14 AFTER JOHN HAD BEEN ARRESTED, Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the Gospel of God: 15 'The time has come; the kingdom of God is upon you; repent, and believe the Gospel.'
16 Jesus was walking by the shore of the Sea of Galilee when he saw Simon and his brother Andrew on the lake at work with a casting-net; for they were fishermen. 17 Jesus said to them, 'Come with me, and I will make you fishers of men.' 18 And at once they left their is nets and followed him.
19 When he had gone a little further he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in the boat overhauling their nets. 20 He called them; and, leaving their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men, they went off to follow him.
21 They came to Capernaum, and on the Sabbath he went to synagogue and began to teach. 22 The people were astounded at his teaching, for, unlike the doctors of the law, he taught with a note of authority. 23 Now there was a man in the synagogue possessed by an unclean spirit. 24 He shrieked: 'What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are-the Holy One of God.' 25 Jesus rebuked him: 'Be silent', he said, 'and come out of him.' 26 And the unclean spirit threw the man into convulsions and with a loud cry left him. 27 They were all dumbfounded and began to ask one another, 'What is this? A new kind of teaching! He speaks with authority. When he gives orders, even the unclean 28 The news spread rapidly, and he was soon spoken of all over the district of Galilee.
29 On leaving the synagogue they went straight to the house of Simon and Andrew; and James and John went with them. 30 Simon's mother-in-law was ill in bed with fever. 31 They told him about her at once. He came forward, took her by the hand, and helped her to her feet. The fever left her and she waited upon them .
32 That evening after sunset they brought to him all who were ill or possessed by devils; 33 and the whole town was there, gathered at the door. 34 He healed many who suffered from various diseases, and drove out many devils. He would not let the devils speak, because they knew who he was.
35 Very early next morning he got up and went out. He went away to a lonely spot and remained there in prayer. 36 But Simon and his companions searched him out, 37 found him, and said, 'They are all looking for you.' 38 He answered, 'Let us move on to the country towns in the neighbourhood; I have to proclaim my message there also; that is what I came out to do .' 39 So all through Galilee he went, preaching in the synagogues and casting out the devils.
40 Once he was approached by a leper, who knelt before him begging his help. 'If only you will,' said the man, 'you can cleanse me.' 41 In warm indignation Jesus stretched out his hand, touched him, and said, 'Indeed I will; be clean again.' 42 The leprosy left him immediately, and he was clean. 43 Then he dismissed him with this stern warning: 44 'Be sure you say nothing to anybody. Go and show yourself to the priest, and make the offering laid down by Moses for your cleansing; that will certify the cure.' 45 But the man went out and made the whole story public; he spread it far and wide, until Jesus could no longer show himself in any town, but stayed outside in the open country. Even so, people kept coming to him from all quarters.
1 When after some days he returned to Capernaum, the news went round that he was at home; 2 and such a crowd collected that the space in front of the door was not big enough to hold them. And while he was proclaiming the message to them , 3 a man was brought who was paralysed. 4 Four men were carrying him, but because of the crowd they could not get him near. So they opened up the roof over the place where Jesus was, and when they had broken through they lowered the stretcher on which the paralysed man was lying. 5 When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralysed man, 'My son, your sins are forgiven.'
6 Now there were some lawyers sitting there and they thought to themselves, 7 'Why does the fellow talk like that? This is blasphemy! Who but God alone can forgive sins?' 8 Jesus knew in his own mind that this s was what they were thinking, and said to them: 'Why do you harbour thoughts like these? 9 Is it easier to say to this paralysed man, "Your sins are forgiven", or to say, "Stand up, take your bed, and walk"? 10 But to convince you that the Son of Man has the right on earth to forgive sins' - he turned to the paralysed man - 11 'I say to you, stand up, take your bed, and go home.' 12 And he got up, took his stretcher at once, and went out in full view of them all, so that they were astounded and praised God. 'Never before', they said, 'have we seen the like.'
