61 Jesus went out from there and came into His hometown ; and His disciples followed Him. 2 When the Sabbath came , He began to teach in the synagogue ; and the many listeners were astonished , saying , "Where did this man get these things , and what is this wisdom given to Him, and such miracles as these performed by His hands ? 3 "Is not this the carpenter , the son of Mary , and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon ? Are not His sisters here with us?" And they took offense at Him. 4 Jesus said to them, " A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and among his own relatives and in his own household ." 5 And He could do no e miracle there except that He laid His hands on a few sick people and healed them. 6 And He wondered at their unbelief . And He was going around e the villages teaching .
7 And He summoned the twelve and began to send them out in pairs , and gave them authority over the unclean spirits ; 8 and He instructed them that they should take nothing for their journey , except a mere staff -no bread , no bag , no money in their belt - 9 but to wear sandals ; and He added, "Do not put on two tunics ." 10 And He said to them, "Wherever e you enter a house , stay there until you leave town . 11 "Any place that does not receive you or listen to you, as you go out from there , shake the dust off the soles of your feet for a testimony against them." 12 They went out and preached that men should repent . 13 And they were casting out many demons and were anointing with oil many sick people and healing them.
14 And King Herod heard of it, for His name had become well known ; and people were saying , " John the Baptist has risen from the dead , and that is why these miraculous powers are at work in Him." 15 But others were saying , "He is Elijah ." And others were saying , "He is a prophet , like one of the prophets of old." 16 But when Herod heard of it, he kept saying , "John , whom I beheaded , has risen !" 17 For Herod himself had sent and had John arrested and bound in prison on account of Herodias , the wife of his brother Philip , because he had married her. 18 For John had been saying to Herod , " It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife ." 19 Herodias had a grudge against him and wanted to put him to death and could not do so; 20 for Herod was afraid of John , knowing that he was a righteous and holy man , and he kept him safe . And when he heard him, he was very perplexed ; but he used to enjoy listening to him. 21 A strategic day came when Herod on his birthday gave a banquet for his lords and military commanders and the leading men of Galilee ; 22 and when the daughter of Herodias herself came in and danced , she pleased Herod and his dinner guests ; and the king said to the girl , "Ask me for whatever e you want and I will give it to you." 23 And he swore to her, "Whatever e you ask of me, I will give it to you; up to half of my kingdom ." 24 And she went out and said to her mother , "What shall I ask for?" And she said , "The head of John the Baptist ." 25 Immediately she came in a hurry to the king and asked , saying , "I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter ." 26 And although the king was very sorry , yet because of his oaths and because of his dinner guests , he was unwilling e to refuse her. 27 Immediately the king sent an executioner and commanded him to bring back his head . And he went and had him beheaded in the prison , 28 and brought his head on a platter , and gave it to the girl ; and the girl gave it to her mother . 29 When his disciples heard about this, they came and took away his body and laid it in a tomb .
30 The apostles gathered together with Jesus ; and they reported to Him all that they had done and taught . 31 And He said to them, "Come away by yourselves e to a secluded place and rest a while ." (For there were many people coming and going , and they did not even have time to eat .) 32 They went away in the boat to a secluded place by themselves . 33 The people saw them going , and many recognized them and ran there together on foot from all the cities , and got there ahead of them. 34 When Jesus went ashore , He saw a large crowd , and He felt compassion for them because they were like sheep without e a shepherd ; and He began to teach them many things . 35 When it was already quite late e , His disciples came to Him and said , "This place is desolate and it is already quite late e ; 36 send them away so that they may go into the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat ." 37 But He answered them, "You give them something to eat !" And they said to Him, "Shall we go and spend two hundred denarii on bread and give them something to eat ?" 38 And He said to them, "How many loaves do you have ? Go look !" And when they found out, they said , "Five , and two fish ." 39 And He commanded them all to sit down by groups on the green grass . 40 They sat down in groups of hundreds and of fifties . 41 And He took the five loaves and the two fish , and looking up toward heaven , He blessed the food and broke the loaves and He kept giving them to the disciples to set before them; and He divided up the two fish among them all . 42 They all ate and were satisfied , 43 and they picked up twelve full baskets of the broken pieces , and also of the fish . 44 There were five thousand men who ate the loaves .
