Book of Common Prayer
The weak and the strong
14 Welcome someone who is weak in faith, but not in order to have disputes on difficult points. 2 One person believes it is all right to eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. 3 The one who eats should not despise the one who doesn’t, and the one who doesn’t should not condemn the one who does—because God has welcomed them.
4 Who do you think you are to judge someone else’s servants? They stand or fall before their own master. And stand they will, because the master can make them stand.
5 One person reckons one day more important than another. Someone else regards all days as equally important. Each person must make up their own mind. 6 The one who celebrates the day does so in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, does so in honor of the Lord, and gives thanks to God; the one who does not eat abstains in honor of the Lord, and gives thanks to God.
The final judgment is the only one that counts
7 We none of us live to ourselves; we none of us die to ourselves. 8 If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So, then, whether we live or whether we die, we belong to the Lord. 9 That is why the Messiah died and came back to life, so that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.
10 You, then: why do you condemn your fellow Christian? Or you: why do you despise a fellow Christian? We must all appear before the judgment seat of God, 11 as the Bible says:
As I live, says the Lord, to me every knee shall bow,
and every tongue shall give praise to God.
12 So then, we must each give an account of ourselves to God.
The healing of the demoniac
26 They sailed to the land of the Gerasenes, which is on the other side from Galilee. 27 As he got out on land, a demon-possessed man from the town met him. For a long time he had worn no clothes, and he didn’t live in a house but among the tombs. 28 When he saw Jesus he screamed and fell down in front of him.
“You and me, Jesus—you and me!” he yelled at the top of his voice. “What is it with you and me, you son of the Most High God? Don’t torture me—please, please don’t torment me!” 29 Jesus was commanding the unclean spirit to come out of the man. Many times over it had seized him, and he was kept under guard with chains and manacles; but he used to break the shackles, and the demon would drive him into the desert.
30 “What’s your name?” Jesus asked him.
“Regiment!” replied the man—for many demons had entered him. 31 And they begged him not to order them to be sent into the pit.
32 A sizable herd of pigs was feeding on the hillside, and the demons begged him to allow them to go into them. He gave them permission. 33 The demons went out of the man and entered the pigs, and the herd rushed down the steep slope into the lake and was drowned.
34 The herdsmen saw what had happened. They took to their heels and spread the news in town and country, 35 and people came out to see what had happened. They came to Jesus, and found the man from whom the demons had gone out sitting there at Jesus’ feet, clothed and in his right mind. They were afraid. 36 People who had seen how the demoniac had been healed explained it to them. 37 The whole crowd, from the surrounding country of the Gerasenes, asked him to go away from them, because great terror had seized them. So he got into the boat and returned.
38 The man who had been demon-possessed begged Jesus to let him stay with him. But he sent him away. 39 “Go back to your home,” he said, “and tell them what God has done for you.” And he went off round every town, declaring what Jesus had done for him.
Scripture quotations from The New Testament for Everyone are copyright © Nicholas Thomas Wright 2011, 2018, 2019.