Chapter 9 - Beginning the Public Work

CHAPTER 9

BEGINNING THE PUBLIC WORK

ON THE first day of the week, January 19, A.D. 27, Jesus and the twelve apostles made ready to depart from their headquarters in Bethsaida. They did not get away from Zebedee's house until near noon because the families of the apostles and others of the disciples had come to say good-bye.

Just before leaving, the apostles missed the Master, and Andrew went out to find him. He found Jesus sitting in a boat down the beach, weeping.

He ventured to approach Jesus and ask:

• "On this great day, Master, when we are to depart for Jerusalem to proclaim the Father's kingdom, why is it that you weep? Which of us has offended you?"

And Jesus, going back with Andrew to join the twelve, answered him:

• "No one of you has grieved me. I am saddened because none of my father Joseph's family have remembered to come over to bid us Godspeed."

At this time Ruth was on a visit to her brother Joseph at Nazareth. Other members of his family were kept away by pride, disappointment, misunderstanding, and petty resentment indulged as a result of hurt feelings.

Leaving Galilee

The first day Jesus and the apostles only journeyed as far as Tarichea, where they rested for the night. The next day they traveled to a point on the Jordan near Pella where John had preached about one year before.

This entire year of A.D. 27 was spent in quietly taking over John's work in Perea and Judea.

God’s Law and the Father’s Will

The night before they left Pella, Jesus gave the apostles some further instruction with regard to the new kingdom.

Said the Master:

• "You have been taught to look for the coming of the kingdom of God, and now I come announcing that this long-looked-for kingdom is near at hand, even that it is already here and in our midst. In every kingdom there must be a king seated upon his throne and decreeing the laws of the realm. So have you developed a concept of the kingdom of heaven as a glorified rule of the Jewish people over all the peoples of the earth with Messiah sitting on David's throne and from this place of miraculous power promulgating the laws of all the world. But, my children, you see not with the eye of faith, and you hear not with the understanding of the spirit. I declare that the kingdom of heaven is the realization and acknowledgment of God's rule within the hearts of men. True, there is a King in this kingdom, and that King is my Father and your Father. We are indeed his loyal subjects, but far transcending that fact is the transforming truth that we are his sons. In my life this truth is to become manifest to all. Our Father also sits upon a throne, but not one made with hands. The throne of the Infinite is the eternal dwelling place of the Father in the heaven of heavens. He fills all things and proclaims his laws to universes upon universes. And the Father also rules within the hearts of his children on earth by the spirit that he has sent to live within the souls of mortal men.

• "When you are the subjects of this kingdom, you indeed are made to hear the law of the Universe Ruler. But when, because of the gospel of the kingdom that I have come to declare, you faith-discover yourselves as sons, you henceforth look not upon yourselves as law-subject creatures of an all-powerful king but as privileged sons of a loving and divine Father. Verily, verily, I say to you, when the Father's will is your law; you are hardly in the kingdom. But when the Father's will becomes truly your will, then are you in very truth in the kingdom because the kingdom has thereby become an established experience in you. When God's will is your law, you are noble slave subjects. But when you believe in this new gospel of divine sonship, my Father's will becomes your will, and you are elevated to the high position of the free children of God, liberated sons of the kingdom."

Some of the apostles grasped something of this teaching, but none of them comprehended the full significance of this tremendous announcement.

The Sojourn at Amathus

The Master and his apostles remained near Amathus for almost three weeks.

Andrew was much occupied with the task of adjusting the constantly recurring misunderstandings and disagreements between the disciples of John and the newer disciples of Jesus.

When Andrew came to Jesus with these questions, he would always say:

• "It is not wise for the host to participate in the family troubles of his guests. A wise parent never takes sides in the petty quarrels of his own children."

Teaching about the Father

While sojourning at Amathus, Jesus spent much time with the apostles instructing them in the new concept of God. Again and again did he impress upon them that God is a Father, not a great and supreme bookkeeper who is chiefly engaged in making damaging entries against his erring children on earth, recordings of sin and evil to be used against them when he subsequently sits in judgment upon them as the just Judge of all creation. The Jews had long conceived of God as a king over all, even as a Father of the nation, but never before had large numbers of mortal men held the idea of God as a loving Father of the individual.

In answer to Thomas's question:

• "Who is this God of the kingdom?"

Jesus replied:

• "God is your Father, and religion -- my gospel -- is nothing more nor less than the believing recognition of the truth that you are his son. And I am here among you in the flesh to make clear both of these ideas in my life and teachings."

Spiritual Unity

One of the most eventful of all the evening conferences at Amathus was the session having to do with the discussion of spiritual unity.

