Nainya Business
Episode IV - A New Hole: Part IV
NOTE: can you believe it? We're four parts in, already! If you haven't read Part III: “It’s Like Rain in the Dessert”, yet. I'm telling ya, you need a little more previous episode in your life.
Read Part III…
Scripture: Name Above the Vain
Soon afterward [Jesus] went to a town called Nain, and His disciples and a great crowd went with him. As He drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow, and a considerable crowd from the town was with her. And when the Lord saw her, He had compassion on her and said to her, “Do not weep.”
Then He came up and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And He said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.” And the dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother.
Fear seized them all, and they glorified God, saying, “A great prophet has arisen among us!” and “God has visited his people!” And this report about Him spread through the whole of Judea and all the surrounding country.
Luke 7:11-17
Part IV: Nainya Business.
First things first, we know that God wrote this whole Bible thing for the generations. Though He could clearly see the coming era of clarifying hyperlinks, digital fonts and emojis – the ancients were not there yet.
So, to help all people understand what He meant, God deployed universally understood literary techniques to support the clear literacy of all of the combined audiences over all the ages to come.
Repetition, for example, if He really wanted to make sure you really get something – He’d say it, several times. Sometimes, in the same sentence.
Parables, on the other hand, He’d use to make sure everyone else misunderstood – or, missed out, entirely – everything He was saying.
Read the Bible long enough and you’ll note God stuck with an old literary trick of saying first, whatever is first of importance for the reader to understand. Which is actually quite intuitive if you think about it. If there’s a list of things I’m going to give my kid to knock out in my absence, I’m putting the critical ones first to make sure he doesn’t just remember them, they’re taken care of first:
‘Put on your helmet’ is the first thing I say before bike rides.
‘Stay on the sidewalk,’ when he asks for permission to walk to his friend’s house.
‘Wear your cup’ when I see him setting up the croquet set. Speaking from experience.
Each time, I’m making sure the first thing he hears is the thing etched into his memory – thus making sure that thing gets done. Same thing is true throughout the Bible.
Somewhere along the line of history, someone very creative would come up with the name, First Things First to pretty accurately describe how the most critical items or subjects are named or described first in the Bible to mark their preeminence in something, leadership over someone, or altogether THE highest priority.
Which, since you asked - as a person who used to market other people’s stuff for a living: THAT’s actually really good branding.
And all that to say, when I was asking God, what do I say now, for part four, He pointed me to what He said first:
Soon afterward [Jesus] went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a great crowd went with him.
Luke 7:11
Up above, the translation I quote from starts out saying, “Soon afterward...” Which, isn’t bad.
My Bible tackles things from a little bit more literal translation of the original language with a little bit of action-biased emphasis, and decidedly says, “The next day…”
I like that one better. The Greek backs it up. So does the King James.
And since it helps serve my underlying premise WAY better, we’re sticking with it.
Personally, I’m of the belief anyway: the more specifically we can understand the things Jesus did, the better, because:
1) the sheer irony of any interpretation intentionally being more vague with what God is explicitly wanting us to know at the very beginning?
And 2), I think getting more exact about the timing of Jesus’s departure matters – because it’s not just a statement about when.
It’s actually more of a statement about what.
Actually, a pretty profound whole bunch of what.
Ironically, to make my first most important point I first have to tell you what God did NOT say. Flipping to the back of your Bible, you’d see that Nain is about 30 miles from where Jesus was currently staying in Capernaum. At the time it was believed to be a wee rural, agricultural town of about 80 people, at the base of a pretty famous mountain in Israel: Mount Tabor.
Which means, nearly all of those 158,400 traversed feet from Capernaum to Nain Jesus walked uphill, both ways. That’s pretty important.
And, God specifically used the word ‘went’ (or, not to keep harping on it, but way better said in my Bible as ‘traveled’). That’s pretty important.
He didn’t use the word ‘left’. He didn’t use the word He usually deployed in these types of situations: ‘departed’. He used the word ‘went’ (traveled), which implies both, a journey’s beginning and end. He didn’t talk about leaving Capernaum; He spoke about arriving in Nain.
When? ‘The next day’.
So, by telling us that Jesus traveled the very next day to Nain means Jesus took all 52,800 sloped steps in the same day. That’s really important.
And He didn’t just walk alone. Also in the first sentence we learn, He walked with His disciples and a large crowd followed, too. And now another thing we know to be true about Jesus is now ironically working against Him in this trip: He doesn’t leave anyone behind, not even one.
Which means, He’s going at the speed of the crowd.
So take it all together: by first telling us when Jesus traveled, God was first telling us what He had to go through to accomplish the will of the Father:
Get up well before the sun, slowly walk a considerable distance – 15 hours minimum – in the sun, someone needing to stop to pee at every broom tree, put up with a lot of ‘are we there yet’ from Bartholomew (least favorite disciple), in order to arrive to the instructed destination, Nain, in the same day.
So, God saying when is actually Him telling us what it cost Jesus to say: Yes.
But the sacrifices Jesus made in taking this steep trip to Nain was way more than just lack of sleep, lots of sweat, and sore legs in an era long before hot tubs.
I hate to do this again, but to make my next point I need to first talk about what God did NOT say, again. By telling us that Jesus ‘traveled to Nain,’ my next really important point, ironically is that God left out the fact that He was leaving Capernaum.
