The Daily Audio Bible

6 ^(A)The Lord gave the following regulations to Moses. ² An offering is to be made if any of you sin against the Lord by refusing to return what another Israelite has left as a deposit or by stealing something from him or by cheating him ³ or by lying about something that has been lost and swearing that you did not find it. ^4-5 When you sin in any of these ways, you must repay whatever you got by dishonest means. On the day you are found guilty, you must repay the owner in full, plus an additional 20 percent. ⁶ You shall bring to the priest as your repayment offering to the Lord a male sheep or goat without any defects. Its value is to be determined according to the official standard. ⁷ The priest shall offer the sacrifice for your sin, and you will be forgiven.

Sacrifices Burned Whole

⁸ The Lord commanded Moses ⁹ to give Aaron and his sons the following regulations for burnt offerings. A burnt offering is to be left on the altar all night long, and the fire is to be kept burning. ¹⁰ Then the priest, wearing his linen robe and linen shorts, shall remove the greasy ashes left on the altar and put them at the side of the altar. ¹¹ Then he shall change his clothes and take the ashes outside the camp to a ritually clean place. ¹² The fire on the altar must be kept burning and never allowed to go out. Every morning the priest shall put firewood on it, arrange the burnt offering on it, and burn the fat of the fellowship offering. ¹³ The fire must always be kept burning on the altar and never allowed to go out.

Grain Offerings

¹⁴ The following are the regulations for grain offerings. An Aaronite priest shall present the grain offering to the Lord in front of the altar. ¹⁵ Then he shall take a handful of the flour and oil, and the incense on it, and burn it on the altar as a token that all of it has been offered to the Lord. The odor of this offering is pleasing to the Lord. ^16-17 The priests shall eat the rest of it. It shall be made into bread baked without yeast and eaten in a holy place, the courtyard of the Tent of the Lord's presence. The Lord has given it to the priests as their part of the food offerings. It is very holy, like the sin offerings and the repayment offerings. ¹⁸ For all time to come any of the male descendants of Aaron may eat it as their continuing share of the food offered to the Lord. Anyone else who touches a food offering will be harmed by the power of its holiness.

¹⁹ The Lord gave Moses the following regulations ²⁰ for the ordination of an Aaronite priest. On the day he is ordained, he shall present as an offering to the Lord two pounds of flour (the same amount as the daily grain offering), half in the morning and half in the evening. ²¹ It is to be mixed with oil and cooked on a griddle and then crumbled and presented as a grain offering, an odor pleasing to the Lord. ²² For all time to come this offering is to be made by every descendant of Aaron who is serving as High Priest. It shall be completely burned as a sacrifice to the Lord. ²³ No part of a grain offering that a priest makes may be eaten; all of it must be burned.

Sin Offerings

²⁴ The Lord commanded Moses ²⁵ to give Aaron and his sons the following regulations for sin offerings. The animal for a sin offering shall be killed on the north side of the altar, where the animals for the burnt offerings are killed. This is a very holy offering. ²⁶ The priest who sacrifices the animal shall eat it in a holy place, the courtyard of the Tent of the Lord's presence. ²⁷ Anyone or anything that touches the flesh of the animal will be harmed by the power of its holiness. If any article of clothing is spattered with the animal's blood, it must be washed in a holy place. ²⁸ Any clay pot in which the meat is boiled must be broken, and if a metal pot is used, it must be scrubbed and rinsed with water. ²⁹ Any male of the priestly families may eat this offering; it is very holy. ³⁰ But if any of the blood is brought into the Tent and used in the ritual to take away sin, the animal must not be eaten; it must be burned.

Repayment Offerings

7 The following are the regulations for repayment offerings, which are very holy. ² The animal for this offering is to be killed on the north side of the altar, where the animals for the burnt offerings are killed, and its blood is to be thrown against all four sides of the altar. ³ All of its fat shall be removed and offered on the altar: the fat tail, the fat covering the internal organs, ⁴ the kidneys and the fat on them, and the best part of the liver. ⁵ The priest shall burn all the fat on the altar as a food offering to the Lord. It is a repayment offering. ⁶ Any male of the priestly families may eat it, but it must be eaten in a holy place, because it is very holy.

⁷ There is one regulation that applies to both the sin offering and the repayment offering: the meat belongs to the priest who offers the sacrifice. ⁸ The skin of an animal offered as a burnt offering belongs to the priest who offers the sacrifice. ⁹ Every grain offering that has been baked in an oven or prepared in a pan or on a griddle belongs to the priest who has offered it to God. ¹⁰ But all uncooked grain offerings, whether mixed with oil or dry, belong to all the Aaronite priests and must be shared equally among them.