James Zebedee had asked:

• "Master, how shall we learn to see alike and thereby enjoy more harmony among ourselves?"

When Jesus heard this question, he was stirred within his spirit, so much so that he replied:

• "James, James, when did I teach you that you should all see alike? I have come into the world to proclaim spiritual liberty to the end that mortals may be empowered to live individual lives of originality and freedom before God. I do not desire that social harmony and fraternal peace shall be purchased by the sacrifice of free personality and spiritual originality. What I require of you, my apostles, is spirit unity -- and that you can experience in the joy of your united dedication to the wholehearted doing of the will of my Father in heaven. You do not have to see alike or feel alike or even think alike in order spiritually to be alike. Spiritual unity is derived from the consciousness that each of you is indwelt, and increasingly dominated, by the spirit gift of the heavenly Father. Your apostolic harmony must grow out of the fact that the spirit hope of each of you is identical in origin, nature, and destiny.

• "In this way you may experience a perfected unity of spirit purpose and spirit understanding growing out of the mutual consciousness of the identity of each of your indwelling Paradise spirits. You may enjoy all of this profound spiritual unity in the very face of the utmost diversity of your individual attitudes of intellectual thinking, temperamental feeling, and social conduct. Your personalities may be refreshingly diverse and markedly different, while your spiritual natures and spirit fruits of divine worship and brotherly love may be so unified that all who behold your lives will of a surety take cognizance of this spirit identity and soul unity. They will recognize that you have been with me and have thereby learned, and acceptably, how to do the will of the Father in heaven. You can achieve the unity of the service of God even while you render such service in accordance with the technique of your own original endowments of mind, body, and soul.

• "Your spirit unity implies two things, which always will be found to harmonize in the lives of individual believers. First, you are possessed with a common motive for life service, you all desire above everything to do the will of the Father in heaven. Second, you all have a common goal of existence; you all purpose to find the Father in heaven. Thereby proving to the universe that you have become like him."

Many times during the training of the twelve Jesus reverted to this theme. Repeatedly he told them it was not his desire that those who believed in him should become dogmatized and standardized in accordance with the religious interpretations of even good men. Again and again he warned his apostles against the formulation of creeds and the establishment of traditions as a means of guiding and controlling believers in the gospel of the kingdom.

Last Week at Amathus

Near the end of the last week at Amathus, Simon Zelotes brought to Jesus one Teherma, a Persian doing business at Damascus. Andrew had presented Teherma to Simon for instruction. Simon looked upon the Persian as a "fire worshiper," although Teherma took great pains to explain that fire was only the visible symbol of the Pure and Holy One.

After talking with Jesus, the Persian signified his intention of remaining for several days to hear the teaching and listen to the preaching.

When Simon Zelotes and Jesus were alone, Simon asked the Master:

• "Why is it that I could not persuade him? Why did he so resist me and so readily lend an ear to you?"

Jesus answered:

• "Simon, Simon, how many times have I instructed you to refrain from all efforts to take something out of the hearts of those who seek salvation? How often have I told you to labor only to put something into these hungry souls? Lead men into the kingdom, and the great and living truths of the kingdom will presently drive out all serious error. When you have presented to mortal man the good news that God is his Father, you can the easier persuade him that he is in reality a son of God. And having done that, you have brought the light of salvation to the one who sits in darkness. Simon, when the Son of Man came first to you, did he come denouncing Moses and the prophets and proclaiming a new and better way of life? I came not to take away that which you had from your forefathers but to show you the perfected vision of that which your fathers saw only in part. Go then, Simon, teaching and preaching the kingdom, and when you have a man safely and securely within the kingdom, then is the time, when such a one shall come to you with inquiries, to impart instruction having to do with the progressive advancement of the soul within the divine kingdom."

Simon was astonished at these words, but he did as Jesus had instructed him, and Teherma, the Persian, was numbered among those who entered the kingdom.

That night Jesus discoursed to the apostles on the new life in the kingdom.

He said:

• "When you enter the kingdom, you are reborn. You cannot teach the deep things of the spirit to those who have been born only of the flesh. First see that men are born of the spirit before you seek to instruct them in the advanced ways of the spirit. Do not undertake to show men the beauties of the temple until you have first taken them into the temple. Introduce men to God and as the sons of God before you discourse on the doctrines of the fatherhood of God and the sonship of men. Do not strive with men -- always be patient. It is not your kingdom. You are only ambassadors. Simply go forth proclaiming, this is the kingdom of heaven -- God is your Father and you are his sons, and this good news, if you wholeheartedly believe it, is your eternal salvation."