “Ye are the light of the world.”  “A city,” Jesus said, “cannot be his when set upon a hill.  Neither do they light a lamp and put it under the bushel-measure, but put it upon the lamp-stand, and it shineth for all that are in the house.  Even so let your light shine before men, that they may see your fair works and glorify your Father in Heaven.”

Such was the mission of the Twelve—not to seek honor and reward in an earthly kingdom, but to seek the glory of God and their fellow-men.

 

Chapter 19

A Lesson in Prayer

 

“O man, forgive thy mortal foe,

Nor ever strike him blow for blow;

For all the souls on earth that live

To be forgiven must forgive.

 

Forgive him seventy times and seven:

For all the blessed souls in Heaven

Are both forgivers and forgiven”—Tennyson.

 

The Twelve found Jesus at daybreak and appealed to Him: “Lord, teach us to pray, even as John taught his disciples.”  He granted that request and gave the prayer in the form that came to be know as “the Lord’s Prayer.”

 

“Our Father that art in Heaven,

Hallowed be Thy Name;

Thy Kingdom come;

Thy Will be done,

as in Heaven, also upon the earth.

Our bread for the approaching day

give us today.

And forgive us our debts

as we also forgive our debtors;

And lead us not into temptation,

but rescue us from the Evil One.”

 

Chapter 20

Renewed Conflict

 

“Men spurned His Grace; their lips blasphemed

The Lord who made Himself their slave;

They grieved that blessed Comforter,

And turned against Him what He gave.”—Faber.

 

After ordaining the Twelve Jesus returned to Capernaum to resume His ministry.  As they had done before, the rulers and the Sanhedrin watched Him with extreme suspicion.  They were eager to discredit Him.

An occasion soon presented itself.  A blind and dumb lunatic was brought to Jesus, and He healed him.  The rulers and the Sanhedrin asserted that Jesus was in league with the Devil.  “This fellow does not cast out demons but by Beelzebul, prince of the demons.”

Jesus then took up the charge and refuted it, on the grounds of its absurdity.  “Referring to the Jewish exorcists, he said: “If it be by Beelzebub that I expel the demons, by whom is it that your sons expel them?  Therefore they shall be your judges.”

Finally, Jesus brought against them a counter charge.  He told them that there was a sin that could never be forgiven, and that they had committed that sin.

 

Chapter 21

Teaching by Parables

 

“The simplest sights we see—

The Sower flinging seed on loam and rock;

The darnel in the wheat; the mustard-tree

That hath its seed so little, and its boughs

Wide-spreading; and the wandering sheep; and nets

Shot in the wimpled waters—drawing forth

Great fish and small:—these, and a hundred such,

Seen by us daily, never seen aright,

Were pictures for Him from the page of life,

Teaching by parable.”—Sir Edwin Arnold.

 

Jesus had adopted a new method of teaching.  He “spoke in parables to the multitudes, and without a parable would He speak nothing to them.”

One parable is especially significant: “Hearken, Behold the sower went forth to sow.”  Some fell on good ground and flourished.  Other seed fell on shallow ground and perished.  “He that hath ears,” Jesus said, “let him hear.”

 

 

Chapter 22

Retreat Across The Lake

 

“The winds were howling o’er the deep,

Each wave a watery hill;

The Saviour waken’d from His sleep;

He spoke and all was still.

 

“The madman in a tomb had made

His mansion of despair:

Woe to the traveler who stray’d

With heedless footsteps there!

 

“He met that glance, so thrilling sweet;

He heard those accents mild;

Ans, melting at Messiah’s feet,

And wept like a weanèd child.”—Heber.

 

Beset by the multitude and harassed by the rulers, it was impossible for Jesus to instruct the Twelve.  “Let us cross over to the other side.”  A boat was procured. Jesus sat in the stern-sheets while His disciples managed the boat.  He soon went to sleep.  That evening a severe storm burst upon the boat.  “Master, Master!” they cried, “we are perishing.”  He awoke and said to them: “Why are ye cowardly, O ye of little faith.”  Then He rebuked the storm: “Silence! Be muzzled.”  The wind sank sank to rest and there ensued a great calm.

They came to land on the eastern shore near the town of Gerasa.  Jesus disembarked and walked up the mountain.  He came upon a mad man who, when he saw Jesus, he cried out: “What have we to do with Thee, Jesus, Son of the Most High God?  Hast Thou come ere the time to torment us?”  “What is thy name?” Jesus asked.  “My name,” he said, “is a legion.” Still speaking for the legions, he prayed: “Send us not away into the wilderness.”  It chance that a large herd of swine was feeding at a distance.  “Send us,” he cried, “into the swine.”  “Away,” Jesus cried.  Then an amazing thing happened.  The swine rushed wildly down the mountain-side, over the precipice, into the lake, and were drowned.

 

Chapter 23

Back in Capernaum

 

Jaïrus was one of the rulers in the synagogue.  His yong daughter was dying.  The father appealed to Jesus to save her.  He complied at once set forth for the ruler’s house, escorted by a large crowd.  Amid the throng was a woman who for years had been afflicted with a disease affecting the blood.  She crept up behind Jesus and held the tassel of His cloak.  “If,” she said to herself, “I only touch the clothes, I can be saved.”  She was immediately cured.  ‘Who touched my clothes,” he asked.  The disciples were astonished.  Peter exclaimed: “Thou seest the multitude pressing about Thee, and Thou sayest ‘who touched me?’!”  The woman, trembling with fear, came forward and told the whole story.  “Daughter,” Jesus said, “thy faith hath saved thee.  Go in peace.”

Jesus was still speaking when a message was brought to Jesus that Jaïrus’ daughter was dead.  Jesus overheard and said calmly: “Fear not; only believe.”  The people were wailing.  “Why,” He exclaimed, “are ye making a tumult and weeping?  The child is not dead but sleepeth.”  Then he took her hand and said: “Talitha, kúm, My lamb, rise!”

As He was going to His home, Jesus saw two blind men following Him.  “Have pity on us,” they cried.  He touched their eyes.  “According to your faith,” He said “be it done to you.”  And their eyes were opened.

 

Chapter 24

In the House of Simon the Pharisee

 

 

After Jesus left Capernaum, He went to the city of Magdela, which was located ob the eastern side of Lake of Galilee.  He was invited by Pharisee called Simon to be a guest in his home.  As the group were seated at the dinner, a harlot had stolen in amongst them.  She abhorred her sinful condition and  hoped that Jesus might relieve her from her sinful condition.  She knelt at His feer, poured ointment over His feet and wiped them with her hair.  Simon revealed his extreme displeasure.  And the guests were equally displeased.  “Simon,” Jesus said, “I have something to say to thee.”  “Teacher,” he said, “say on.”  “A certain man” He said, “had two debtors.  The one owed him five hundred denarï and the other fifty; and as they nothing to pay, he freely forgave both.  Now which of them will love him the more?”  “I suppose,” answered Simon, the one whom he forgave the more.”  “A correct judgment,” said Jesus.  He turned to the woman crouching at His feet and sais to his host: “Thou seest this woman?  I entered into thine house: water to My feet thou gavest not, but she with her tears rained upon my feet and with her tears wiped them.  A kiss to me thou gavest not, but she, ever since I entered did not cease fondly kissing My feet.  With oil My head thou didst not anoint, but she with perfume anointed my feet.  Wherefore I tell thee, forgiven are her sins, because she loved much.  But to one to whom little is forgiven, little loveth.”

 

Chapter 25

Another Mission Through Galilee

 

“Measure thy life by loss instead of gain;

Not by the wine drunk, but by the wine poured forth

For love’s strength standeth in love’s sacrifice;

And whoso suffers most hath most to give.” H. E. H. King.

 

From Magdala Jesus proceeded on hia tour through Galilee accompanied by the Twelve and by a band of women who had experienced His loving-kindness and followed Him with grateful hearts.  Mary Magdalene was one of them.  She quitted her life of shame and went with her Saviour, a witness to His redeeming grace.  Another was Johanna, wife of Chuza, the steward of Herod.  Another was Susanna, who was well-known in the primitive Church.

Jesus struck inland and traveled to Nazareth.  The people, though they knew him, seemed not to know Him, did not recognize His grace.  “He could there  do no mighty work, save that on a few infirm folk He laid His hands and healed them.  And He wondered by reason of their faithlessness.”

On the Sabbath Day He addressed the congregation.  He found the passage in the sixty=first chapter of Isaiah where the prophet announces to the people announces the the exiles in Babylon their approaching deliverance: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He anointed me; to preach good tidings to the poor hath he sent me forth, to proclaim to the captives deliverance and to the blind recovery of sight, to let the bruised go free, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.  Today hath this scripture been fulfilled in your ears.”  The people responded to the gracious words: “They all testified to Him, and wondered at the words of grace that proceeded out of His mouth.”

Prejudice asserted itself and the hearts of the people rose up in rebellion.  Jesus listened to their questions and answered them gently and winsomely. Aggrieved at their refusal to accept His message, He said “Verily I tell you, ‘No prophet is acceptable in his native place.’”

 

Chapter 26

The Closing Scene of the Baptist’s Life

 

“John, than which man a madder or a greater

Not till this day has been of woman born

John like some lonely peak of the Creator

Fired with the red glow of the rushing morn”—Meyers

 

 

The Apostles went their several ways.  Jesus came into the south of Galilee and approached the town of Nain, which is seven miles southeast of Nazareth.  He met a cortege.  A young lad, a widow’s only son.  “Weep not,” He said to the mournful mother and laid an arresting hand upon the open bier.  “Lad,” He said, “Arise.” and the boy sat up and began to talk.  “A great prophet,” said some, thinking of Elijah and his mission in the village of Shunem hard by, “hath risen among us.”  “God, said others, hath visited His people.”

Herodius, the wife of Herod Antipas, the Tetrarch, greatly resented the Baptist and clamored for his death because he had denounced Herodius’ riotous living.  Her daughter was Salome.  She was sent by her mother to perform a lewd dance.  It was a shameless performance.  Nevertheless it evoked a rapturous applause.  He summoned the girl before him that she could have whatever she might crave.  After consulting her mother, she requested the head of John the Baptist.  The deed was done, and the dripping head was brought into the banquet hall.

 

Chapter 27

Another Retreat Across the Lake

 

John’s disciples conveyed the corpse to Sebaste, the capital of Samaria, and buried it there beside the tombs of Elisha and Obediah. They then sought Jesus and tole him what they had done.  He was deeply moved.  His disciples arrived, and he asked them to accompany Him to the other side of the lake.  “Come ye yourselves apart into a lonely place and rest a little.”  They came to a place near Bethsaida Julius.  The people were hungry.  There were five barley loaves and two small fish.  “Give ye them to eat,” He said.  Jesus blessed the food and gave it to the disciples for distribution.  It was a bounteous meal.

