Joseph’s Brothers Go to Egypt

42 When Jacob heard that grain was available in Egypt, he said to his sons, “Why are you standing around looking at one another? ² I have heard there is grain in Egypt. Go down there, and buy enough grain to keep us alive. Otherwise we’ll die.”

³ So Joseph’s ten older brothers went down to Egypt to buy grain. ⁴ But Jacob wouldn’t let Joseph’s younger brother, Benjamin, go with them, for fear some harm might come to him. ⁵ So Jacob’s^[a] sons arrived in Egypt along with others to buy food, for the famine was in Canaan as well.

⁶ Since Joseph was governor of all Egypt and in charge of selling grain to all the people, it was to him that his brothers came. When they arrived, they bowed before him with their faces to the ground. ⁷ Joseph recognized his brothers instantly, but he pretended to be a stranger and spoke harshly to them. “Where are you from?” he demanded.

“From the land of Canaan,” they replied. “We have come to buy food.”

⁸ Although Joseph recognized his brothers, they didn’t recognize him. ⁹ And he remembered the dreams he’d had about them many years before. He said to them, “You are spies! You have come to see how vulnerable our land has become.”

¹⁰ “No, my lord!” they exclaimed. “Your servants have simply come to buy food. ¹¹ We are all brothers—members of the same family. We are honest men, sir! We are not spies!”

¹² “Yes, you are!” Joseph insisted. “You have come to see how vulnerable our land has become.”

¹³ “Sir,” they said, “there are actually twelve of us. We, your servants, are all brothers, sons of a man living in the land of Canaan. Our youngest brother is back there with our father right now, and one of our brothers is no longer with us.”

¹⁴ But Joseph insisted, “As I said, you are spies! ¹⁵ This is how I will test your story. I swear by the life of Pharaoh that you will never leave Egypt unless your youngest brother comes here! ¹⁶ One of you must go and get your brother. I’ll keep the rest of you here in prison. Then we’ll find out whether or not your story is true. By the life of Pharaoh, if it turns out that you don’t have a younger brother, then I’ll know you are spies.”

¹⁷ So Joseph put them all in prison for three days. ¹⁸ On the third day Joseph said to them, “I am a God-fearing man. If you do as I say, you will live. ¹⁹ If you really are honest men, choose one of your brothers to remain in prison. The rest of you may go home with grain for your starving families. ²⁰ But you must bring your youngest brother back to me. This will prove that you are telling the truth, and you will not die.” To this they agreed.

²¹ Speaking among themselves, they said, “Clearly we are being punished because of what we did to Joseph long ago. We saw his anguish when he pleaded for his life, but we wouldn’t listen. That’s why we’re in this trouble.”

²² “Didn’t I tell you not to sin against the boy?” Reuben asked. “But you wouldn’t listen. And now we have to answer for his blood!”

²³ Of course, they didn’t know that Joseph understood them, for he had been speaking to them through an interpreter. ²⁴ Now he turned away from them and began to weep. When he regained his composure, he spoke to them again. Then he chose Simeon from among them and had him tied up right before their eyes.

²⁵ Joseph then ordered his servants to fill the men’s sacks with grain, but he also gave secret instructions to return each brother’s payment at the top of his sack. He also gave them supplies for their journey home. ²⁶ So the brothers loaded their donkeys with the grain and headed for home.

²⁷ But when they stopped for the night and one of them opened his sack to get grain for his donkey, he found his money in the top of his sack. ²⁸ “Look!” he exclaimed to his brothers. “My money has been returned; it’s here in my sack!” Then their hearts sank. Trembling, they said to each other, “What has God done to us?”

²⁹ When the brothers came to their father, Jacob, in the land of Canaan, they told him everything that had happened to them. ³⁰ “The man who is governor of the land spoke very harshly to us,” they told him. “He accused us of being spies scouting the land. ³¹ But we said, ‘We are honest men, not spies. ³² We are twelve brothers, sons of one father. One brother is no longer with us, and the youngest is at home with our father in the land of Canaan.’

³³ “Then the man who is governor of the land told us, ‘This is how I will find out if you are honest men. Leave one of your brothers here with me, and take grain for your starving families and go on home. ³⁴ But you must bring your youngest brother back to me. Then I will know you are honest men and not spies. Then I will give you back your brother, and you may trade freely in the land.’”

³⁵ As they emptied out their sacks, there in each man’s sack was the bag of money he had paid for the grain! The brothers and their father were terrified when they saw the bags of money. ³⁶ Jacob exclaimed, “You are robbing me of my children! Joseph is gone! Simeon is gone! And now you want to take Benjamin, too. Everything is going against me!”

³⁷ Then Reuben said to his father, “You may kill my two sons if I don’t bring Benjamin back to you. I’ll be responsible for him, and I promise to bring him back.”

³⁸ But Jacob replied, “My son will not go down with you. His brother Joseph is dead, and he is all I have left. If anything should happen to him on your journey, you would send this grieving, white-haired man to his grave.^[b]”

Jesus’ Triumphant Entry

21 As Jesus and the disciples approached Jerusalem, they came to the town of Bethphage on the Mount of Olives. Jesus sent two of them on ahead. ² “Go into the village over there,” he said. “As soon as you enter it, you will see a donkey tied there, with its colt beside it. Untie them and bring them to me. ³ If anyone asks what you are doing, just say, ‘The Lord needs them,’ and he will immediately let you take them.”

