People from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were flocking to him, being baptized by him while they confessed their sins.

Just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens split open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove.

At once the Spirit drove him into the wilderness.

He was in the wilderness for 40 days being tempted by Satan. He was among wild animals, and angels were ministering to him.

So immediately they left their nets and followed him.

He immediately called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and followed him.

But Jesus rebuked him. "Be quiet," he ordered, "and come out of him!"

At this, the unclean spirit shook the man, cried out with a loud voice, and came out of him.

All the people were so stunned that they kept saying to each other, "What is this? A new teaching with authority! He tells even the unclean spirits what to do, and they obey him!"

When evening came, after the sun had set, people started bringing to him everyone who was sick or possessed by demons.

Simon and his companions searched frantically for him.

When they found him, they told him, "Everyone's looking for you."

Then a leper came to Jesus and began pleading with him. He fell on his knees and told him, "If you want to, you can make me clean."

Moved with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand, touched him, and told him, "I do want to. Be made clean!"

Instantly the leprosy left him, and he was clean.

Then Jesus sternly warned him and encouraged him to go at once.

But when the man left, he began to proclaim it freely. He spread the news so widely that Jesus could no longer enter a town openly, but had to stay out in deserted places. Still, people kept coming to him from everywhere.

when some people came and brought him a paralyzed man being carried by four men.

Since they couldn't bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof over the place where he was. They dug through it and let down the mat on which the paralyzed man was lying.

Jesus went out again beside the sea. The whole crowd kept coming to him, and he kept teaching them.

As he was walking along, he saw Levi, the son of Alphaeus, sitting at the tax collector's desk. Jesus told him, "Follow me!" So Levi got up and followed him.

Later, he was having dinner at Levi's house. Many tax collectors and sinners were also eating with Jesus and his disciples, because there were many who were following him.

When the scribes and the Pharisees saw him eating with sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples, "Why does he eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?"

The Pharisees asked him, "Look! Why are they doing what is not lawful on Sabbath days?"

The people watched Jesus closely to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath, intending to accuse him of doing something wrong.

Immediately the Pharisees and Herodians went out and began to plot how to kill him.

Jerusalem, Idumea, from across the Jordan, and from the region around Tyre and Sidon followed him. They came to him because they kept hearing about everything he was doing.

Jesus told his disciples to have a boat ready for him so that the crowd wouldn't crush him,

because he had healed so many people that everyone who had diseases kept crowding up against him in order to touch him.

Whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they would fall down in front of him and scream, "You are the Son of God!"

Then Jesus went up on a hillside and called to himself those whom he had decided on, and they approached him.

He appointed the Twelve, whom he called apostles, to accompany him, to be sent out to preach,

and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him.

When his family heard about it, they went to restrain him, because they kept saying, "He's out of his mind!"

Then his mother and his brothers arrived. Milling around outside, they sent for him, continuously summoning him.

A crowd was sitting around him. They told him, "Look! Your mother and your brothers are outside asking for you."

Then looking at the people sitting around him, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers!

Then Jesus began to teach again beside the sea. Such a large crowd gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while the entire crowd remained beside the sea on the shore.

When he was alone with the Twelve and those around him, they began to ask him about the parables.

If anyone has ears to hear, let him listen!

because whoever has something, will have more given to him. But whoever has nothing, even what he has will be taken away."

So they left the crowd and took him away in a boat without making any special preparations. Other boats were with him.

But Jesus was in the back of the boat, asleep on a cushion. So they woke him up and asked him, "Teacher, don't you care that we're going to die?"

Overcome with fear, they kept saying to one another, "Who is this man? Even the wind and the sea obey him!"

Just as Jesus stepped out of the boat, a man with an unclean spirit came out of the tombs and met him.

He lived among the tombs, and no one could restrain him any longer, not even with a chain.

He had often been restrained with shackles and chains, but had snapped the chains apart and broken the shackles in pieces. No one could tame him.

When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and fell down in front of him,

Jesus had been saying to him, "Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!"

Then Jesus asked him, "What's your name?"

He told him, "My name is Legion, because there are many of us." He kept pleading with Jesus not to send them out of that region.

So the demons begged him, "Send us among the pigs, so that we can go into them!"

As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed kept begging him to let him go with him.

But Jesus wouldn't let him. Instead, he told him, "Go home to your family, and tell them how much the Lord has done for you and how merciful he has been to you."

