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His intention was to take the jewels that He had given, remove the rubbish around them, wash them and place them in the setting or context that HE had originally intended. It is Satan that takes truth and places it in a different frame from the one that God intended. Satan has done this with the Sabbath, baptism, the Second Coming of Jesus, even Creation itself. This has been described as like taking an egg, sucking out the true original contents and replacing them with something different. |
It still looks like an egg, but it is not genuine. Jesus came to expose the frauds and reveal the original Truth as He made and gave it. He said, ‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.’
The doctors of the law had loaded the Sabbath with rules and traditions till it was a day of distress and suffering. But the people still did their best to remember and keep the Sabbath, When they came back from the Babylonian captivity, there were massacres and killings, particularly in the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes of Syria. These often took place on the Sabbath but, whatever the oppression, the people tried to keep their promise to remember the Sabbath.
It was into this arena that Jesus, our Lord, Creator and Saviour came. But saddest of all, in spite of all the prophecies of His coming, there were only a few people waiting for Him. Simeon, who was a good man, was told that he should not see death until he had seen the Messiah, and Anna, a widow of eighty-four years of age who lived in the temple and served God, was also privileged to see the baby Jesus. It is recorded that she in turn went and told others of His birth. Apart from a few shepherds on the hills in Bethlehem, there seemed to be hardly anyone else in His own country and among His own people that knew the time or were expecting Jesus to come. Later, some wise men, who were not Jewish, came from the East to see Baby Jesus.
Jesus had stepped down from the light and glory of heaven to begin His ministry in a hostile world and in a town called Nazareth. Nazareth was such a notorious place that it was asked, ‘Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?’ but this is where Jesus began His ministry of light and hope. |
