Study Desk

It is like a mustard seed that a man took and planted in his own garden, and it grew and became a tree, and the birds flying about nested in its branches."

Yeshua continued traveling through town after town and village after village, teaching and making his way toward Yerushalayim.

When the time came for the banquet, he sent his slave to tell those who had been invited, ‘Come! Everything is ready!'

The slave came and reported these things to his master. "Then the owner of the house, in a rage, told his slave, ‘Quick, go out into the streets and alleys of the city; and bring in the poor, the disfigured, the blind and the crippled!'

"If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father, his mother, his wife, his children, his brothers and his sisters, yes, and his own life besides, he cannot be my talmid.

Whoever does not carry his own execution-stake and come after me cannot be my talmid.

"Or again, suppose one king is going out to wage war with another king. Doesn't he first sit down and consider whether he, with his ten thousand troops, has enough strength to meet the other one, who is coming against him with twenty thousand?

When he does find it, he joyfully hoists it onto his shoulders;

and when he gets home, he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Come, celebrate with me, because I have found my lost sheep!'

I tell you that in the same way, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who turns to God from his sins than over ninety-nine righteous people who have no need to repent.

The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the estate that will be mine.' So the father divided the property between them.

As soon as he could convert his share into cash, the younger son left home and went off to a distant country, where he squandered his money in reckless living.

"So he went and attached himself to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs.

He longed to fill his stomach with the carob pods the pigs were eating, but no one gave him any.

"At last he came to his senses and said, ‘Any number of my father's hired workers have food to spare; and here I am, starving to death!

So he got up and started back to his father. "But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was moved with pity. He ran and threw his arms around him and kissed him warmly.

His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against Heaven and against you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son — '

but his father said to his slaves, ‘Quick, bring out a robe, the best one, and put it on him; and put a ring on his finger and shoes on his feet;

"Now his older son was in the field. As he came close to the house, he heard music and dancing.

But the older son became angry and refused to go inside. "So his father came out and pleaded with him.