About Jesus choosing his first disciples

1One day Jesus was standing on the shore of Lake Gennesaret. It is a big freshwater lake with two names, Gennesaret and Galilee. The people came there to Jesus to hear God's word, and there were so many people that they were pushing each other.

2Jesus saw two boats pulled up on the beach. The owners of the boats had left them and were washing their nets.

3Jesus got into the boat that belonged to Simon and said to him, “Push the boat a little way out into the deep.” So Simon pushed the boat and it floated a little way out from the shore. Then Jesus sat down in the boat and spoke to all the people on the shore and taught them God's word.

4When he finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Push the boat out further into the deep water so that you and your men can let down the nets and catch some fish.”

5Simon answered, “Master, we tried all night but we didn't catch any. But if you want me to, I will let down the nets.”

6So they let down the nets. There were so many fish coming into the nets that they were beginning to break.

7Then they made signs with their hands to the men in the other boat, because the men in the two boats were partners. Simon and the men with him wanted them to help pull in the fish they had caught. So the others rowed over to them and helped them pull in the nets. Both boats were so full of fish that they nearly tipped over and sank.

8When Simon Peter saw all the fish and that the boats were about to sink, he knelt down in front of Jesus and said, “Go away from me, Lord! I am a sinful man,”

9because he was very surprised to see so many fish. The other men in his boat were also surprised at catching so many.

10James and John who were in the other boat were very surprised too. They were the sons of Zebedee and they were Simon Peter's partners. Jesus said to Simon, “Don't be afraid. From now on you will be bringing people to me, just as you are bringing fish to the shore today.”

11Then they pulled the two boats up on the beach and left them there with their other things and followed Jesus.

About Jesus healing a man covered with sores

12One day Jesus was in a town where there was a man who was covered with bad sores. He was very sick. When he saw Jesus he threw himself down on the ground because he really wanted Jesus to heal him. He said to Jesus, “Please! Please! Good Lord, if you want to, you know you can make my skin clean!”

13Jesus stretched out his hand and touched the man and said, “I do want to heal you, so your skin will be clean.” While Jesus was still speaking, straight away the sores were gone.

14Jesus said to him, “Don't tell anyone that you are better, but go straight to the priest. He will look at you and say, ‘You are well now.’ Then later you must give him two birds to kill for you, as Moses said long ago. Then everyone will know that you are healed.”

15But he spread the news about what Jesus had done. The news spread more and more from place to place. Then crowds of people came to Jesus. They came to listen to Jesus and for him to heal all the sick people.

16But sometimes Jesus went away by himself to lonely places and prayed to God.

About Jesus healing a cripple

17One day Jesus was with a man in his house. While he was there some people came to him, and Jesus taught them about God. Some Jews called Pharisees came to him too and some teachers of Moses' law. They came from different places in Judea and Galilee. Others came from Jerusalem. They sat in the house where Jesus was. And the Spirit of the Lord God was with Jesus making him strong, and he healed sick people there in the house.

18Some men came to the house bringing a cripple. They had lifted him on to a bed and carried him, because he couldn't walk and he couldn't move. His whole body was weak all the time. The men looked for a way to get into the house and put the man near Jesus. They kept trying to find a way,

19but they couldn't find a space to get inside because there were so many people there. So they climbed up outside on to the roof carrying the man with them. Then they made a hole up on the roof and let the man down through the hole with some rope and the bed landed on the floor in the middle of all the people. Then the cripple and Jesus were facing one another.

20The men who took the cripple to Jesus trusted Jesus and knew that he could heal him. Jesus knew what they were thinking and said to the cripple, “All your sins are forgiven and God won't think about them any more.”

21The teachers of Moses' law and the Pharisees said to themselves, “Who is this man? He wants to be like God, does he? God is the only one who can forgive sins, no one else can do that.”

22Jesus knew what they were thinking and he said to them, “Why do you think such things?

23Maybe you can say to this man, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ Of course you can't say that! Or maybe you can say to him, ‘Get up and move your feet.’ No! You can't say either of those things to this man by yourself.

24But as for me, the one who was born in this place, God has told me that I can forgive your sins. So I will show you today that God's word to me is true.” Then Jesus spoke to the crippled man and said, “Get up! Pick up your bed and go home!”

25The man got up straight away and picked up his bed. All the people there saw him stand up. And he went out of the house carrying his bed, and went home praising God.

26Everyone was very surprised and afraid and they praised God. Then they said to each other, “We have seen wonderful things with our own eyes today!”

About Jesus choosing Levi

27After Jesus had healed the crippled man and forgiven his sins, he came out of the house. As he went along, Jesus found a man called Levi. This man had two names, Levi and Matthew. He worked for the Roman rulers, so he had a small building beside the road for his work. He collected tax money from people as they went along the road and passed the building. He took their money to give to the Romans. As Jesus went along the road, he saw Levi sitting inside his office, and he said to him, “Come and follow me.”

28Levi stood up and came outside and followed Jesus. He left the work he had been doing so that he could follow Jesus all the time, and they went away together.

29Later Levi, Jesus' new disciple, cooked a lot of food, and when it was ready Jesus and his other disciples and a lot of other people came to his house. A lot of those people did the same kind of work as Levi had done before he came to Jesus, but others did different work. And they all ate together.

30But some Pharisees and teachers of Moses' law knew that Jesus had gone to Levi's house. And they complained and said to Jesus' disciples, “Why are you eating together in that man's house? You eat with people who collect tax money. You eat with sinners!”

31When Jesus heard them he said to them, “Sick people look for someone to heal them, but strong people don't look for someone like that.

32I have come here to teach bad people so that they won't do wrong things but they will obey God. If people say, ‘I am all right and I never do anything wrong,’ then I can't teach them, I can only teach bad people.”

About people asking Jesus about going without food

33Some people said to Jesus, “You know what John's disciples are always doing. They often go without food so that they can pray to God, and the disciples of the Pharisees do the same. But your disciples don't do that, they eat whenever they want to.”

34Jesus answered, “Listen to this. When a man gets married, lots of people gather together with him and his wife to have a party. You won't say to them, ‘Don't eat this food, you should go hungry.’ Of course you won't, because those people want to have a party while their friend is still with them.

35Afterwards maybe some bad men might take that man away. Then his friends would be very sad and want to stop eating and go hungry.” When Jesus said this, he was thinking of himself and his disciples.

36Then Jesus told them this little story. He said, “We don't tear a good piece of material in half so that we can sew a little piece of the good material on to some that is old. We don't spoil the good material. If we do that, the new piece of material and the old piece will both tear.”

37Then Jesus told them this story about grapes that people crushed so they could drink the wine. They poured grape juice into skin bottles and filled the skin with juice and left it so that they could drink the wine later on. The juice stayed in the skin until it swelled. That's why they poured new juice into strong new skins. Then when the juice swelled, the skin swelled too. So Jesus said, “We don't pour new juice into old skins that have already swelled. If we do that, when the juice swells the skin will burst and the juice will spill out on to the ground.

38So we pour new juice into new skin bottles.”

39Jesus also told them this about the wine. “People always leave that wine I have been talking about until it is old. They don't like drinking it when it is new. So when people have been drinking old wine, they don't want any new wine. They say, ‘The old is better.’” When Jesus spoke about the material and the wine, he was thinking about people. When people follow him, they mustn't go with two minds.