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And that night God sent Mary her Son. She had no nice cradle to lay the Lord in, but she had some clothes to put on Him, so she wrapped the sweet babe in them, and laid Him in a manger, where the ox and the ass fed. |
How good it was of our Lord to be born a poor child for our sakes, was it not? He was the Son of God, but to save men He came down and was a babe in a stable of Bethlehem. |
Winter had come, the snow was on the hills near Bethlehem, and some shepherds were keeping watch over their flocks at night for fear the wolves or bears should come and hurt them, when suddenly they saw a great light in the dark sky, and from it a bright angel came down close to them, and they were much afraid. But the... |
Mary gave the name of Jesus to the babe as God had told her, and when He was six weeks old she and Joseph brought Him to God's Temple to present Him to the Lord, and to give two doves to show her thanks for the child God had sent to her. There was an old and good man at that time, to whom God had promised that he shoul... |
The word Christ means anointed -- that is, touched with oil, as kings and priests were -- and the Jews always spoke of the Saviour who was to come as "the Christ," or "King." |
Then Mary took the Child back to Bethlehem. |
Now there were some Wise Men who lived a long way off, and who knew a great deal about the stars. At that time all the world expected that Christ would come, and these wise men had heard that when He was born they would see a new star. One night they saw a bright one that they did not know, and it shone over the land o... |
Now at that time the Romans had made a very bad, cruel man, whose name was Herod, King of the Jews. When he heard of the wise men and of what they wanted to know, he was troubled; for he was afraid if the great King was born that he (Herod) would not be King any longer. So he sent for the chief priests and asked them w... |
Then Herod sent for the wise men and asked them when they first saw the star; and he sent them to Bethlehem and said: "When you have found the young Child bring me word, that I may come and worship Him too." |
But the cruel King meant to kill the Babe if he found him. Then the wise men went to Bethlehem, and to their great joy, the star that they saw in the east went before them till it came and stood over where the young Child was. |
Then the wise men went in, and saw the young Child and Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshipped Him, and gave Him rich gifts -- gold and a sweet scent, and myrrh, which is a kind of gum. But God told them, in a dream, not to return to Herod, so they went back to their own land by another way. And when they we... |
King Herod was very angry when he knew that the wise men were gone home, and he sent and had all the babes in Bethlehem killed, from quite babies up to two years old. He thought, thus, that he would be sure to kill the Holy Child, but God did not let him, you know. |
When this cruel King died, an angel came and told Joseph to take the Child back again into His own land. And Joseph took Him and Mary, and they went to live at Nazareth, a town on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. |
And the Child grew strong and full of wisdom, and the grace of God was on him. And when He was twelve years old, He went up with Mary and Joseph to Jerusalem, to keep the Passover -- this was a feast that God had commanded the Jews to keep, to remind them that He had saved them from death, and set them free when they w... |
Now about fifteen years after this time there came a man in the wild part of the land, by the river Jordan, who cried to the people, "Repent," that is, "Be sorry for your sins and be good," "for the Kingdom of Heaven is near." This man's name was John, and he was the cousin of Jesus. He wore only a rough robe of camel'... |
Then all the people of Jerusalem, and in all the places near, came to John, and said how sorry they were for their sins, and he baptized them in the Jordan -- that is, he poured water on their heads as they stood in the stream as a sign that God would wash their sins away -- that is, forgive them. But he told them all ... |
After He had been baptized, Our Lord went into the wild country, or wilderness, for forty days, and was tempted by the wicked spirit, called the Devil. To tempt any one is to try and make him wicked; but the devil could not make our Lord say or do a wrong thing, although he tried in every way that he possibly could, an... |
But Jesus came back to John the Baptist, and as He came near the river, John said to those who stood by him, "Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world." And he told them how he knew that Jesus was the Son of God, by the voice from heaven and the dove coming down on Him. Again, the next day as John s... |
The next day Our Lord told Philip to follow Him. And Philip went to his friend Nathanael, and said to him, "We have found the Lord who is Christ, He is Jesus of Nazareth." Nathanael said, "Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?" for Nazareth was a very bad town. Philip said, "Come and see." He knew that if his friend... |
Now Jesus had five disciples with Him, and He left the shores of the Jordan and went with his friends, John, Andrew, Peter, Philip, and Nathanael, to a town called Cana. |
And three days after they came to it, there was to be a wedding in Cana. The mother of Jesus was there, and Our Lord and His disciples were invited to the marriage. Now, you know the Lord Jesus and His mother were poor, and no doubt the people who gave the feast were also poor, for they had not enough wine to last till... |
Now there were some large stone jars or pots in the room used for holding water, and Jesus said to the servants, "Fill the water-pots with water." And they filled them up to the brim. And then Our Lord told them to pour it out and take it to the man who was ruler of the feast; for the Jews used to get a friend to see t... |
Now Our Lord had changed the water into wine, and when the ruler of the feast had tasted it he sent for the bridegroom, and said to him, "You have kept the good wine till now," for it was very good wine. But the servants knew that it had been water, and they told every one that Jesus had made it wine. This was the firs... |
Why did our Lord do this wonderful thing? To be kind, and to show men that He was God. There are things men cannot do; but God can do them, and when Jesus did them He showed men that He was God. |
Soon after this, Our Lord went up to Jerusalem to keep the Passover. He went to the Temple -- God's house in which He was worshipped; and where every day they killed a lamb and burnt it on the altar. The lamb was offered up that God might forgive the sins of the people. So when John the Baptist said, "Here is the Lamb ... |