45 Immediately Jesus made His disciples get into the boat and go ahead of Him to the other side to Bethsaida , while He Himself was sending the crowd away . 46 After bidding them farewell , He left for the mountain to pray . 47 When it was evening , the boat was in the middle of the sea , and He was alone on the land . 48 Seeing them straining at the oars , for the wind was against them, at about the fourth watch of the night He came to them, walking on the sea ; and He intended to pass by them. 49 But when they saw Him walking on the sea , they supposed that it was a ghost , and cried out; 50 for they all saw Him and were terrified . But immediately He spoke with them and said to them, " Take courage ; it is I, do not be afraid ." 51 Then He got into the boat with them, and the wind stopped ; and they were utterly e e astonished , 52 for they had not gained any insight from the incident of the loaves , but their heart was hardened .
53 When they had crossed over they came to land at Gennesaret , and moored to the shore. 54 When they got out of the boat , immediately the people recognized Him, 55 and ran about that whole country and began to carry here and there on their pallets those who were sick , to the place they heard He was. 56 Wherever He entered villages , or cities , or countryside , they were laying the sick in the market places , and imploring Him that they might just touch the fringe of His cloak ; and as many as touched it were being cured .
31 He entered again into a synagogue ; and a man was there whose hand was withered . 2 They were watching Him to see if He would heal him on the Sabbath , so that they might accuse Him. 3 He said to the man with the withered hand , "Get up and come forward e !" 4 And He said to them, "Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath , to save a life or to kill ?" But they kept silent . 5 After looking around at them with anger , grieved at their hardness of heart , He said to the man , "Stretch out your hand ." And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored . 6 The Pharisees went out and immediately began conspiring with the Herodians against Him, as to how they might destroy Him.
7 Jesus withdrew to the sea with His disciples ; and a great multitude from Galilee followed ; and also from Judea , 8 and from Jerusalem , and from Idumea , and beyond the Jordan , and the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon , a great number of people heard of all that He was doing and came to Him. 9 And He told His disciples that a boat should stand ready for Him because of the crowd , so that they would not crowd Him; 10 for He had healed many , with the result that all those who had afflictions pressed around Him in order to touch Him. 11 Whenever the unclean spirits saw Him, they would fall down before Him and shout , "You are the Son of God !" 12 And He earnestly warned them not to tell who He was.
13 And He went up on the mountain and summoned those whom He Himself wanted , and they came to Him. 14 And He appointed twelve , so that they would be with Him and that He could send them out to preach , 15 and to have authority to cast out the demons . 16 And He appointed the twelve : Simon (to whom He gave the name Peter ), 17 and James , the son of Zebedee , and John the brother of James (to them He gave the name Boanerges , which means , "Sons of Thunder "); 18 and Andrew , and Philip , and Bartholomew , and Matthew , and Thomas , and James the son of Alphaeus , and Thaddaeus , and Simon the Zealot ; 19 and Judas Iscariot , who betrayed Him.
20 And He came home , and the crowd gathered again , to such an extent that they could not even eat a meal . 21 When His own people heard of this, they went out to take custody of Him; for they were saying , " He has lost His senses ."
22 The scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying , "He is possessed by Beelzebul ," and " He casts out the demons by the ruler of the demons ." 23 And He called them to Himself and began speaking to them in parables , "How can Satan cast out Satan ? 24 "If a kingdom is divided against itself , that kingdom cannot e stand . 25 "If a house is divided against itself , that house will not be able to stand . 26 "If Satan has risen up against himself and is divided , he cannot e stand , but he is finished ! 27 " But no one can enter the strong man's house and plunder his property unless e he first binds the strong man , and then he will plunder his house . 28 " Truly I say to you, all sins shall be forgiven the sons of men , and whatever e blasphemies they utter ; 29 but whoever e blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never e e has forgiveness , but is guilty of an eternal sin "- 30 because they were saying , "He has an unclean spirit ."
31 Then His mother and His brothers arrived , and standing outside they sent word to Him and called Him. 32 A crowd was sitting around Him, and they said to Him, "Behold , Your mother and Your brothers are outside looking for You." 33 Answering them, He said , "Who are My mother and My brothers ?" 34 Looking about at those who were sitting around e Him, He said , " Behold My mother and My brothers ! 35 "For whoever e does the will of God , he is My brother and sister and mother ."
