Adapted from the Urantia Book original paper, here.
As Jesus entered young adulthood, he continued to live a normal life as a mortal of the material realm. Other than choosing our planet for his seventh incarnation in submission to the Paradise Trinity, he was born and raised as a man of his time with all of the problems and hardships everyone else endured.
It’s important to remember the two primary reasons that Jesus came to Earth.
First, Jesus had to master the full in-flesh life of a mortal on a world of time and space, and in doing so finish his requirements for complete rule of Nebadon, our, universe.
Second, Jesus was to reveal the Fatherhood of God to humanity, and in doing so learn how to better lead us to our Universal Father.
Everything else that occurred and any other benefits we received from his time on Earth, were secondary to those two main reasons for him being with us.
The Twenty-First Year (A.D. 15)
Jesus of Nazareth was now aware of his dual nature as a son of man and a son of God. He was concentrating his efforts on mastering the life of the man-side of his being. He worked and got tired; he got bored, hungry, and thirsty. He combined knowledge and experience into wisdom, he suffered and died, and in every other way he experienced our lives in the flesh as we do. But Jesus did so with grace, and without sin.
No person can ever complain to the heavens that their suffering isn’t known, because Jesus experienced it the same as we do. Throughout all of Jesus’ life up until his baptism on the Jordan River, he used none of the supernatural power at his disposal. And today, as ruler of our universe, he still holds the title, Son of Man. Jesus submitted himself to the will of his Father so he could better understand us, and in turn, better minister to us.
This year it was Joseph’s turn to attend the Passover with Jesus. Throughout his time as their brother/father, Jesus never showed favoritism to anyone in his family. He met his responsibilities equally to everyone. As he did with James, Jesus used the journey to and from Jerusalem to teach Joseph the history of Palestine and the Jewish people. And for Passover, they stayed with their friends in Bethany. On this trip Joseph tried to get Jesus to open up about his future mission, but Jesus would only tell him that it wasn’t yet time to do so. Still, Joseph managed to pick up enough of what Jesus did say, that he remembered these talks much later in the troubled times ahead.
The Twenty-Second Year (A.D. 16)
By this time, Jesus’ brothers and sisters were between the ages of seven and eighteen. They were all going through their own issues that come with puberty, adolescence, and passing through the mental stages leading to adulthood. And since he was their substitute father, Jesus had to help his brothers and sisters through those rough times.
Simon graduated school, and went to work with Jacob, the stone mason’s son. The family had decided that it was best if the boys each learned a different trade, rather than all of them being carpenters. This way, they reasoned, they could contract and build a whole house together. Later in the year, Jesus went to Sepphoris and worked under a blacksmith for six months. That’s where he learned about metals and acquired his skill at the anvil.
Jesus used his time working in Sepphoris to transfer responsibility for the family over to James. Before he left, he made him head of the household in charge of the family’s money. Jesus got all of his brothers and sisters to promise to support James in his new role, and Jesus only came home on the weekends so that James would have room to grow. While he was in Sepphoris, Jesus took the opportunity to live and work with the gentiles. He got to better understand them and their way of life. But within six months the low moral standards of Sepphoris were getting to Jesus, and he was ready to return to Nazareth. And worse, if he would have stayed, he would’ve had to work under Herod Antipas, who had already cheated the family out of his dead father’s back wages. Jesus wasn’t going to go for that.
Back in Nazareth, James remained head of the household for two years, until Joseph was ready to assume the role. Step-by-step, Jesus was preparing his family for his departure.
The Twenty-Third Year (A.D. 17)
With four of the boys now working, the family’s financial situation was improving. Miriam was earning money from selling milk and butter, and Martha was making her way as an expert weaver. Simon was of age to go to the Passover, so Jesus took three weeks off of work and they went to Jerusalem. By varying his routes on these trips to the Passover, Jesus became knowledgeable of most of Palestine north of Jerusalem.
Simon had a great time at Passover, and became a new son of the commandment. Jesus walked around and spent his time talking with the people. They met a rich trader from Damascus who told Jesus all about his businesses in far parts of the world. This man wanted Jesus to come and work with him, and again, Jesus said no because of his family. But the seed of visiting cities in far off lands begin to germinate inside his mind.
When he was talking with people around the temple, Jesus had a conversation with a Greek named Stephen. The two of them spoke for four hours about God and how to pray and worship. Stephen was so impressed with Jesus that he never forgot his words. Fifteen years later, Stephen was proclaiming Jesus as the world’s savior, without ever knowing that he was the same man he had spoken with so long ago at the Passover.
That first conversation Stephen had with Jesus gave him the courage to boldly preach the new gospel. And because of his boldness, Steven was stoned to death by a mob of Jews becoming the first martyr of the new Christian faith.
