The Good Shepherd | Page 6

Jesus who had come to be baptized before He began His work. He wanted to obey God in everything; and He wanted to show that He was the Brother and Friend of all the people whom John had been baptizing. And so, as Jesus wished it, John went into the River Jordan with Him and baptized Him.
When Jesus had been baptized, and was full of the Holy Spirit, He went away into a wilderness. And there, when Jesus was tired and hungry, Satan came to Him--just as he came to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden--to tempt Him.
To tempt means to try. Mother tries you sometimes, to see whether you can be trusted; and God tries us all sometimes. But if God tries us, it is to make us better; and if Satan tries us, it is to make us worse.
Every time that Jesus was tempted, He said, 'It is written,' and then He told Satan something 'which was written in the Bible. That is the very best way to fight Satan. The Bible is called 'the Sword of the Spirit,' and Satan is afraid when he sees us using that Sword. Let us ask God to fill us, like Jesus, with the Holy Spirit, and then we shall soon learn how to use the Sword of the Spirit, and we too shall be able to drive Satan away when he comes to tempt us.
Only we must be sure to read the Bible, as Jesus used to do, or else we shall never be able to drive Satan away by telling him the things that God has written there.
CHAPTER V
JESUS BEGINS HIS WORK
One day, when the fight of Jesus with the devil in the wilderness was over, He came to Bethabara, where John was baptizing, and when John saw Jesus coming towards him, he said:
'BEHOLD THE LAMB OF GOD, WHICH TAKETH AWAY THE SIN OF THE WORLD.'
The next day John saw Jesus again, and again he said the same words:
'BEHOLD THE LAMB OF GOD!'
John called Jesus the Lamb of God, because He had come to die for our sins.
Two men were standing close to John when Jesus came by, and they heard what he said. The name of one of these men was Andrew, and of the other John. Jesus knew that they would like to speak to Him, so He turned round and asked them what they wanted. 'Master,' they said, 'where dwellest Thou?' (that means 'where are you living?') Jesus said, 'Come, and you shall see.' And He took the two disciples to His home, and He let them stay with Him the whole of the day. What a happy day that must have been!
Andrew had a brother called Simon, and he went and found him, and told him that he had found the Messiah, and brought him to see his new Master. So now Jesus had three disciples--John, Andrew, and Simon; and next day He took them away with Him to Galilee. While they were going along, Jesus saw a man called Philip, who came from the place where Simon and Andrew lived when they were at home. Jesus told Philip to come with Him, and he came. But Philip went to a friend of his, a very good man called Nathanael, also called Bartholomew, and he told him that he had found Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, and begged him to come and see Him.
How many disciples had Jesus now? Let us see. John, Andrew, Simon, Philip, and Nathanael--five. And very likely John had brought his brother James to Jesus. If so, that would make six.
Directly Jesus came into Galilee He was invited to a wedding, at a place called Cana, and all of His disciples with Him. Jesus went to the wedding because He likes to see people happy, and loves to make them happy. In America, people often drink more wine at weddings and at other times than is good for them, and a great many people go without any wine at all, so as to set a good example. But in the East it is different. The people there hardly ever take too much wine. So Jesus allowed His disciples to use it, and He drank it Himself. There was some wine at the wedding party to which Jesus went; but presently it came to an end. Then Mary came to Jesus, and said, 'They have no wine.' Jesus knew what Mary was thinking about, but He had to tell her to wait; and He had to make Mary understand that He could not do everything now which she told Him to do, exactly as when He was a boy. He was God's Son as well as Mary's, and He had God's work to do, and He must do it at