Jesus’ Galilean Ministry (3D Jesus Part 4)

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Welcome to Out of Zion with Susan Michael, an exploration of the Bible and the land of

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Israel.

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From ancient biblical sites to the story behind the stories, join Susan on a journey through

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the most exciting book on the planet.

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Hit the subscribe button for future episodes which will deepen your faith and bring the

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Bible to life.

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And now, here's our host, Susan Michael.

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Hey there.

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Welcome back.

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This is the 3D Jesus series and we're on part four about Jesus' Galilean ministry.

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I hope that you have enjoyed what we've covered so far and that Jesus is beginning to become

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more alive to you than he ever has before.

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That's my prayer for you, that Jesus comes alive, he becomes three-dimensional.

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As you see him walking in the land within his cultural setting, his religious setting,

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and you understand how very real he was and he is.

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So Jesus' childhood is over now and we're entering his adult life and his ministry.

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And so his ministry begins with being baptized by John the Baptist at the River Jordan.

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This is when the Holy Spirit comes upon him and his ministry begins.

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The first miracle recorded by Jesus is the famous one about the wedding of Cana where

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he goes with his disciples and his mother says that they are running out of wine.

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Weddings at the time were often a multi-day event, sometimes as many as seven days, and

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the guests have to be fed.

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And they were at some point in this wedding running out of wine and so Jesus takes water

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and turns it into wine.

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You've all heard the story.

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I find it curious that Jesus' mother knew that he could take care of this problem.

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And what that tells me is that this was not the first miracle by Jesus.

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This is just the first one that we have recorded in the Bible.

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I think he must have done a number of things in the home so Mary knew exactly that Jesus

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could take care of the situation.

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And she commanded the servants, do whatever he tells you to do.

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And so they did.

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And Jesus performed this miracle.

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There's been many sermons preached on the meaning of the miracle and I'm not going to

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take time to do that.

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After this story then we see Jesus migrates away from Nazareth to the Sea of Galilee area.

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The Sea of Galilee is actually not a sea.

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It's a large lake.

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But in Hebrew it's called a sea.

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And it's about 13 miles long and about eight miles wide.

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It's actually shaped in the shape of a harp.

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And so in Hebrew it's known as canaret, which is a harp.

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So it's the Sea of Canaret.

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It is referred to as that at least one time in the Gospels.

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The Sea of Galilee at the northwest corner of the Sea of Galilee is where most of Jesus'

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ministry took place.

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They call it the evangelical triangle because it's in that area where so many of the stories

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that we read about in the Gospels take place.

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It happens to be up in that northwest corner, there are seven hot springs that are taking

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warm water into the Sea of Galilee.

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And because of that warm water, that's where the fishing stories take place.

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The tilapia is a warm water fish and so they would congregate there in those warmer waters.

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And so a number of our stories we find take place right there in that northwest corner.

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Also, the Sea of Galilee is known for very, very violent storms that come upon you suddenly.

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And we do have one of those stories in the New Testament of Jesus and the disciples out

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on the boat and one of these mean storms comes up very quickly.

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And it's life-threatening.

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They're very violent storms.

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And this has to do with the fact that the Sea of Galilee is down, as I said, it's the

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lowest freshwater body of water on the planet.

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And to its right or the high mountain range of the Golan Heights and of Jordan and to

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its west is another set of hills, the Arbel Cliffs.

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And then there is a valley that goes straight west all the way over to the Mediterranean

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Sea.

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That valley is known as the Valley of Jezreel.

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And there is a famous roadway that came from Egypt up the Mediterranean Sea and then it

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turned inwards and went across that Jezreel Valley to the Sea of Galilee and then went

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on northeastward into Assyria.

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So this was a very, very important and busy place.

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There was a lot of traffic.

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There was a lot of commerce.

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And the Sea of Galilee was the largest oases on that road from Egypt to Assyria.

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So now right there in that northwest corner is the town that Jesus made his home base.

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It actually is referred to as his home.

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And that is the town of Capernaum.

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Capernaum is a town of roughly about a thousand or 1500 people.

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So it's sizable for the time.

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And it is right there.

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And one of our famous disciples' home is in Capernaum.

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And that's Simon Peter.

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And so we have Jesus staying there in the home of Simon Peter and in the hometown of

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Simon Peter at Capernaum.

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And it says that he taught in the synagogue there.

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Now when you go with me to Israel, for sure, we will go to Capernaum.

