Jesus Heals a Man with a Paralyzed Hand^(A)

3 Jesus^[a] went into the synagogue again, and a man with a paralyzed hand was there. ² The people^[b] watched Jesus^[c] closely to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath,^[d] intending to accuse him of doing something wrong. ³ He told the man with the paralyzed hand, “Come forward.”^{[e] 4} Then he asked them, “Is it lawful to do good or to do evil on Sabbath days,^[f] to save a life or to destroy it?” But they remained silent.

⁵ Jesus^[g] looked around at them in anger, deeply hurt because of their hard hearts. Then he told the man, “Hold out your hand.” The man^[h] held it out, and his hand was restored to health. ⁶ Immediately the Pharisees and Herodians^[i] went out and began to plot how to kill him.

Jesus Encounters a Large Crowd

⁷ So Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the sea. A large crowd from Galilee, Judea, ⁸ 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. ⁹ Jesus^[j] told his disciples to have a boat ready for him so that the crowd wouldn’t crush him, ¹⁰ because he had healed so many people that everyone who had diseases kept crowding up against him in order to touch him. ¹¹ Whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they would fall down in front of him and scream, “You are the Son of God!” ¹² But he sternly ordered them again and again not to tell people who he was.

Jesus Appoints Twelve Apostles^(B)

¹³ Then Jesus^[k] went up on a hillside and called to himself those whom he had decided on, and they approached him. ¹⁴ He appointed the Twelve,^[l] whom he called apostles, to accompany him, to be sent out to preach, ¹⁵ and to have the authority to drive out demons. ¹⁶ He appointed the Twelve:^[m] Simon (whom he named Peter), ¹⁷ Zebedee’s sons James and his brother John (whom he named Boanerges, that is, Sons of Thunder), ¹⁸ Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddeus,^[n] Simon the Cananaean,^{[o] 19} and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him.

Jesus is Accused of Working with Beelzebul^(C)

²⁰ Then he went home. Such a large crowd gathered again that Jesus and his disciples^[p] couldn’t even eat. ²¹ When his family heard about it, they went to restrain him, because they kept saying, “He’s out of his mind!”

²² The scribes who had come down from Jerusalem kept repeating, “He has Beelzebul,” and, “He drives out demons by the ruler of demons.”

²³ So Jesus^[q] called them together and began to speak to them in parables. “How can Satan drive out Satan? ²⁴ If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. ²⁵ And if a household is divided against itself, that household won’t stand. ²⁶ So if Satan rebels against himself and is divided, he cannot stand. Indeed, his end has come. ²⁷ No one can go into a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions without first tying up the strong man. Then he can ransack his house. ²⁸ I tell all of you^[r] with certainty, people will be forgiven their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter.^{[s] 29} But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never be forgiven, but is guilty of eternal sin.” ³⁰ …because they had been saying, “He has an unclean spirit.”

The True Family of Jesus^(D)

³¹ Then his mother and his brothers arrived. Milling around outside, they sent for him, continuously summoning him. ³² A crowd was sitting around him. They told him, “Look! Your mother and your brothers^[t] are outside asking for you.”

³³ He answered them, “Who are my mother and my brothers?” ³⁴ Then looking at the people sitting around him, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! ³⁵ Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”