Dinner at Jesus’ House

Dinner at Jesus’ House.  Matthew 8.14-15; Matthew 12.46 

“Jude, will you please pass the lentils?”  Jesus asked.  And so the earthen bowl was passed from brother to brother, as the family partook of the evening meal.  Mary noticed Jesus’ hunger and said, ‘Son, you must have worked incredibly hard with your father today!  Jude, pass Jesus another piece of bread, won’t you?”  Like all good mothers, Mary no doubt made sure her husband and children had enough to eat—besides lentils and bread, dinner would have also variously included hummus, perhaps some figs, dates or nuts, and seasonal fruits and vegetables.¹  

As you can see, the fare of a simple Nazarene family such as the home in which Jesus grew up, was simple.  Am I making this up?  Yes and no.  The narrative is mine, but the details are true.  It surprises some people to think of Jesus in this normal familiar setting of his childhood, teens and twenties around the dinner table with his brothers and sisters.  Yes, it is true, Jesus was not an only child, though of course, he was the only who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, thereby making his brothers and sisters half-siblings.  There were at least four younger brothers—James, Joseph, Jude, and Simon², and at least two younger sisters whose names we do not know from Scripture.³ Even Matthew makes reference to them, “While he [Jesus] was still speaking to the people, behold, his mother and his brothers stood outside, asking to speak to him.”⁴ 

Can you imagine growing up with Jesus?  What was the family’s dinnertime conversation like? And what would it have been like to eat dinner and sleep next to the Son of God?  I wonder what Jesus knew about himself, and when?  What did his siblings know?  Hmmm . . . 

I got to thinking about Jesus’ family when I read Matthew’s brief account about Peter’s family:  “Now when Jesus had come into Peter’s house, He saw his wife’s mother lying sick with a fever.  So He touched her hand, and the fever left her. And she arose and served them.”  Matthew 8.14-15  I love the response of the woman who was healed; she got up and immediately wanted to serve the one who had touched and healed her.  Note to self:  when I have received a blessing from God—such as answered prayer, for instance—is my first reaction to think about how I can bless God, how I can serve him? 

So we know for certain that Peter was married and maintained a home.  Paul makes reference to the marital status of other apostles, by asking the Corinthian believers, “Don’t we have the right to bring a believing wife with us as the other apostles and the Lord’s brothers do, and as Peter does?”⁶ From this, we can assume that Peter was not the only one of the disciples to have a wife.  Intriguing, is it not? 

This is interesting to me because even as we study the pages of the Gospels, trying to learn about Jesus’ life, teaching, miracles, and relationships, there is so very much we do not know—like about his growing up years, as an example. 

Matthew, Mark, Luke and John record fewer than forty miracles of Jesus, but we know that there were many more than that.  O to have walked with him!  O to have been in the crowd when he taught, to be witness when Jesus turned plain water into the finest of wine to save the day for a wedding celebration!  Yes, there was far more to Jesus’ life and ministry than was recorded.

John, the one whom Jesus loved, closed his gospel by assuring us that is certainly the case:  “And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. Amen.”⁷

Thought provoking, isn’t it? 

While we can know a lot about Jesus from the pages of Scripture, we will never know it all.  That said, experiencing life with Jesus gives some clues along the way.  There is no greater adventure than following closely in the dust of the Rabbi! 

Christine

astorWoman.com 

1 – This dinnertime scene is my narrative, but the names are real as well as the food items common for first century meals.

2 – Matthew 13.55

3 – Matthew 13.56

4 – Matthew 12.46, ESV

5 -  http://www.gotquestions.org/disciples-married.html#ixzz3eYk4SbWe

6 – 1 Corinthians 9.5

7 – John 21.25