Gerasa

• Gerasa

128:3.2They jour­neyed to Je­ru­sa­lem by way of the De­capo­lis and through Pella, Gerasa, Phil­a­del­phia, Hes­h­bon, and Jeri­cho. They re­turned to Naz­a­reth by the coast route, touch­ing Ly­dda, Joppa, Cae­sarea, thence around Mount Carmel to Ptole­mais and Naz­a­reth. This trip fairly well ac­quainted Je­sus with the whole of Pales­tine north of the Je­ru­sa­lem dis­trict.

• Gerasa

134:9.1It was now near the end of the sum­mer, about the time of the day of atone­ment and the feast of taber­na­cles. Je­sus had a fam­ily meet­ing in Ca­per­naum over the Sab­bath and the next day started for Je­ru­sa­lem with John the son of Zeb­e­dee, go­ing to the east of the lake and by Gerasa and on down the Jor­dan val­ley. While he vis­ited some with his com­pan­ion on the way, John noted a great change in Je­sus.

• Gerasa

138:9.3The apos­tles car­ried on their per­sonal work in Ca­per­naum, Beth­saida-Ju­lias, Cho­ra­zin, Gerasa, Hip­pos, Mag­dala, Cana, Beth­le­hem of Gal­i­lee, Jo­ta­p­ata, Ramah, Safed, Gis­chala, Gadara, and Abila. Be­sides these towns they la­bored in many vil­lages as well as in the coun­try­side. By the end of this pe­riod the twelve had worked out fairly sat­is­fac­tory plans for the care of their re­spec­tive fam­i­lies. Most of the apos­tles were mar­ried, some had sev­eral chil­dren, but they had made such ar­range­ments for the sup­port of their home folks that, with some lit­tle as­sis­tance from the apos­tolic funds, they could de­vote their en­tire en­er­gies to the Mas­ter’s work with­out hav­ing to worry about the fi­nan­cial wel­fare of their fam­i­lies.

• Gerasa

144:7.1Through­out the months of Novem­ber and De­cem­ber, Je­sus and the twenty-four worked qui­etly in the Greek cities of the De­capo­lis, chiefly in Scythopo­lis, Gerasa, Abila, and Gadara. This was re­ally the end of that pre­lim­i­nary pe­riod of tak­ing over John’s work and or­ga­ni­za­tion. Al­ways does the so­cial­ized re­li­gion of a new rev­e­la­tion pay the price of com­pro­mise with the es­tab­lished forms and us­ages of the pre­ced­ing re­li­gion which it seeks to sal­vage. Bap­tism was the price which the fol­low­ers of Je­sus paid in or­der to carry with them, as a so­cial­ized re­li­gious group, the fol­low­ers of John the Bap­tist. John’s fol­low­ers, in join­ing Je­sus’ fol­low­ers, gave up just about ev­ery­thing ex­cept wa­ter bap­tism.

• Gerasa

152:7.1Sun­day, April 3, Je­sus, ac­com­pa­nied only by the twelve apos­tles, started from Beth­saida on the jour­ney to Je­ru­sa­lem. To avoid the mul­ti­tudes and to at­tract as lit­tle at­ten­tion as pos­si­ble, they jour­neyed by way of Gerasa and Phil­a­del­phia. He for­bade them to do any pub­lic teach­ing on this trip; nei­ther did he per­mit them to teach or preach while so­journ­ing in Je­ru­sa­lem. They ar­rived at Beth­any, near Je­ru­sa­lem, late on Wednes­day evening, April 6. For this one night they stopped at the home of Laz­a­rus, Martha, and Mary, but the next day they sep­a­rated. Je­sus, with John, stayed at the home of a be­liever named Si­mon, near the house of Laz­a­rus in Beth­any. Ju­das Is­car­iot and Si­mon Ze­lo­tes stopped with friends in Je­ru­sa­lem, while the rest of the apos­tles so­journed, two and two, in dif­fer­ent homes.