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And you'll be able to see the remains of that town.

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You will see the remains of the ancient synagogue.

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Now the synagogue that was there at the time of Jesus, what we would call the first-century

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synagogue, was later destroyed and a new one built on top of it in the fourth century.

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So what you will see standing there is the remains of the fourth-century synagogue.

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But you can look down at the base of that synagogue and you'll see the dark basalt stone

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that you know is from the first century.

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It's the foundations of that first-century synagogue that Jesus would have stood in and

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taught in.

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Right in front of that synagogue and not too far away is the remains of a housing division.

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You know, homes then were very close.

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And in a way, it was kind of a communal living situation.

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They lived, families lived very close to each other.

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It's not like today here in the United States.

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And Simon Peter's mother-in-law was ill one day, it says, and Jesus left the synagogue

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and he went to the home and she was very ill and he healed her.

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And over the remains of that housing, that unit within a gathering of homes, over the

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top of it has been built a church.

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Now this church that's over it today is on, you could say, on stilts.

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It's built up above the ground so that it didn't disturb the stones.

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And you can stand there underneath the church and look at the stones.

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You can go into the church and look through a glass place in the middle of the floor and

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you can look down to the very stones that were of the house of Simon Peter.

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Now you might be asking, how do we really know that that's the house?

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And it's a very strong possibility it is the house.

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And this is how we know this.

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Back in the fourth century, in the early 300s AD, when the Roman Empire became Christian

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and Constantine declared Christianity to be the state religion, his mother, Helena, made

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a trip to the Holy Land.

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And she researched these various sites in the ministry of Jesus.

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And once she found what the locals told her was the site, then she would have churches

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built over the site or beside it to commemorate that.

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And so when we know that there was a fourth century church built in an area, it tells

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us that the locals told Helena and others that traveled to the Holy Land at that time

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that these were the various locations.

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And so in this situation, in this house, it's well known that this one unit was plastered

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over many times, over the years and over probably decades and centuries.

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It was replastered.

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And there was Christian graffiti underneath some of these layers of plaster where you

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saw the name Yeshua or you saw the name of Peter.

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And you saw certain graffiti that you knew it was a place of prayer and of worship.

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And you could tell that it had been preserved.

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So for instance, it wasn't just renovated, it was actually preserved in the condition

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that it was in in the first century.

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So this is a very good indication that this was known to be the home of Simon Peter.

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Now today when you look at it, it's very hard to tell anything.

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It's the stone floor, basically, and a few other stones.

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And you have to take the word of the archaeologist as in terms of what was found there and what

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it would have looked like when it was actually built with walls and a roof over it.

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But that is a Capernaum, and that's where we know that Jesus spent a lot of his time,

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a lot of the stories took place there.

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We also know that Jesus did many, many more miracles in that area than the New Testament

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tells us.

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And we know that because Jesus alludes to it.

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In one scripture in Matthew 11, he said that if the pagan cities of Tyre and Sidon, which

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are today in Lebanon at that point right north of Israel, he said, if Tyre and Sidon had

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seen the works, the mighty works that had been done, not only in Capernaum, but in

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Bethsaida and in Corazine, the people would have repented long ago, he said.

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And so he's saying that so many miracles were done in these three cities, and yet they still

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didn't repent, they still didn't follow him.

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And it's interesting to see that those three cities today lay in ruins.

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They were destroyed by an earthquake probably in the early fourth century, late fourth century.

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There was another earthquake in the eighth century.

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They were destroyed and never inhabited again.

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But we know from this that there were many miracles done in Corazine and Bethsaida, and

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yet we don't have them recorded in the New Testament.

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So the New Testament tells us what we need to know, but my point is this, that we shouldn't

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just be limited to it and understand that so much more took place.

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And Mark said at the end of his gospel, he said, if I were to have written everything

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that Jesus said and did, it would have taken so many more books to record it all.

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But we're so grateful for what we do know and what we do have recorded.

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Now from Capernaum right up the hillside, there is a story where Jesus retreated away

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up the hillside, and then he from there gave the sermon on the mount, or the famous sermon

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called the Beatitudes, where he went through and gave the ten Beatitudes.

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Now what I want to point out to you, I don't have time today to give you all these teachings

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of what Jesus taught and what he did.

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What I'm wanting to do is give you the setting and to understand how accurate the portrayal

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is of what Jesus said and did.

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Here on this hillside, in this area, we have this unique formation of a hill that's shaped

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like what I would call a theater.

