Book of Common Prayer
The brothers at Tyre warn Paul not to go to Jerusalem
21 1-11 When we had finally said farewell to them we set sail, running a straight course to Cos, and the next day we went to Rhodes and from there to Patara. Here we found a ship bound for Phoenicia, and we went aboard her and set sail. After sighting Cyprus and leaving it on our left we sailed to Syria and put in at Tyre, since that was where the ship was to discharge her cargo. We sought out the disciples there and stayed with them for a week. They felt led by the Spirit again and again to warn Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. But when our time was up we left there and continued our journey. They all came out to see us off, bringing their wives and children with them, accompanying us till we were outside the city. Then kneeling down on the beach we prayed and said good-bye to each other. Then we went aboard the ship while the disciples went back home. We sailed away from Tyre and arrived at Ptolemais. We greeted the brothers there and stayed with them for just one day. On the following day we left and proceeded to Caesarea and there we went to stay at the house of Philip the evangelist, one of the seven deacons. He had four unmarried daughters, all of whom spoke by the Spirit of God. During our stay there of several days a prophet by the name of Agabus came down from Judea. When he came to see us he took Paul’s girdle and used it to tie his own hands and feet together, saying, “The Holy Spirit says this: the man to whom this girdle belongs will be bound like this by the Jews in Jerusalem and handed over to the Gentiles!”
We all warn Paul, but he is immovable
12-13 When we heard him say this, we and the people there begged Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. Then Paul answered us, “What do you mean by unnerving me with all your tears? I am perfectly prepared not only to be bound but to die in Jerusalem for the sake of the name of the Lord Jesus.”
14 Since he could not be dissuaded all we could do was to say, “May the Lord’s will be done,” and hold our tongues.
Jesus cures leprosy
12 While he was in one of the towns, Jesus came upon a man who was a mass of leprosy. When he saw Jesus, he prostrated himself before him and begged, “If you want to, Lord, you can make me clean.”
13 Jesus stretched out his hand, placed it on the leper, saying, “Certainly I want to. Be clean!”
14 Immediately the leprosy left him and Jesus warned him not to tell anybody, but to go and show himself to the priest and to make the offerings for his recovery that Moses prescribed, as evidence to the authorities.
15-16 Yet the news about him spread all the more, and enormous crowds collected to hear Jesus and to be healed of their diseases. But he slipped quietly away to deserted places for prayer.
Jesus cures a paralytic in soul and body
17-20 One day while Jesus was teaching, some Pharisees and experts in the Law were sitting near him. They had come out of every village in Galilee and Judea as well as from Jerusalem. God’s power to heal people was with him. Soon some men arrived carrying a paralytic and they kept trying to carry him in to put him down in front of Jesus. When they failed to find a way of getting him in because of the dense crowd, they went up on to the top of the house and let him down, bed and all, through the tiles, into the middle of the crowd in front of Jesus. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the man, “My friend, your sins are forgiven.”
21 The scribes and the Pharisees began to argue about this, saying, “Who is this man who talks blasphemy? Who can forgive sins? Only God can do that.”
22 Jesus realised what was going on in their minds and spoke straight to them.
23-24 “Why must you argue like this in your minds? Which do you suppose is easier—to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven’ or to say, ‘Get up and walk’? But to make you realise that the Son of Man has full authority on earth to forgive sins—I tell you,” he said to the man who was paralysed, “get up, pick up your bed and go home!”
25-26 Instantly the man sprang to his feet before their eyes, picked up the bedding on which he used to lie, and went off home, praising God. Sheer amazement gripped every man present, and they praised God and said in awed voices, “We have seen incredible things today.”
The New Testament in Modern English by J.B Phillips copyright © 1960, 1972 J. B. Phillips. Administered by The Archbishops’ Council of the Church of England. Used by Permission.