This chapter starts with a creepy king, his evil wife, a dancing daughter, a headless prophet and a whole lot of bad feelings.

It ends with a number of fantastic claims about Jesus.

Herod was a creep. His stepdaughter has a dance that stops him in his tracks and Herodias is tired of hearing she’s wrong from the prophet – so a plot is formed to cut off his head. And John’s question from before is answered. He won’t get out of jail.

Then Matthew shows us Jesus is God by recounting some significant moments in the ministry of the Lord. Jesus feeds 5000, walks on water and is worshipped by His disciples. As He should be!

He then heals people in the plain of Gennesaret. This is by Magdala, on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee (Lake Kinneret), southwest of Capernaum. Here’s a picture of the plain from Mt Arbel

And this is looking back at Arbel from the plain. Look how imposing these mountains seem!

While it may seem that there are lots of sick people all over Israel, it may interest you that it was believed in the ancient times that portions of Galilee had healing powers. They may have been coming from all over the world to get healing!