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It's like a 180 degree incline in the hillside.

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And the hill is made of basalt stone that acts, it amplifies what is said.

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So it's been tested and it's been proven.

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You can stand midway up that hill or all the way up that hill and speak, and you can be

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heard all the way down at the bottom of the hill standing on the shore of the Sea of Galilee.

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And if the wind is blowing in the other direction, you can stand on the shores of the Sea of Galilee

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and you can be heard at the top of the hill because of the unique shape there and because

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of the basalt stone that acts as an amplification.

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It's as though the earth itself had been prepared for the ministry of Jesus.

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And from there, he gave this famous sermon on the Mount.

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In that area, he also fed the 5,000.

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And yes, they could have fit in that area and they could have heard him.

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And when I say that they can fit there, you can go there and look at it today.

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But in the year 2000, when the Pope was visiting the Holy Land, they actually prepared that

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area to hold 100,000 people to hear the Pope.

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Now it rained that day, so they didn't have that many, but they were prepared for it and

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said that it could hold as many as 100,000.

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So for sure, the 5,000 that Jesus fed probably was more like 15,000 people when you added

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up the families.

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For sure it could have held that.

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Now right south of Capernaum, down the shoreline of the Sea of Galilee, we come to the town

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of Magdala.

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And I mentioned this, it's very significant what was found here at Magdala.

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And that is that they found the remains of another first-century synagogue.

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But this one had not been built over.

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And so this one, you can see the floor of the first-century synagogue.

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And we can be so certain that Jesus stood there on that floor in that synagogue.

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Why?

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Because two Gospels tell us that Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages in

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the area, and he taught in their synagogues.

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So we can be very, very certain that this one he stood in.

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So we have a story in Matthew 15 where Jesus had just healed the 5,000.

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It says he got in a boat and he came down to the area of Magdala.

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And when he came into the town, which is right there on the sea, it had a port, he came into

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the town and it says that the Pharisees and the Sadducees came to him to test him.

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So we can be pretty sure that that story took place right outside that first-century synagogue,

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which may have been where Jesus was headed to.

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Magdala is also famous for something else.

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This was the hometown of Mary Magdalene.

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Magdalene means she was of Magdala.

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And so this was her hometown.

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When you go there with me, it's one of my favorite places because of the first-century

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synagogue, but also because the Catholics that own this area, and they actually are the

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ones that uncovered the first-century city of Magdala when they were building there,

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they uncovered it all.

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And they built a beautiful chapel right on the shores of the Sea of Galilee, where you

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can go in and you're usually hot and tired from touring.

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And you can sit there in that chapel and look through the all-glass windows to the Sea of

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Galilee.

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And they built a little infinity pool so that when you're sitting there in the pew, all

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you see is water all the way to the Sea of Galilee.

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And the pulpit in this chapel is shaped like a first-century fishing boat.

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So if you are actually going to attend a service there, the priest or pastor will be standing

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in what looks to be a first-century fishing boat.

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It's a very special place.

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And this chapel was built in memory of not just Mary of Magdala, but actually of all

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the women that followed Jesus.

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The name of this chapel is in Latin, which I don't know how to pronounce it exactly,

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but it's duke in Altum.

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And that means launch into the deep, and it's built in commemoration of the famous story

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where the disciples had been fishing all night.

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And Jesus told them to launch out on the other side of the boat, and they launched their

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nets and brought in a miraculous load of fish.

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Now the Sea of Galilee, this northwest corner, was a very Jewish area of the Sea of Galilee.

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But on the east side of the Sea of Galilee, it was Gentile.

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And therefore, when it said that Jesus crossed over to the other side, it means he actually

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crossed over into a more Gentile area.

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And that's where we have the story of the feeding of the 4,000, which is full of symbolism

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and significance, but also the healing of the demoniac who was in the cave there.

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And it really seemed to imply worship of Baal, and he had been possessed by these demons

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from this pagan worship.

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And when Jesus set him free from these demons, it said that they went in.

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He allowed them to go into a herd of pigs, which ran into the water.

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Now what's significance here is that you would never have a herd of pigs over on the

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west side of the Sea of Galilee, because that was the Jewish territory.

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But over in the pagan, more Greek area, which was Roman, Brun, you had pigs, and you had

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this demoniac which seemed to be part of a Baal worship.

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So after this story, it says that Jesus took his disciples into the region of Caesarea

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Philippi.