• Gerasa

159:0.2On this Thurs­day morn­ing, Au­gust 18, the Mas­ter called his fol­low­ers to­gether and di­rected that each of the apos­tles should as­so­ciate him­self with one of the twelve evan­ge­lists, and that with oth­ers of the evan­ge­lists they should go out in twelve groups to la­bor in the cities and vil­lages of the De­capo­lis. The women’s corps and oth­ers of the dis­ci­ples he di­rected to re­main with him. Je­sus al­lot­ted four weeks to this tour, in­struct­ing his fol­low­ers to re­turn to Ma­g­a­dan not later than Fri­day, Septem­ber 16. He prom­ised to visit them of­ten dur­ing this time. In the course of this month these twelve groups la­bored in Gerasa, Gamala, Hip­pos, Za­phon, Gadara, Abila, Edrei, Phil­a­del­phia, Hes­h­bon, Dium, Scythopo­lis, and many other cities. Through­out this tour no mir­a­cles of heal­ing or other ex­traor­di­nary events oc­curred.

• Gerasa

165:0.1On Tues­day, Jan­uary 3, A.D. 30, Ab­ner, the for­mer chief of the twelve apos­tles of John the Bap­tist, a Nazarite and one­time head of the Nazarite school at En­gedi, now chief of the sev­enty mes­sen­gers of the king­dom, called his as­so­ciates to­gether and gave them fi­nal in­struc­tions be­fore send­ing them on a mis­sion to all of the cities and vil­lages of Perea. This Perean mis­sion con­tin­ued for al­most three months and was the last min­istry of the Mas­ter. From these labors Je­sus went di­rectly to Je­ru­sa­lem to pass through his fi­nal ex­pe­ri­ences in the flesh. The sev­enty, sup­ple­mented by the pe­ri­odic labors of Je­sus and the twelve apos­tles, worked in the fol­low­ing cities and towns and some fifty ad­di­tional vil­lages: Za­phon, Gadara, Macad, Ar­bela, Ra­math, Edrei, Bosora, Caspin, Mis­peh, Gerasa, Ragaba, Suc­coth, Am­athus, Adam, Penuel, Capi­to­lias, Dion, Hatita, Gadda, Phil­a­del­phia, Jog­be­hah, Gilead, Beth-Nim­rah, Tyrus, Elealah, Livias, Hes­h­bon, Cal­lir­rhoe, Beth-Peor, Shit­tim, Sibmah, Medeba, Beth-Meon, Are­opo­lis, and Aroer.

166:3.1As Je­sus and the twelve vis­ited with the mes­sen­gers of the king­dom at Gerasa, one of the Phar­isees who be­lieved in him asked this ques­tion: “Lord, will there be few or many re­ally saved?” And Je­sus, an­swer­ing, said:

166:3.2“You have been taught that only the chil­dren of Abra­ham will be saved; that only the gen­tiles of adop­tion can hope for sal­va­tion. Some of you have rea­soned that, since the Scrip­tures re­cord that only Caleb and Joshua from among all the hosts that went out of Egypt lived to en­ter the prom­ised land, only a com­par­a­tively few of those who seek the king­dom of heaven shall find en­trance thereto.

166:3.3“You also have an­other say­ing among you, and one that con­tains much truth: That the way which leads to eter­nal life is straight and nar­row, that the door which leads thereto is like­wise nar­row so that, of those who seek sal­va­tion, few can find en­trance through this door. You also have a teach­ing that the way which leads to de­struc­tion is broad, that the en­trance thereto is wide, and that there are many who choose to go this way. And this proverb is not with­out its mean­ing. But I de­clare that sal­va­tion is first a mat­ter of your per­sonal choos­ing. Even if the door to the way of life is nar­row, it is wide enough to ad­mit all who sin­cerely seek to en­ter, for I am that door. And the Son will never refuse en­trance to any child of the uni­verse who, by faith, seeks to find the Fa­ther through the Son.

