John 4 | Matthew 4:12-17 | Mark 1:14-15 | Luke 4:14-30

After Jesus met with Nicodemus, He took His disciples into the area of the Jordan River for a while, but then determined to go into Galilee, some 70 miles north of Jerusalem, where He had grown up.  Most of the Lord’s 3 and 1/2 years of ministry occurs in Galilee, and it was most of the final 6 months that Jesus spent most of his time in and around Jerusalem.

On the way towards Galilee they stop in a small Samaritan town named Sychar, where Jesus meets a Samaritan women at the well.  Samaritans were descendants of marriages between Gentiles and Jews, where a small number of Jews were sent back to the northern kingdom of Israel following the Assyrian captivity, and they were expressly hated by pure-bred Jews.  However, Jesus stops and ministers to them as descendants of Abraham, and always treats Samaritans with compassion during His ministry.  Jesus declares to her that He is the source of everlasting water (which God had demonstrated to Moses and Israel for 40 years in the desert wanderings, with the river of water that came from the Rock).  He tells her plainly that He is the Messiah, and Jesus stays in that town another 2 days, with many becoming believers.

From Sychar Jesus goes into Galilee, and when they are in the town of Cana (again), Jesus performs His second miracle by healing the son of a Gentile ruler from Capernaum.  Most of the miracles reported in John’s gospel were done without many people even noticing, as was the case with His first 2 miracles reported in John.

Jesus initiates His Galilean ministry, and in Luke 4 He goes to the synagogue in Nazareth and reads from Isaiah 61:1-2, telling them that the prophecy of Isaiah was fulfilled in their presence on that day, but He was immediately rejected by the people of His own town.