Our passage is preceded by one of the more famous miracles Jesus did: the remote healing of a Roman centurion’s servant. Yes, ironically, just 10 verses back, Jesus proves He didn’t need to leave to go anywhere to make miracles happen. After commending the pagan soldier for, ironically having a better understanding of how the Kingdom of Heaven works than any of God’s chosen people in town, Jesus said to the centurion: it was done. And it was. God can do whatever He wants, anywhere He wants, from wherever He is. And, ironically, just like our passage – Luke likes to start His stories with the Protagonist’s location: Jesus was in Capernaum.
And by all accounts, not too long after Jesus traveled to Nain, Luke lets us know He was back in Capernaum. Ironically, right here is the first time Luke decides to not be very specific about Jesus’ GPS coordinates, but we know He had to have been right back in local proximity for: John’s disciples to find him and ask, ‘where is the Revolution?’; his mother and brothers showing up to try and rebuke him; and taking off from the Capernaum area with His disciples in tow, to eventually tell off the storm on the sea of Galilee.
In other Gospels, though heading out to Nain with the masses is not mentioned, the miracle of healing the centurion’s servant is – along with giving the wind and waves a sedative, also immediately following. And since that means God repeated Himself on the order of events whilst in Capernaum, we’ll go ahead and lock it in. Which means, if Luke, the more-educated-than-most-apostles, medical-doctor-turned-nonfiction-biographer AND the Gospel bearing his name – which, was penned directly by the Holy Spirit of God Most High – got it even just mostly right: Jesus most likely went (traveled): Capernaum to Nain to Capernaum.
So, it’s 15 hours there; take a few selfies; take in the sights; probably take a nap; and then 15 hours back again. Purely for the monologue’s sake, let’s just call it an even 45 hours.
Contrary to wee Nain, Capernaum was a pretty big deal back then. Not only did it serve as Jesus’ homebase, but several of His disciples also called that place ‘home’ along with about 1500 other people. It was a pretty big town at the time due to its advantageous position along big-time trade routes. Capernaum is busting with target audience and influencers on all sides. Everything He would do would get plenty of eyeballs, comments, and exposure. What gets started here would get spread from here, and Jesus already had holy momentum, teaching with Authority in the local synagogue, and backing it up with the miracles that only God could do: telling demons to take a hike (ha! THAT was ironic) along with raising paralyzed dudes and dead daughters, alike. Altogether, the more Jesus hung out there, the more people heard about the coming Kingdom, which He said, is why He was there.
And now another thing we know to be true about Jesus is now ironically working against Him in traveling to Nain: He’s God, in the flesh.
Which means, for the time being, He can only be in any one place at any one time.
Which means leaving Capernaum is altogether counterintuitive, let alone seemingly counter-Kingdom. If you’re strategically planning a one-man-coup de sin, let alone injecting some life into the intended exponential expansion of one’s ministry that you already know has a very short lifespan - heading out of town when it’s just starting to get hot is bad strategy.
Especially when You’ve just proven YESTERDAY that you can do any long-distance miracle you want virtually and keep your focus on going viral at home.
Let alone, ironically just like the pagan soldier said the day before: Jesus can command any number of angels to keep the situation that precipitates the need for a miracle, from happening in the first place.
Worse still, He’s not going somewhere else that’s bustling. He’s headed into obscurity.
Again, with its two-digit population, Nain probably has way more livestock than actual human lives. At the time its known as an isolated agricultural town not just off major trade routes, but off the beaten path altogether. There’s most likely no members of his Discord up there, let alone an insufficient number of subscribers to warrant the infrastructure expense for 5G. Anything Jesus is going to do up there is happening in a social vacuum.
Which means, clearly Jesus’ highest priority is not a high engagement rate at the Roman outpost.
So, take it all together: by first telling us where Jesus traveled to, God was first telling us what He had to give up to accomplish the will of the Father:
Saying farewell to Capernaum for a few days was actually Jesus saying sayonara to copious amounts of free publicity. He was walking away literally from a much bigger, much broader, and much more influential audience. By heading up to Nain, He was actually heading towards social isolation – instead of continuing as a viral sensation in Capernaum. And with Passover 33 A.D. circled in red on his calendar, Jesus knew better than anyone that audience conversion efficiency in everything He did would be critical for every day he had left on the planet.
So, God talking about where is actually Him telling us what it cost Jesus to say: Yes.
Actually, let me say that better: by telling us when and where Jesus had traveled, God was first telling us the total cost Jesus would have first calculated to obey the will of the Father – and did what the Father said, right away.
Which means ironically – with everything else we know to be true about Jesus – the things God tells us first are actually the last things Jesus is thinking about.
Even with His own rule of First Things First working against His Brand, what God wants etched into the minds of the generations to come is that Jesus walking all day up to little Nain – all the while his reach, impressions, follower growth, and conversions trended down – is the Heart of the Father:
When Jesus made the Father’s Will the first thing He does despite where He currently is, that means His highest priorities aren’t just somewhere else – it’s also somewhen else.
It’s actually another cute little literary trick He’s using called foreshadowing – by first talking about Jesus traveling to Nain, God is setting up all His audiences to come for universally understanding later that it doesn’t matter how much it costs Him…
He’s coming.
Ironically, though, one of my favorite parts of this story isn’t in Jesus traveling to Nain: it’s what happened, soon afterward.
Episode IV - A New Hole: Nainya Business. Behold(en), still. Copyright © 2026 Behold(en), still.
One more thing
No matter where He was or what He was doing, Jesus was always doing it His Father's way. No matter where you are in life, and no matter what you've done - Jesus is your only way.
Don't know what THAT means? Please take just a few moments and click the below to find out.