M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
Taming the tongue
3 Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers and sisters; you know that we will be judged more severely. 2 All of us make many mistakes, after all. If anyone makes no mistakes in what they say, such a person is a fully complete human being, capable of keeping firm control over the whole body as well. 3 We put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, and then we can direct their whole bodies. 4 Consider, too, the case of large ships; it takes strong winds to blow them along, but one small rudder will turn them whichever way the helmsman desires and decides. 5 In the same way, the tongue is a little member but boasts great things. See how small a fire it takes to set a large forest ablaze! 6 And the tongue is a fire. The tongue is a world of injustice, with its place established right there among our members. It defiles the whole body; it sets the wheel of nature ablaze, and is itself set ablaze by hell. 7 Every species of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, you see, can be tamed, and has been tamed, by humans. 8 But no single human is able to tame the tongue. It is an irrepressible evil, full of deadly poison. 9 By it we bless the Lord and father; and by it we curse humans who are made in God’s likeness! 10 Blessing and curses come out of the same mouth! My dear family, it isn’t right that it should be like that. 11 Does a spring put out both sweet and bitter water from the same source? 12 Dear friends, can a fig tree bear olives, or a vine bear figs? Nor can salt water yield fresh.
True and false wisdom
13 Who is wise and discerning among you? Such a person should, by their upright behavior, display their works in the humility of wisdom. 14 But if you have bitter jealousy and contention in your hearts, don’t boast, and tell lies against the truth. 15 This isn’t the wisdom that comes from above. It is earthly, merely human, coming from the world of demons. 16 For where there is jealousy and contention, there you will get unruly behavior and every kind of evil practice. 17 But the wisdom that comes from above is first holy, then peaceful, gentle, compliant, filled with mercy and good fruits, unbiased, sincere. 18 And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.
The miraculous catch of fish
5 One day, as the crowds were pressing close to him to hear the word of God, Jesus was standing by the lake of Gennesaret. 2 He saw two boats moored by the land; the fishermen had gone ashore and were washing their nets. 3 He got into one of the boats—it was Simon’s—and asked him to put out a little way from the land. Then he sat down in the boat and began to teach the crowd.
4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deeper part, and let down your nets for a catch.”
5 “Master,” replied Simon, “we were working hard all night and caught nothing at all. But if you say so, I’ll let down the nets.”
6 When they did so, they caught such a huge number of fish that their nets began to break. 7 They signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. So they came, and filled both the boats, and they began to sink.
8 When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees.
“Leave me alone, Lord!” he said. “I’m a sinner!” 9 He and all his companions were gripped with amazement at the catch of fish they had taken. 10 This included James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon.
“Don’t be afraid,” said Jesus to Simon. “From now on you’ll be catching people.”
11 They brought the boats in to land. Then they abandoned everything and followed him.
The healing of the man with a virulent skin disease
12 It so happened that, as Jesus was in one particular town, there was a man whose skin was covered all over with a virulent disease. When he saw Jesus, he fell on his face.
“Lord,” he begged, “if you want, you can make me clean.”
13 Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him.
“I do want to,” he said. “Be clean.”
And the skin disease disappeared immediately.
14 Jesus instructed the man not to tell anyone. “Go and show yourself to the priest,” he said, “and make the offering commanded by Moses in connection with your healing, as evidence for them.”
15 The news about Jesus, though, spread all round, and large crowds came to hear and to be healed from their diseases. 16 He used to slip away to remote places and pray.
The healing of the paralytic lowered through the roof
17 One day, as Jesus was teaching, there were Pharisees and legal experts sitting there who had come from every village of Galilee, and from Judaea and Jerusalem. The power of the Lord was with Jesus, enabling him to heal. 18 Just then some men appeared, carrying a paralyzed man on a mattress; they were trying to bring him in and lay him before Jesus. 19 The crowd made it impossible for them to get through, so they went up on the roof and let him down through the tiles, mattress and all, so that he landed right in the middle, in front of Jesus.
20 Jesus saw what trust they had.
“My friend,” he said, “your sins are forgiven.”
21 The legal experts and Pharisees began to argue. “Who does he think he is?” they said. “He’s blaspheming! Nobody can forgive sins—only God can do that!”
22 Jesus knew their line of thought.
“Why are you complaining in your hearts?” he replied. 23 “Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up and walk’? 24 But if you want to be convinced that the son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins—” (here he turned to the paralyzed man) “—I say to you, get up, pick up your mattress, and go home.”
25 At once he got up in front of them all, picked up what he’d been lying on, and went off home, praising God.
26 A sense of awe came over everyone. They praised God, and were filled with fear. “We’ve seen extraordinary things today,” they said.
Questions about table-company and fasting
27 After this Jesus went out and saw a tax-collector called Levi, sitting at the tax-office. “Follow me,” he said. 28 And he left everything, got up, and followed him.
29 Levi made a great feast for him in his house, and a large crowd of tax-collectors and others were there reclining at table. 30 The Pharisees and the legal experts began to grumble to Jesus’ disciples.
“Why do you lot eat and drink,” they asked, “with tax-collectors and sinners?”
31 “Healthy people don’t need a doctor,” replied Jesus. “It’s sick people who do! 32 I haven’t come to call the righteous; I’m calling sinners to repentance.”
33 “John’s disciples often fast, and say prayers,” they said to him, “and so do the Pharisees’ followers—but your disciples eat and drink.”
34 “Can you make the wedding guests fast,” replied Jesus, “while the bridegroom is with them? 35 But the time will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them. That’s when they will fast.”
36 He added this parable. “Nobody tears a piece of cloth from a new coat to make a patch on an old one. If they do, they tear the new, and the patch from it won’t fit the old one anyway. 37 And nobody puts new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the new wine will burst the skins: it will go to waste, and the skins will be ruined too. 38 You have to put new wine in new skins. 39 And nobody who drinks old wine wants new. ‘I prefer the old,’ they say.”
Scripture quotations from The New Testament for Everyone are copyright © Nicholas Thomas Wright 2011, 2018, 2019.