 

Chapter 28

Controversy in Capernaum

 

Jesus returned to Capernaum.  On one day there was a service in the Synagogue.  Jesus attended and preached, and the would people questioned Him.  It was a conviction among the Jews that the Messiah would free them from bondage and  give them abundance of bread.  Jesus repudiated the role that thet had thrust upon  Him. First, He upbraided them for their lack of spirituality: “Verily, verily I tell you, ye are seeking Me, not because ye saw signs, but because ye ate of the loaves and were filled.”  And then, He spoke in mystic language of His death and resurrection.  The were dreaming of a Messiah who would feed them with bread from Heaven.  “The bread of God,” He said, “is He that cometh down from Heaven and giveth life to the world.  I am the Bread of Life.  He that cometh unto Me shall never hunger.  Verily, verily I tell you, unless ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, ye have not life in yourselves.  He that feedeth on My flesh and drinketh My blood hath eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”

The meaning about this is that in the Scriptures and Rabbinical literature, sacred instruction is called bread.

The rulers and their party among the people were horrified and indignant.  “Is not this man,” the cried, “Jesus the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?  How is this man now saying: ‘I have come down from Heaven’?”  “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?  Many, even those who had espoused His cause  and went by the name of His disciples, left His cause.  “This is a hard saying,” the said; who can hear it?” and many of them drew back and would no longer walk with Him.”  Then Jesus said to the twelve” “Are ye also wishing to be gone?”  And Peter answered: “Lord, unto whom shall we go away?  Thou hast the words of Eternal Life.  And we have believed and recognized that Thou art the Holy One of God.”

The people had taken offence at Jesus, but they soon found how greatly they needed Him.  He continued His ministry in their midst.  The Passover came, but Jesus, but Jesus, aware of the murderous designs of the rulers, remained in Galilee.

 

The Rabbinical law required the washing of hands before eating a meal.  The enemies of Jesus observed that His disciples neglected this requirement.  They approached Jesus and demanded an explanation.  Why,” they asked, “do thy disciples transgress the Tradition of the Elders”?  “Why,” he retorted, do ye on your part transgress the commandment of God for the sake of your Tradition?”

“Ye play-actors,” Jesus exclaimed, “admirably did Isaiah prophesy of you saying: ‘This people with their lips honoureth Me, but their heart is far away from Me.  But in vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines men’s commandments.”

Then Jesus addressed the bystanders who had witnessed the rencontre.  “Hearken.” He said, “and take it in: It is not what goeth into hia mouth that defileth the man; but what cometh out of his mouth, that it is that defileth the man.”

 

Chapter 29

Retreat Into Phoenicia

 

Jesus desired to be alone with the Twelve, and found lodging in the district adjacent Tyre and Sidon.  He was approached by woman, a widow who had a lunatic daughter.  “Have pity on me, Lord, Thou Son of David,” she cried.  She knelt at His feet and prayed: “Lord, help me.”  She persisted in her plea for help. “O woman, He said, “great is thy faith.  Be it done unto thee as thou wilt.”  She went home and found her daughter healed.

 

Chapter 30

Wanderings

 

“When he showed himself to Israel, they drove him sometimes into the wilderness, some times into the desert, sometimes into the sea, and sometimes into the mountains, and still in every of these places he waseither haunted or hunted br new enemies.”—John Bunyan.

 

Jesus on the eastern side of the Lake of Galilee Jesus had ascended to the uplands, thinking that the multitude that had gathered around Him would respect His privacy and withdraw.  But they lingered around Him.  Jesus saw a deaf man, took pity on him and healed his malady.  “Be open,”Jesus said, and the miracle was wrought.

The people were hungry.  “I have compassion on the multitude,” Jesus said, “because they have now been with Me three days, and I will not let them go away fasting, lest the faint on the road.”  The disciples informed Him that the had only a few provisions, seven loaves and a few small fish.  He took the scanty store and blest it and served it to company, which numbered above four thousand.  And it sufficed.

Jesus then went into the region of Magadan, which gave Him the seclusion He desired.  But it did not last.  A band of Pharisees and Sadducees tracked Him down and demanded of Him a sign.  He refused, saying ”Why doth this generation seek a sign?  Verily I tell you, there shall no sign be given to this generation.”

 

Chapter 31

The Great Confession

 

 

Jesus found the retreat He desired and repaired to Cæsarea.  He addressed Himself to the task of instructing the twelve in the Kingdom of Heaven and preparing them for the impending dènouement.  “What,” He asked, “say the people that the Son of Man is.”  And the Twelve told Him various opinions that they had heard.  The Twelve told Him the various opinions that they had heard.  Some thought that He was John the Baptist, that He was Elijah, or that He was Jeremiah. “But, He continued, “ye, who say ye that I am?”  Peter answered: “Thou art the Messiah.”  Then Jesus responded: “Blessed art thou, Simon son of John, for flesh and blood did not reveal it unto thee, but my Father in Heaven.”  I tell the,” Jesus said, “that thy art Peter, the Rock, and on this Rock, and on this rock I will build My Church and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.  I will give thee unto thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven; ans whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven, but whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall stand loosed in Heaven.”

 

Chapter 32

Sufferings and Glory.

 

Fearing that their testimony would reanimate the popular enthusiasm, Jesus them to tell no one that He was the Messiah.  The disciples held the old dream that the Messiah would inaugurate a worldly kingdom.  Jesus then told them the truth: that “He must go away to Jerusalem and suffer many things of the Elders and Chief Priests and Scribes and be killed, and on the third day be raised up.”

Jesus took Peter, James and John to a mountain and “was transfigured in their presence.”  “His face,” Matthew writes, “shone as the sun, and His garments became white as light.”  There were two men with Him.  The were Moses and Elijah, and they talked with Him “of the decease which He was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.”

 

Chapter 33

The Return to Capernaum

 

While Jesus and the three disciples were absent, a man came to the remaining disciples. He had a son who was a lunatic, deaf and dumb, and subject to fits of epilepsy.  The remaining disciples attempted to heal him.  But they failed.  The Scribes rejoiced in their failure, alleging that had Jesus been present He would also have failed.  Jesus appeared on the scene.  The unhappy father told Him of the failure of the disciples.  “O faithless and perverse generation,” He cried, “bring him to me.  How long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you?  Bring him unto me.”  They brought the lad to Jesus, and Jesus said to the distraught father: “If thou canst,” He said to the father, “all things are possible to one that believeth.”  “I believe,” he said; “help my unbelief.”  “Thou deaf and dumb spirit” Jesus said, “I charge thee, come out of him and no more enter into him.”  A wild and a violent convulsion, and the child appeared to be be dead, until Jesus took his hand and raised him up and him to his father healed.

The disciples attempted to find a plausible excuse for their failure.  They alleged that it was a difficult case, requiring a higher power than they possessed.  When they returned to their lodging, they appealed to Jesus, but He swept their excuse aside.  “This kind,” He retorted, “goeth out by naught but prayer.”

It was now time for Jesus to quit His retirement.  He set out for Capernaum, seeking to escape recognition.  As they traveled through that pleasant land, He spoke of His Passion: “Set it into your ears,” He said, “these words: the Son of Man is about to be betrayed into men’s hands, and the will kill Him, and on the third day He will be raised.”

They soon arrived at Capernaum and went their several ways to their abodes.  Jesus stayed at Peter’s house, and before the reached it the disciples were summoned from his Master’s side. There was a tax enacted for the maintenance of the Temple.  Jesus had not paid the tax, since He had been away.  The collectors then set about recovering the debt.

But any accusation lodged against Him was irrelevant, and He reminded the disciples of that irrelevance.  “What thinkest thou, Simon?  The kings of the earth—from whom take they custom or tribute?  From their own sons or from other men’s?”  “From other men’s,” was the reply.  “Then,” said Jesus, “their sons are free.”  The point was: He is the Son of God, and the Temple is His Father’s House.  Thus He owes no tax.

 

That evening the disciples assembled in Peter’s house.  Jesus talked with them, reminding them to be humble.  “If any one desires to be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.”  Peter’s little child was in the house.  Jesus took him in His arms and said “Verily I tell you, unless ye turn about and become as the children, ye shall in no wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.”

“Teacher,” John said, “we saw a man in Thy name casting out dæmons, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.”   “Try not to stop him, said Jesus; for there no one who shall do a mighty work in My name and be able soon to speak evil of Me.”  Then He enunciated a far-reaching principle: “One who is not against us, is for us.”

Jesus also instructed them as to the method of dealing with offenders: “If thy brother sin, go, convict him betwixt thee and him alone.  If he hearken to thee, thou hast gained thy brother.  But if he do not hearken, take with thy self one or two besides, that at the mouth of two witnesses or three every word may be established.’ And if he refuse to hearken even to the Church, let him be to thee as the gentile and the Tax-gatherer.”

Peter asked a question: “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him?  Until seven times?”  The Rabbinical rule was that after three offenses the duty of forgiving ceases.  “Nay,” answered Jesus, “the duty of forgiving is inexhaustible.  I tell thee not until seven times, but until seventy times seven.  If thy brother repent forgive him.  And, if seven times a day he sin against thee and seven times turn unto thee, saying, ‘I repent,’ thou shalt forgive him.”

 

Chapter 34

Lingering in Galilee

 

Jesus returned to Capernaum, but He did not remain.  “The day for His being received up were being fulfilled, and He steadfastly set His face to go t0 Jerusalem.”  His Galilean ministry had ended.  He felt that, while there were accomplishments, it was not the success for which he had hoped.

Jesus decided to travel slowly to Jerusalem, passing through Samaria and preaching as he went.  He chose seventy of His converts and sent them two by two in advance along the route, “unto every city and place where He Himself was about to come.”  There was a man in the crowd that was in dispute with his brother over their inheritance.  He appealed to Jesus to assist in resolving the dispute.  “Man,” Jesus said, “who appointed Me a judge or divider over you?”

Then He addressed the people: “Take heed and beware of every sort of grasping greed; because it is not so that, when a man has abundance, his life is derived from his possessions.”  Then He spoke a parable.  He described a husbandman who grew richer year by year.  There was no more available space in his granaries.  “What shall I do?” he cried.  He thought it over and made up his mind.  “This will I do: I will pull down my barns and build greater, and will gather there all my fruits and my goods.  And I will say to my soul: ‘Soul, thou hast many good things laid up for many years.  Take thine ease eat, drink, make merry.”  He was not an evil man.  But he was a foolish man, because he had grasped at material things and neglected spiritual concerns.  God said to him: “Thou fool!  This night thy soul is required from thee.”  “So,” Jesus concludes, “is he that layeth up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

Then, being alone with His disciples, He expanded it to them in ampler discourse: “Be not anxious for your life and what ye shall eat, nor for your body what te shall put on.”

In this discourse Jesus is saying three things about worldly matters: It is unreasonable, it is useless, and it is irreligious.

