Reading the four Gospels brings an ever-increasing understanding of our Master's life, his challenges as well as victories, thus helping us live our own lives to the fullest. It deepens our natural desire to follow in Christ Jesus' footsteps, to follow the path of healing and regeneration for humanity.
Once as I studied the familiar gospel stories and statements, I asked myself questions in order to gain fresh ideas. For instance, Luke's Gospel recounts how Jesus preached by the seaside and then instructed the fishermen to launch into deeper water and let down their nets. They gathered so many fish that the net broke. See Luke 5:1—11. My first question concerned a particular word in the first verse of this account, 'And it came to pass, that, as the people pressed upon him to hear the word of God, he stood by the lake of Gennesaret."
I asked myself what might be the significance of the word pressed. It reminded me of pressure—an insistence, an unwillingness to give up, even an imposition. The people wanted to hear Jesus. It occurred to me that perhaps he had been brought to the point where his back was against the wall, or in this case, against the lake. He had already been preaching. Now he was asked to do more.
