THE
RABBI’S DISCIPLE

Topics: Heaven; Humility; Love; Ministry; Servanthood

References: Matthew 25:31–40; John 13:1–17

In a small Jewish town in Russia, a rabbi disappeared each Friday morning for several hours. His devoted disciples boasted that during those hours their rabbi went to heaven and talked to God.

A stranger who moved into town was skeptical, so he decided to check things out. He hid and watched the rabbi. The rabbi got up in the morning, said his prayers, then dressed in peasant clothes. He grabbed an ax, went into the woods, and cut some firewood, which he then hauled to a shack on the outskirts of the village, where an old woman and her sick son lived. The rabbi left them the wood and went home.

The newcomer became the rabbi’s disciple. Now, whenever he hears a villager say, “On Friday morning our rabbi ascends to heaven,” the newcomer quietly adds, “if not higher.”

—Jim McGuiggan, Jesus, Hero of Thy Soul (Howard, 1998)