A company of Galileans had gone up to Jerusalem and gone to the Temple to make offerings.  Pontius Pilate had set upon them and cut them to pieces.  The Jewish theory was that misfortune was an evidence of God’s displeasure.  Jesus did not accept this theory.  “Think ye,” He said, “that these Galileans were found sinners beyond the Galileans because they have suffered these things?  No, I tell you; but, unless ye repent, ye all shall perish.”

 

Another incident occurred while Jesus lingered in Galilee.  There was a woman who was disfigured with rheumatism.  Jesus took pity on her and healed her.  Since it was the Sabbath, a man remonstrated with the people.  “There are six days,” he said, “whereon it is right to work.  On them, therefore, come and be healed and not on the Sabbath Day.”  “Ye play-actors, Jesus said, “Doth not each of you on the Sabbath loose his ox or his ass and lead it to watering?  And this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan hath bound, behold, for eighteen years—ought she not to have been loosed from this bond on the Sabbath Day?”

 

Chapter 35

The Journey Through Galilee

 

“O Shepherd with the bleeding Feet,

Good Shepherd with the pleading Voice,

What seekest Thou from hill to hill?

Sweet were the valley pastors, sweet

The sound of flocks that bleat their joys,

And eat and drink at will.

Is one worth seeking, when Thou hast of Thine

Ninety and nine?”—Christina A. Rossetti.

 

It was time for Jesus to leave Galilee go to Jerusalem.  The Feast of Tabernacles, which began on the 15^th of Trisi or October, was at hand.  The brothers of Jesus accompanied Him.  They wanted Jesus to accompany them.  They hoped that Jesus would declare Himself as King of Israel.  “Remove hence,” they said, and begone to Judæ, that thy disciples also may behold the works which thou doest.  For no one doeth aught in secret and seeketh to be himself known openly.  If thou doest these things, manifest thyself to the world.

Jesus answered: “My time hath not yet come, but your time is always ready.  The world cannot hate you, but Me it hateth, because I testify concerning it that its works are evil.  Go ye up to the feast, because My time hath not yet been fulfilled.”  Jesus realized that He was indeed going up to the feast, but it was the Passover six months later.  He knew that it was the Father’s that there He was to offer Himself up as the true Paschal Lamb, a sacrifice for the sins of the world.

He intended to make a gradual progress southward, preaching as He went, and to reach the sacred Capital in time for the great dénouement.  A man there asked Jesus a question: “Lord, are they few that are being saved?”  Jesus replied: “The question is not whether the saved be few or many, but whether you be of the number.  Strive to enter through the narrow door.  Enter through the straight gate; because broad and spacious is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many are they that enter through it; because narrow is the gate and straightened that leadeth to life, and few are they that find it.”

Jesus then spoke of the great feast in the messianic Kingdom: “When once the Master of the House hath arisen and shut the door, and ye have begun to knock at the door saying: ‘Lord, open to us!, and He shall answer to you: ‘I know not whence ye are’: Then shall ye begin to say: “We ate in Thy presence and drank in our streets Thou didst teach.’  And He shall say: ‘I tell you, I know you not whence ye are.  Withdraw from Me, all ye workers of unrighteousness!’  There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the Kingdom of God, while ye are flung outside.  And they shall come from east and west and north and south and take their places in the feast in the Kingdom of God.  And, behold, there are last who shall be first, and there first who shall be last.”

As He traveled southward, Jesus found Himself in the vicinity of Tiberias, the capital of the tetrach Herod Antipas, and He was approached by a company of Pharisees.  The brought Him a warning: “Begone and take thy way hence; For Herod is wishing to kill thee.”

 

Jesus met their alarm with calm contempt.  He bade them carry a message of defiance to the tyrant.  “Go your way and say to the fox: ‘Behold, I cast out dæmons and accomplish healings today and tomorrow, and on the third day I am perfected.”  Then He continued: “Nevertheless, it is necessary that today and tomorrow and the next day I should go My way, and on the third day I am perfected.”  Then He adds: “It is necessary that today and tomorrow and the next day I should go my way, because it is not possible that a prophet should perish outside of Jerusalem.”  In Jerusalem all the prophets had bee slain, and there it was fitting that the greatest of the prophets and their Lord should die.

In the course of His last journey through Galilee, Jesus got an invitation to a Sabbath entertainment in the house of a leading Pharisee.  He had invited a company of Lawyers and Pharisee to meet Jesus.  Nor were they disappointed in witnessing something unusual.  There was a man in the neighborhood who suffered from dropsy.  He went to the Pharisee’s house and knelt before Jesus, hoping that He take pity upon him.  And so it proved.  “Is it right,” said Jesus, “to heal on the Sabbath or not?”  The Rabbinical law ordained that only if the patient’s life were in danger, was it allowable to apply remedies on the Sabbath.  But Jesus took hold of the patient’s hand, and then He justified His action by an appeal to the instinct of humanity.  “Which of you,” He asked, if his son or his ox fell into a well, will not immediately draw him up on the Sabbath day?”  The place of honor at a feast was next the host, and there had been some contending for the coveted distinction.  The scene had amused Jesus, and he alluded to it.  “If thou covetest honor, feign humility.  Take the lowest place at the feast, and the host will say unto thee: “Friend, come up higher.  Then shalt thou have glory in the presence of thy fellow-guests.”  Then He had counsel for the host: “When thou makest a feast, call not thy friends nor thy brethren nor thy kinsfolk nor thy rich neighbors, lest haply they on their part invite thee in return, and a requital be made thee.  Invite poor folk, maimed, lame, and blind; and blessed shalt thou be, because they have nothing to requite thee with; and it shall be requited thee at the resurrection of the righteous.”

Jesus went on His way, and as He went, He was followed by great crowds.  They thought that Jesus was going to Jerusalem to declare Himself King of Israel.  Suddenly Jesus turned and faced the crowd, and told them the terms of discipleship.  “If any one cometh unto Me and hateth not his father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, moreover, his own life, he cannot be My disciple.  Whosoever doth not carry his cross and come after Me, cannot be My disciple.”

One of the outcasts of the neighborhood offered Jesus hospitality, and Jesus accepted and took His seat at the table.  The Pharisees were horrified and cried out at the scandal.  “This man receiveth sinners and eateth with them!”

In answer to their complaint, Jesus spoke three parables—the Lost Sheep, the Lost Drachma, and the Lost Son—which constitute His supreme defense of His attitude toward sinners.

“What man of you, having a hundred sheep and having lost one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the pasture and hie him to the mountains and search for the wanderer until he find it?  And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing.  And on getting home he calleth his friends and his neighbours, saying to them: ‘Rejoice with me, because I have found my sheep.’  I tell you that even thus there shall be joy in Heaven over a single repenting sinner rather than over ninety-nine righteous men who have no need of repentance.”  Jesus here declares that the sinner’s misery moves compassion in the heart of God.

“Or what woman, having ten drschma, if she lose one, doth not light a lamp and sweep the house and search diligently until she find it, And when she hath found it, she calleth together her friends and neighbours, saying: ‘Rejoice with me, because I have found the drachma which I lost. I tell you that even thus there ariseth joy in the presence of the angels of God over a single repenting sinner.”  Jesus here declares that a sinner is precious in God’s sight and his loss is a loss to God.

In the third parable He makes a still more amazing declaration.  A sinner is not merely a lost possession, he is a lost child of God, and the Father’s heart yearns for his recovery.  The man had two sons, and the younger son requested his inheritance.  When he got it, he went away to a far country and wasted his inheritance.  To save himself he became a swine-herder.  In his wretchedness he remembered his father’s house where the very hirelings had enough to eat.  “I will arise,” he said, “and go to my father, and I will say to him: ‘Father, I have sinned against Heaven and in thy sight; no more am I worthy to be called your son: make me as one of thy hirelings.’”

 

One day his father saw him in the distance, coming home. “Father,” he said, “I am no more worthy to be called thy son—.”  He got no farther.  His father was shouting to the servants: “Bring forth a robe, the best in the house, and put it on him, and give him a ring and put it on his hand and shoes on his feet; and bring the fatted calf, and slay it, and let us eat and make merry; forasmuch as this my son was dead and is alive again, was lost and is found.”

There was a certain rich man.  He allowed his factor absolute control  over his estate.  The factor abused his trust, and the lord took him to task.  “What is this that I hear from thee?  Render the account of thy factorship; for thou canst no longer be factor.”  The factor debated what he should do: “To dig I have not strength; to beg I am ashamed.”  Then a solution came to him.  Many of the tenants were overwhelmed with debt, and he summoned them before him.  “How much owest thou to my lord? he asked the first, keeping up the fiction that the debt was due to the proprietor and not himself.  “A hundred batks of oil,” was the answer, and he bade the man enter in his account.  “And thou—how much dost thou owe?” he asked another.  “A hundred cors of wheat,” was the reply; and he bade the man put down eighty.  The transaction came to the lord’s knowledge and it greatly amused him.  He laughed and complimented the rascal on his shrewdness.

“Learn a lesson,” says Jesus, “of this clever knave.  Make wise use of your money.  Spend it in charity; and when you leave this world and reach the gate of Heaven, you will be greeted by those whom ye have succored here.  Make yourself friends with the mammon of unrighteousness, that, when it fails, they may welcome you into the Eternal Tents.”

Jesus explains the meaning of the phrase “the mammon of unrighteousness” when he contrasts “the unrighteousness” and “the true.”  It is a Hebrew phrase.  “The paths of righteousness” means paths that lead to the desired goal, in contrast to the delusive patha that lead nowhere.  And when Jesus speaks of “the mammon of unrighteousness,” He means earthly riches that delude and disappoint.

Jesus addressed this discourse to His disciples; but there were Pharisees listening, and it was very unpalatable to them.  They loved money, and believed that prosperity was a mark of God’s special favor.  The address touched them to the quick, and they sneered.  “You are they,” Jesus cried, “that make themselves out righteous in the sight of men, but God readeth your hearts; forasmuch as what is high among men is an abomination in the sight of God.”  And then He speaks a parable.  “There was a certain rich man, his life baptized with luxury: his robe of purple and his underclothing of fine linen, his sumptuous and glittering table.  And there was a certain poor man named Lazarus.  The name, which is a shortened form of Eleazar, means “God hath helped.”  The rich man died and was buried.  It was a splendid funeral, in the sight of men.  But a far more one in God’s sight was furnished to the beggar by the ministry of the angels, who dis not carry him to a marble tomb but carried him to Abraham’s bosom.

 

Chapter 36

The Journey Through Samaria

 

When Jesus reached Samaria, He found a company of ten lepers.  They stationed themselves there in a hope that He would heal them.  “Jesus, Master,” they cried, “have pity on us.”  Jesus responded to their appeal and bade them to go and show themselves to their respective priests.  They obeyed, and as they went they were healed.  One, a Samaritan, remained and poured out his gratitude.  “Were not ten cleaned?” Jesus exclaimed.  “The nine—where are they?  Have none found that returned to give glory to God except this alien?”  The occasion showed that the despised Samaritans were open to His grace.  Chagrined by His commendation of the grateful commendation of the grateful Samaritan, they approached Jesus and asked Him: “When cometh the Kingdom of God?”  They believed that Jesus would appear in pomp and circumstance; and when Jesus, a wanderer and a refugee, with no royal clothing, came thy laughed at his royal claim.  He answered with a terse and scornful epigram; “The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation.”

