Jesus went out of his way to upset the religious authorities by healing a man … on the Sabbath day, which went against their man-made laws.

So he healed a blind man in a very unconventional way, involving his own spit.

Healing a deaf and mute man? Nothing was impossible for Jesus, of course.

This is faith at its boldest.

This is where the grumbling started, when they started doubting, when they started saying, wait a minute isn’t this the carpenter’s son?

Here is a persistent theme throughout the Gospels, Jesus being pulled up for his disregard for man-made traditions, though he never transgressed Biblical laws laid down in Old Testament Scripture.

As with the feeding of the five thousand, stories can be so familiar that they lose all impact and become well-worn cliches.

Sometimes stories can be so familiar that they lose all impact and become well-worn cliches.

So Herod the tetrarch, aided and abetted by the women in his life, did away with the inconvenient prophet.

John the Baptist, as he suffered in his prison captivity, had to be absolutely sure that Jesus was “the one.”