Sometimes, Jesus taught directly, as in the Beatitudes, but often, he spoke to the people in Parables or told stories to which they could relate. These were Kingdom stories. He taught Kingdom principles without saying, “Do this, but don’t do that.” These Kingdom principles were hidden from the religious of the day. They did not have “ears to hear.” They thought they already knew about God. After all, Moses handed down God’s law to them. What more was there? But when Jesus came, he presented a new Kingdom of grace and mercy. This new Kingdom was so foreign to the ordinary Jew that Jesus spoke to them in stories that they could relate to, but only if they had an ear to hear. In this class, we will discover this new Kingdom of God afresh, as revealed in the Parables.