 

It was the time of the Feast of Tabernacles and the pilgrims were on their way to Jerusalem; and Jesus described two men going up to pray.  One was a Pharisee.  He struck an attitude and prayed: “O God, I thank ye that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unrighteous, adulterers, or even as this tax-gatherer.  I fast twice in the week, I tithe all that I get.”

The tax-gatherer looked on and prayed, “O God, be merciful to me the sinner.”

“I tell you,” said Jesus, “this man went down justified to his house rather than the other.”

Jesus reached a Samaritan village.  The Samaritans refused him admission.  Some of the disciples cried: “Lord, wilt thou that we bid fire descend from Heaven and consume them?”  Jesus responded: “Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of.  For the Son of Man came not to destroy lives but to save them.”

Jesus then left Samaria and hasten on His way to Judæa.  Somewhere along the way. He met the seventy, who had accomplished their mission and were coming to tell Him how they had fared.  They were jubilant.  But Jesus reminded them that they had a greater mission.  “Ye have indeed been endowed with wondrous powers; nevertheless in this rejoice not that spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names have been enrolled in Heaven.”

After leaving Samaria, Jesus went to Jericho.  He preached in the Synagogue and, when He had finished His discourse, one of His hearers, a lawyer, asked a question.  “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit ‘Eternal Life”?  Jesus replied, “What stands written in the Law?  How readest thou?”  The man answered: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God from thy whole heart and with thy whole mind, and thy neighbor as thy self.”  “This do,” Jesus said, and thou shalt live.”  Then the lawyer asked, “And who is my neighbor?”  Jesus then told a parable: A traveler was going down from Jerusalem.  Brigands robbed him and left him for dead.  A priest saw him and left the scene.  Next came a Levite, who also left.  Then came a merchant, a Samaritan, who dressed the traveler’s wounds and took him to an inn and gave the host two denarïï and charged him to tend the invalid.  “Spare no expense,” he said, “I will pay thee on my way back.”  “Now,” Jesus said, “which of these three seemeth to thee to have proved ‘neighbour’ to the man that fell in with the robbers?”  “Go thy way,” Jesus said, “and do thou likewise.”

 

Chapter 37

Ministry In Jerusalem

 

“Then is it nothing to thee?  Open, see

Who stands to plead with thee,

Open, lest I should pass thee by and thou

One day entreat My Face

And howl for grace,

And I be deaf as thou art now

Open to Me”—Christina G. Rossetti.

 

Jesus arrived in Jerusalem while the Feast of Tabernacles was in progress.  He then reached Bethany and visited with Lazarus and his sisters, Mary and Martha.

The Feast of Tabernacles was the most joyous of all the Jewish festivals.  It commemorated the Exodus from Egypt.  Martha, the mistress of the house, was busy readying the dinner.  Mary was sitting at Jesus’ feet listening to His discourse.  “Lord,” Martha said, “dost Thou not care that my sister left me alone to serve?  Tell her then that she lend me a helping hand.”  “Martha, Martha.” He said, “thou art anxious and bustled about many things, but a few are all we need.”

From Bethany Jesus went to Jerusalem.  On the fourth day of the feast he taught at the Temple.  He was questioned by the rulers.  Jesus replied to their questioning that His teaching was not His own, but God’s.  “And,” He said, “if any one willeth to do His will, he will discover in regard to the teaching whether it be of God or whether I speak from Myself.”

 

Preaching still from the Temple, Jesus appealed to the the waverers.  He warned them that the time was short.  “For a little while longer am I with you and I go away to Him that sent Me, and where I am ye cannot come.  Ye shall seek Me and shall not find Me, and where I am ye cannot come”

One day Jesus addressed the waverers, in the effort to win them.  “If,” He said, “ye abide in My Word, ye are truly My disciples, and ye shall discover the Truth and the Truth shall make you free.”

One day Jesus met a blind man who was sitting by the wayside begging for alms.  Jesus spat on the ground and making clay out of the spittle bade the man go and wash in the Pool of Siloam.  This the man did, and having washed his eyes, his sight returned.

Jesus spoke a parable.  He described a sheep-fold.  The shepherd, Jesus said, “goeth before them, and the sheep follow him, because they know his voice; and a stranger will in no wise follow, but will flee from him, because they know not the voice of the strangers.”  The shepherd’s office demanded tenderness, courage, and devotion.  “He shall gather the lambs in his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young.”

 

Chapter 38

Retreat To Bethany Beyond Jordan

 

“I want sober mind,

A self-renouncing will,

That tramples down and casts behind

The bates of pleasing ill;

A soul inured to pain,

To hardship, grief, and loss;

Bold to take up, firm to sustain,

The consecrated cross”—Charles Wesley.

 

When He left Jerusalem, Jesus went away down to Bethany.  He did not go merely to communicate to God.  A multitude followed Him and He ministered to them.  Soon the Pharisees appeared on the scene.  They asked Him a captious question: “Is it allowable for a husband to divorce for every cause”?  He told them that Moses did indeed sanction divorce, but that was a departure from the primal ordinance necessitated by Israel’s inability to rise to the height thereof.  “In view of the hardness of heart he permitted you to divorce your wives.”

Presently people brought their children to Jesus to receive His benediction.  It was a solemn benediction, but it displeased the disciples.  Jesus was vexed by their churlishness.  “Suffer the children,” He said, “to come unto Me!  Hinder them not!  For of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.”  And He took them in His arms, laid His hands upon them and blessed them.

One day a young man came to Jesus and asked Him: “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit ‘eternal life’?”  “Why dost thou call Me good’?  No one is ‘good’ save God alone.”  Then Jesus continued: “If thou wishest to enter into eternal life, keep the commandments.”

Jesus enumerated the commandments: “Thou shalt not kill: Thou shalt not commit adultery: Thou shalt not steal: Thou shalt not bear false witness: Honor thy father and mother.”  “All these I observed from my youth.  What lack I yet?”  Jesus set before him a sacrifice that he had never contemplated, and challenged him to face it.  “If,” he said, “thou wishest to be perfect, go, sell all that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven; and come, follow Me.”  This staggered the man.  He was very wealthy, and he recoiled from the sacrifice.  His face fell, and he went away grieving.

 

As the young ruler withdrew, Jesus spoke the sternest words that ever fell on mortal ears.  “How hardly, He exclaimed, “shall they that have riches enter the Kingdom of God: it is easier for a camel to pass through a needle’s eye than  for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God.”  The disciples were amazed at His words.  While they loved Him, there existed a trace of a more ignoble motive, the desire and hope for material rewards.  Then Peter, ever the spokesman of the Twelve, said “Behold, we have left all and followed Thee.  What shall we get?”  He answered: “I tell you that ye that have followed Me, in the Regeneration, when the Son of Man shall sit upon His throne of glory, shall yourselves also take your seats upon the twelve thrones of glory, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.  And everyone who hath left brethren or sisters or father or mother or children or lands or houses for My name’s sake shall receive manifold more and inherit eternal life.”

“But,” Jesus added, insinuating a word of warning, “there shall be many first last and last first.”  He then spoke a parable.  A master hired workers at different times during the day.  He paid them the same wages, regardless of how long they worked.  They felt aggrieved.  One of them said to the master: “These last fellows put in a single hour, and thou hast put them on an equality with us that have borne the burden of the day and the burning heat.”  The master answered: “I am doing thee no injustice.  Didst thou not bargain with me for a denarius?  Take up thy pay, and begone!  It is my pleasure to give to ‘this last fellow’ even as to thee.  May I do what I please with my own?  Or is thine eye grudging because I an generous”?

The was designed for the following reasons: to correct the mercenary spirit of the Twelve; to beat down the arrogance of the disciples.

 

Chapter 39

The Raising of Lazarus

 

Jesus was at Bethany beyond Jordan when news reached Him from Bethany.  Lazarus had become ill and his sisters sent word to Jesus.  “Lord,” the message ran, “he whom thou lovest is sick.”  “The sickness,” He declared, “is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God,” that is, the Messiah, “may be glorified through it.”

After two days Jesus asked His disciples to accompany Him to Judæ.  He told them “Lazarus our friend hath fallen asleep, but I am going to awake him.”  He had been buried on the fourth day after his death.  Jesus arrived on that day.  Mary said to Him: “If thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.”  Then she added: “Even now I know that all that Thou askest of God, God will give thee.”  He answered her: “Thy brother shall rise again.”  She thought that Jesus meant the Resurrection at the Last Day.  Jesus hastened to reassure her drooping spirit.  “I,” He said, “am the Resurrection and the Life.  He that believeth in Me shall never die.  Believest thou this?  “Yes, Lord, she answered, “I have believed that Thou art the Messiah, the Son of God, He that cometh into the world.”

Mary was weeping at Jesus’ feet.  Jesus and she went to the tomb in which Lazarus lay.  “Take away the stone,” He commanded.  Mary remonstrated, since it had been four days since her brother had died.  “Said I not unto thee,” Jesus replied, “if thou believest thou shalt see the glory of God’?”  Then He cried: “Lazarus, come forth!.  And Lazarus, when he heard that voice, he came forth, wrapped in his grave clothes.  “Loose him,” said Jesus, “and let him go hos way.”

 

Chapter 40

Going Up to the Passover

 

“All in the April Evening,

April airs were abroad;

The sheep with their little lambs

Passed me by on the road.

 

“The lambs were weary, and crying

With a weak, human cry;

I thought on the Lamb of God

Going meekly to die.”—Katherine Tynan.

 

 

Jesus went to the town of Ephraim, situated on the margin of the wilderness of Judæa.  When the time for the Passover came, He and His disciples journeyed to Jerusalem.

 

As they traveled He took the Twelve aside and warned them of His Passion.  The mother of James and John approached Jesus with a request.  “Say the word that these my two sons may sit on Thy right and the other on Thy left in Thy Kingdom.”  Jesus answered: “Ye know not what ye are asking.  Can ye drink the cup which I am drinking, and with the baptism wherewith I am being baptized, be baptized?”

Proceeding on their way, Jesus and His retinue reached Jerico.  His arrival drew a large crowd.  Among the crowd was a man named Zacchæus.  He was a Jew and a tax-gatherer.  Unable to see Jesus, he climbed a sycamore tree.  Jesus saw him and said “Zacchæus, make hast and come down; for today I must stay at thy home.”  The people who heard the exchange were aghast. “They are gone in,” thet exclaimed, “to lodge with a sinful man.”  Zacchæus then faced the crowd and said: “Behold, the half of of my property, Lord, I give to the poor, and whatever I took from any one by false accusation, I give back fourfold.”  Then Jesus said: “Today salvation came to this house, forasmuch as even he is a son of Abraham.”

