Less than two miles
This location is going to turn out to be very important. If you were writing a story and wanted it to get attention you wouldn’t want it to be set in Nazareth or Bethlehem or Bethel. It would be like launching your new high end line of cosmetics or clothes in Petersburg instead of Richmond - or if your a snob about such things - in Richmond instead of Manhattan. Why is Bethel the place? Who knows? God works in places like this all the time. It’s the same as the previous verse: Jesus arrived. When he arrived it was the right time; where he arrived was the right place. That’s it. Later we get word that Bethel’s proximity to Jerusalem is the reason a lot of people hear about the Lazarus story, but that’s not really a good point is it? Jesus could have done this in the center of that city and no one would have to wander out into the suburbs to see if it was true. The fact that people end up doing that is only important to show that God works wherever he wants to work and it’s us who have to go and look for it.
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