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When
he was just twelve years old, his parents who had traveled to Jerusalem
for the the Feast of the Passover found young Jesus missing on the way
back home. Much to their relief he was retraced three days later back
at the temple talking to the teachers and the priests. His understanding
of the scriptures amazed everybody. Jesus told his anxious mother that
he had to be in his Father’s house and she should not have worried.
He always followed his religion properly keeping all the feasts, going
to the synagogue regularly and keeping of the Sabbath. Yet he never hesitated
to correct his fellow men that keeping the Sabbath for the sake of it
and carrying it to the extent of a rigorous ritual was neither necessary
nor useful. He did this by citing examples of King David and his people
(Luke6;3-5) and also healing people on the Sabbath. He did this to show
that it was better to help rather than make the excuse of Sabbath and
refrain from lending a helping hand and more important love for God should
be in the heart and it should not be replaced by love for days. Sabbath
is useful so long as it is spent the proper way, prayerfully. It is the
praying that helps and not the day by itself.
Jesus was definitely not diplomatic. While dining with a Pharisee on invitation
(Pharisees were keepers of the Jewish Law) a woman brought along some
expensive perfume with her to pour it on the feet of Jesus. She then wiped
them with her hair. Looking at this there was a lot of criticism at the
waste involved. Jesus rebuked them with words like this “ You who
have neither welcomed me warmly nor gave me water to wash my feet, should
you put this woman down ? Many of her sins have been forgiven and therefore
she is showing greater love.”
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