Mary was grateful for Jesus’ help He had given her.  She procured an alabaster vase of ointment and washed Jesus’ feet and dried them with her hair.  A man who witnessed the scene was offended.  “Wherefore,” he demanded, “was not this ointment sold for three hundred denarïï and given to the poor?”  Then Jesus responded: “Suffer her to observe the rite against the day of My burial!  For the poor ye have always withe you, but Me ye have not always.”  And then He added a great word of promise: “Verily I tell you, wherever the Gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, the thing also which she did shall be spoken of for a memorial of her.”

 

Chapter 41

The Entry into Jerusalem

 

There came a day when Jesus was in the little village of Bethphage, a short distance away.  There was a donkey in the vicinity.  “Loose it, “ Jesus said to His disciples, “and bring it to me.”  Jesus mounted the animal and set forth to Jerusalem.  The multitude accompanied Him.  They strewed the road with their garments, and cut boughs from the palm trees that lined the road and escorted Him on His way.  As they descended the western slope of Olivet, they shouted their acclamations:

 

“Hosanna to the son of David!

Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord.

Hosanna to the highest!”

 

This literally was the word fulfilled that Jesus had spoken when he departed from Jerusalem: “I tell you, ye shall never more see Me until ye say: ‘Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord.’”

There came a poor widow with an offering in her hand.  “Verily I tell you, Jesus said to His disciples, “that this poor widow hath contributed more than all that they are contributing to the Treasury.  For they all of their superfluity contributed, but she of her penury contributed all that she had, even her whole living.”

 

Chapter 42

Encounter with the Rulers

 

 

Jesus resumed His teaching in the Temple at Jerusalem.  The rulers soon appeared and demanded: “By what manner of authority art thou doing these things? And who gave thee this authority?”  He retorted: “I also will ask you a single question.  Answer Me, and I will tell you by what manner of authority I am doing these things.  The Baptism of John—was it from heaven or from men?”  John had proclaimed Jesus the Messiah and hsd administered the rite of baptism in preparation for His advent; and, if they said: From Heaven, Jesus would retort: Then why did ye not believe him?”  On the other hand, they did not dare say: “from men,” since John was universally regarded a prophet, and they feared to provoke an uproar by offending the popular sentiment.  “Answer Me,” Jesus said; and they blurted out helplessly: “We do not know.”  Then came the contemptuous and humiliating rejoinder: “Neither do I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.”

The purpose of the rejoinder was to bring home to His assailants the reason of their antagonism against Him.  They had at first been favorably impressed with Jesus’ mission.  But in their pride they had rebelled his demand for repentance.

“What think ye?” He continued, speaking a parable.  “A man had two children.  He came to the first and said to him: ‘Child, go, work to-day in the vineyard.’  ‘Yes, sir,’ answered the lad, and did not go.  He came to the second and said to him likewise.  ‘I will not,’ he answered; afterwards he repented and went.  “Which of the two,” Jesus asked, “did the will of the father?”  “The latter,” they replied, pronouncing sentence upon themselves, inasmuch as the former of these two lads represented the Jewish people, who in the prophet’s language “honoured God with their lips while their hearts were far from Him,” and the latter the outcasts.  “Verily I tell you,” said Jesus, “that the tax-gatherers and the harlots are going before you into the Kingdom of God.  For John came unto you in the way of righteousness, and ye did not believe him.”  Jesus seemed an innovator, and their rejection of Him was so far excusable.  But they had no excuse for the rejection of John.

Jesus turned His attention to the multitude and resumed His instruction.  He spoke a parable.  He told how a landlord planted a vineyard, furnishing it with hedge, wine-press, and watch-tower, let it out to husband-men, and went abroad.  At the season of vintage he sent for his share of the fruit, but his messenger was ill-received.  The husband-men scourged him and sent him away empty-handed.  He sent others and each in succession were worse treated than the last.  He had a well-beloved son, and he resolved to send him, thinking: “They will reverence my son.”  But, when they spied him, they exclaimed: “Here is the heir!  Come, let us kill him, and take hid inheritance.”  And they seized him, and cast him forth outside the vineyard, and killed him.

“Now,” said Jesus, “when the lord of the vineyard cometh, what will he do to those husband-men?”  The multitude answered: “Miserable men! he will miserably destroy them, and will let out the vineyard to other husband-men who will render him the fruits at their seasons.”  They did not perceive the drift of the of the parable, but the rulers perceived it.  They understood the reference to the prophets who had bee sent in long succession to impenitent and rebellious Israel; and they knew that, when Jesus spoke of the heir, He meant Himself.  The multitude’s inconsiderate reply was a confession of Israel’s guilt and of the justice of the doom, which Jesus had already announced; and they broke out with a protest: “Perish the thought!”

Jusus turned and, fixing His eyes upon them, asked: “Have ye never read: ‘A stone which the builder’s rejected, this hath been made the head of the corner.  Of the Lord was it made, and it is wondrous to our eyes’?”  Jesus interprets the saying: the Jews are now the persecuters and despisers, and He is Himself the stone that the builders have rejected but which God will make the head of the corner.  It is a parable of Israel’s rejection.  “Therefore I tell you that the Kingdom of God shall be taken away from you and given to a nation producing the fruits thereof.”

There was a woman who had been taken in adultery.  The rulers thought that thet could trap Jesus by forcing Him to make a judgment antagonistic to the Law.  “Teacher,” they said, “this woman hath been caught in the very act of adultery: and in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such.  Now what sayest thou?”

 

It was a snare.  Should Jesus oppose the the execution of the legal sentence, they would raise a cry of blasphemy and arraign Him on that account.  Should He, on the contrary, oppose the stern enactment, He would alienate the popular sympathy, such that the rulers would convict Him of inconsistency and self-condemnation.  He stooped and with His finger wrote on the ground.  They thought that He was confounded and did not know why to say; and exulting in their triumph, they pressed for an answer.  He hurled His answer to them: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”  It was like a rapier-thrust.  They hung their heads and, conscience-stricken, left one by one.  He raised Himself up and asked: “Woman, where are they?  Did none condemn thee?”  “None, Lord,” she answered expecting reproof.  “Neither do I condemn thee,” He said.  “Go!  Henceforth sin no more.”  Her condemnation was all the concern of the Pharisees; her salvation was all the concern of Jesus.

The adversaries devised another snare.  Thet sent a deputation of Pharisees to Jesus.  They submitted a question to Him: “Teacher, we know that thou art true, and teachest the way of God in truth, and carest not for anyone; for thou regardest not the person of men.  Tell us, therefore what thou thinkest: Is it right to give tribute to Cæsar or not?”  It was a clever trick.  The Jews were groaning under the Roman yoke, and the necessity of paying tribute to the conqueror was very grievous to their proud spirits.  If Jesus should pronounce against payment, He would expose Himself to the ruthless vengeance of the Romans.  If He were to pronounce for payment, He would alienate the popular sympathy, and bereft of that bulwark of defense, He would be at the ruler’s mercy.

It was a clever plot, but Jesus was not deceived.  Imperial taxes were not paid in Jewish coinage, but in Roman coinage.  “Why are ye tempting Me,” He cried.  “Show Me the tribute-coin.”  They handed Him a denarius bearing the Emperor’s medallion and the superscription: TL. CÆSAR DIVI AUG. F. AUGUSTUS PONTIF. MAXIM. “Whose,” He demanded, “are this image and superscription?” “Cæsar’s.” they replied.  “Then pay what is Cæsar’s to Cæsar, and what is God’s to God.”

The plotters were baffled, and they withdrew without a word, marveling at the Lord’s dexterity.

A company of Sadducees now approached Jesus.  Their design was to confound Jesus and the Pharisees both by exposing that ridiculous idea of the Resurrection.  They propounded to Him an imaginary case.  There were seven brothers.  The first died childless, and the second married the wife.  They had no children, and on his death she married the third brother.  The question was: “In the resurrection-life of which of the seven shall be wife,?”  “In the resurrection-life,” Jesus said, “they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but as God’s angels they are in Heaven.”

Jesus then proceeded to convict those arrogant men of ignorance on another score.  They recognized the Pentateuch as their rule of faith, and it contained the doctrine that they denied.  “As regards the Resurrection of the dead, have ye not read what hath been spoken to you by God: ‘I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob’?  He is not a God of dead men but of living.  Ye greatly err.”

The Pharisees then made anther attempt to embarrass Jesus.  They deputed one of their order, a Scribe versed in the Sacred Law, to approach Him and submit a vexed question to his decision.  The Rabbis believed that the Law contained six hundred and thirteen precepts, some “heavy” and some “light.  ”The schools of Shammai and Hillel disagreed over the question.

Thinking to entangle Jesus in the controversy, the scribe approached Jesus and asked: “What manner of commandment is first of all?”  “First.” Jesus answered, “is: ‘Hear, Israel: the Lord your God is one Lord; and thou shalt love the Lord with all thy whole heart and with thy whole soul and with thy whole mind and with thy whole strength.’  Second is this: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.’  Greater than these is no other commandment.  On these two commandments the whole Law hangs and the Prophets.”

The scribe was very impressed by Jesus’ answer.  “Of a truth, teacher.” he said, “thou hast spoken well.  For there is one God, and there is none beside Him; and to love Him with the whole heart ans with the whole understanding and with the whole strength and love one’s neighbor as one’s self is exceeding more than the whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”  Jesus was touched by the wistfulness of the reply.  “Thou are not far,” He said kindly, “from the Kingdom of God.”

 

Chapter 43

The Great Indictment

 

  “Sinner, thou dost bear of love, prithee do not provoke it, by turning it into wantoness.  He that dies for slighting love, sinks deepest into Hell, and there will be tormented by the remembrance of that evil, more than by the deepest cogitation of all his other sins.  Take heed therefore, do not make love thy tormentor.”—John Bunyan.

 

Jesus had put His enemies to silence for the last time, exposing and satirizing their corruption and perversity.  It was a scathing indictment, the most terrible that ever fell on human ears; yet, as it poured from His lips, pity struggled with indignation at His breast.

He began with a stroke of biting satire.  “On Moses’ chair,” He said to His disciples and the multitude, “are the Scribes and Pharisees seated.  All therefore that they say unto you do and observe; but according to their works do not; for they say and do not.”  This was a heavy indictment of those teachers of Israel.  For they enjoined ‘light’ things upon themselves and ‘heavy’ things upon others.

The rulers were standing by in angry discomfiture.  “Woe unto you,” Jesus said.  “Woe unto you, Scribes and play-actors!  forasmuch as ye shut the Kingdom of Heaven in men’s faces.  For ye do not enter, neither them that are entering do ye suffer to enter.”  John had sought to open up the way to the Kingdom of Heaven, and they had hunted him to death; and now they were plotting against Jesus.

“Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, play-actors!  Forasmuch as ye scour land and sea to make a single proselytes; and when he is gained, you make him twice more a son of Gehenna than yourselves.”