But there’s more. In the crowd watching Stephen being killed was a man named Saul, who was from Tarsus. Seeing how Stephen willingly died for his faith was the catalysis for this man to himself believe in Jesus. Saul of Tarsus became Paul, who went on to found Christianity. Unfortunately, Paul created a religion about Jesus himself, rather than about his teachings.
Jesus and Simon bonded well on the trip back to Jerusalem. They had many talks as they walked through the country and camped out at night. When they got back home, Mary wasn’t too happy to hear that Jesus had spent most of his time talking with strangers from strange lands. None of the others in Jesus’ family shared his desire to meet strangers, and they couldn’t understand why he wanted to know people from outside their community. Mary, by now, hardly ever thought anymore about Jesus having a special mission in life, and he didn’t speak about it much either. Everyone was just too caught up in their daily needs to think much about the future.
The Damascus Episode
The rich trader from Damascus that Jesus and Simon had met at Passover, sent a messenger to Jesus and invited him to visit in Damascus. Jesus went, and he spent the last four months of the year with this man’s family. This trader and a dozen other wealthy people in Damascus wanted to build a university there that would be even bigger and better than the one already in Alexandria.
This group wanted Jesus to go on a world-wide tour and visit all of the other academies they knew of, and then come back to run the one they were going to build in Damascus. Even though Jesus was nothing more than a young carpenter from Nazareth, these successful businessmen were able to see his leadership potential.
Jesus was tempted by this offer, but again, he refused. He knew his mission wasn’t to be associated with any university, and he sure wasn’t supposed to take orders or get guidance from any group of men. So by the end of the year, Jesus was back home in Nazareth. He never told his family about the offer he refused, and in later years this group of men in Damascus never figured out that it was Jesus who was causing all of the trouble in Palestine.
Jesus lived his life in a way that stopped people from being able to connect him to all of the events he was part of during his time on Earth. He didn’t want people to see some great list of achievements he had accomplished. Jesus thought this would cause later generations to worship him, the teacher. Instead, he wanted them preach what he was teaching, the Gospel of the Kingdom of God. So it didn’t bother him to carry various titles throughout his life, or that the people didn’t know they were all one and the same man.
And in proclaiming this gospel, Jesus would use no pressure or elegant persuasion. All who believe, must do so by their own free will.
The Twenty-Fourth Year (A.D. 18)
After Passover, a messenger came to Nazareth to set up a meeting between Jesus and the Jewish leaders in Alexandria. The agreed on the middle of June, and Jesus went to Caesarea on the Palestinian coast to attend. This group wanted Jesus to be a religious teacher in Alexandria, and offered him a job assisting the chazan at the synagogue. They argued that Alexandria was going to become the world center of Jewish culture. They also told Jesus that if the Jews in Palestine rebelled as rumored, that the Romans would crush them in three months: all the way down to the point to where no stone of theirs would be left on another.
Jesus refused, telling them it still wasn’t his time. The group gave up trying to convince Jesus, and offered to compensate him for his journey. Again he refused. Jesus said his family couldn’t accept charity as long as he and his brothers were able to work. So, these guys went back to Egypt, and once again, they never connected the man who refused their offer with the Jesus of later years.
Jesus returned home to Nazareth. Things stayed pretty calm for the last half of the year. Jesus hung out, meditated, talked to his Father in heaven, and continued to master his human mind.
In December, James came to Jesus and told him he was in love with a gal named Esta. James asked if it was alright if they got married. Jesus said yes, but that they had to wait two years until Joseph, who was turning 18, learned to take over as head of the household.
Then Miriam was next. After James had gotten the okay to get married, Miriam asked Jesus if Jacob, the stone mason’s son, and her could do the same. Again, Jesus agreed, and he asked that Jacob come to him in person and make a formal request for her hand in marriage. Jesus said that Miriam and Jacob could get married once Martha was ready to take over as the eldest daughter.
The Twenty-Fifth Year (A.D. 19)
At twenty-five years old, Jesus was one of the best physical specimens of a man since Adam, and his mind had grown many times beyond that of the other people around him.
By now, the kids were all out of school and everybody was healthy. Financially, they were doing okay: they were out of debt and putting money away for the future. This year it was Jude’s turn to go to the Passover.
Jude had already developed a reputation for getting into trouble because of his patriotic feelings, so Jesus took the safest route for them to get to Jerusalem. Jude, like Jesus had been the first time, was super excited to see the temple. When they got there, they ran into Lazarus, and Jesus and him started talking about plans for the Passover dinner at Lazarus’ house later that night. While this was going on, a Roman guard that was close by made an off-remark to a Jewish girl strolling by, and Jude heard it. He, of course, got mad and told off the guard.
The Romans didn’t put up with any disrespect from the Jews, so the guard got mad and arrested Jude. This just made Jude angrier, and before Jesus could get him to shut up, his mouth dug him deeper into the hole. The guard grabbed ahold of Jude and hauled him straight to the military prison, with Jesus following along, probably shaking his head at his little brothers lack of control.