166:3.4“But herein is the dan­ger to all who would post­pone their en­trance into the king­dom while they con­tinue to pur­sue the plea­sures of im­ma­tu­rity and in­dulge the sat­is­fac­tions of self­ish­ness: Hav­ing re­fused to en­ter the king­dom as a spir­i­tual ex­pe­ri­ence, they may sub­se­quently seek en­trance thereto when the glory of the bet­ter way be­comes re­vealed in the age to come. And when, there­fore, those who spurned the king­dom when I came in the like­ness of hu­man­ity seek to find an en­trance when it is re­vealed in the like­ness of di­vin­ity, then will I say to all such self­ish ones: I know not whence you are. You had your chance to pre­pare for this heav­enly cit­i­zen­ship, but you re­fused all such prof­fers of mercy; you re­jected all in­vi­ta­tions to come while the door was open. Now, to you who have re­fused sal­va­tion, the door is shut. This door is not open to those who would en­ter the king­dom for self­ish glory. Sal­va­tion is not for those who are un­will­ing to pay the price of whole­hearted ded­i­ca­tion to do­ing my Fa­ther’s will. When in spirit and soul you have turned your backs upon the Fa­ther’s king­dom, it is use­less in mind and body to stand be­fore this door and knock, say­ing, ‘Lord, open to us; we would also be great in the king­dom.’ Then will I de­clare that you are not of my fold. I will not re­ceive you to be among those who have fought the good fight of faith and won the re­ward of un­selfish ser­vice in the king­dom on earth. And when you say, ‘Did we not eat and drink with you, and did you not teach in our streets?’ then shall I again de­clare that you are spir­i­tual strangers; that we were not fel­low ser­vants in the Fa­ther’s min­istry of mercy on earth; that I do not know you; and then shall the Judge of all the earth say to you: ‘De­part from us, all you who have taken de­light in the works of in­iq­uity.’

166:3.5“But fear not; ev­ery one who sin­cerely de­sires to find eter­nal life by en­trance into the king­dom of God shall cer­tainly find such ev­er­last­ing sal­va­tion. But you who refuse this sal­va­tion will some day see the proph­ets of the seed of Abra­ham sit down with the be­liev­ers of the gen­tile na­tions in this glo­ri­fied king­dom to par­take of the bread of life and to re­fresh them­selves with the wa­ter thereof. And they who shall thus take the king­dom in spir­i­tual power and by the per­sis­tent as­saults of liv­ing faith will come from the north and the south and from the east and the west. And, be­hold, many who are first will be last, and those who are last will many times be first.”

166:3.6This was in­deed a new and strange ver­sion of the old and fa­mil­iar proverb of the straight and nar­row way.

166:3.7Slowly the apos­tles and many of the dis­ci­ples were learn­ing the mean­ing of Je­sus’ early dec­la­ra­tion: “Un­less you are born again, born of the spirit, you can­not en­ter the king­dom of God.” Nev­er­the­less, to all who are hon­est of heart and sin­cere in faith, it re­mains eter­nally true: “Be­hold, I stand at the doors of men’s hearts and knock, and if any man will open to me, I will come in and sup with him and will feed him with the bread of life; we shall be one in spirit and pur­pose, and so shall we ever be breth­ren in the long and fruit­ful ser­vice of the search for the Par­a­dise Fa­ther.” And so, whether few or many are to be saved al­to­gether de­pends on whether few or many will heed the in­vi­ta­tion: “I am the door, I am the new and liv­ing way, and whoso­ever wills may en­ter to em­bark upon the end­less truth-search for eter­nal life.”

166:3.8Even the apos­tles were un­able fully to com­pre­hend his teach­ing as to the ne­ces­sity for us­ing spir­i­tual force for the pur­pose of break­ing through all ma­te­rial re­sis­tance and for sur­mount­ing ev­ery earthly ob­sta­cle which might chance to stand in the way of grasp­ing the all-im­por­tant spir­i­tual val­ues of the new life in the spirit as the lib­er­ated sons of God.