The Great Gospel of John
Volume 9

Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching

The Lord in Cana

- Chapter 109 -

The true sanctification of the Sabbath.

Since I knew his weakness I put him to the test, so I slept with My disciples until sunrise, which made the Sabbath-conscious of the innkeeper restless.

After the sun had completely risen, I left the table with My disciples and went outside, what I mostly used to do in any other place.

However, the innkeeper came directly after Me, greeted Me very respectfully, as also the disciples, and asked Me: "O Lord and Master, what must be done now? It is the Sabbath today. The morning meal was already prepared before sunrise. Do You also want to take it after sunrise, and should I also give food to the 4 from India in the daytime?"

I said: "O My dear friend, look, on other occasions you are in all respects really a wise man, but what concerns the celebration of the Sabbath you are still like the blind Pharisees who keep the letter of the law, but who never knew about its spirit. If you give feed to your sheep, oxen, cows, calves, donkeys and goats, just like on a working day - which is certainly also a servile work - then why must men fast? Does God consider men less than your domestic animals? Besides, I am today, as well as eternities ago, also Lord over the Sabbath, as well as over every other day, which are, just like the Sabbath, a day of the Lord. Should I then not do on a Sabbath the same as on any other day?

Who let the sun come up? Who let the grass grow? Who let the winds blow and who let the clouds pass by? Who drives the water in the wells, brooks, rivers and streams? Who brings the sea into movement from one end of the Earth to the other? Who drives your blood in the veins, and the heart in the chest - mind you - also on the Sabbath?

If I would rest on a Sabbath, even for one moment, would the whole creation not go to ruin?

Look, to perform works of true neighborly love means to Me: to truly serve God and men, which is certainly more important than celebrating the Sabbath in laziness. Therefore, perform good works also on the Sabbath, then you will celebrate the Sabbath in the manner that is most pleasing to Me, the Lord.

And now we will return to the dining hall to partake of the morning meal, and the 4 Indo-Jews, who have their Sabbath only the day after tomorrow, should do the same."

When the innkeeper heard Me saying that, he realized immediately the great foolishness of the outer celebration of the Sabbath and let the morning meal be set on the table. And we went to the dining hall, sat at the table and we very cheerfully partook of the morning meal.

Now came also the 4 Indo-Jews, and I told them to sit at our table to share the morning meal with us, which they also did with great pleasure, for they did not know that in Galilee, as well as in the whole Jewish land, the Sabbath was celebrated on that day.

After we had taken the morning meal, the Sabbath-shouter came through the streets of the little city Kana, who called the people, great and small, young and old, to go to the synagogue. Now the 4 were frightened because they heard now that today it was the true, ancient Jewish Sabbath, and they had taken a morning meal after sunrise.

But I said: "I am the Lord, also over the Sabbath. If I truly do not count this as a sin to you, then why should you burden your conscious?"

The man said: "We thank You, o Lord, for Your word of mercy that comforts our hearts tremendously, for if we would have sinned now before You, then You certainly would have told us and rebuked us. However, how is it possible that it is not a sin in Your eyes what was called a sin according to the law of Moses? Then why did Moses give such laws as if from God to the people?"

I said: "Otherwise you are truly a wise man and well acquainted with the Scripture of Moses. The letter you know indeed, and the word is not strange to you, but the true spirit, which makes everything alive, and is hidden in the word, is still strange to you, just like it became strange to all the Jews a long time before the Babylonian captivity. That is why you still hold on to the dead bark, but the essence and the activity of the living marrow within the tree is strange to you. If you damage the old bark of a tree, it will bring no visible damage to the life of the tree, but if you damage the marrow of a tree, that will be a sin against the life of the tree, because the tree will wither after that and will thus die.

Look, under the pharaohs in Egypt the Israelites became lazy, and gluttons like the animals. They almost completely forgot the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and they thought highly of the idols of the Egyptians. Only a few remained loyal to the one, true God, and they prayed to God that He would save His people from the hard bondage and unscrupulous tyranny of the Egyptians. And God did so through Moses, as you well know.

