The Great Gospel of John
Volume 10
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
The Lord in Abila
- Chapter 69 -
The midday meal and the departure of the Lord.
They all thanked Me for this lesson, and the mayor stood up from the table to leave because he saw that the eldest had given his personnel instruction to put the midday meal on the table. But I asked him to stay and to partake of the midday meal with us, and he stayed and ate with us.
2
When he saw the noble fishes, he asked the captain if and when he perhaps had given the fishes from Gennesaret or Gadara to the Jews.
3
But the captain said: "Friend, not I did this, but only and solely the Lord for whom everything is possible, of which you were able to convince yourself enough today. And so these fishes are also a sign of His divine power and glory. Eat them, and strengthen yourself with them - your body and in the heart of your soul."
4
Then the mayor took a fish and ate it immediately, since it tasted extremely well to him, but he did not take a second one because he already felt completely strengthened with that one fish.
5
A lot of things were still talked about during the meal, about the phenomena and the things in the natural world, and the mayor experienced great joy on it.
6
The conversation was also about dreams, and I Myself explained to them the inner world of the dreams and showed them the divine, creating power that is still not developed in the soul, and that he can attain to his highest development and perfection by faithfully acting according to My teaching.
7
The Greek experienced also a great joy on that, as well as the captain, and he said: "O, the people know all together nothing, and they are nothing compared to You, o Lord, Lord."
8
I said: "That is why I came to you in this world, to show you the way on which, while walking on, you can attain to that perfection in all things that I unchangeably and immutably possess from eternity. I am all in all, and everything is in Me and from Me. And so you also will be with Me as My children.
9
I say to you: no eye has ever seen, no ear has ever heard, and in no human thought has it ever come up what kind of blissfulness is prepared for those who love Me and who faithfully keep My commandments. So be sober, zealous in all things that are good and true, and be active with all the love and patience, so that My Spirit can awake and rise in you and will show you, in the clearest light, the inner divine world in the heart of your soul. For in this lies hidden an undiscovered extremely blissful eternity for the outer man, and no one except Me knows the way to it. But I have shown you that way. Therefore, follow it, so that you can attain to the divine world in yourself."
10
After these words of Mine, the Greek said: "This is a very deep inner wisdom, but I could not completely understand it, for I certainly am still completely an outer man in everything. That is why I will try to gradually put off that outer man completely in order to understand the inner man more and more. O Lord, Lord, be and remain helpful to me in this heavy task. For only with Your help can man, who is poor and weak when he is on his own, attain to everything, but without that help eternally to nothing else than death, which everyone must once experience - a destiny which will really not help to make a deep thinking man cheerful and happy. And that is also why no one has seen us, adherers of Diogenes, walking around with a happy face.
11
But from now on, now that I personally have seen and spoken to the Creator and the Lord of Life and all things and have convincingly heard from His mouth that there is eternally no death for man, I became very cheerful in my heart. O Lord, Lord, keep me in that cheerfulness, because a sad person cannot have any pleasure in a good work."
12
I said: "If you do your part, I will do Mine. But do not desire too much cheerfulness of life as long as you are still walking in the flesh, for then the soul can easily go astray into the worldly and the material, and then he will only find the way to life very difficultly in the right perfection.
13
Bear joy and sorrow with the right patience and in full dedication to My will, then later in My Kingdom you will be adorned with the crown of life.
14
But now My time has also come for this place, and I will leave you now and go to another place where there are also many dead whom I want to awaken to life. You, captain, are free now to accompany Me to Golan."
15
The captain said: "O Lord and Master, I would like to accompany You much farther if this would be pleasing to You, for in this springtime, as far as my work is concerned, I have the time for it. But to the places that are under my command, I certainly will accompany You because I have to review them anyway. My subordinates will therefore also go with us, as well as my daughter. And so we can go on our way now."
16
Now also the Jews of this house came, thanked Me deeply moved for the wonderful mercy I had shown to them, and they asked Me not to leave them with My help in case of necessity.
17
I promised them that I would stay with them in the spirit if they would stay in My teaching. The captain promised them also that he would protect them, and also the mayor said the same.