But when our Lord came into the Temple He was very angry. For He saw in it oxen and sheep, doves and pigeons waiting to be sold to people for sacrifice, and tables with heaps of money on them that came from all lands; for the men whose the tables were, changed the gold of far off countries for the Jew's money. Do you n... |
The men whom the Lord drove out were very angry, but they knew that He was quite right, and so they did not strive against Him. But the priests, who ought not to have allowed such things, came to Jesus and said, "Give us some sign, you have a right to do this." They meant, do some miracle. |
But our Lord would not do a miracle for them. He said the only sign that should be given them was, that if they killed Him He would rise again in three days. But they did not know what His words meant. |
While Jesus was here a very good and wise rich man, named Nicodemus, came to see Him by night. He did not go to see Jesus in the daytime, because he was afraid of the Jews; but Our Lord taught him a great many things. Among others, that God so loved the World that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believed ... |
Then Jesus left the City, and went about teaching and doing good, healing the sick, making the blind see, and the deaf hear, and so He came to Samaria. Now the Jews hated the people who lived there; and the Samaritans hated the Jews. Our Lord never hated any one. He loved both the good and the bad, and came to save all... |
One day Our Lord was very tired; He had been teaching the poor and making the sick well, and He had walked a long way, and He wanted food. So He sat down on the stone edge of an old well in Samaria, while the disciples went to buy food, and while He sat there a woman came from the town with a jug to draw water. And Jes... |
What did Our Lord mean by living water? He meant God's grace -- that is -- God's help to make us good. The woman did not know what He meant, so she said, "Give me this water that I may not have to come here to draw any more." Then Our Lord told her of her sins; He knew that she was not good; He knew all her past life, ... |
Think how glad she must have been when Our Lord said, "I, that speak unto you, am He." |
Just then His disciples came, and they wondered that He talked to a Samaritan woman. She left her water-pot, and went to tell her friends, and to ask them to come and see Jesus. The disciples said to Our Lord, "Master, eat;" they had brought food; but Jesus cared more to do God's work than to eat, though He was hungry. |
The woman brought many of the people of the town to Our Lord, and they believed that He was the Christ, and begged that He would stay with them and teach them; and He did stay there for two days. How good our Lord was to stay and teach these poor men, to whom the proud Jews would not even speak. Then Jesus went to Cana... |
Our Lord wanted to try the man's faith, so He did not say, "Yes, I will," at once. He said, "If you do not see signs and wonders you will not believe." But the man said again, "Sir, do come down or my son will be dead." Our Lord pitied him and said, "Go thy way, thy son liveth." |
Jesus could cure the sick boy without seeing him. The rich man had faith; he believed Our Lord's words and went his way, but before he reached his house his servants met him, and said, "Your son is getting well." "When did he begin to get better?" asked the father. "Yesterday, at the seventh hour, the fever left him," ... |
You see what bad men lived in Nazareth. They drove away the good, gentle Lord, who came to save them from their sins, because they were proud and jealous of Him; and He never again came to teach them. He went down to Capernaum, another town by the Sea of Galilee, and taught there and did many miracles, and it was calle... |
Our Lord had not His disciples always with Him yet; John and James and Andrew and Peter had gone back to their boats to fish; but now Jesus wished them to be always with Him, so He called them again. I will tell you how. One day when Jesus was on the sea-shore, such crowds of people came to hear Him speak to them that ... |
Then Peter called to the other boat, in which were his partners, James and John, to help him, and they came and filled both boats with fish; there were so many that the boats began to sink. |
When Simon Peter saw it he fell down at Our Lord's feet, and said, "Go away from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord." |
For he was afraid. But Jesus said to him, "Fear not; from this time you shall catch men." What did that mean? Peter knew, and James and John knew; it meant that they must not fish any more, but come and try to draw men to the Lord to make them good. They were quite sure now that Our Lord was the Christ, so when they ha... |
After Our Lord had been away for a time from Capernaum, He went back there. As soon as the people heard it they came in great numbers to the house Jesus was in, to see and hear Him. |
Now the houses in that land are not like ours: they have flat roofs, on which you can walk or sit, and a staircase outside the house leads up to it. Most of the houses -- all the large ones -- have a court in the middle of them. The people crowded into the court of the house where Our Lord was, and He preached to them ... |
Now there was a poor man in the town who was sick of the palsy, so that he could not move; and lay always on a bed. He wished very much to go to Our Lord for help, and his friends who loved him had him carried by four men on a kind of bed to the house where the Lord Jesus was, but they could not come near Him through t... |
After Our Lord had made the sick man well, He walked down to the shore of the beautiful sea of Galilee. The crowd followed Him, and there in the fresh, sweet air, He went on teaching them. Not far off was a place called the Receipt of Custom. I will tell you for what it was used. |
The Romans made the Jews pay them money, and this was called a tax. They put men in some places to receive this tax for them, and these men were called Publicans. They were not good men generally, and the priests and great men hated them; but some of them were just and honest. Levi was; and we may be sure he had heard ... |
Now some of the Jews hated Our Lord; these were the Scribes and Pharisees. The Scribes were men who wrote out the laws -- there were no printed books in those days -- so they were thought wise; the Pharisees were a set of men who pretended to serve God better than any other people, and made a show of praying, saying th... |
Now I must tell you that Levi had two names, as you have. His first name was Matthew, and a long time after, he wrote the story of Our Lord's life. It is called the Gospel -- that means good news -- of St. Matthew, and it is in the Bible. |
Now just as the feast was ending there came a ruler and he threw himself down at Jesus' feet, and said, "My daughter is dying, but come and lay Your hands on her and she shall live." This ruler's name was Jairus; he had great faith. And Jesus rose up at once and went with him, and so did His disciples. And as they went... |
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