An Adventure in Bethany

Lucy Cunningham-Schultz has been so busy writing a series of articles about the towns and cities of the Bible that she has skipped church and Bible study to meet her deadlines. When Whit gently points out that doing things for God is not the same as being with Him, Lucy brushes it off - somebody has to do the work. So Whit suggests her next city: Bethany, a suburb of Jerusalem where some remarkable things happened, and offers her a better way to learn about it than any book - the Imagination Station.

Dressed as the daughter of a first-century merchant, Lucy lands in the bustling kitchen of a woman named Martha, who is frantically preparing a meal for a house full of guests while her sister Miriam - Mary - sits in the front room listening to their honored visitor, the great teacher Yeshua: Jesus. Martha's brother Eleazar, the man known as Lazarus, begs her to let the servants cook and come listen too, but Martha insists that someone has to do it - words that sound uncomfortably familiar to Lucy. At the well, two synagogue leaders, Ishod and Jeduthun, warn Eleazar that his friendship with the teacher could cost him his standing in the synagogue, and perhaps much more. When Martha finally interrupts to demand that Jesus tell Mary to help her, Jesus answers gently that Martha is fretting over many things, but only one thing is essential, and Mary has chosen it.

That evening Lucy hears the family's fears. Jesus plans to travel back across the Jordan, where Herod beheaded John the Baptizer, and people want to kill him wherever he goes. Mary presses Eleazar with a hard question: can he really love Jesus without believing in him too? The next morning in the market, the two rabbis corner Lucy and try to bully her into helping them get to Jesus quietly, for his own good, they claim. She is rescued by Whit, who has entered the Imagination Station as her guardian, Yocanan. Then dreadful news arrives: Eleazar has fallen gravely ill. The physician Aryeh can do nothing for him - unless a miracle occurs, Eleazar will die. Mary knows exactly where a miracle can be found, so Whit and Lucy hurry off to carry word to Jesus. Through his disciple Thomas they deliver the message: "Lord, the man you love is sick." Jesus' reply is puzzling - this sickness will not end in death, but is for God's glory, so that the Son of God may receive glory through it. What that means, Whit says, they must wait to see, and the adventure continues in part two.