1 Just at that time some people came up to tell Him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate mingled with that of their sacrifices.
2 Then He answered them, "Do you think, because these Galileans suffered like this, that they were worse sinners than all the rest of the Galileans?
3 By no means, I tell you, but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did.
4 Or those eighteen people at Siloam on whom the tower fell and whom it crushed to death, do you think that they were offenders worse than all the rest of the people who live in Jerusalem?
5 By no means, I tell you, but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did."
6 Then He told them this story: "A man had a fig tree planted by his vineyard, and he kept going and looking for figs on it, but did not find any.
7 So he said to the vine-dresser, 'Look here! for three years I have been coming to look for figs on this fig tree, and have not found any. Cut it down. Why waste the ground with it?'
8 But he answered, 'Leave it, sir, just one more year, till I dig around it and manure it.
9 If it bears figs in the future, well; but if not, you will have to cut it down.'"
10 One Sabbath He was teaching in one of the synagogues,
11 and there was a woman there who for eighteen years had had a disease caused by a spirit. She was bent double and could not straighten herself up at all.
12 As soon as Jesus saw her, He called her to Him and said to her, "Woman, you are freed from your disease!"
13 Then He laid His hands on her, and at once she straightened herself up and burst into praising God.
14 But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured her on the Sabbath, answered the crowd, "There are six days on which people must work; so come on these and be cured, but not on the Sabbath."
15 Then the Lord answered him, "You hypocrites! Does not everyone of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or donkey and lead him out of the stable to water him?
16 And so was it not right for this woman, a descendant of Abraham, whom Satan has for eighteen years kept bound, to be freed from this bond on the Sabbath?"
17 Even while He was saying this, His opponents were blushing with shame, but all the people were rejoicing over all the glorious things that were being done by Him.
18 So He went on to say, "What is the kingdom of God like? To what may I compare it?
19 It is like a mustard seed which a man took and dropped in his garden, and it grew and became a tree, and the wild birds roosted in its branches."
20 And again He said, "To what may I compare the kingdom of God?
21 It is like yeast which a woman took and hid in a bushel of flour until it all had risen."
22 Then He was traveling from town to town and from village to village, teaching and making His way toward Jerusalem.
23 And someone asked Him, "Lord, are only a few to be saved?" And He said to them,
24 "You must struggle on to get in through the narrow door, for I tell you, many will try to get in, but will not succeed,
25 when once the master of the house gets up and shuts the door, and you begin to stand on the outside and to knock on the door again and again and say, 'Lord, open it for us'; but He will answer, 'I do not know where you come from.'
26 Then you will begin to say, 'We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.'
27 But He will say to you, 'I do not know where you come from. Go away from me, all you wrongdoers!'
28 There you will weep and grind your teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves being driven away on the outside.
29 People will come from east and west, from north and south, and take their seats at the feast in the kingdom of God.
30 And so there are those now last who will be first then, and there are those now first who will then be last."
31 Just at that time some Pharisees came up and said to Him, "Get out at once! Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you!"
32 But He said to them: "Go and tell that fox, 'Here I am, driving out demons and performing cures, today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will finish these tasks.
33 But I must continue on my way, for it is not possible for a prophet to perish outside Jerusalem.'
34 "O Jerusalem! Jerusalem! The city that continues to murder the prophets, and to stone those who are sent to her, how often I have yearned to gather your children around me, as a hen gathers her brood under her wings. But you refused!
35 Now your house is abandoned to its fate! And I tell you, you will never see me again until you say, 'Blessed be He who comes in the name of the Lord!'"