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Good morning my “Walking with Jesus” friends,
Do you suppose it’s safe to say that almost everyone’s life in Asia, Europe and North America, has experienced some change due to the Coronavirus pandemic? How many millions of people are or have been working from home? How many millions of children have not been in school? How many millions have been unemployed and how many hundreds of millions have been restricted in their normal daily activities and are evaluating the news daily to try and discern when life might return to some degree of normal?
We’ve been traveling with Jesus’ disciples and friends as they returned home to the Galilee region from that historic Passover/Easter weekend in which Jesus died and rose again. For them also, life had irreversibly changed! Once back ‘home’ what do you suppose they experienced? The towns in the region near Lake Galilee are where Jesus did many miracles, drew very large crowds and spent many months. I’m sure news about Jesus’ death had already come back from Jerusalem and you can imagine how the rumors had run wild in Capernaum, Cana, Nain, Nazareth, Bethsaida, Tiberias and other Galilean communities where Jesus had spent much of the past three years.
I can imagine the traveling group stopped as they came over the rise and their eyes saw Lake Galilee and the towns on the shoreline… Tiberias, Capernaum, and at that time Bethsaida. Home at last, But home would be different now. Each of them knew they would be questioned, by all who knew them. Everyone wanted to know. . .what’s the truth? What really had happened to Jesus? Each of the disciples and several of the women had seen the RISEN Jesus personally. They’d touched Him, talked with Him, even seen Him eat some food. But none of them could fully explain the healed, but new body Jesus now had, nor could they explain where He was at that moment. They did not know if or when they’d ever see Him again.
So, put yourself in their sandals my friends. What would you be prepared to say to your friends who have been anxiously awaiting your return from Jerusalem? The curious want to know the truth about Jesus… what will you say? I wonder what you say today when the resurrection of Jesus comes up in conversation? Due to the Coronavirus scare, have you had more opportunity to talk about Jesus, heaven, and your certainty of life with Jesus in heaven after death? What have you said and how have people responded?
We know that Philip, and the brothers Peter and Andrew were from the town of Bethsaida, (John 1:44) and I presume likely returned to their homes. Peter was married (Mark 1:30), so I presume his wife was waiting for his return with excitement. Oh my, can you imagine the very different perspective that Philip, Peter and Andrew had of the Passover/Easter weekend events! While Peter had seen the risen Jesus twice at least, we have no record that he and Jesus had yet discussed privately the painful matter of Peter’s denials of Jesus.
Nathaniel was from Cana (John 21:2), the town where Jesus had turned the water into wine at the wedding (John 2:1-11), His first miracle. Some weeks after that Jesus was in Cana again with His disciples, and was approached by a royal official asking for a healing for his son who lay sick and was dying several miles away in Capernaum. Nathaniel remembered Jesus had assured the official that by the time he returned home to his son, his son would be well, and he was! I wonder what Nathaniel told his friends in Cana about what he had experienced with Jesus during Passover weekend and how twice he had seen and talked with the Risen Jesus?!
John and his brother James had grown up there along Lake Galilee as well, and had been in the fishing business with their father Zebedee. We presume their father had kept the business going while his sons had spent the last several months with Jesus, traveling the countryside. Zebedee’s wife, mother of John and James, had been with his sons and the others in Jerusalem during Passover. In fact Matthew tells us she had been standing at the cross with Mary, Jesus’ mother, watching Jesus die. (Matt. 27:56) Upon their return can you imagine the family gatherings and the discussions about Passover weekend?
We know that Mary, Jesus’ mother, was of course from Nazareth. John had been staying particularly close to Mary since that day they stood together at Jesus’ cross and Jesus had entrusted them to each other. I presume Mary walked back from Jerusalem with John and the others, and perhaps went first with John, James and their mother, to their home. Zebedee and his wife were friends of hers of course. John tells us he took Mary into his home after she watched her son die on that cross. (John 19:27) We can imagine it was a safe, loving place for Mary.