Fellowship Offerings

¹¹ The following are the regulations for the fellowship offerings presented to the Lord. ¹² If you make this offering as a thanksgiving offering to God, you shall present, together with the animal to be sacrificed, an offering of bread made without yeast: either thick loaves made of flour mixed with olive oil or thin cakes brushed with olive oil or cakes made of flour mixed with olive oil. ¹³ In addition, you shall offer loaves of bread baked with yeast. ¹⁴ You shall present one part of each kind of bread as a special contribution to the Lord; it belongs to the priest who takes the blood of the animal and throws it against the altar. ¹⁵ The flesh of the animal must be eaten on the day it is sacrificed; none of it may be left until the next morning.

¹⁶ If you bring a fellowship offering as fulfillment of a vow or as your own freewill offering, not all of it has to be eaten on the day it is offered, but any that is left over may be eaten on the following day. ¹⁷ Any meat that still remains on the third day must be burned. ¹⁸ If any of it is eaten on the third day, God will not accept your offering. The offering will not be counted to your credit but will be considered unclean, and whoever eats it will suffer the consequences. ¹⁹ If the meat comes into contact with anything ritually unclean, it must not be eaten, but must be burned.

Any of you that are ritually clean may eat the meat, ²⁰ but if any of you who are not clean eat it, you shall no longer be considered one of God's people. ²¹ Also, if you eat the meat of this offering after you have touched anything ritually unclean, whether from a person or an animal, you shall no longer be considered one of God's people.

²² The Lord gave Moses the following regulations ²³ for the people of Israel. No fat of cattle, sheep, or goats shall be eaten. ²⁴ The fat of an animal that has died a natural death or has been killed by a wild animal must not be eaten, but it may be used for any other purpose. ²⁵ Anyone who eats the fat of an animal that may be offered as a food offering to the Lord will no longer be considered one of God's people. ^26 (B)No matter where the Israelites live, they must never use the blood of birds or animals for food. ²⁷ Anyone who breaks this law will no longer be considered one of God's people.

A Crowd by the Lake

⁷ Jesus and his disciples went away to Lake Galilee, and a large crowd followed him. They had come from Galilee, from Judea, ⁸ from Jerusalem, from the territory of Idumea, from the territory on the east side of the Jordan, and from the region around the cities of Tyre and Sidon. All these people came to Jesus because they had heard of the things he was doing. ^9 (A)The crowd was so large that Jesus told his disciples to get a boat ready for him, so that the people would not crush him. ¹⁰ He had healed many people, and all the sick kept pushing their way to him in order to touch him. ¹¹ And whenever the people who had evil spirits in them saw him, they would fall down before him and scream, “You are the Son of God!”

¹² Jesus sternly ordered the evil spirits not to tell anyone who he was.

Jesus Chooses the Twelve Apostles^(B)

¹³ Then Jesus went up a hill and called to himself the men he wanted. They came to him, ¹⁴ and he chose twelve, whom he named apostles. “I have chosen you to be with me,” he told them. “I will also send you out to preach, ¹⁵ and you will have authority to drive out demons.”

¹⁶ These are the twelve he chose: Simon (Jesus gave him the name Peter); ¹⁷ James and his brother John, the sons of Zebedee (Jesus gave them the name Boanerges, which means “Men of Thunder”); ¹⁸ Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Patriot, ¹⁹ and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus.

Jesus and Beelzebul^(C)

²⁰ Then Jesus went home. Again such a large crowd gathered that Jesus and his disciples had no time to eat. ²¹ When his family heard about it, they set out to take charge of him, because people were saying, “He's gone mad!”

^22 (D)Some teachers of the Law who had come from Jerusalem were saying, “He has Beelzebul in him! It is the chief of the demons who gives him the power to drive them out.”

²³ So Jesus called them to him and spoke to them in parables: “How can Satan drive out Satan? ²⁴ If a country divides itself into groups which fight each other, that country will fall apart. ²⁵ If a family divides itself into groups which fight each other, that family will fall apart. ²⁶ So if Satan's kingdom divides into groups, it cannot last, but will fall apart and come to an end.

²⁷ “No one can break into a strong man's house and take away his belongings unless he first ties up the strong man; then he can plunder his house.

²⁸ “I assure you that people can be forgiven all their sins and all the evil things they may say.^{[a] 29 (E)}But whoever says evil things against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven, because he has committed an eternal sin.” (³⁰ Jesus said this because some people were saying, “He has an evil spirit in him.”)

The Destiny of the Wicked and of the Good^[a]

³ The Lord will not let good people go hungry, but he will keep the wicked from getting what they want.

⁴ Being lazy will make you poor, but hard work will make you rich.