Читать книгу The Story of Jesus The Christ - Helen Braun Hojt - Страница 24

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In the course of liis journey he came to Cana where he had

made the water into wine. While there, one day at noon, a

nobleman came to him

in great haste. He had

come twenty miles, from

Capernaum, on purpose

to see Jesus and ask

him a great favor. He

had a son at home who

was very, very ill; it

seemed as if he must

die. But the father

had known of the mir¬

acles of Jesus, and be¬

lieved that he could

make his child well.

So when he heard

that Jesus was in Cana

he went to him as

quickly as he could, and

begged him to go to

Capernaum and heal

the boy. Jesus said to him, “ Unless you see wonders you will

not believe.» But the father only thought of his sick boy, and

said, “ Sir, come down before my child dies.» The Saviour

looked at the father who seemed to trust him so, and said, “ Go

home, your son will live.» Did the man believe that Jesus had

the power to cure a sick boy twenty miles away, without any

medicine? Yes, he believed, and went home, sure that he would

find him well.

When be was almost home he met his servants coming to tell

him that his boy was well. He asked them when he began to get

The Appeal of the Nobleman

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A CHILD’S STORY OF THE LIFE OF CHRIST

better, and they told him it was at one o’clock, just the time when

Jesus had said, «Your son will live.» So the nobleman and all

his family believed that Jesus was the Christ, and became hi?

friends.

Though the Jews had only one temple they had in every town

places where they met to worship when they did not want to offer

sacrifices. These were called synagogues. They had only one

room. The men sat on one side of the room and the women on

the other behind a screen. There was a raised seat for the

preacher and ten «chief seats» where the leading Jews sat.

The service was much like ours. There were prayers and

hymns, and a passage was read from the Scripture, or that part

of our Bible which we call the Old Testament. The most of what

our New Testament tells had not yet happened. Any one could

read this lesson, and could explain it afterward, if he had permis¬

sion from the ruler of the synagogue, who was the man who had

the charge of the service. It was the custom for the reader to

stand while he read the lesson, and to sit down in front of the

people when he began to talk. The hymns they sang were not

like ours, and they had no hymn books. What they usually sang

were the Psalms, which we can read in our own Bibles. One

man, standing in front of the others, led the singing, sometimes

singing alone, while the people joined in the chorus.

Soon after healing the nobleman’s son Jesus spent a Sabbath

day at his old home, Nazareth. As his custom always was, he

went to the synagogue, to read the lesson and talk to the people.

They handed him the book from which the lesson was to be read,

and he found one of the places where the prophet Tsaiah tells

about the Christ that was to come, and what he was to do to help*

the people. You can find just what Jesus read to them that day

if you look in your Bibles at the first two verses of the sixty-first

chapter of Isaiah.