Christ taught in Parables. In the Bible there are 38 Parables of Jesus. Why did He teach this way? He taught His disciples in this way, because He knew the people liked to hear them, and would remember what He said better, if He said it in that way. Charles Dickens wrote of two of Christ's parables, and their meaning.
" And he told His Disciples this story: He said, "There was once a servant who owed His master a great deal of money, and could not pay it, at which the master, being very angry, was going to have the servant sold for a slave. But the servant kneeling down and begging his master's pardon with great sorrow, the master forgave him. Now the same servant had a fellow-servant who owed him a hundred pence, and instead of being kind and forgiving to this poor man, as his master had been to him, he put him in prison for his debt. His master, hearing of it, went to him, and said, 'O wicked servant, I forgave you. Why did you not forgive your fellow-servant? And because he had not done so, his master turned him away with great misery. So," said our Savior, "how can you expect God to forgive you, if you do not forgive others?" This is the meaning of that part of the Lord's Prayer, where we say "forgive us our trespasses" - that word means faults - "as we forgive them that trespass against us."
And He told them another story, and said: "There was a certain farmer once, who had a yard, and he went out early in the morning, and agreed with some labourers to work there, all day, for a pennie. And bye and bye, when it was later, he went out again and engaged some more labourers on the same terms; and bye and bye went out again; and so on, several times, until the afternoon. When the day was over, and they all came to be paid, those who had worked since morning complained that those who had not begun to work until late in the day had the same money as themselves, and they said it was not fair. But the master said, 'Friend, I agreed with you for a pennie; and is it less money to you, because I give the same money to another man?' “Our savior meant to teach them by this, that people who have done good all their lives long will go to heaven after they are dead. But that people who have been wicked, because of their being miserable, or not having parents or friends to take care of them when young, and who are truly sorry for it, however late in their lives, and pray God to forgive them, will be forgiven and will go to heaven too. "
By George Konig
3/2/2008
www.georgekonig.org
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