Can you imagine what it must have been like for the men and women who actually were present when Jesus taught here on this earth? Think about it. To have the privilege of listening to the only begotten Son. To listen to the words of the One who was with God in the beginning, the One whom we are told that all the world was created through. When God said, "Let Us create man in Our image", it was Jesus to whom He was talking to. 

This is the One whom people came to to be healed. Once the healing was completed they then stayed to hear what He had to say. I can only imagine the intensity with which I would have listened to someone who had just healed my child, my spouse or myself of some terrible disease for which there had been no hope of recovery. Think of the time that Jesus fed the 5,000 with just a few loaves and fish. Then He did the same with the 4,000 who were gathered a short time later. We call to mind these great miracles, but we also remember that they needed to be fed because they had been listening to Jesus for so long that they lost track of time and were now faint with hunger.

I can tell you from brutal experience that I have been faint with hunger on countless occasions when some man was preaching, but I never lost track of the time.

In fact when such instances occurred, I thought of little else than the length of time they had been speaking. This was not so with Jesus. When He spoke it seems that people were more than willing to stay for as long as He preached. We are told that people marveled at His teaching. That they freely admitted they had never heard anyone speak in such a way. And why not? They were listening to the Son of God!

And then there is the Sermon on the mount! It is widely considered to be the greatest sermon ever preached. While it's topics seem to vastly differ, they are bound together by the common themes of perspective, duty, and responsibility to God. In this sermon Jesus addresses the heart of the great issues that rule men's lives. Within it, He gives both great promises and serious warnings. He gives hope to those who may have forgotten what hope was. He pointed out to a crowd filled with the same daily concerns that we possess that they had no need to worry because God would take care of them. 

And He spoke about love.

I can only imagine what it must have been like to have been present at the feet of the Master when He spoke these words. This sermon must have forever changed the lives of those who were present. The people must have gone away from this sermon filled with a sense of pride to be a child of the King, as well as a determination to begin living as a child of the King should live. Yes, these people who got to hear Jesus preach were a blessed people indeed! 

But what of us who weren't there? Isn't it true that we can still experience this same sense of wonder and appreciation? We can do so each time that we pick up the Word of God and read the things that the Creator deemed worthy of being included within the pages of the Holy Bible. We can not only read the greatest sermon ever told, but we can read of everything else that the Father and the Son want us to know for our daily lives. And while we may not have been present for those wonderful moments when Jesus healed and fed the multitudes, we can experience the great spiritual healing that His words still bring and we can still have our souls fed by His great truths contained within the pages of the Bible.

We are a privileged people indeed to have such an opportunity. We just need to be wise enough to see it, and then to take advantage of this great blessing!