So the man left and began proclaiming in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him. And everyone was utterly amazed.

When Jesus again had crossed to the other side in a boat, a large crowd gathered around him by the seashore.

and begged him urgently, saying, "My little daughter is dying. Come and lay your hands on her so that she may get well and live."

So Jesus went with him. A huge crowd kept following him and jostling him.

Since she had heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his robe,

Immediately Jesus became aware that power had gone out of him. So he turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who touched my clothes?"

His disciples asked him, "You see the crowd jostling you, and yet you ask, "Who touched me?'"

So the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came forward fearfully, fell down trembling in front of him, and told him the whole truth.

Jesus allowed no one to go further with him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James.

They laughed and laughed at him. But when he had driven all of them outside, he took the child's father and mother, along with the men who were with him, and went into the room where the child was.

Jesus left that place and went back to his hometown, and his disciples followed him.

When the Sabbath came, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were utterly amazed. "Where did this man get all these things?" they asked. "What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What great miracles are being done by his hands!

This is the builder, the son of Mary, and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas, and Simon, isn't it? His sisters are here with us, aren't they?" And they were offended by him.

because Herod himself had sent men who arrested John, bound him with chains, and put him in prison on account of Herodias, his brother Philip's wife, whom Herod had married.

So Herodias bore a grudge against John and wanted to kill him. But she couldn't do it

because Herod was afraid of John. He knew that John was a righteous and holy man, and so he protected him. Whenever he listened to John, he did much of what he said. In fact, he liked listening to him.

So without delay the king sent a soldier and ordered him to bring John's head. The soldier went and beheaded him in prison.

The apostles gathered around Jesus and told him everything they had done and taught.

When it was quite late, his disciples came to him and said, "This is a deserted place, and it's already late.

But he answered them, "You give them something to eat." They asked him, "Should we go and buy 200 denarii worth of bread and give it to them to eat?"

He asked them, "How many loaves of bread do you have? Go and see." They found out and told him, "Five loaves and two fish."

Jesus immediately had his disciples get into a boat and cross to Bethsaida ahead of him, while he sent the crowd away.

but when they saw him walking on the sea, they thought it was a ghost and began to scream.

All of them saw him and were terrified. Immediately he told them, "Have courage! It's me. Stop being afraid!"

Wherever he went, whether into villages, towns, or farms, people would place their sick in the marketplaces and beg him to let them touch even the tassel of his garment, and everyone who touched it was healed.

"you no longer let him do anything for his father or mother.'

Nothing that goes into a person from the outside can make him unclean. It's what comes out of a person that makes a person unclean.

If anyone has ears to hear, let him listen!"

When he had left the crowd and gone home, his disciples began asking him about the parable.

He asked them, "Are you so ignorant? Don't you know that nothing that goes into a person from the outside can make him unclean?

In fact, a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him and came and fell down at his feet.

Now the woman happened to be a Greek, born in Phoenicia in Syria. She kept asking him to drive the demon out of her daughter.

But she answered him, "Yes, Lord. Yet even the puppies under the table eat some of the children's crumbs."

Some people brought him a deaf man who also had a speech impediment. They begged him to lay his hand on him.

Jesus took him away from the crowd to be alone with him. Putting his fingers into the man's ears, he touched the man's tongue with saliva.

Then he looked up to heaven, sighed, and told him, "Ephphatha," that is, "Be opened!"

His disciples answered him, "Where could anyone get enough bread to feed these people out here in the wilderness?"

The Pharisees arrived and began arguing with Jesus. They tested him by demanding from him a sign from heaven.

When I broke the five loaves for the 5,000, how many baskets did you fill with leftover pieces?" They told him, "Twelve."

"When I broke the seven loaves for the 4,000, how many large baskets did you fill with the leftover pieces?" They told him, "Seven."

As they came to Bethsaida, some people brought a blind man to Jesus and begged him to touch him.

Jesus took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village. He spit into his eyes, placed his hands on him, and asked him, "Do you see anything?"

Then Jesus sent him home, saying, "Don't go into the village or tell anyone in the village."

They answered him, "Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, and still others one of the prophets."

Peter answered him, "You are the Messiah!" Jesus sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him.

Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, Jesus rebuked Peter, saying, "Get behind me, Satan, because you're not thinking God's thoughts, but human thoughts!"