Daily Gospel Plan

¹Again Jesus went into a synagogue; and a man was there whose hand was withered.

²The Pharisees were watching Jesus closely to see if He would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him [in the Jewish high court].

³He said to the man whose hand was withered, "Get up and come forward!"

⁴He asked them, "Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save a life or to kill?" But they kept silent.

⁵After looking around at them with anger, grieved at the hardness and arrogance of their hearts, He told the man, "Hold out your hand." And he held it out, and his hand was [completely] restored.

⁶Then the Pharisees went out and immediately began conspiring with the Herodians [to plot] against Him, as to how they might [fabricate some legal grounds to] put Him to death.

⁷Jesus withdrew to the sea with His disciples; and a large crowd from Galilee followed Him; and also people from Judea,

⁸and from Jerusalem, and from Idumea, and [from the region] beyond the Jordan, and around Tyre and Sidon; a vast number of people came to Him because they were hearing about all [the things] that He was doing.

⁹And He told His disciples to have a small boat stand ready for Him because of the many people, so that they would not crowd Him;

¹⁰for He had healed many, and as a result all who had diseases pressed around Him to touch Him.

¹¹Whenever the unclean spirits saw Him, they fell down before Him and screamed out, "You are the Son of God!"

¹²Jesus sternly warned them [again and again] not to tell who He was.

¹³He went up on the hillside and called those whom He Himself wanted and chose; and they came to Him.

¹⁴And He appointed twelve [disciples], so that they would be with Him [for instruction] and so that He could send them out to preach [the gospel as apostles—that is, as His special messengers, personally chosen representatives],

¹⁵and to have authority and power to cast out demons.

¹⁶He appointed the twelve: Simon (to whom He gave the name Peter),

¹⁷and James, the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James (to them He gave the name Boanerges, that is, "Sons of Thunder");

¹⁸and [He also appointed] Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew (Nathanael), and Matthew (Levi the tax collector), and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus (Judas the son of James), and Simon the Zealot;

¹⁹and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him.

²⁰Then He came to a house [in Capernaum], and a crowd formed again, so [many people] that Jesus and His disciples could not even eat a meal [together].

²¹When His own family heard this they went to take custody of Him; for they were saying, "He is out of His mind."

²²The scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, "He is possessed by Beelzebul (Satan)," and "He is driving out the demons by the [power of the] ruler of the demons."

²³So He called them to Himself and spoke to them in parables, "How can Satan drive out Satan?

²⁴If a kingdom is divided [split into factions and rebelling] against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.

²⁵And if a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand.

²⁶And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but is coming to an end.

²⁷But no one can go into a strong man's house and steal his property unless he first overpowers and ties up the strong man, and then he will ransack and rob his house.

²⁸"I assure you and most solemnly say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and all the abusive and blasphemous things they say;

²⁹but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit and His power [by attributing the miracles done by Me to Satan] never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an everlasting sin [a sin which is unforgivable in this present age as well as in the age to come]"—

³⁰[Jesus said this] because the scribes and Pharisees were [attributing His miracles to Satan by] saying, "He has an unclean spirit."

³¹Then His mother and His brothers arrived, and standing outside they sent word to Him and called for Him.

³²A crowd was sitting around Him, and they said to Him, "Look! Your mother and Your brothers are outside asking for You."

³³And He replied, "Who are My mother and My brothers?"

³⁴Looking at those who were sitting in a circle around Him, He said, "Here are My mother and My brothers!

³⁵For whoever does the will of God [by believing in Me, and following Me], he is My brother and sister and mother."

¹Again Jesus began to teach beside the sea [of Galilee]. And a very large crowd gathered around Him, so He got into a boat [anchoring it a short distance out] on the sea and sat down; and the whole crowd was by the sea on the shore.

²And He taught them many things in parables, and in His teaching He said to them,

³"Listen! A sower went out to sow seed;

⁴and as he was sowing, some seed fell by the road, and the birds came and ate it up.

⁵Other seed fell on rocks where there was not much soil; and immediately a plant sprang up because the soil had no depth.

⁶And when the sun came up, the plant was scorched; and because it had no root, it dried up and withered away.

⁷Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns came up and choked it, and it yielded no grain.

