Mark 2 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.

A few days later, Jesus came back to Capernaum, and word got around that he was home.

So many people packed in that there wasn't even room left by the door. And he was speaking the message to them.

Then some people came bringing a paralyzed man to him, carried by four of them.

But they couldn't get to Jesus because of the crowd, so they tore open the roof above where he was, dug through it, and lowered the mat the paralyzed man was lying on.

When Jesus saw their trust, he said to the paralyzed man, "Friend, your failures are forgiven."

Now some of the religious scholars were sitting there, thinking it over in their heads:

"Why does this man talk like that? He's insulting God! Who can forgive failures except God alone?"

Jesus immediately knew in his spirit what they were thinking, and said to them, "Why are you thinking these things?"

"Which is easier — to say to the paralyzed man, 'Your failures are forgiven,' or to say, 'Get up, pick up your mat, and walk'?"

"But so you'll know that the Son of Man has the authority on earth to forgive failures..." — he turned to the paralyzed man —

"I'm telling you: get up, pick up your mat, and go home."

And the man got up, immediately picked up his mat, and walked out in front of everyone. They were all completely stunned and praised God, saying, "We've never seen anything like this!"

Jesus went out again along the lake, and the whole crowd kept coming to him, and he was teaching them.

As he was walking along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collection booth. Jesus said to him, "Follow me." And Levi got up and followed him.

Later, Jesus was having dinner at Levi's house, and a large number of tax collectors and people known for their failures were eating with Jesus and his followers — because many of them had started following him.

When the religious scholars who were Pharisees saw him eating with tax collectors and people known for their failures, they said to his followers, "Why does he eat with tax collectors and people known for their failures?"

When Jesus heard this, he said to them, "Healthy people don't need a doctor — sick people do. I didn't come to call people who have it all together. I came for the ones who are failing."

John's followers and the Pharisees were observing a fast. Some people came to Jesus and asked, "How come John's followers and the Pharisees' followers fast, but yours don't?"

Jesus answered, "Can wedding guests go without eating while the groom is right there with them? As long as the groom is with them, they can't fast.

But the time will come when the groom is taken away from them, and then — on that day — they will fast.

"Nobody sews a patch of unshrunk cloth onto an old coat. If you do, the new patch will pull away from the old fabric and make the tear even worse.

And nobody pours fresh wine into stiff old wineskins. If you do, the wine will burst the skins, and you'll lose both the wine and the skins. No — fresh wine goes into new, flexible wineskins."

One Sabbath, Jesus was walking through the grain fields, and his followers began picking heads of grain as they walked.

The Pharisees said to him, "Look, why are they doing what's not allowed on the Sabbath?"

He said to them, "Haven't you ever read what David did when he and his men were hungry and in need?

How he went into God's house during the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread that had been set apart for God — which only the priests were allowed to eat — and shared it with the men who were with him?"

Then he told them, "The Sabbath was made for people, not people for the Sabbath.

So the Son of Man is master even of the Sabbath."