However, for 40 years in the desert, with the daily visible help of Jehovah, Moses had much to do with the degenerated people to lift them up by means of wise teachings and suitable laws unto that state in which man should live according to God's order. A degenerated people needed also laws that prescribed to man when, what, how much and how often he should eat and drink on a day, and how he should clothe himself and cleanse his body.

Also the people were very inclined to laziness and did not want to do any work on any day, and Moses gave them only the 7th day to celebrate and to rest, and on that day they were instructed by the leaders about God, His order, His will and His guidance, and they were seriously warned not to rebel against the laws.

But once man, out of his own free will, acquires God's order and becomes active in all that is good, true and right, it can be no sin to him when he as a completely healthy human being will not take any more medicines that a sick person has to take. Therefore, also you, who are a god-fearing and righteous man, you will not sin against the celebration of the Sabbath when you will take food and drink, always with measure, also after sunrise, at noon time and also, when you are hungry, before sunset, and when you will do good to your fellowman just like on a working day. Do as I do, then you will do what is right and live.

To what advantage is it for the celebration of the Sabbath when the Jews are excessively stuffing themselves with food and drink, often already 3 hours before sunrise, and this so much so that during the whole Sabbath they can hardly walk or stand? And after sunset they again begin to revel and guzzle until midnight, and so they cannot do any work the next working day. Know that such celebration of the Sabbath is in My eyes an abomination. However, if you keep the Sabbath in the manner that I have shown you, then this is My will and thus certainly pleasing to Me. Therefore, remember always: the letter of the law kills, it is only the inner spirit of love and truth that makes you alive."

When the man heard Me saying that, he and the 3 others thanked Me for this lesson, and they all became cheerful.

Then the innkeeper asked Me if he had to go to the synagogue with his family or if he also could stay at home.

I said: "Who is more, I or the synagogue? Let your personnel go to it and send an offering to the rabbi, which is more dear to him than your presence, but you better stay home, because soon a caravan from Persia will come here and will give you much work to do."

The innkeeper said: "O Lord and Master, now that today it is a New Moon Sabbath, this is very inconvenient, because we innkeepers have a strict law that forbids us to take in a Jew, let alone a stranger, into the inns on this kind of Sabbath."

I said: "It is good in My eyes when you do good, as I have said to you, and also before to the men from India, but if you are unnecessarily afraid of the chief of the synagogue, then send him, through your chief servant, an offering of exemption, then he gladly will give you that permission."

The innkeeper did so, and the chief servant brought to him immediately a card of exemption, valid for 3 Sabbaths. And the innkeeper was very glad about that, because the caravan gave him a hundredfold profit compared to what he paid for the card.

Then the innkeeper asked Me: "Lord and Master, is it right what the chief of the synagogue did? By paying an offering for an exemption to break the Sabbath, which is to him an extremely great and most punishable sin, he allows me to commit this sin with my whole family, and this without any worry, as if I never had to fear any punishment for that."

I said: "Friend, if, according to his conscious and in the light of his faith, the chief really thinks that the breaking of the Sabbath is a sin, then the sin will be on his account, because for money he let others commit it. But if he has no faith and still pretends before the people that he believes firmly and has no doubt that he considers it as an extremely punishable sin according to the Scripture - which he says for the sake of appearances - giving severe sermons of punishment about it, then he is not only an equally frequent breaker of the Sabbath as those many to whom, for money, he gave permission to commit a sin, but he also commits by that the still much greater sin of lie, hypocrisy and greediness, because he gave up his faith for the sake of his greed.

But the one who, like you now, has received permission to, so-called, profane the Sabbath, can all the more be encouraged to do good works on the Sabbath, because it is My will to celebrate the Sabbath in this manner."

When the innkeeper heard that from Me, he immediately told his personnel that they should make all the necessary things ready to serve a big caravan.

And everybody went to work, and this all the more zealously because the first line of the caravan did already arrive before the inn.

Footnotes

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