13 Once more he went away to the lake-side. All the crowd came to him, and he taught them there. 14 As he went along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus at his seat in the custom-house, and said to him, 'Follow me'; and Levi rose and followed him.
15 When Jesus was at table in his house, many bad characters - tax-gatherers and others - were seated with him and his disciples; for there were many who followed him. 16 Some doctors of the law who were Pharisees noticed him eating in this bad company, and said to his disciples, 'He eats with tax-gatherers and sinners!' 17 Jesus overheard and said to them, 'It is not the healthy that need a doctor, but the sick; I did not come to invite virtuous people, but sinners.'
18 Once, when John's disciples and the Pharisees were keeping a fast, some people came to him and said, 'Why is it that John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees are fasting, but yours are not?' 19 Jesus said to them, 'Can you expect the bridegroom's friends to fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, there can be no fasting. 20 But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and on that day they will fast.
21 'No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on to an old coat; if he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and leaves a bigger hole. 22 No one puts new wine into old wine-skins, if he does, the wine will burst the skins, and then wine and skins are both lost. Fresh skins for new wine!'
23 One Sabbath he was going through the cornfields; and his disciples, as they went, began to pluck ears of corn. 24 The Pharisees said to him, 'Look, why are they doing what is forbidden on the Sabbath?' 25 He answered, 'Have you never read what David did when he and his men were hungry and had nothing to eat? 26 He went into the House of God, in the time of Abiathar the High Priest, and ate the consecrated loaves, though no one but a priest is allowed to eat them, and even gave them to his men.'
27 He also said to them, 'The Sabbath was made for the sake of man and not man for the Sabbath: 28 therefore the Son of Man is sovereign even over the Sabbath.'
1 On another occasion when he went to synagogue, there was a man in the congregation who had a withered arm; 2 and they were watching to see whether Jesus would cure him on the Sabbath, so that they could bring a charge against him. 3 He said to the man with the withered arm, 'Come and stand out here.' 4 Then he turned to them: 'Is it permitted to do good or to do evil on the Sabbath, to save life or to kill?' 5 They had nothing to say; and, looking round at them with anger and sorrow at their obstinate stupidity, he said to the man, 'Stretch out your arm.' He stretched it out and his arm was restored. 6 But the Pharisees, on leaving the synagogue, began plotting against him with the partisans of Herod to see how they could make away with him.
7 JESUS WENT AWAY to the lake-side with his disciples. 8 Great numbers from Galilee, Judaea and Jerusalem, Idumaea and Transjordan, and the neighbourhood of Tyre and Sidon, heard what he was doing and came to see him. 9 So he told his disciples to have a boat ready for him, to save him from being crushed by the crowd. 10 For he cured so many that sick people of all kinds came crowding in upon him to touch him. 11 The unclean spirits too, when they saw him, would fall at his feet and cry aloud, 'You are the Son of God'; 12 but he insisted that they should not make him known.
13 He then went up into the hill-country and called the men he wanted; and they went and joined him. 14 He appointed twelve as his companions, whom he would send out to proclaim the Gospel, 15 with a commission to drive out devils. 16 So he appointed the Twelve: to Simon he gave the name Peter; 17 then came the sons of Zebedee, James and his brother John, to whom he gave the name Boanerges, Sons of Thunder; 18 then Andrew and Philip and Bartholomew and Matthew and Thomas and James the son of Alphaeus and Thaddaeus and Simon, a member of the Zealot party, 19 and Judas Iscariot, the man who betrayed him.
20 He entered a house; and once more such a crowd collected round them that they had no chance to eat. 21 When his family heard of this, they set out to take charge of him; for people were saying that he was out of his mind.
22 The doctors of the law, too, who had come down from Jerusalem, said, 'He is possessed by Beelzebub', and, 'He drives out devils by the prince of devils.' 23 So he called them to come forward, and spoke to them in parables: 'How can Satan drive out Satan? 24 If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand; 25 if a household is divided against itself, that house will never stand; 26 and if Satan is in rebellion against himself, he is divided and cannot stand; and that is the end of him.
