The Good Shepherd | Page 8

Holy Spirit. He gives the Holy Spirit to
everyone who asks Him.
Then Jesus spoke to the woman about the bad things she had done, and
she tried to make Him talk about something else. But she could not stop
His wonderful words. At last she said, 'I know that the Messiah is
coming. He will tell us all things.' Then Jesus said to her, 'I THAT
SPEAK UNTO THEE AM HE.'
Just then His disciples came up to the well, and they were very much
astonished to see Him talking to the woman. The Jew men were too
proud to talk much to women, even if the women were Jews; and this
was a Samaritan. But the disciples did not ask Jesus any questions
about why He talked to the woman. They brought Him the things they
had been buying, and said, 'Master, eat.' But Jesus was so happy that
He had been able to speak good words to that poor woman that He did
not feel hungry any more. He told His disciples that doing God's work
was the food He liked best.
After this Jesus lived for awhile first at Nazareth, and then at
Capernaum. There was a boy ill in Capernaum just then with a fever. It
is so hot near the Sea of Galilee that the people who live there often get
fever. That sick boy's father was rich, but money could not make the
dying boy well. His father had heard of Jesus, and when he knew that
Jesus had come into Galilee, and that He was only a few miles away, he
came to Him, and begged Him to come down to Capernaum and make
his child well. At first Jesus said to him, 'You will not believe on Me
unless you see Me do some wonderful thing.' But when He saw how
eager the poor father was, He thought He would try him, and He said to
him, 'Go thy way, thy son liveth.' Directly Jesus said that, the man felt
sure in his heart that his boy was well. He did not ask Jesus any more to
come with him, but he just went back home quietly by himself.

Next day, as he was going down the long hilly road from Cana to
Capernaum, some of the servants from his house came to meet him,
and they said to him, 'Thy son liveth.' Then the father asked them what
time it was when the boy began to get better, and said, 'Yesterday, at
the seventh hour (that means at one o'clock) the fever left him.' Then
the father knew that that was the very time when Jesus had said to him,
'Thy son liveth,' and he and all the people in the house believed in
Jesus.
The Jews could not bear paying taxes to the Romans, and they hated
the publicans. They would not eat with them or talk with them. But
Jesus did not hate the publicans. He only hated the wrong things they
did. So one day, when He was outside the town of Capernaum, and saw
Matthew sitting and taking the taxes, He said to him, 'Follow Me.' And
Matthew got up from his work, and at once left all and followed Jesus.
Jesus often told His disciples beautiful stories. One day He told them a
story to teach them not to be proud like the Pharisees. 'Two men went
up into the Temple to pray: the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican.
The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank Thee
that I am not as other men are; I thank Thee that I am not even as this
publican. Twice a week I go without food, and I give away a great deal
of money. But the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so
much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God
be merciful to me, a sinner. When the publican went home that night he
was better and happier than the Pharisee. The Pharisee thought he was
good; he did not want to be forgiven, and so God let him carry all his
sins back home with him again. But the publican knew he was a sinner,
and was sorry, and so God forgave his sins.'
While Jesus was in Capernaum, He went every Sabbath day to teach in
the synagogue. One day a man shouted out--
'What have we to do with Thee, Thou Jesus of Nazareth? I know Thee
who Thou art, the Holy One of God.'
Satan had put an unclean spirit, or devil, in that man. Jesus was not
angry with the poor man, but He spoke to the unclean spirit, and said,

'Be silent, and come out of him.' He