Additional Study Material - The Third Year of Jesus’ Public Ministry

The third year commences with a dramatic miracle—the feeding of five thousand. Because of this miracle, many of the Jews seek to make Jesus their king, but he refuses. He later tells the people that they have followed him, not because of his miracles, but because he has fed them. That is, not because they wished to obey his teachings, but for selfish, physical reasons. Jesus then delivers to them his great discourse on the Bread of Life, announcing openly that he is the messiah. With the miracle of the feeding of five thousand, it appears that Jesus reaches the highest point of his popularity with the masses.

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Additional Study Material - “He that receiveth whomsoever I send receiveth me”

Jesus taught profound doctrine and worked mighty miracles according to the faith of the people of Galilee. From this spreading of the kingdom, he turned a second time to the town of his youth, offering to Nazareth a second chance to hear his truth and acknowledge his ministry, He testified of his divinity by marvelous works; but his compassion for mankind, which had been manifest so often among the believers of Galilee, found few ready, receiving hearts in Nazareth. Jesus left Nazareth and commenced another journey into Galilee.

He called, commissioned, and sent others to labor in the cause of truth with a statement of the greatest possible earthly honor and approval: “He that receiveth you receiveth me.” (Matthew 10:40.) Jesus led his church through authorized servants, holy men, who dispensed his power and his will to the saints and to the world. It was true for his servants then, it is true for his servants today as well—an everlasting principle.

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Additional Study Material - “He Spake Many Things unto Them in Parables”

The word parable is Greek in origin and means a setting side by side, a comparison. In parables divine truth is presented by comparison with material things. The Hebrew word, mashal, which parable is used to translate, has a wider significance, and is applied to the balanced metrical form in which teaching is conveyed in the poetical books of the Old Testament. See Matt. 13:35.

Most teachers, especially those in the Middle East, have used some form of parable in their instruction, but none so exclusively as Jesus at one period of His ministry. During part of the Galilean ministry the record states that “without a parable spake he not unto them” (Mark 4:34). From our Lord’s words (Matt. 13:13–15; Mark 4:12; Luke 8:10) we learn the reason for this method. It was to veil the meaning. The parable conveys to the hearer religious truth exactly in proportion to his faith and intelligence; to the dull and uninspired it is a mere story, “seeing they see not,” while to the instructed and spiritual it reveals the mysteries or secrets of the kingdom of heaven. Thus it is that the parable exhibits the condition of all true knowledge. Only he who seeks finds.

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Additional Study Material - “Whosoever Shall Do the Will of the Father”

Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples, And said unto him, Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?

The question often arises why John would send his disciples to ask such a question of Jesus. Still months after the baptism of Jesus and after John’s repeated efforts to persuade them, John found some of his disciples still reluctant to detach themselves from him and to follow their true Master. It seems most consistent to identify John’s motive in sending the two disciples to Jesus as one of persuasion for them, rather than of reassurance for himself. The question they were to put to Jesus was for their edification, not for his own. John knew, as no one else knew, who Jesus was, and he had known it for a long time. He had had revelation from heaven to this effect: he had seen with his eyes, he had heard with his ears, and he had the testimony of the Holy Ghost. He even had received the ministry of angels while in the prison.

The most satisfactory answer seems to be that John sent his disciples to question Jesus about his identity so that they themselves would at long last realize the truth of what John had been testifying for these many months.

With that in mind, what is our answer to that question? And when we have our answer, what are we to do about it?

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Additional Study Material - “Be Ye Therefore Perfect”

Have you given much thought as to what your ultimate goal is? How does it make you feel when you read these words of Jesus: “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect”? (Matthew 5:48.) Your divine potential is to become like your Father in heaven, perfect and without sin.

Perfection is a word that causes different reactions from many people. Some people say, “Perfection? Why, that is impossible!” Others say, “Perfection? I get discouraged just thinking about it!”

Yet, would the Lord give us a commandment that was impossible for us to keep? And when he gives a commandment, doesn’t he, as Nephi said, prepare a way for us to accomplish what he commands? The Sermon on the Mount is the Lord’s blueprint for perfection.

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Day 181

Matthew 23; Matthew 24; Matthew 25

Jesus pronounces woes upon the scribes and Pharisees. They will be held responsible for killing the prophets. They will not escape the damnation of hell. Jesus foretells the doom of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple. Great calamities will precede his Second Coming. He gives the parable of the fig tree. Jesus gives the parables of the ten virgins, the talents, and the sheep and the goats.

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Additional Study Material - The Second Year of Jesus’ Public Ministry

The second year opened as Jesus came down from Galilee to attend the feast of the Passover at Jerusalem. While there he healed a man on the Sabbath day. So reactionary were the Jewish leaders to a healing on the Sabbath that they sought to kill Jesus. The plot against Jesus caused him to withdraw again to Galilee, where he called and ordained twelve men, whom he designated as apostles.

Some of the places and events and some of the highlights of the second phase of the Galilean ministry mentioned by the Gospel writers can be found here.

One of the remarkable spiritual experiences to which the disciples were privileged is described by the Master, himself: "Ye have not chosen me but I have chosen you and ordained you,—that whatsoever ye should ask the Father in my name He may give it you." (John 15:16) Try to imagine if you can, being "called" by the Master and "ordained" under His hands. That these ordinations resulted in an endowment of power from on high as well as giving authority to act officially as the Lord’s representatives, is well attested by the miraculous events that followed, which made of them, "men different" because of that divine commission.

What is the distinction between a disciple and an apostle? Get some more of the answer - click here.

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