27 'On the other hand, no one can break into a strong man's house and make off with his goods unless he has first tied the strong man up; then he can ransack the house.
28 'I tell you this: no sin, no slander, is beyond forgiveness for men; 29 but whoever slanders the Holy Spirit can never be forgiven; he is guilty of eternal sin.' 30 He said this because they had declared that he was possessed by an unclean spirit.
31 Then his mother and his brothers arrived, and remaining outside sent in a message asking him to come out to them. 32 A crowd was sitting round and word was brought to him: 'Your mother and your brothers are outside asking for you.' 33 He replied, 'Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?' 34 And looking round at those who were sitting in the circle about him he said, 'Here are my mother and my brothers. 35 Whoever does the will of God is my brother, my sister, my mother.'
1 ON ANOTHER OCCASION he began to teach by the lake-side. The crowd that gathered round him was so large that he had to get into a boat on the lake, and there he sat, with the whole crowd on the beach right down to the water's edge. 2 And he taught them many things by parables.
As he taught he said: 3 'Listen! A sower went out to sow. 4 And it happened that as he sowed, some seed fell along the footpath; and the birds came and ate it up. 5 Some seed fell on rocky ground, where it had little soil, and it sprouted quickly because it had no depth of earth; 6 but when the sun rose the young corn was scorched, and as it had no proper root it withered away. 7 Some seed fell among thistles; but the thistles shot up and choked the corn, and it yielded no crop. 8 And some of the seed fell into good soil, where it came up and grew, and bore fruit; and the yield was thirtyfold, sixtyfold, even a hundredfold .' 9 He added, 'If you have ears to hear, then hear.'
10 When he was alone, the Twelve and others who were round him questioned him about the parables. 11 He replied, 'To you the secret of the kingdom of God has been given, but to those who are outside everything comes by way of parables, 12 so that (as Scripture says) they may look and look, but see nothing; they may hear and hear, but understand nothing; otherwise they might turn to God and be forgiven.'
13 So he said, 'You do not understand this parable? How then are you to understand any parable? 14 The sower sows the word. 15 Those along the footpath are people in whom the word is sown, but no sooner have they heard it than Satan comes and carries off the word which has been sown in them. 16 It is the same with those who receive the seed on rocky ground; as soon as they hear the word, they accept it with joy, 17 but it strikes no root in them; they have no staying-power; then, when there is trouble or persecution on account of the word, they fall away at once. 18 Others is again receive the seed among thistles; they hear the word, 19 but worldly cares and the false glamour of wealth and all kinds of evil desire come in and choke the word, and it proves barren. 20 And there are those who receive the seed in good soil; they hear the word and welcome it; and they bear fruit thirtyfold, sixty-fold, or a hundredfold.'
21 He said to them, 'Do you bring in the lamp to put it under the meal-tub, or under the bed? Surely it is brought to be set on the lamp-stand? 22 For nothing is hidden unless it is to be disclosed, and nothing put under cover unless it is to come into the open. 23 If you have ears to hear, then hear.'
24 He also said, 'Take note of what you hear; the measure you give is the measure you will receive, 25 with something more besides. For the man who has will be given more, and the man who has not will forfeit even what he has.'
26 He said, 'The kingdom of God is like this. A man scatters seed on the land; 27 he goes to bed at night and gets up in the morning, and the seed sprouts and grows-how, he does not know. 28 The ground produces a crop by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then full-grown corn in the ear; 29 but as soon as the crop is ripe, he sets to work with the sickle, because harvest-time has come.'
30 He said also, 'How shall we picture the kingdom of God, or by what parable shall we describe it? 31 It is like the mustard-seed, which is smaller than any seed in the ground at its sowing. 32 But once sown, it springs up and grows taller than any other plant, and forms branches so large that the birds can settle in its shade.'
33 With many such parables he would give them his message, so far as they were able to receive it. 34 He never spoke to them except in parables; but privately to his disciples he explained everything.