⁴ This took place to fulfill the prophecy that said,

⁶ The two disciples did as Jesus commanded. ⁷ They brought the donkey and the colt to him and threw their garments over the colt, and he sat on it.^[c]

⁸ Most of the crowd spread their garments on the road ahead of him, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. ⁹ Jesus was in the center of the procession, and the people all around him were shouting,

¹⁰ The entire city of Jerusalem was in an uproar as he entered. “Who is this?” they asked.

¹¹ And the crowds replied, “It’s Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee.”

Jesus Clears the Temple

¹² Jesus entered the Temple and began to drive out all the people buying and selling animals for sacrifice. He knocked over the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves. ¹³ He said to them, “The Scriptures declare, ‘My Temple will be called a house of prayer,’ but you have turned it into a den of thieves!”^[f]

¹⁴ The blind and the lame came to him in the Temple, and he healed them. ¹⁵ The leading priests and the teachers of religious law saw these wonderful miracles and heard even the children in the Temple shouting, “Praise God for the Son of David.”

But the leaders were indignant. ¹⁶ They asked Jesus, “Do you hear what these children are saying?”

“Yes,” Jesus replied. “Haven’t you ever read the Scriptures? For they say, ‘You have taught children and infants to give you praise.’^[g]” ¹⁷ Then he returned to Bethany, where he stayed overnight.

Jesus Curses the Fig Tree

¹⁸ In the morning, as Jesus was returning to Jerusalem, he was hungry, ¹⁹ and he noticed a fig tree beside the road. He went over to see if there were any figs, but there were only leaves. Then he said to it, “May you never bear fruit again!” And immediately the fig tree withered up.

²⁰ The disciples were amazed when they saw this and asked, “How did the fig tree wither so quickly?”

²¹ Then Jesus told them, “I tell you the truth, if you have faith and don’t doubt, you can do things like this and much more. You can even say to this mountain, ‘May you be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ and it will happen. ²² You can pray for anything, and if you have faith, you will receive it.”

The Authority of Jesus Challenged

²³ When Jesus returned to the Temple and began teaching, the leading priests and elders came up to him. They demanded, “By what authority are you doing all these things? Who gave you the right?”

²⁴ “I’ll tell you by what authority I do these things if you answer one question,” Jesus replied. ²⁵ “Did John’s authority to baptize come from heaven, or was it merely human?”

They talked it over among themselves. “If we say it was from heaven, he will ask us why we didn’t believe John. ²⁶ But if we say it was merely human, we’ll be mobbed because the people believe John was a prophet.” ²⁷ So they finally replied, “We don’t know.”

And Jesus responded, “Then I won’t tell you by what authority I do these things.

Parable of the Two Sons

²⁸ “But what do you think about this? A man with two sons told the older boy, ‘Son, go out and work in the vineyard today.’ ²⁹ The son answered, ‘No, I won’t go,’ but later he changed his mind and went anyway. ³⁰ Then the father told the other son, ‘You go,’ and he said, ‘Yes, sir, I will.’ But he didn’t go.

³¹ “Which of the two obeyed his father?”

They replied, “The first.”^[h]

Then Jesus explained his meaning: “I tell you the truth, corrupt tax collectors and prostitutes will get into the Kingdom of God before you do. ³² For John the Baptist came and showed you the right way to live, but you didn’t believe him, while tax collectors and prostitutes did. And even when you saw this happening, you refused to believe him and repent of your sins.

Parable of the Evil Farmers

³³ “Now listen to another story. A certain landowner planted a vineyard, built a wall around it, dug a pit for pressing out the grape juice, and built a lookout tower. Then he leased the vineyard to tenant farmers and moved to another country. ³⁴ At the time of the grape harvest, he sent his servants to collect his share of the crop. ³⁵ But the farmers grabbed his servants, beat one, killed one, and stoned another. ³⁶ So the landowner sent a larger group of his servants to collect for him, but the results were the same.

³⁷ “Finally, the owner sent his son, thinking, ‘Surely they will respect my son.’

³⁸ “But when the tenant farmers saw his son coming, they said to one another, ‘Here comes the heir to this estate. Come on, let’s kill him and get the estate for ourselves!’ ³⁹ So they grabbed him, dragged him out of the vineyard, and murdered him.

⁴⁰ “When the owner of the vineyard returns,” Jesus asked, “what do you think he will do to those farmers?”

⁴¹ The religious leaders replied, “He will put the wicked men to a horrible death and lease the vineyard to others who will give him his share of the crop after each harvest.”

⁴² Then Jesus asked them, “Didn’t you ever read this in the Scriptures?

⁴³ I tell you, the Kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation that will produce the proper fruit. ⁴⁴ Anyone who stumbles over that stone will be broken to pieces, and it will crush anyone it falls on.^[j]”

⁴⁵ When the leading priests and Pharisees heard this parable, they realized he was telling the story against them—they were the wicked farmers. ⁴⁶ They wanted to arrest him, but they were afraid of the crowds, who considered Jesus to be a prophet.