Unafraid (15 page)

Confused, she searched his eyes. “But, Jesus, how can you say that? I’m here. Your brothers and sisters . . .”

Jesus drew her into his arms and held her tightly. She inhaled the scent of her son and put her arms around him as she had done so many times in the past. But now something was different. She felt engulfed by his love, upheld in it, and yet felt him withdrawing from her. She held on tighter, but he took her hands from behind him and stepped back. He spoke in a still small voice. “Each must choose.” He searched her face for a moment and then turned from her.

As Jesus walked down the road, only his disciples followed.

Mary gathered her sons and daughters. “Your brother has left Nazareth and he won’t be coming back.”

“Even if Jesus wanted to come back, I doubt he’d be allowed back inside the synagogue.” James was downcast.

Mary grasped James’s hand and looked at the others. “He took the road down to the Sea of Galilee. I think he’s going back to Capernaum. We should go there.”

“It might be a good idea to leave Nazareth for a few days,” Joseph said solemnly. “And let things settle down again.”

“And we can talk to Jesus,” James said.

“My husband needs me, Mother,” Anne said. “I can’t go without his permission.”

Sarah looked as aggrieved as her sister. “After what happened at the synagogue, how do any of us dare go?”

Mary was stunned by their faithlessness. “Have you ever known your brother to lie?”

“No, Mother.” James’s eyes darkened. “But then, he never claimed to be God before.”

“He
is
the Son of God.” She saw how her children stared at her. She told them again how the angel of the Lord had come to her. She told them how she had conceived by the Holy Spirit. She told them how the angel of the Lord had appeared to their father in a dream, telling him that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and how he had married her and kept her a virgin until after Jesus was born in Bethlehem. She told them about the star over Bethlehem, the visit of the magi, King Herod’s decree to kill the children. When she finished, she looked from face to face and drew in a sobbing breath. “Why won’t you believe me?”

James leaned forward, clasping his hands tightly between his knees, his face haggard with concern. “We know how children are conceived, Mother. He’s our brother and we love him.”

“You think I’m lying.” They preferred the lies of gossips to the truth she spoke.

“We think—” he looked at the others and then back into her eyes—“that you’re deluded.”

Anger and hurt rose in her. “Deluded? How? By whom? Your father, Joseph? Other than Jesus, have you ever known such a righteous man so eager to please God? And Jesus. Hasn’t he always done what is right and true and noble and . . . ?”

James hung his head. “Just because he’s obeyed the Law doesn’t mean he’s God.”

She stood. She was angry, but she was even more afraid for them. What would become of her children if they rejected the Messiah? “We will go to Capernaum. Your brother will make things clear to you.”

James and Joseph rose early one morning to speak with Jesus, but they were told Jesus had already gone off on one of his habitual solitary walks. “The men he calls his disciples refused to tell us, his brothers, where he went. They act like bodyguards!” they complained.

Mary had hoped that her sons and daughters would recognize Jesus’ true identity when they heard him preaching. But instead they were even more confused by Jesus’ parables about wheat and weeds and choice pearls and mustard seeds. They were offended when Jesus did not separate himself from the others and treat them with more consideration than the hodgepodge band hanging around him day and night. There was never time to be alone with him because so many were pleading for his attention. Furthermore, they were frightened by the approach of priests and dismayed when Jesus welcomed
everyone.
He even ate with prostitutes and tax collectors!

Mary’s daughters and sons-in-law left after two days, taking Simon and Jude back home with them. James and Joseph stayed another day, and then urged Mary to come home with them. “He doesn’t need you, Mother. He’s got a dozen men following him around like lost sheep.” She felt torn between Jesus and her other sons, and was finally swayed by their arguments.

Passover was fast approaching, and she must prepare for the yearly pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Surely, Jesus would join them for the journey to the City of David.

It wasn’t until the family came down from Nazareth that they heard from others that Jesus had gone on ahead without them.

“Your son is in the city already,” Abijah told Mary when she arrived in Jerusalem with her family. “He’s been teaching in the corridors of the Temple.” The elderly man wore a frown.

“Everyone has been talking about him,” his wife, Rachel, said. “He seems to have a following.”

Abijah shook his head. “The Pharisees are not pleased with his teaching.”

“The Nazarenes weren’t either,” Joseph said grimly.

“I’ve heard that his disciples transgress the tradition of the elders.”

“How?” Mary said.

“They do none of the ceremonial washing of hands before eating. It was on that very matter that the Pharisees questioned Jesus, and he called them hypocrites.”