There were some Greeks who came to Jesus, expressing interest in Him and His message.  He recognized that there would be a greater audience to receive His message, and it thrilled Him.  “The hour hath come,” Jesus said, “that the Son of Man should be glorified.  Verily, verily I tell you, if the grain of wheat do not fall into the earth and die, by itself alone it remaineth; but if it die, much fruit it beareth.”  It was the path that not only He, but His disciples as well, must tread, winning the world by sacrifice.  “He that loveth his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world unto eternal life shall guard it.  If anyone serve Me, let him follow Me, and where I am, there My servant also shall be.  If anyone serve Me, the Father will honor him.”

Presently His exultation was checked.  There rushed upon Him that old temptation that had assailed Him at the outset of His ministry.  Was it necessary that He should die?  “Now,” He cried, “hath My soul been troubled; and what am I to say?  Father,” He prayed, “save Me from this hour.”  And His prayer was answered.  It was the eternal purpose of God that He should die, a sacrifice for the sin of the world.  That was His mission, and He would not flinch from it.  “Nay.” He exclaimed, rousing Himself from His momentary irresolution, “it was for this that I came unto this hour.  Father, glorify Thy name.”  And God answered His beloved Son: “I both have glorified and will glorify it again.”  The multitude that had heard that voice needed to hear it.  “Not for My sake, He said, “hath this voice come, but for yours.  Now is this world on its trial; now shall the Prince of this world be cast out.  And I,” He said, “be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Me.”

“This He said,” explains the Evangelist, “signifying what manner of death He should die.”  The men of Jerusalem could not understand the significance of the Lord’s words.  “We have heard out of the Law,” they objected, “that the Messiah remaineth forever, and how dost Thou say that the Son of Man should be lifted up?  Who is this Son of Man?”

He did not stay to to resolve their perplexity.  A greater business claimed Him.  He most talk with the Greeks.  “A little longer,” He said, “is the light among you.  Walk as ye have the light, lest darkness overtake you; and he that walketh in the darkness knoweth not where he goeth.  As ye have the light, believe in the light, that sons of light ye may become.”  It was the last word to the men of Jerusalem.  “This spoke Jesus, and went away and was hidden from them.  “I have become a light into the world,” Jesus said, “I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.”

 

Chapter 44

Discourse About Things To Come

 

 

Evening came on and Jesus and the twelve left the city and went to the Mount of Olives.  The disciples remarked upon the grandeur of the sacred edifice.  “Teacher,” one of them remarked, “see what manner of stones and what manner of buildings.”  “Thou art looking,” Jesus said ”on these great buildings?  There shall not be left one stone upon another which shall not be pulled down.”

It was a startling announcement; and the disciples approached Jesus and asked: “Tell us, when this shall be?  And what is the sign when all this is about to be consummated?”  He told of things to come, foretelling two tremendous crises—the destruction of Jerusalem that befell in A.D. 70, and His second advent, which is still future.  Jerusalem must fall because she was ripe for judgment.  The cup of her iniquity was full.  In order to emphasize the point, Jesus told two parables: the Ten Virgins and the Talents. “Keep awake therefore,” Jesus said, “because ye know not the day nor the hour.”  He continued: “Then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven, and all the tribes of the earth shall mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of Heaven with power and much glory.”  To emphasize the imagery, He said: “He shall sit on His throne of glory, and there shall be gathered before Him all the nations.”

Those who have rejected the Gospel will meet their doom: “He shall separate them from one and another, as the shepherd separateth the sheep from the goats, and shall set the sheep on His right and the goats on His left.”

The test of discipleship. Jesus proclaimed, is kindness.  To the hungry is given food; to the thirsty is given drink; to the stranger hospitality is given; the naked are clothed; the sick are visited; the prisoner is visited.  “Verily I tell you, inasmuch as ye did it unto one of these My brethren, even the least, unto Me ye did it.”

 

Chapter 45

The Upper Room

 

“I will remember all thy Love divine;

Oh, come thou with me where Thy saints are met,

Revive me with the holy bread and wine.

And may my love, O God, lay hold on Thine,

And ne’er forget.”—Walter C. Smith.

 

 

On the evening of the day, the 14^th day of Nisan, (April), Jesus sat on Olivet and spoke to His disciples.  Tomorrow would be the day of the Passover, and on the evening on that day Jesus would eat the Passover with the Twelve.  Immediately thereafter the tragedy of the Passion would occur, beginning with the betrayal in the Garden of Gesthesmane and culminating on the Hill of Calvary.

The end was near, and Jesus knew it.  The following night Jesus would be in the hands of his malignant enemies.  He did not blanch or falter.  Where the world saw only defeat, He saw triumph, and when He spoke, there was exultation in His tone.  “Now hath the Son of Man been glorified, and God hath been glorified in Him.”  “Before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus, knowing that His hour had come to pass out of this world unto the Father, having loved His own that were in the world, loved them to the utmost” (Augustine).

The rulers had met in the High Priest’s palace and consulted how the might put Him to death.  They decided that they must arrest Him by stealth, and they must wait until the Feast was over.

That evening Judas came to the High Priest’s palace and explained how he would betray Jesus.  He had expected that Jesus would become the victorious Messiah and that he would have a place of honor in the new Kingdom.  But now he knew the truth, that there would be no such kingdom, but only defeat and death.

Jesus had arranged with a friend, probably John Mark, where He and His disciples would celebrate the Passover.  He told Peter and John to see His host.  “Go into the city, and there shall meet you a man carrying a pitcher of water.  Follow him, and, wheresoever he entereth, say to the master of the house: ‘The Teacher sayeth: ‘Where is My room where I am to eat the Passover with My disciples?’”

 

Jesus and the Twelve took their place at the table.  They gave thanks and drank a cop of wine.  Jesus then announced that He would never again eat the Passover with them.  “I tell you, I shall not hereafter drink of this fruit of the vine until that day when I shall drink it with you in the Kingdom of My Father.”  Then the various viands were brought forward—the bitter herbs, which symbolized the bitterness of the Egyptian bondage, the unleavened bread, the

charosheth, and the lamb already carved.  After a blessing had been asked the herbs were dipped in the paste and eaten, and then a second cup was prepared.

At this point it was customary for the head of the house to explain the origin and significance of the Passover; and here Jesus rebuked, tenderly, the disciples, teaching them a remarkable lesson in humility.  “He took from the Supper and layeth aside His robes and took a towel and girded it about Him.  Then He putteth water into the basin and began to wash the feet of the disciples and wipe them with the towel wherewith He was girded” (Lightfoot).

Usually the servants washed the guest’s feet.  Jesus’ purpose was to rebuke the selfish ambition of His disciples.  “If ye be not clothed with humility, ye are none of Mine.  Your worldly and selfish ambition proves you still uninitiated into the mysteries of The Kingdom of Heaven, whose law is love and whose glory is service.  Think not to enter it ‘with unwashed feet.’

If I wash you not, ye have no part with Me.”

“Lord,” Peter cried, “Thou wash my feet.”  “What I am doing, thou knowest not just now, but thou shalt recognize presently.”

As soon as He had resumed His garments and His place at the table, He explained to Peter what He had done.  He explained to the company of the humility that makes people great on the Kingdom of Heaven.  “I have washed your feet; I am in your midst as he that serveth.  An example I have given you, that, even as I have done to you, ye also should do.”

“Be not ye called ‘Rabbi; for One is your Teacher, and all ye are brethren.  And call none your ‘Father’ on the earth; for One is your Father, even the Heavenly One.  Neither be called ‘leaders’; for your Leader is One, the Messiah.”  Jesus had introduced into the world a new ideal of greatness: the value of a life of self-abasement and sacrifice.  “Proud man,” Augustine said, “would have perished for ever, had not a lowly God found him.”

The custom was that when the master of the house had discoursed on the significance of the Passover, the company sang the first part of the Hallel, and  the cup was passed round.  Then there was a rite of solemnity preliminary to the eating of the lamb.  Grace was said: “Blessed be Thou, O Lord God, our Eternal King, who has sanctified us by Thy commandments, and commanded us to eat.”  It was apparently at this stage that Jesus startled the disciples by an appalling announcement: “He was troubled in spirit and testified and said: “Verily, verily I tell you that one of you shall betray Me.”  He said this to indicate that the traitor must depart.

John, the beloved disciple, asked: “Lord, who is it?”  He answered: “It is the man for whom I shall dip the sop and give it to him.”  He then handed it to Judas.  His crime was known, and it was impossible for him to draw back.  “Afer the sop then Satan entered into the wretch.”  Jesus then said to him curtly and significantly: “What thou art doing do quickly.”  Judas arose and left the room.  His withdrawal was a confession of his guilt.  “Now,” Jesus exclaimed exultantly, “hath the Son of Man been glorified, and God hath been glorified in Him.  My children, a little longer am I with you; and, as I said to the Jews: ‘Where I am going away, ye cannot come,’ I now tell you also.  A new commandment I give you, that ye love one another—that, as I have loved you, ye also love one another.  By this shall all recognize that ye are My disciples, if ye love one for another.”

Then He made a second announcement, as startling as the first: “All of you shall stumble at me in the course of the night; for it hath been written: ‘I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered abroad.’” He then added a great promise of hope, which gave great courage to the Twelve.  “After I have risen, I will go before you into Galilee.”

 

Peter protested: “Though all shall stumble at thee, I will never stumble.”  “Simon, Simon,” Jesus said, “behold, Satan hath requested you all, that he may sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith may not fail.  And do thou, when anon thou hast rallied, strengthen thy brethren.”  “Lord,” Simon answered, “I am ready to accompany Thee both to prison and to death.  Lord, where is it that Thou art going away?”  “Where I am going away, thou canst not follow Me, but thou shalt follow Me afterwards.”  “Lord,” he asked, “why cannot I follow Thee just now?  I will lay down my life for Thy sake.”  “Thou wilt lay down thy life for my sake?  Verily, verily I tell thee, the cock shall not crow until thou shalt deny Me repeatedly.”  “If I must die with thee,” protested Peter, I will in no wise deny Thee.”

Jesus let them have their way and endeavored to awaken them to the impending crisis.  “When I sent you forth,” He asked, “without purse and wallet and shoes, lacked ye anything?”  “Nothing,” they replied, and He warns them that a very different experience awaits them.  A storm of opposition will break upon them, and they will hardly escape.  They will need every recourse.  “Now he that hath no purse, let him sell his cloak and buy a sword.  For I tell you that this that hath been written must be fulfilled in Me: ‘and with transgressors was He reckoned’; for what concerneth Me is having its fulfillment.”  Peter, and another, perhaps John, had swords concealed beneath their cloaks.  “Lord,” they said, producing their weapons, “see, here two swords.”  “It is sufficient,” Jesus said wearily.