But Mary had other children (Mark 6:3) and I presume some if not all were still in Nazareth, and thus I presume John accompanied Mary back to Nazareth. Some may have been in Jerusalem, among the crowds, we don’t know. Can you imagine the reception Mary might have received arriving back in Nazareth?
30 years or so before, Mary and her husband Joseph had first come back to Nazareth from their refugee days in Egypt, bringing with them infant Jesus, who had been born in Bethlehem. I doubt they tried to explain to the Nazarene’s all that had happened to them in Bethlehem and Egypt. They just wanted to build a life, a normal life, in small town Nazareth. Of course word came back to Nazareth often of the miracles that Jesus had been doing and the things He was preaching all around the Galilee region.
No doubt Nazareth was abuzz with news of Jesus’ death and as Mary arrived back for the first time, can you imagine the looks, the finger pointing, the questions. As her adult children gathered together in her home with her, can you imagine what Mary and John told them about the truth of what had happened in Jerusalem over the past three weeks or so? The Palm Sunday triumphal entrance into Jerusalem must have seemed as though it was months ago. But it was only three weeks or so!
We know that at least two of Mary’s children, James and Judas, eventually believed the truth about the resurrection of Jesus, and both wrote New Testament books (James & Jude), but we don’t know when they believed. I wonder how long Mary stayed in Nazareth this first visit back? I can imagine it wasn’t long. John’s home, with his parents whom she loved, and John & James who had known Jesus so well and been with Him through it all, would be a far more accepting, loving place for Mary. She would be deeply respected there and I have no doubt the conversations in that home, revolved around Jesus for many months.
It was perhaps only a few days or so after they all arrived home, that Peter returned to the most familiar place and activity that he knew. . .fishing on Lake Galilee. John tells us about it in John 21: “Simon Peter, Thomas (called Didymus), Nathaniel from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. ‘I’m going out to fish’, Simon Peter told them, and they said, ‘we’ll go with you.’ So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.”
I wonder what you see in this little glimpse into their lives after they’ve returned home from Jerusalem? I see that they were hanging out together, as they had for so many months, but with no particular purpose. They were directionless, and the absence of their leader and friend Jesus left them floundering. Fishing was both familiar and practical. They had bills to pay, mouths to feed, and they loved being out on the water together. No wonder they all jumped at the chance to get in the boat together and head out onto familiar Lake Galilee.
The disciples had several remarkable memories of Jesus with them, in the boat on this lake, do you remember? How many of those stories can you recount my friends? I’ll remind you of three: Peter & Jesus after a night of empty net fishing, when Jesus filled his net so full he had to call for help (Luke 5:1-11. Or the time Jesus was asleep in the boat when a furious storm came up and after they had awakened Jesus, He calmed the storm. (Mark 4:35-41) Or the most memorable, of course, was when Jesus walked on the stormy waves, and called Peter out to Him. (Matthew 14 & John 6)
What these men didn’t know, was that this night of fishing was going to turn out to be one of the most memorable experiences of their lives, as they would again encounter the resurrected Jesus. I think we’ll look deeply into their experience tomorrow. For today, I’m hoping you’ve been able to walk with each of them, back into their hometowns, and imagine what they experienced, as they faced the questions of their friends and all the rumors that were circulating about Jesus.
It’s not all that different from what you and I face today my friends, as people wonder about the truth of Jesus and especially the relevance of Jesus to our world today in the grip of the Coronavirus. I wonder what you have been saying to people about the truth of Easter and what difference a resurrected Jesus makes in your life as you deal with the COVID-19 pandemic and its very real affects on your life, your family, your community, the economy of your city, and the lifestyle changes brought about by such a contagious disease that is still killing thousands of people every day around our world?
Oh Lord Jesus we thank you that you are a resurrected Savior who makes a huge difference in our lives, as an uncontrollable global pandemic continues to so dramatically affect billions of people in our world today. We are grateful that Your death breaks the power of sin in our lives, and Your resurrection proves God’s power over death, so we can face the pandemic with You, our Risen Savior, holding our lives in Your hands.
Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
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Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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