The hair rose on the back of her neck. “Hypocrites?” she said weakly, unable to imagine Jesus losing his temper.

“My friend said he told them straight to their faces that they honored God with their lips, but not their hearts. Your son said they worship in vain because they’re teaching the doctrines and precepts of men.” Abijah’s face grew more and more flushed as he spoke. “Of course, the unwashed mob that follows him loved it.” He glowered at Mary. “Where did your son get these ideas? You should speak to your son, and remind him of the respect due the men who take our sacrifices before God!”

Your son . . . your son . . .
Mary could hear the accusation in her relative’s voice. She felt the heat come into her face. Surely there was some mistake. Jesus had never been disrespectful to anyone.

“If he keeps on like this, he’ll offend King Herod and end up like John the Baptist.”

“Abijah,” Rachel said in a hushed voice.

Mary felt her blood go cold. “What do you mean, ‘end up like John’? What’s happened?” She looked round at the faces of her sons and other relatives. What were they keeping from her? “James? Joseph?”

A muscle tensed in James’s cheek. “He was beheaded.”

Mary put her hand to her throat. “Beheaded?” Tears sprang to her eyes. John, the miracle child of Zechariah and Elizabeth, was dead? John, the child who recognized Jesus from the womb, was dead?

“It was only a matter of time,” Abijah said. “He offended Herod and Herodias. You can’t shout that the king and his wife are adulterers without expecting repercussions. He said it wasn’t lawful for Herod to have Herodias because her husband is Herod’s brother Philip and still alive.”

She stared at him. “But that’s true. Everyone knows it’s true.”

His face reddened. “Of course it’s true, but it’s foolish to proclaim it. King Herod had John arrested. I think he merely intended to keep John away from the people for a while, but Herodias held a feast for the king’s birthday. Herod was drunk when Herodias’s daughter danced for him, and he promised her anything up to half of his kingdom. And you can guess what happened. Herodias closed the trap, and told the girl to ask for John’s head on a silver platter.”

Mary slowly shook her head. “No. No! How can this be?”

Abijah seemed distressed at her reaction to his news, and turned to her sons in accusation. “How is it your mother has not heard any of this?”

“We didn’t want to worry her,” Joseph said. “John was arrested during the time Jesus was missing.”

“Missing?” Abijah looked between her two oldest. “When was this?”

“After he went down to the Jordan and was baptized,” James said.

Mary clutched her hands in her lap, struggling against the emotions that threatened to overwhelm her. Her sons must think she was weak and could not bear to hear what was happening around her. What else were they withholding from her? “John was a prophet of God,” she insisted.

“Some say so,” Abijah said sardonically.

She lifted her chin and looked at the men of her family. “A prophet of God speaks only the truth.”

James frowned. “And every prophet who has done so has died for it.”

Abijah leaned forward. “Your brother is going to get himself killed if he persists in offending everyone.”

Mary’s eyes glistened. “God brought Jesus out of my womb and made him trust in the Lord even at my breast. From conception, Jesus was cast upon the Lord. He can only do what God tells him to.”

Abjiah and Rachel stared at her, openmouthed. Abijah looked at James. “Is she claiming what I think she is?”

“She believes it,” James said, glancing at her and bowing his head in shame.

“Woman,” Abijah said in pity, “you are out of your mind if you think your son, the boy who has come every year to Jerusalem and sat at
my
table, is the . . . the Messiah. . . .” He rose and moved away from her as though she were contaminated.

Mary felt Rachel’s hand on her back. “Mary, Mary, my dear friend. You are a good woman, but do you really believe yourself worthy to be chosen to bear God’s anointed? A poor woman from . . . Nazareth, whose husband was a humble carpenter?”

“Our father was from the line of David,” Jude said, pride-pricked.

“So are a lot of other men, in higher stations than your father,” Abijah said and raised his hands. “We are not speaking against our relative. He was a good man, devout and faithful. But to be the father of the Messiah?”

“Jesus is not Joseph’s son.”

“Mother!” James said harshly, his eyes black with anger. “Everyone in this room knows what really happened.”

Mary felt the blood surge into her cheeks. She looked around at them all. “God will keep Jesus safe. Jesus will not die!” He was the Messiah! He was the Anointed One of God, the Promised One who would save Israel! “The Lord’s hand is upon him.”

But she saw in their eyes that they didn’t believe her and, consequently, would not believe in Jesus either.