Today we really start to get to know Jesus.  If you don’t have a Bible, you can read the story here:

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%204%3A31-44&version=NLT

Luke 4:31-44 Jesus is not wasting time. After leaving Nazareth, he goes on a miracle working spree. He has moved on to Capernaum.  Capernaum is a town that keeps showing up in Jesus’ adult life.  He spends a lot of time, and will make some of his closest friends in this little seaside village.   This is his first visit, at least since he started going from town to town teaching in the synagogues, and he makes an impression very quickly.   He teaches like no one they had heard before.  Luke will start relating some of Jesus’ teachings soon, and we will see that he really was pushing the boundaries of your average religious teachers of the day! But things get interesting when Jesus casts demons out of a man who comes yelling at him to leave them alone.  The demons recognize that Jesus has the power to destroy them because he is “the Holy One of God”. The people hadn’t figured out who Jesus was, but the demons needed no introduction. 
Apparently Jesus isn’t ready to be front page news just yet.  He silences the demon by ordering it to leave the man, which it does without causing him further harm.  The people are, understandably, even more amazed by his authority over demons than they were by his authoritative teaching.  But they didn’t make the connection.  As far as they understood he was just a really remarkable man.  The demon’s terrified declaration was just nonsense.  And Jesus is fine with that, in fact he seems to be making an effort to keep it that way.  

I often wonder about this desire for anonymity early in his ministry. This isn’t the only place we see it. We are told in other passages that he knew it wasn’t time yet.  I wonder if he simply wanted to enjoy loving on people. I imagine him saying, “This world is shattered. Can I just fix some of this brokeness? Can I heal and help in the quiet little corners before this blows up and I can’t go anywhere without being recognized?” 

Here in Capernaum, he gets an opportunity for exactly that. Jesus goes to the house of Simon, to whom we have not been introduced, but we will.  Spoiler alert- Simon is MY GUY.  SO relatable.  If you don’t already know and love him, I think you’re going to! Upon his arrival at the house, people start begging Jesus for help because Simon’s mother in law is gravely ill.  He immediately responds by healing her, and he didn’t just give her an advil to break the fever.  She was so instantly well that she got up and made dinner! Then word got out and people started running for their sick relatives.  Jesus helped everyone who came, no matter what was wrong. And once again there were some in the crowd who were demon possessed and the minute they saw Jesus they recognized him and tried to tell everyone that Jesus was the Messiah. Again, Jesus told them to be quiet.  The demons knew.  Jesus knew.  That was enough for the moment. 

The Holy Spirit had descended on Jesus at his baptism. He had always been God incarnate, but he chose not to exercise his omniscience and omnipotence in order to fully enter into human experience.  It seems like he had to wait for the Spirit to show him what his next steps were, and to give him power to do the work. Likely at his baptism or after his tempting in the desert, the Spirit had revealed more of the road ahead of him.  Jesus had waited some thirty years, humbly growing in wisdom and in stature just like any other man. He had waited for the time when the Spirit would empower him to do what he had come to earth to do.  Suddenly, he is unleashed (for lack of a better term) and his first inclination is to heal and restore. It is so easy to love this God-man!