It seemed good to me, having made observation, with great care, of the direction of events in their order, to put the facts in writing for you, most noble Theophilus;

They were upright in the eyes of God, keeping all the rules and orders of God, and doing no wrong.

Now it came about that in his turn he was acting as priest before God,

But the angel said, Have no fear, Zacharias, for your prayer has come to the ears of God, and your wife Elisabeth will have a son, and his name will be John.

For he will be great in the eyes of the Lord; he will not take wine or strong drink; and he will be full of the Spirit of God from his birth.

And through him great numbers of the children of Israel will be turned to the Lord their God.

And the angel, answering, said, I am Gabriel, whose place is before God; I have been sent to say these words to you and to give you this good news.

Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town in Galilee, named Nazareth,

And the angel said to her, Have no fear, Mary, for you have God's approval.

He will be great, and will be named the Son of the Most High: and the Lord God will give him the kingdom of David, his father:

And the angel in answer said to her, The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will come to rest on you, and so that which will come to birth will be named holy, Son of God.

For there is nothing which God is not able to do.

Then Mary got up and went quickly into the high lands, to a town of Judah;

And Mary said: My soul gives glory to God;

My spirit is glad in God my Saviour.

Those who had no food he made full of good things; the men of wealth he sent away with nothing in their hands;

And it came to the ears of her neighbours and relations that the Lord had been very good to her, and they took part in her joy.

And straight away his mouth was open and his tongue was free and he gave praise to God.

Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, for he has come to his people and made them free,

Because of the loving mercies of our God, by which the dawn from heaven has come to us,

And the angel said, Have no fear; for truly, I give you good news of great joy which will be for all the people:

And suddenly there was with the angel a great band of spirits from heaven, giving praise to God, and saying,

Glory to God in the highest, and on the earth peace among men with whom he is well pleased.

Then the keepers of the sheep went back, giving glory and praise to God for all the things which had come to their ears and which they had seen, as it had been said to them.

And there was then in Jerusalem a man whose name was Simeon; and he was an upright man, fearing God and waiting for the comfort of Israel: and the Holy Spirit was on him.

Then he took him in his arms and gave praise to God and said,

And coming up at that time, she gave praise to God, talking of him to all those who were waiting for the freeing of Jerusalem.

And the child became tall and strong and full of wisdom, and the grace of God was on him.

And Jesus was increasing in wisdom and in years, and in grace before God and men.

And all flesh will see the salvation of God.

Make clear by your acts that your hearts have been changed; and do not say to yourselves, We have Abraham for our father: for I say to you that God is able from these stones to make children of Abraham.

And even now the axe is put to the root of the trees; and every tree which does not have good fruit will be cut down and put into the fire.

And he said to them, Do not make an attempt to get more money than the right amount.

John made answer, saying to them all, Truly, I give you baptism with water, but one is coming who is greater than I, whose shoes I am not good enough to undo: he will give you baptism with the Holy Spirit, and with fire:

In whose hand is the instrument with which he will make clean his grain; he will put the good grain in his store, but the waste will be burned in the fire which will never be put out.

And so comforting them with these and other words, he gave the good news to the people;

The son of Enos, the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God.

And the Evil One said to him, If you are the Son of God, give orders to this stone to become bread.

And Jesus in answer said to him, It has been said in the Writings, Give worship to the Lord your God, and be his servant only.

And he took him to Jerusalem and put him on the highest point of the Temple and said to him, If you are the Son of God, let yourself go down from here; for it is said in the Writings,

And Jesus made answer and said to him, It is said in the Writings, You may not put the Lord your God to the test.

And he came to Nazareth, where he had been as a child, and he went, as his way was, into the Synagogue on the Sabbath, and got up to give a reading.

The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because I am marked out by him to give good news to the poor; he has sent me to make well those who are broken-hearted; to say that the prisoners will be let go, and the blind will see, and to make the wounded free from their chains,

To give knowledge that the year of the Lord's good pleasure is come.

And they got up and took him out of the town to the edge of the mountain on which their town was, so that they might send him down to his death.

Let us be! what have we to do with you, Jesus of Nazareth? have you come to put an end to us? I have knowledge who you are, the Holy One of God.

And Jesus said to him, Be quiet, and come out of him. And when the evil spirit had put him down on the earth in the middle of them, he came out of him, having done him no damage.

And he got up and went out of the Synagogue and went into the house of Simon. And Simon's wife's mother was very ill with a burning heat; and in answer to their prayers for her

He went near her, and with a sharp word he gave orders to the disease and it went away from her; and straight away she got up and took care of their needs.

And evil spirits came out of a number of them, crying out and saying, You are the Son of God. But he gave them sharp orders not to say a word, because they had knowledge that he was the Christ.

But he said to them, I have to give the good news of the kingdom of God in other towns, because that is why I was sent.

Now it came about that while the people came pushing to be near him, and to have knowledge of the word of God, he was by a wide stretch of water named Gennesaret;

And he got into one of the boats, the property of Simon, and made a request to him to go a little way out from the land. And being seated he gave the people teaching from the boat.

