Sometime later, Yeshua sneaked back into town.
But it wasn't long before half of Capernaum knew he was there
and the house was packed to overflowing again.
Yeshua was inside preaching to the people
when four men arrived outside with a paralyzed man on a stretcher.
There was no way through the crowd, so they carried the man up onto the flat roof.
And they started tearing up the tiles.
When they had made a big enough hole in the ceiling
they lowered the stretcher down with the paralyzed man on it.
Despite the damage, Yeshua was impressed by their faith, and he said to the sick man
"I forgive you for this, and for any other sins that you have done."
Some religious experts there heard it and they grumbled in their hearts...
"What blasphemy! He can't forgive sins!
"Only Yahweh can do that!"
Yeshua had a pretty good idea what they were thinking.
So he said, "What's the real reason you're upset?
"Anyone can say that someone's sins have been forgiven
"but could you tell this man to get up and take his stretcher home with him?
"Now I'm going to show you that I have the right to forgive sins."
Then Yeshua turned to the paralyzed man...
"Go ahead, get up.
"Now pick up your stretcher. And now carry it home with you."
Right there and then, the healed man did as he was told in front of everyone.
It startled them all, and it was clear to everyone that it was Yahweh who made it all possible.
He really did have the right to forgive sins!
"I'm telling you, none of us he has ever seen anything like this before! Never!"
Yeshua later left the house and went down by the beach.
More crowds gathered, and he taught them too.
Somewhere along the way he came upon Matthew, the son of Alphaeus
sitting at a table, collecting taxes for the Roman armies.
"Hey, come with me, Matthew."
Well, what do you know? Matthew got up and followed him too! Just like that; without hesitation.
One evening back at the house Yeshua was having dinner
and several tax collectors and other disreputable sorts were there with him and his disciples.
The usual religious leaders took note that he was eating with such people
and they approached some of Yeshua's disciples...
"Why does he do that?"
"What does he see in such people? Doesn't he know that they're bad people?"
"Who needs a doctor the most? Sick people, or those who are well?
"I'm not here to flatter those who think they're better than others.
"I'm here to help the ones who know they need to change!"
Followers of John the Baptist, like so many other religious people of the day, would often fast.
At that time, some of these religious people approached Yeshua.
"We show that we want to change by fasting, and John's followers do the same.
"But your people not even far and fasting! Look at 'em!"
"Do people fast at a wedding party?
"That would be an insult to the groom. They're happy for the groom and so they celebrate with him.
"But there is coming a time when the groom will be taken away!
"That'll be soon enough to start fasting.
"If you try to stitch new cloth onto a worn out garment, it'll just make the hole worse
"because the old cloth is too weak to hold together with the patch.
"And you don't put new wine into old wine skins.
"If you do as the wine ferments the expansion will burst those hard old skins, and the wine will be lost.
"No, when you have something that is really new... really different...
"you need people who are not happy with the old ways to help get you started."
One Sabbath, Yeshua and his disciples were gleaning grain from a field as they walked through it.
And again, the starchy old religious leaders took offense.
"Don't you have any respect for the Sabbath?"
"Harvesting is not allowed on rest days!"
"Well how about this one...
"When David and his men were hungry
"they went into the house of Yahweh and ate the sacred bread.
"That was against the Torah too!
"Yet David took enough for himself and his men as well.
"You see, the Sabbath law was made to keep employers from oppressing their workers.
"The Sabbath was never intended to make life harder for people.
"When you get the spirit of what I'm saying you will be able to see through the Commandments
"to the intention or spirit that was behind it in the first place."