Capernaum--Where they Believed

Three more days to nominate CAYMAN SUMMER for the Whitney Award. Anyone, anywhere can nominate until December 31st. And don't forget to enter my Christmas Week swag giveaway. I promised I'd send out Michael and Leesie M&Ms when it was cold, so I didn't have to worry about them melting. Here's your chance to get a bag of your own.

Today I'm giving you a tour of Capernaum. Jesus lived here for eighteen to twenty months. Instead of trying to kill him, the people of Capernaum believed!

Capernaum had a population of 10,000.

Capernaum was a fishing town and sits on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. We fell in love with the Sea of Galilee and the beautiful hills surrounding it. 

Here I am by the Sea of Galilee near Capernaum.

This is the view from Capernaum.

Capernaum was a large, prosperous town. Fishing from the fresh waters of Galilee was a key industry.

It was Peter's home town. There is a giant church built where they think Peter's house was, but there are also lots of ruins of buildings made with black, volcanic rock. They say these structures date to the time Jesus walked the streets here. 

 

Jesus found his first disciples here. He called five of them to be apostles--Peter, James, John, Andrew and Matthew. Standing in the ruins of this once thriving town, you can almost hear the Savior say, "Follow me, and I'll make you fishers of men." You know, he said that to them after he'd miraculously filled their empty nets with more fish than they'd ever seen. And they forsook it all and followed him. Their lives would never be the same--but that's true for everyone who meets the Savior. He transforms a handful of fishermen to mighty apostles, water to wine, and makes of us something far greater than anything we could have ever imagined.

 

Jairus also lived in Capernaum, and when Jesus was rushing to his house to raise Jairus' daughter from the dead, the woman with an issue of blood touched him. Don, our guide, told us that if you were bleeding you couldn't go to the temple. Jesus healed her spiritually as well as physically. And the word that is translated as "daughter" meant "one of the converted ones." 

 

These are millstones. Jesus could have sat in this very square, held a child on his knee, and told the people it would be better to have one of these stones hung around your neck and be cast in the nearby sea than to offend one of His little ones. We are all His little ones.

I would have liked to spend on day in Capernaum wandering, pondering. It is beautiful, and even though the parking lots was crammed with HUNDREDS of buses full of pilgrims like us, it was a place of peace, but we had a boat to catch! I'll share that tomorrow.