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Now, Caesarea Philippi is really close to the border between the pagan west side and,

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sorry, the pagan east side and the Jewish west side.

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It's right outside of the town of Bethsaida.

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And at Caesarea Philippi, there was a huge amount of pagan god worship, and there was

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actually a cavern in a cave that went deep into the earth, and they called that the gates

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of hell.

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And there was pagan worship that took place there in Caesarea Philippi.

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So I don't believe Jesus actually entered Caesarea Philippi for that reason.

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But it says that he took his disciples into the region around Caesarea Philippi, and this

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is where he begins to question them.

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He has now spent a couple of years with them.

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So he asked them, who do men say that I am?

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They said, well, some say that you're Elijah, and some say you're a prophet.

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And he said, but who do you say I am?

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And that's where Peter said that thou art the Christ, the Messiah.

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This is a very, very significant story in our whole story of Jesus.

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It's as though he gave them time to get to know him, to hear him, to witness the miracles,

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to follow him closely as a disciple would.

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You know, Jesus gathering disciples around him was very, very common at the time.

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There were other rabbis that had disciples following them.

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But this rabbi was different.

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He not only did miracles, and miracles that no one had seen before, but he taught with

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authority.

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And they had never heard a rabbi speak and teach the way Jesus did.

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So now comes the point.

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He asked his disciples, who do you say that I am?

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And Peter says, thou art the Christ, the Messiah.

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And he tells them not to tell anyone.

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And then it says that after six days he takes them up on a hill.

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Now we assume that this took place really close to this region again, and that this

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hill that he took them up was a part of the range of mountains there in the north of Israel

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called the Hermon Mountains, or you would pronounce it Hermon.

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In English we pronounce it Hermon.

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But in Hebrew it's Hermon.

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And that's the highest mountain in Israel where they do have snow on the top of Mount

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Hermon.

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And you can go up there today and you can ski.

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They have a ski lift.

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But it's a part of a whole range and there are lower hills that come down to eventually

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this area around the Sea of Galilee.

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And so we think that Jesus took his disciples up on one of those hills.

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It's a very, very interesting story and it's highly significant.

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It says that after six days that Jesus and three of the disciples climbed up the high

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mountain.

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Well, the high mountain, that would be Mount Hermon.

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And like Moses, when Moses went up on Sinai, I want to remind you, it says that Moses

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went up on Mount Sinai, Mount Sinai, and that's where God gave him the Torah and God invited

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him to ascend it.

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And it said that for six days he was surrounded by a cloud of glory.

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And on the seventh day then the Lord called from that cloud and he spoke to Moses.

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And here we have in this story, it says that after six days Jesus took three of the disciples

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up to the high mountain and there they were enveloped by a cloud of glory.

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And like Moses, they heard the voice of God speaking.

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And like Moses, Jesus radiated the presence.

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But who did they see there?

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They actually saw Moses there in this cloud and somebody else, Elijah the prophet.

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Why is that?

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Well, Elijah the prophet is the only other person in the Bible who also ascended Sinai

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and heard God speak to him.

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Also the symbolism of Jesus' meeting with Moses and Elijah is that Moses symbolized

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the law and Elijah symbolized the prophets.

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Meaning the entirety of God's word to the Jewish people, the law and the prophets, were

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here verifying Jesus.

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It was a verification of who Jesus was.

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The disciples, two of the disciples saw this and when they came down Jesus told them, don't

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tell anyone.

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He knew that this was probably a bit much.

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This was an earth-shaking revelation of who he was and he told them, don't tell anyone

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but he wanted them to know.

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From this point forward he began to emphasize to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem

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and he must suffer there at the hands of the leaders and he must die.

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They maybe didn't understand what he was telling them but he told them over and over

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and then soon after this he leaves for Jerusalem.

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Next time when we're together we're going to talk about his time in Jerusalem.

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But this brings today to an end of understanding the Galilee ministry where Jesus revealed

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who he was to his followers.

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And then he said, now is the time.

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I must go to Jerusalem.

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So I'll see you back here next time.

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We'll talk about Jesus in Jerusalem.

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And until then, God bless.

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We hope you have enjoyed this episode of Out of Zion with Susan Michael.

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Be sure to subscribe to Out of Zion now on Apple Podcasts, cpnshows.com, YouTube, or

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wherever you like to listen and learn.

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Out of Zion with Susan Michael is a production of ICEJUSA, All Rights Reserved.