⁸And other seed fell into good soil, and as the plants grew and increased, they yielded a crop and produced thirty, sixty, and a hundred times [as much as had been sown]."

⁹And He said, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear and heed My words."

¹⁰As soon as He was alone, those who were around Him, together with the twelve [disciples], began asking Him about [the interpretation of] the parables.

¹¹He said to them, "The mystery of the kingdom of God has been given to you [who have teachable hearts], but those who are outside [the unbelievers, the spiritually blind] get everything in parables,

¹²so that they will continually look but not see, and they will continually hear but not understand, otherwise they might turn [from their rejection of the truth] and be forgiven."

¹³Then He said to them, "Do you not understand this parable? How will you understand and grasp the meaning of all the parables?

¹⁴The sower sows the word [of God, the good news regarding the way of salvation].

¹⁵These [in the first group] are the ones along the road where the word is sown; but when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word which has been sown in them.

¹⁶In a similar way these [in the second group] are the ones on whom seed was sown on rocky ground, who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy [but accept it only superficially];

¹⁷and they have no real root in themselves, so they endure only for a little while; then, when trouble or persecution comes because of the word, immediately they [are offended and displeased at being associated with Me and] stumble and fall away.

¹⁸And others are the ones on whom seed was sown among the thorns; these are the ones who have heard the word,

¹⁹but the worries and cares of the world [the distractions of this age with its worldly pleasures], and the deceitfulness [and the false security or glamour] of wealth [or fame], and the passionate desires for all the other things creep in and choke out the word, and it becomes unfruitful.

²⁰And those [in the last group] are the ones on whom seed was sown on the good soil; and they hear the word [of God, the good news regarding the way of salvation] and accept it and bear fruit—thirty, sixty, and a hundred times as much [as was sown]."

²¹He said to them, "A lamp is not brought in to be put under a basket or under a bed, is it? Is it not [brought in] to be put on the lampstand?

²²For nothing is hidden, except to be revealed; nor has anything been kept secret, but that it would come to light [that is, things are hidden only temporarily, until the appropriate time comes for them to be known].

²³If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear and heed My words."

²⁴Then He said to them, "Pay attention to what you hear. By your own standard of measurement [that is, to the extent that you study spiritual truth and apply godly wisdom] it will be measured to you [and you will be given even greater ability to respond]—and more will be given to you besides.

²⁵For whoever has [a teachable heart], to him more [understanding] will be given; and whoever does not have [a yearning for truth], even what he has will be taken away from him."

²⁶Then He said, "The kingdom of God is like a man who throws seed on the ground;

²⁷and he goes to bed at night and gets up every day, and [in the meantime] the seed sprouts and grows; how [it does this], he does not know.

²⁸The earth produces crops by itself; first the blade, then the head [of grain], then the mature grain in the head.

²⁹But when the crop ripens, he immediately puts in the sickle [to reap], because [the time for] the harvest has come."

³⁰And He said, "How shall we picture the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use to illustrate and explain it?

³¹It is like a mustard seed, which, when it is sown on the ground, even though it is smaller than all the [other] seeds that are [sown] on the soil,

³²yet when it is sown, it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden herbs; and it puts out large branches, so that the birds of the sky are able to make nests and live under its shade."

³³With many such parables, Jesus spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear and understand it;

³⁴and He did not say anything to them without [using] a parable; He did, however, explain everything privately to His own disciples.

³⁵On that [same] day, when evening had come, He said to them, "Let us go over to the other side [of the Sea of Galilee]."

³⁶So leaving the crowd, they took Him with them, just as He was, in the boat. And other boats were with Him.

³⁷And a fierce windstorm began to blow, and waves were breaking over the boat, so that it was already being swamped.

³⁸But Jesus was in the stern, asleep [with His head] on the [sailor's leather] cushion. And they woke Him and said to Him, "Teacher, do You not care that we are about to die?"

³⁹And He got up and [sternly] rebuked the wind and said to the sea, "Hush, be still (muzzled)!" And the wind died down [as if it had grown weary] and there was [at once] a great calm [a perfect peacefulness].

⁴⁰Jesus said to them, "Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith and confidence [in Me]?"

⁴¹They were filled with great fear, and said to each other, "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him?"