New Testament in a Year
9 He got back in the boat, crossed the sea, and returned to His own town. 2 When He got there, some men approached Him carrying a mat. On the mat was another man, a paralytic. The men evidently believed that Jesus could heal the paralytic, and Jesus saw their faith, how much faith they had in His authority and power.
Jesus: Rest assured, My son; your sins are forgiven.
3 Now some scribes and teachers of the law had been watching this whole scene.
Scribes and Teachers (to themselves): This man is blaspheming!
4 Though they had only spoken in low whispers among themselves, Jesus knew their thoughts.
Jesus: Why do you hold such hardness and wickedness in your hearts? 5 Look, is it easier to say, “Your sins are forgiven,” or “Get up and walk”? 6 To make clear that the Son of Man has the authority on earth to forgive sins (turning to the paralytic man on the mat), Get up, pick up your mat, and go home.
7 And the man did. 8 When the crowd saw this, they were amazed, even a little scared, and they praised God who had given humans the authority to do such miraculous things.
9 Later Jesus was walking along and He saw a man named Matthew sitting in the tax collector’s office.
Jesus (to Matthew): Follow Me.
Matthew got up and followed Him.
10 Once when He ate a meal at home with His disciples, a whole host of tax collectors and other sinners joined them. 11 When the Pharisees saw this, they asked Jesus’ disciples,
Pharisees: Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?
Jesus (overhearing this): 12 Look, who needs a doctor—healthy people or sick people? 13 I am not here to attend to people who are already right with God; I am here to attend to sinners. In the book of the prophet Hosea, we read, “It is not sacrifice I want, but mercy.”[a] Go and meditate on that for a while—maybe you’ll come to understand it.
14 And then some of the disciples of John came.
John’s Disciples: What’s the story with fasting? We fast and the Pharisees fast, but Your disciples do not fast!
Jesus: 15 When you celebrate—as at a wedding when one’s dearest friend is getting married—you do not fast. The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them. Then My friends and followers will fast. 16 You would begin by washing and shrinking a patch you would use to mend a garment—otherwise, the patch would shrink later, pull away from the garment, and make the original tear even worse. 17 You wouldn’t pour new wine into old wineskins. If you did, the skins would burst, the wine would run out, and the wineskins would be ruined. No, you would pour new wine into new wineskins—and both the wine and the wineskins would be preserved.
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.