Episode:Jesus in Galilee—Early Public Work (Part 5)
There prevailed in the minds of most of the apostles the idea that their failure to meet with success when they visited some Galilean towns was due to Jesus’ insistence that they refrain, in their teaching and preaching, from referring to him as a healer. How they wished he would in some manner so manifest his power as to attract the attention of the people! But the Master was unmoved by their earnest urging.
Keywords: Urantia, Jesus, Healings, Miracles, Wonders
Summary by Kermit
Commentary on the Review
Post review discussion explored the difference between truth versus correct understanding. While we have emphasized repeatedly on our broadcast that a correct understanding is not equivalent to the truth, a correct understanding of facts of time is a necessary precursor for success in the quest for the truths of eternity. This led to an admonition to avoid the fallacy of inferring a bidirectional equivalence in various truthful declarations, as in God is love, but Love isn’t God, or God is good, but goodness isn’t God. Also, we briefly touched on the difficulty of the revelators’ attempt to put truth into the words of the revelation in English, which becomes compounded when the book is translated into other languages.
146:4.3 The Gospel at Iron (cont.)
We pick up our story with Jesus’ healing of the leper. This cleansing of the leper was the first so-called miracle which Jesus had intentionally and deliberately performed up to this time. We examined a number of aspects of Jesus’ healing episodes. Recall that our current arc takes up on the day following the healing at sundown, which was a most sobering event for Jesus in light of his momentous decisions in the Perean hills immediately following his baptism to avoid wonder working. This leper really believed that his disease was a spiritual deficiency rather than merely a physical disease, which would prevent his being received into the coming kingdom. Accordingly, Jesus cleansed him of his leprosy. Unlike the making of wine at Cana and the healing at sundown no celestial intermediaries were involved. As with subsequent instances of this type Jesus enjoined the man to tell no one of his healing and to comply with the religious sacrifices commanded by Moses in testimony to his cleansing thus restoring him to good standing in the eyes of the religious authorities.
And of course he did not do as Jesus instructed, but instead proclaimed to the whole town that Jesus had healed him. Consequently, Jesus was besieged with throngs of the sick seeking healing, forcing him to cut short his time in Iron. It should be understood that this so-called miracle should not be thought of as magical or supernatural. However, it certainly can be considered unusual and outside the normal course of human events.
Our discussion included an inquiry into the revelators’ reference to the man’s leprosy as a real case of leprosy rather than an actual case of leprosy. Check out the archive for the details of the significance of this word choice and note the degree of precision employed by the authors awaiting recognition by the diligent student of the revelation. And so we see here and in events just ahead how the role of Jesus as a preacher is again thwarted by circumstances which reinforce his reputation as a healer and physician seemingly in opposition to his express desires.
Chorazin was a great disappointment to the apostles, as their gospel message was widely rejected. The apostles blamed this rejection on Jesus’ insistence that in their teaching and preaching they refrain from referring to Jesus as a healer. So the apostles were heartened by Jesus' announcement that they were to proceed to Cana, the site of Jesus’ first so-called miracle.
146:5. Back in Cana
Jesus and the apostles were assured of a sympathetic reception in Cana. Jesus’ fame as a healer was about to receive another boost in spite of the fact that no wonder working was actually performed. A Capernaum nobleman Titus came to Cana to implore Jesus to come to Capernaum to heal his afflicted son. Jesus rebuked Titus for his failure to recognize by faith the power of God in his midst. Titus came back with a declaration of faith that Jesus could heal his son. At this point, Jesus employed his faculty of preknowledge concerning the course of natural law and ascertained that the boy did not require his healing, but would recover on his own. Jesus’ instructions to Titus to return home assuring him that his son would live, were misconstrued as an indication that Jesus had healed the boy. Notwithstanding that this was not a case of Jesus curing a physical disease, Titus and his family believed he had been healed. This son went on to become a mighty minister of the kingdom and was subsequently martyred in Rome. Biblical accounts of this event have led to the erroneous idea that part of Jesus’ mission was to raise up martyrs for the kingdom.
Once again, Jesus was forced to leave Cana prematurely, for now not only the sick came to him in droves, but also messengers from afar seeking his healing at a distance.
146:6. Nain and the Widow’s Son
By this time the surrounding peoples of central and southern Galilee had become miracle minded regarding Jesus and his personal ministry. Hundreds suffering from purely nervous disorders and emotional disturbances came to Jesus and departed claiming to have been healed by Jesus. All of which show the power of the mind through belief to grasp their encircuitment by grace and effect mental and emotional balancing.
We finally take up the story of the widow of Nain and her son. Here we have another case of curious circumstances conspiring to create the impression among the multitudes following after Jesus and his troop that he is indeed a wonderworker capable of even raising the dead. Jesus encounters a funeral procession coming out of the city with the son of a much respected widow of Nain, who is believed to be dead. The widow recognizing Jesus implores him to bring her son back to life. Jesus, observing that the boy is not dead, merely arouses him and dismisses the funeral procession back to their homes. All of Jesus’ efforts to persuade the onlookers that he had wrought no miracle were to no avail. Word of Jesus wonderworking spread throughout Galilee and even some of his apostles never fully believed that Jesus had not raised this boy from the dead.
We pondered this situation of an incarnate Creator Son fully intending to dissociate himself from being seen and sought after as a remedy for the afflictions and struggles of the flesh, confronted with circumstances which unavoidably reinforced this very reputation. We wonder at the cosmic conspiracy that supervenes upon the plans of a Creator Son in the final chapter of his quest for local universe sovereignty. We further marvel at the grace and humility Jesus demonstrates in his cooperative subordination the greater whole as he works to complete his mission.
Notes by Brad
- Some of the superuniverse authors of papers in the 5th ER are especially non-linear and holistic in presentation.
- More difficult to consume. Exceptionally difficult to translate in truth.
- Healing the leper seems so simple. "I will--be clean." But so many questions!
- Why did Jesus decide to do this? Why did he set aside his basic post-baptism approach to his life? Why did he purpose energy in this case, a God the Supreme kind of function?
- What about the physics of this?
- In [Paper 145] they went to great lengths to explains that supermaterial beings were all just waiting in the wings for a command from Jesus' personalized Thought Adjuster.
- Same case here? Fair question. Was this a healing by living faith, no supermaterial beings required? Was this Jesus' own Supreme-like nature just doing what it can do?
- Jesus did this healing deliberately--in the "weighing completely in the weights/scales" of this word. (de- + -libra, a pair of scales)
- Your free will is FREE. FREE from all grace. It's just you and existence. Powerful, but two edges.
- God is your Father, yes, but you don't get to the Isle of Paradise through coddling or paternalism.
- "Heal me! Feed me!" says the little child.
- That patience a parent must have for their material-minded child... imagine the pateince God has with us.
- Can you develop to a point to where you're at least focused on the mind instead of matter? Because quality of thinking (and the quest for knowledge and wisdom) resides there.
- Jesus the psychologist: helping nervous and emotionally disturbed persons re-grasp their grace-given objectivity.
- His batting average was so much better than today's psychologists...
- Why? He was... inconcussibly solid! Many psychologists today themselves are barely held together with duct tape.
- Also, they believed in his ability to heal them.
- The mind is so much more fluid than matter. It can be reformed easier than matter (physical illness)
- Just re-found your mind on the cosmos again.
- Best laid plans of mice and men? How about Jesus' best laid plans? It appears the Supreme (the whole) had other ends in mind that even Jesus as God did not fully understand.
- How much can you expect your grand plans to hold if even a Creator Son's plans get disrupted so definitively.
- Plan? Thwarted. Plan? Thwarted. And this is Jesus!