The feast was almost ended.  There remained only the eating of the lamb.  Here Jesus invested the Passover with a new significance.  As the were eating, He took a loaf, and after giving thanks broke it and handed it to the disciples.  “This,” He said, “is My body that is for you.  This do in remembrance of Me.”  The company then dispersed, they drank a third cup, the Cup of Blessing, and sang the second part of the Hallel.  This Jesus invested with a new significance: “This cup is the New Covent in My blood.  This do in remembrance of Me.”  Then He added: “When ye keep this feast which your fathers have observed all those centuries, think no longer of the deliverance from Egypt’s house of bondage, but of the greater deliverance which I have wrought.”  “When ye would remember Me,” He said, “turn your eyes to Calvary.”

After the memorial rite, Jesus spoke words of consolation and reassurance to His disciples.  “Let not your heart be troubled,” He began.  “Believe in God; in Me also believe.”  He was soon to leave them.  He was not forsaking them.  He was only only hastening in advance to make ready for them and would bid them welcome.  “In My Father’s House there are many lodging-places.  If there were not, I would have told you, because I am going to prepare room for you, and, if I go and prepare room for you, I am coming again, and will receive you unto Myself, that, where I am, ye also may be.  And where I am going away, ye know the way.”

“Lord,” interrupted Judas the Twin, “We do not know where thou art going, and how do we know the way?”  “I,” answered Jesus, “am the Way and the Truth and the Life.  None cometh unto the Father but through Me.  If ye had recognized Me, also ye would have known.  Henceforth ye recognize Him and have seen Him.”  Philip was puzzled.  “Lord,” he said, “show us the Father, and it is enough for us.”  Jesus was vexed and disappointed.  “So long time am I with you and hast thou not recognized Me, Philip?  He that hath seen Me hath seen the

Father.  How sayest thou: ‘Show us the Father’?  Dost thou not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in Me?”  He reassured them that, though He was about to leave the world, He would be always with them.

Jesus had already promised His spiritual presence wherever His people should assemble in His name; and now He reiterates and enlarges the promise: “I will ask the Father, and another advocate will He give you to be with you for ever.  I will not leave you orphans; I am coming unto you.”  He would send another Advocate, the Holy Spirit, who would take the place of Jesus and carry forward His work, “teaching His disciples all things and reminding them of all things which He had told them.”  If they loved Him, they would keep His commandments, they would enjoy His spiritual fellowship.  “He that hath My commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me; and he that loveth Me shall be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself unto him.”

 

This puzzled the disciples.  They still clung to their Jewish expectation.  They believed that their Master would extricate Himself from His embarrassments and display His power and glory to an astonished world.  “Lord,” exclaimed one of the name Judas Lebbæus, “what hath come to pass that in us Thou art to manifest Thyself and not to the world?”  Jesus made no attempt to disabuse their minds.  The course of events would soon dispense that worldly dream, and the Holy Spirit would in due time would reveal to them the true glory of the Messiah.  “If,” He said, reiterating His declaration, “a man love Me, he will keep My Word, and My Father will love him, and we will come unto him and lodge with him.  Peace I am giving to you.  Not as the world giveth, am I giving it to you.”

It was waxing late, and the hour was nigh.  “Arise,” He said, “let us go hence;” and when they sang the Hallel, they left the Upper Room and departed into the street.

 

Chapter 46

The Arrest in Gethsemane

 

It is probable that when Jesus left the Upper Room, He and the disciples went to the court of the Temple and continued communing with the Eleven.  He told them that they would suffer persecution, but they would know that He, their Lord, had suffered even greater persecution.  “If the world hate you, recognize that Me before you it hath hated.  Remember the word which I spoke to you: ‘A slave is not greater than his lord.’  Moreover, they would have the succour of the Holy Spirit.  And it should reconcile them to their Lord’s departure that the promise of His spiritual presence could not otherwise be fulfilled.  His departure was really a gain not only for Him but for them.  “I tell you the truth: it is expedient for you that I should depart.  For, if I do not depart, the Advocate shall not come unto you.  But if I go, I will send Him unto you.”

“These things have I spoken unto you that in Me ye may have peace.  In the world ye have tribulation; but courage!  I have conquered the world.”  He concluded His discourse and addressed Himself to the Father in prayer.  It was a prayer of self-consecration, thanksgiving, and intercession.  Lifting His eyes to Heaven, He declared: “I have glorified Thee upon the earth, having accomplished the work which Thou hast given to Me to do.”

When He had done communing with His disciples, he left the Eleven, and passing through the gate, crossed the Kedron and sought His accustomed retreat on the slope of Olivet.

It was late at night.  “Sit down here,” He said, “while I go and pray yonder”; and, taking Peter, James, and John, He went aside with them.  As soon as they were beyond hearing of the rest, He opened His heart to His companions, and they perceived that He was in extreme distress.

“My soul,” He said to the faithful three, “is more grieved even unto death.  Stay here,” He pleaded, “and watch with Me.”  He withdrew from them a short distance, and fell on His face and prayed: “Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass away from Me.  Nevertheless,” He added, “not as I wilt, but as Thou wilt.”  He soon came to the disciples.  They had fallen to sleep.  “Thus!  Had ye not strength for a single hour to watch with Me?  Watch and pray lest ye enter into temptation.  “The spirit.” He added, making generous excuse for their frailty, “is eager, but the flesh is weak.”  He withdrew again, and prayed to the Father: “My Father, if this cannot pass away unless I drink it, Thy will be done.”  He hastened to join the disciples and addressed them with sad irony: “Sleep on and rest you.  Enough! the hour is come.  Behold, the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.  Arise! l us be going.  Behold! my betrayer is at hand.”

 

On his withdrawal from the Upper Room, Judas had met with the rulers and and told them that he would implement his bargain, and they had a band for the Lord’ arrest.  Judas led the way, since he knew the location to which Jesus had repaired.  “The one I shall kiss,” he said, is he.  Take him; and advancing he greeted Jesus with a show of reverence: “Hail, Rabbi!” and kissed Him effusively.  Jesus, answered with a single sentence quivering with scorn and indignation: “Comrade,” He said, “to thine errand!”  Waving Judas aside, He stepped forward and addressed the soldiers: “Whom are ye seeking?”  There was that in His tone and bearing that overpowered them, and they faltered: “Jesus the Nazarene.”  “I am He,” He replied.

Jesus repeated His question: “Whom are ye seeking?” and again they answered: “Jesus the Nazarene.”  “I told you,” He said, “that I am He.  If then,” He added, solicitous for His disciples, “ye are seeking Me, let these men go away.”  Peter, unable to restrain himself, drew his sword and falling upon a man who stood nearest him, cut off his right ear.  “Put the sword into its sheath,” He commanded Peter.

Then He turned to the Priests and Pharisees who had accompanied the band, and scornfully addressed them.  “As though against a brigand ye have come to me with swords and cudgels to capture Me.”

 

Chapter 47

Before the High Priests

 

From Gethsemane they led Jesus to his trial.  Since the Jewish nation was controlled by Rome, a person could be executed only by Roman authority.  Thus Jesus had to undergo two trials, first, by the Sanhedrin, and, second, by the Roman governor’s sanction.

Two of the disciples, Peter and John, followed Jesus and His captors.  When the troops reached the gateway of the Booths, Peter remained outside, but John passed in.  As he passed in, a girl said to him: “Thou art one of this fellow’s disciple, art thou not?”  Peter became frightened and blurted out: No, I am not.”

Meanwhile Jesus had been taken upstairs to the audience chamber of Annas, the High Priest.  Annas questioned Him regarding His disciples and His teaching.  He answered proudly; “I have spoken openly to the world.  I always taught in the Synagogue and in the Temple where all the rulers assemble, and in secret spoke I nothing.  Why question Me?  Question them that have heard Me what I spoke unto them.  See,” He exclaimed, pointing to the spectators, “these men know what I said.”  It was a crushing rejoinder.  One of the officers was offended by Jesus’ manner.  “Is it,” he said, “thus that thou answerest the High Priest.?”  Jesus answered with quiet dignity: “If I spoke ill, bear witness regarding the ill; but if well, why smite Me?”

Baffled and angry, Annus ended the interview, and ordered that Jesus be led away bound to Caiaphus to stand His trial before the Sanhedrin.  A girl among the spectators pointed a finger in Peter’s direction and said: “This fellow is one of them.”  He denied it, but it was useless.  “Certainly thou art one of them, cried a chorus of voices, “for thy speech betrayeth thee“ ”I am not,” he vociferated wildly; “I do not know what ye are talking about.”    Another person asked him: “Did I not see thee in the garden with him?”  “I do not know the man,” he said.  Just then a cock crew.  Jesus looked at Peter with infinite sadness and regret.  Peter was crest-fallen, and hurried from the court-yard and wept bitterly.

They led Jesus into the city.  When dawn came, the Sanhedrin met and preferred charges against Him.  Two men were there.  “We heard Him,” they alleged, “saying: ‘I can pull down the Sanctuary of God and in the course of three days build it.”  Rising from his chair, Caiaphas advanced, and confronting the prisoner, demanded: “Answerest thou nothing?  What is it that these men are witnessing against thee.”  Jesus held His peace.  I put thee on oath.” the High-Priest said, “to say to us whether thou art the Messiah, the Son of God.”  Then Jesus spoke: “Thou hast said,” He replied; and, He continued, surveying the assembly, “ye shall see the Son of Man seated at the Right Hand of Power and coming upon the clouds of Heaven.”

Caiaphus had gained his end.  He had extorted from Jesus a declaration that the Sanhedrin’s malign purpose required.  “Blasphemy!” cried Caiaphus, “What further need have we of witnesses?  Behold, just now ye heard the blasphemy.  What is your verdict?”  Instantly came the unanimous response: “He is liable to death”; and Jesus stood condemned.

 

Judas, frightened by what he had done and stricken with remorse, confronted the Sanhedrin, and, addressing the High Priest, said: “I have sinned in betraying innocent blood.”  “What is that to us?” They sneered.  “Thou must see to that”.  Before the Priests had recovered their astonishment, he was gone.  “He went away and hanged himself.”

 

Chapter 48

Before Pontius Pilate

 

Thus, “by impious show of law condemned ,” Jesus was led without delay to the governor.  It was early in the morning.

Pontius Pilate held the office of procurator.  The Sanhedrin brought Jesus bound to the office.  “What accusation.” he demanded, “are ye bringing against this man?”  They answered: “Had he not bee an evil-doer we would not have delivered him unto thee.” “Take ye him,” he cried impatiently, “and judge him according to your law”; and they answered: ”We may not put anyone to death.”

The governor retired into the Praætorium and, summoning the prisoner, proceeded to examine Him.  Pilate looked at Jesus. “Thou!” he exclaimed.  “Art thou the King of the Jews?”  “Sayest thou this,” Jesus replied, “of thyself, or did others tell the about Me?”  The governor replied brusquely: “Am I a Jew?  Thy nation and the High Priests handed thee over to me.  What didst thou do?”  “My Kingdom,” He said, “is not of this world.  Had My Kingdom been of this world, My servants had been striving that I might not be handed over to the rulers.  But, as it is, My Kingdom is not from hence.”  “Then,” exclaimed the latter, “thou art a king?”  “Thou sayest it,” was the reply; because a king I am.”  It is for this end that I was born and for this end that I have come into the world, that I may testify to the truth.  Everyone that is of the truth hearkeneth to My voice.”

