The Crisis at Capernaum

153:0.1On Fri­day evening, the day of their ar­rival at Beth­saida, and on Sab­bath morn­ing, the apos­tles no­ticed that Je­sus was se­ri­ously oc­cu­pied with some mo­men­tous prob­lem; they were cog­nizant that the Mas­ter was giv­ing un­usual thought to some im­por­tant mat­ter. He ate no break­fast and but lit­tle at noon­tide. All of Sab­bath morn­ing and the evening be­fore, the twelve and their as­so­ciates were gath­ered to­gether in small groups about the house, in the gar­den, and along the seashore. There was a ten­sion of un­cer­tainty and a sus­pense of ap­pre­hen­sion rest­ing upon all of them. Je­sus had said lit­tle to them since they left Je­ru­sa­lem.

153:0.2Not in months had they seen the Mas­ter so pre­oc­cu­pied and un­com­mu­nica­tive. Even Si­mon Pe­ter was de­pressed, if not down­cast. An­drew was at a loss to know what to do for his de­jected as­so­ciates. Na­than­iel said they were in the midst of the “lull be­fore the storm.” Thomas ex­pressed the opin­ion that “some­thing out of the or­di­nary is about to hap­pen.” Philip ad­vised David Zeb­e­dee to “for­get about plans for feed­ing and lodg­ing the mul­ti­tude un­til we know what the Mas­ter is think­ing about.” Mat­thew was putting forth re­newed ef­forts to re­plen­ish the trea­sury. James and John talked over the forth­com­ing ser­mon in the syn­a­gogue and spec­u­lated much as to its prob­a­ble na­ture and scope. Si­mon Ze­lo­tes ex­pressed the be­lief, in re­al­ity a hope, that “the Fa­ther in heaven may be about to in­ter­vene in some un­ex­pected man­ner for the vin­di­ca­tion and sup­port of his Son,” while Ju­das Is­car­iot dared to in­dulge the thought that pos­si­bly Je­sus was op­pressed with re­grets that “he did not have the cour­age and dar­ing to per­mit the five thou­sand to pro­claim him king of the Jews.”

153:0.3It was from among such a group of de­pressed and dis­con­so­late fol­low­ers that Je­sus went forth on this beau­ti­ful Sab­bath af­ter­noon to preach his epoch-mak­ing ser­mon in the Ca­per­naum syn­a­gogue. The only word of cheer­ful greet­ing or well-wish­ing from any of his im­me­di­ate fol­low­ers came from one of the un­sus­pect­ing Al­pheus twins, who, as Je­sus left the house on his way to the syn­a­gogue, saluted him cheer­ily and said: “We pray the Fa­ther will help you, and that we may have big­ger mul­ti­tudes than ever.”