Matthew 8

J.B. Phillips New Testament

Jesus cures leprosy, and heals many other people

8 ^1-3 Large crowds followed him when he came down from the hillside. There was a leper who came and knelt in front of him. “Sir,” he said, “if you want to, you can make me clean.” Jesus stretched out his hand and placed it on the leper saying, “Of course I want to. Be clean!” And at once he was clear of the leprosy.

⁴ “Mind you say nothing to anybody,” Jesus told him. “Go straight off and show yourself to the priest and make the offering for your recovery that Moses prescribed, as evidence to the authorities.”

^5-6 Then as he was coming into Capernaum a centurion approached. “Sir,” he implored him, “my servant is in bed at home paralysed and in dreadful pain.”

⁷ “I will come and heal him,” said Jesus to him.

^8-9 “Sir,” replied the centurion, “I’m not important enough for you to come under my roof. Just give the order, please, and my servant will recover. I’m a man under authority myself, and I have soldiers under me. I can say to one man ‘Go’ and I know he’ll go, or I can say ‘Come here’ to another and I know he’ll come—or I can say to my slave ‘Do this’ and he’ll always do it.”

^10-12 When Jesus heard this, he was astonished. “Believe me,” he said to those who were following him, “I have never found faith like this, even in Israel! I tell you that many people will come from east and west and sit at my table with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of Heaven. But those who should have belonged to the kingdom will be banished to the darkness outside, where there will be tears and bitter regret.”

¹³ Then he said to the centurion, “Go home now, and everything will happen as you have believed it will.” And his servant was healed at that actual moment.

^14-15 Then on coming into Peter’s house Jesus saw that Peter’s mother-in-law had been put to bed with a high fever. He touched her hand and the fever left her. And then she got up and began to see to their needs.

^16-17 When evening came they brought to him many who were possessed by evil spirits, which he expelled with a word. Indeed he healed all who were ill. Thus was fulfilled Isaiah’s prophecy—‘He himself took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses’.

^18-19 When Jesus had seen the great crowds around him he gave orders for departure to the other side of the lake. But before they started, one of the scribes came up to Jesus and said to him, “Master, I will follow you wherever you go.”

²⁰ “Foxes have earths, birds in the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere that he can call his own,” replied Jesus.

²¹ Another of his disciples said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.”

²² But Jesus said to him, “Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.”

Jesus shows his mastery over the forces of nature

^23-25 Then he went aboard the boat, and his disciples followed him. Before long a terrific storm sprang up and the boat was awash with the waves. Jesus was sleeping soundly and the disciples went forward and woke him up. “Lord, save us!” they cried. “We are drowning!”

^26-27 “What are you so frightened about, you little-faiths?” he replied. Then he got to his feet and rebuked the wind and the waters and there was a great calm. The men were filled with astonishment and kept saying, “Whatever sort of man is this—why, even the wind and the waves do what he tells them!”

^28-29 When he arrived on the other side (which is the Gadarenes’ country) he was met by two devil-possessed men who came out from among the tombs. They were so violent that nobody dared to use that road. “What have you got to do with us, Jesus, you Son of God?” they screamed at him. “Have you come to torture us before the proper time?”

^30-31 It happened that in the distance there was a large herd of pigs feeding. So the devils implored him, “If you throw us out, send us into the herd of pigs!”

³² “Then go!” said Jesus to them. And the devils came out of the two men and went into the pigs. Then quite suddenly the whole herd rushed madly down a steep cliff into the lake and were drowned.

^33-34 The swineherds took to their heels, and ran to the town. There they poured out the whole story, not forgetting what had happened to the two men who had been devil-possessed. Whereupon the whole town came out to meet Jesus, and as soon as they saw him implored him to leave their territory.