And when they had done this, they got such a great number of fish that it seemed as if their nets would be broken;

And when they had got their boats to the land, they gave up everything and went after him.

And some men had with them, on a bed, a man who was ill, without power of moving; and they made attempts to get him in and put him before Jesus.

And because of the mass of people, there was no way to get him in; so they went up on the top of the house and let him down through the roof, on his bed, into the middle in front of Jesus.

And the scribes and Pharisees were having an argument, saying, Who is this, who has no respect for God? who is able to give forgiveness for sins, but God only?

Which is the simpler: to say, You have forgiveness for your sins; or to say, Get up and go?

But so that you may see that on earth the Son of man has authority for the forgiveness of sins, (he said to the man who was ill,) I say to you, Get up, and take up your bed, and go into your house.

And straight away he got up before them, and took up his bed and went away to his house giving praise to God.

And wonder overcame them all, and they gave glory to God; and they were full of fear, saying, We have seen strange things today.

And giving up his business, he got up and went after him.

I have come, not to get the upright, but sinners, so that they may be turned from their sins.

And he said to them, in a story, No man takes a bit of cloth from a new coat and puts it on to an old coat, for so the new coat would be damaged and the bit from the new would not go well with the old.

How he went into the house of God and took for food the holy bread, which only the priests may take, and gave it to those who were with him?

But he had knowledge of their thoughts; and he said to the man whose hand was dead, Get up and come into the middle. And he got up and came forward.

And Jesus said, I put the question to you, Is it right to do good on the Sabbath or to do evil? to give life or to take it away?

And it came about in those days that he went out to the mountain for prayer; and he was all night in prayer to God.

And turning his eyes to his disciples he said, Happy are you who are poor: for the kingdom of God is yours.

But I say to you who give ear to me, Have love for those who are against you, do good to those who have hate for you,

If a man gives you a blow on one side of your face, then let the other side be turned to him; from him who takes away your coat, do not keep back your robe.

Give to everyone who comes with a request, and if a man takes away your property, make no attempt to get it back again.

And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is it to you? for even sinners do the same.

And if you let those have the use of your money, from whom you are hoping to get it back, what credit is it to you? even sinners do so to sinners, hoping to get back as much as they gave.

But be loving to those who are against you and do them good, and give them your money, not giving up hope, and your reward will be great and you will be the sons of the Most High: for he is kind to evil men, and to those who have hard hearts.

Be not judges of others, and you will not be judged: do not give punishment to others, and you will not get punishment yourselves: make others free, and you will be made free:

Give, and it will be given to you; good measure, crushed down, full and running over, they will give to you. For in the same measure as you give, it will be given to you again.

For no good tree gives bad fruit, and no bad tree gives good fruit.

For every tree is judged by its fruit. Men do not get figs from thorns, or grapes from blackberry plants.

The good man, out of the good store of his heart, gives good things; and the evil man, out of his evil store, gives evil: for out of the full store of the heart come the words of the mouth.

He is like a man building a house, who went deep and put the base of it on a rock; and when the water came up and the river was driving against that house, it was not moved, because the building was good.

And I had the feeling that I was not even good enough to come to you: but say the word only, and my servant will be well.

And he came near, and put his hand on the stretcher where the dead man was: and those who were moving it came to a stop. And he said, Young man, I say to you, Get up.

And the dead man got up, and words came from his lips. And he gave him to his mother.

And fear came on all, and they gave praise to God, saying, A great prophet is among us: and, God has given thought to his people.

And answering them he said, Go back and give news to John of what you have seen, and the things which have come to your ears; the blind now see, those who had no power in their legs are walking, lepers are made clean, those who had no hearing now have their ears open, dead men come to life again, and the poor have the good news given to them.

I say to you, Among all the sons of women, not one is greater than John: but he who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.

(And all the people, and the tax-farmers, to whom John had given baptism, when they had knowledge of these things, gave glory to God.

But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law were against the purpose of God for themselves, not having had his baptism.)

And it came about, after a short time, that he went through town and country giving the good news of the kingdom of God, and with him were the twelve,

And some falling on good earth, came up and gave fruit a hundred times as much. And with these words he said in a loud voice, He who has ears, let him give ear.

And he said, To you is given knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of God; but to the others, they are given in stories, so that seeing, they may not see, and though they give hearing, the sense will not be clear to them.

Now this is the point of the story: The seed is the word of God.

Those by the side of the road are those who have given hearing; then the Evil One comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not have faith and get salvation.

And those in the good earth are those who, having given ear to the word, keep it with a good and true heart, and in quiet strength give fruit.

And his mother and his brothers came to him, and they were not able to get near him because of the great number of people.

But he said to them in answer, My mother and my brothers are those who have knowledge of the word of God and do it.

Now it came about on one of those days that he got into a boat with his disciples; and he said to them, Let us go over to the other side of the water: and they put out the boat.

And when he saw Jesus, he gave a loud cry and went down on the earth before him and in a loud voice said, What have I to do with you, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? Do not be cruel to me.