At the prison, Jesus tried to get Jude released in time for the Passover feast that evening, but he wasn’t able to do so. With the next day being a holy one for the Jews, it would have caused problems for the Romans to try Jude then. So Jude was stuck, and had to stay in prison until the second morning. Jesus stayed with him the whole time. When Jude finally went in front of the military magistrate, Jesus managed to convince the judge that Jude had at least some reason to yell at the Roman guard. So the magistrate let Jude off with a warning. But, he also warned Jesus to keep an eye on the lad, because he was likely to bring trouble to the whole Jewish community.
And, the judge was right: Jude never did learn to calm his temper and it caused Jesus more problems later in life. Jude’s was Jesus’ last Passover with his family. And since Jude had missed his chance to go through the Passover rites because he was in jail, he didn’t finally make it to the ceremony again until several years later when he was involved with the Zealots.
After Jude was released from prison, they went to visit Lazarus and apologize for missing the Passover dinner. When they got back to Nazareth, Jesus didn’t tell the others in the family what had happened. Jesus gave Jude time to calm down, and then several weeks later after the two of them talked it over, Jude, on his own, decided to tell everyone what had happened. While Jude clashed with Jesus at times in the future, he never forgot Jesus’ patience with him throughout this episode.
Jesus often went into periods of deep meditation, but he never let contemplating his life’s mission take precedence over the sheer joy of playing with the younger children. Little Ruth and her friends loved hanging-out with Jesus and hearing about nature and animals and his trips to Jerusalem. Jesus kept scraps of wood in his carpenter shop for the kids from the neighborhood to play with. To them, Jesus was Uncle Joshua, and with him, they learned to laugh with joyful innocence. In the back corner of the shop was a rock he’d sit on, usually with one or two littles on his knees, while the others sat around in a semi-circle and listened to his stories. Jesus could make this swing from deep serious thoughts to lighthearted play without effort, and this allowed him to spend a lot of time with the children around him.
The Twenty-Sixth Year (A.D. 20)
Jesus was now aware of his creator powers, but he was also convinced he wasn’t supposed to use them. At least not yet, and not as the son of man. And over and above all, in whatever he did he’d be subject to the will of his Paradise Father.
Jude continued to be the rebel in the family. He couldn’t control his temper, and he was a constant problem for James. On top of that, he wasn’t doing his share of the work or bringing in his share of the family income. If it wasn’t for Jesus, James and Joseph would have kicked him out of the house. But Jesus advised them patience. He suggested that James and Joseph should try to change Jude by showing him a better way through how they lived their own lives, and by how they took care of the family. They agreed, and this stopped the family from breaking up. But Jude didn’t calm down until he later got married.
Step-by-step Jesus was preparing his family to live without him. When the time came to be about his Father’s business, Jesus was going to need the freedom to come and go as needed. He was on Earth to experience the many facets of our lives as mortals, and in doing so both earn his right to rule our universe in harmony with the Paradise Trinity, and to reveal to us and the rest of the universe the Paradise Father.
Mary could tell Jesus was getting ready to leave, but she was still confused about her son. Other than when she remembered Gabriel’s visit, she had about given up hope that Jesus was the messiah. She wanted him to sit down and open up with her about his, their, future but he wouldn’t speak of it to her or anyone else.
This year Jesus spent a lot of his time one-on-one with the other children in the family, often taking them for long walks in the country. He took Jude to the uncle’s farm south of Nazareth to work the harvest, but Jude eventually ran away and was found hanging out with the fishermen at the lake. So, after talking it over with him, Jesus took Jude to Magdala to live with a relative and learn his trade as a fisherman. Now, all the boys had established their lifework.
James and Esta, and Miriam and Jacob, had a double wedding that November. Esta’s father gave her and James a small house on the west side of town. Jesus put Joseph in charge of the family. Jude started to improve his behavior, and he gave Joseph his word that he’d help out more with the family’s expenses. Miriam moved out of the house to live with Jacob next door, and Martha took over Miriam’s duties in the house.
The day after the wedding, Jesus took James aside for a secret meeting. Jesus told James he was getting ready to leave home, and that he wanted to transfer the family’s properties to James’ name. They also drew up an agreement saying that James now had full financial responsibility for the family, and Jesus no longer did. But Jesus also told James that for as long as he could, he’d continue to send him money for the family, and that James could use that money however he wanted.
Jesus was now ready to enter into the phase of his adult life where he lived away from home, and right before he began to be about his Father’s business.
Okay, folks, that’s it for Chapter 7, “Jesus’ Early Manhood.”
Next week’s Chapter 8 is titled, “The Later Adult Life of Jesus.”
Have a fantastic week out there.
Bob