Thus resolved, Pilate conducted the prisoner forth and said to the expectant rulers: “I find no fault in him.”  It was not the verdict the rulers desired, and they raised a clamor.  “Answer thou nothing”? Pilate said.  “See how many things they are accusing thee of.”  Still He held His peace.  Pilate soon learned that Jesus was a Galilean.  This meant that Jesus was under the jurisdiction of Herod Antipas, the tetrach of Galilee.  Pilate, therefor remitted the case to him.

Pilate knew that the Jewish rulers were set upon the death of Jesus.  And he knew that he was in an awkward position.  “Ye brought this man unto me, he said, “as a perveter of the people: and, behold, nothing worthy of death hath ben committed by him.  “I will therefore chastise him and release him.”

It was the time of the year when the governor could choose which of two prisoners might be released.  Pilate saw his opportunity, The two prisoners were Jesus and Bar Abba.  “Which will ye that release unto you—“Bar Abba or Jesus that is called Messiah?”

Just then a message was brought to Pilate.  It was a communication from his wife.  “Have thou nothing to do with that righteous man; for I suffered much this day in consequence of a dream on his account.”  “Which of them will ye that I release?”  “Bar Abba,” the crowd shouted.  “Then,” asked the disconcerted governor, shall I do to Jesus that is called Messiah?” and they shouted back: “Let him be crucified.”  “Why,” he remonstrated, “What ill hath he done?”  “Let him be crucified!” they shouted long and loud.

Reluctantly, Pilate gave way.  He had water brought to him and he washed his hands exclaiming: “I am innocent of this blood.  Ye shall see to it” The rabble had no misgivings.  “His blood,” they cried, “be upon us and our children.”

The soldiers led Jesus away and they scourged Him.  The scourge was a frightful instrument—a whip with several thongs, each loaded with acorn-shaped balls of lead or sharp stones.  Over His lacerated back, they put Herod’s purple robe; they plaited a crown of thorns and put it over His head; and in His right hand, by way of a sceptre, they put a reed.  Then in mock homage they knelt before Him and saluted Him: “Hail! King of the Jews.”  And they spat upon His face, buffeted Him, and, snatching the reed from His hand, smote Him on the head, at each stroke driving the thorns into His tortured brow.

 

Sick at heart Pilate said, “Take ye him and crucify him; for I find no fault in him.”

 

Chapter 49

The Crucifixion

 

No sooner ha the sentence been pronounced than the soldiers proceeded to carry it out.  First of all, they stripped Jesus of then purple robe and re-clothed Him with His own satire.  They selected a cross.  It was a grim custom that a criminal should carry it to the place of execution; and they laid the gastly gibbet on the shoulders of Jesus.  Pilate put on a board: JESUS THE NAZARENE, writing it, that all might be able to read it, in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek.  “Do not,”remonstrated the High Priests, “write: The King of the Jews, but: He said: I am King of the Jews’” What I have written, I have written,” was the answer.

Jesus did not go alone to execution.  Two brigands accompanied Him.  John, the best beloved of the disciples, was there when the procession started, and saw his dear Lord set forth with His cross on His shoulders.  He left the procession to inform Mary of the issue of the trial and support her beneath the weight of her sorrow; and soon, in company with her, and the rest of the Galilean women, he went forth and stood beside the Cross.  The women in the crowd poured forth lamentations.

Jesus staggered along beneath His burden as far as the city gate, and there His strength utterly failed.  He fell, and the soldiers were looking for someone to assist Jesus.  While this search went on, the women were crying, their faces wet with their tears.  Jesus turned to them and said: “Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for Me; but for yourselves weep and for your children.  For, behold, there are coming days wherein they shall say: ‘Blessed are the barren and the wombs which did not bear and breasts which did not give suck.”

The procession resumed its march, but so shaken was Jesus that, no longer burdened by with His cross, He was unable to walk unsupported.

At nine o’clock, they reached the place of execution: Golgotha, the place of the skull.  He was stripped of His garments.  He was laid on the transom with outstretched arms and his hands were nailed to either end.  The transom was hoisted on the upright, and there the body hung in agony.  He was given a cup of wine.  Parched with thirst, He put His lips to it, and when He recognized what it was, refused to drink.  The soldiers took His cloak, girdle, sandals, and turban, and cast lots for His tunic.  The passage in the Psalms was fulfilled: “They parted My garments among themselves, and for My vesture cast lots.”

The High Priests had gathered around the Cross and hurled a series of hateful ridicules at Him.  One of the soldiers who had relented heard Jesus’ prayer: “Father, forgive them.”

John arrived on the scene.  “Woman,” He said to Mary, “See! thy Son.  “See,” He said to John, “thy mother.”  Even in His agony, Jesus was solicitous for His mother and His friends.  John took Mary to his own home.

Three hours after darkness had set in, a cry was heard from the Cross: “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?”  He spoke the words in Hebrew as they were written by the Psalmist: “Eli, Eli, Lama azabhtani.”

The end had come.  “Father,” He said, “into Thy hands I commit My Spirit.”    The death of Jesus greatly affected one of the soldiers.  “Indeed,” he exclaimed, “this man was ‘righteous’; truly he was God’s Son”.

Among those who witnessed the crucifixion was Joseph of Armiahtæ.  He was an acquaintance of Jesus.  He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus.  He and Nicodemus took the body from the Cross and wrapped it in linen cloths.  Then they laid the body in Joseph’s tomb, which had not been used.

 

Chapter 50

The Resurrection

 

The death of Jesus seemed to His disciples a heavy and irretrievable disaster.  They had deemed Him the Messiah, and, despite His repeated and emphatic protests, they had clung with pathetic tenacity to their Jewish ideal and expected confidently that He would manifest Himself to the world in regal splendor, claim the throne of His Father David, and reign in Jerusalem over an emancipated regenerate Israel.  The Crucifixion had dispelled their dream.  In addition to their breavement, they were put to shame.  They stood convicted in the eyes of the nation and in their own as foolish dupes of a preposterous delusion; and it seemed that nothing remained for them but to return to their homes and, amid the derision of their acquaintance, resume their old occupations, but presently they changed their minds.  They repented of their cowardice and, returning to the neighborhood of Jerusalem, lurked there in concealment.  It waa the day of the Sabbath, but they kept close and took no part in its solemnities.

It was now three days after the burial of Jesus.  It was the morning of the Sabbath.  Mary Magdalene went to the garden on the slope of Olivet, accompanied by others of the women.  To their surprise the found that the heavy stone that closed the cavern’s entrance had been removed.  Mary ran to the retreat of Peter and John and told them of her discovery.  They hurried to the Sepulchre; and John, being younger, got there first.  Passing through the open entrance, he found himself on the floor of the cavern; and, peering down to the place the Lord’s body should have been, he saw the contents there.  As he stood and gazed, Peter arrived, and examined the grave.  It was indeed empty, but its condition was puzzling.  If His body had been stolen, the marauders would have taken it away in its contents; but these were lying flat as though the body had evaporated, and the napkin that had been bound around His head, covering His face, was lying apart from the linen cloths where His head had rested, still retaining its fold.  It had not collapsed when His head was withdrawn.  John then descended and saw how matters stood.  The wondrous truth dawned upon him: Jesus had risen.

The two disciples then left the Sepulchre and returned home, leaving Mary weeping by the entrance.  Two angels were there, one at the head and the other at the feet where the Lord’s body had lain.  “Woman,” they said, “why art thou weeping?’  “They have taken away my Lord,” she said, “and I know not where they have put Him.”  She looked around and beheld one standing there.  It was Jesus, but she did not recognize Him.  “Woman,” He asked, “why art thou weeping?  Whom art thou seeking?”  She thought that it was the gardener, perhaps charging her with trespass.  “Sir,” she cried, “if thou didst carry Him off, tell me where thou didst put Him, and I will take Him away.”  “Mary!” He said, and that was enough.  “Rabbûni” she cried, and turned herself about.  Flinging herself st His feet, she she would have embraced them and covered them wit kisses.  “Cling not to Me,” He said, gently repulsing her, “for I have not ascended to My Father, but go to My brethren and tell them: “I ascend to My Father and your Father, and My God and your God.”

 

That afternoon two disciples were journeying to Emmaus, a village a few miles from Jerusalem.  They were not apostles.  One was called Cleopas; the other person’s name is unknown.  They belonged to the rank and file of the Lord’s followers, and they were departing from Jerusalem in deep dejection, believing that all was over.  Soon a stranger joined them.  It was Jesus, but they did not know Him.  He accosted them: “What are these arguments which ye are banding one with another as ye walk?”  Cleopas answered: ”Art thou sojourning all alone at Jerusalem that thou knowest not the things that have been done therein during these days?”  “What manner of things?” the stranger asked.  “The things about Jesus the Nazarene,” they replied together, ”who proved a prophet mighty in work and word before God and all the people, and how the High Priests handed Him over for sentence of death and crucified Him.”  “And, sighed Cleopas, “we were hoping that it was He that should redeem Israel; but, to crown all, this is the third day since these things were done.”  “Yes,” the other person said, “But some women of our company amazed us.  They went early to the Sepulchre, and they did not find His body and came saying that they had actually seen a vision of angels who said that He lived.”  “But Him,” Cleopas added, “they did not see.”  “Ye foolish men,” exclaimed Jesus, “and slow of heart to put your trust on all that the Prophet spoke!  Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and enter into His glory?”  Then He quoted to them passage after passage of the Scriptures from Moses onward through the Prophets, showing they all had been fulfilled by His Passion.

At length they reached Emmaus, and Jesus made as though He would continue His journey.  “Lodge with us,” they said, ”forasmuch it is toward evening, and the day is far spent.”  He accepted their invitation, and presently the table was spread.  He was the guest, yet He assumed the part of host and gave thanks before eating.  He took the bread, and broke it, and handed it to them.  He was recognized by them in the breaking of the host.  Before they could speak to them, He was gone.

Later they told their story.  Suddenly a hush fell upon the company.  Jesus was present.  None had heard Him knock, none had unbarred the door, none had seen Him enter; yet there He stood.  He advanced into the midst of the company with the accustomed greeting: “Peace to you!”  They were surprised and affrighted.  He showed them His wounded hands and side.  Their doubts vanished.  Then He greeted them anew, and gave then another token.  “As the Father hath commissioned Me,” He said, “I also send you,” and breathing upon them, and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.  Whatsoever sins ye remit, they have been remitted unto them; whatsoever ye retain, they have been retained.

When He finished speaking, He led them to Olivet.  He lifted up His hands and blessed them.  And while He was blessing them, He parted from them.

 

Copyright ^© 2015 by J. Prescott Johnson