17:1 Jesus said to His disciples, "It is inevitable that causes of stumbling should come; but alas for him through whom they come!

17:2 It would be well for him if, with a millstone round his neck, he were lying at the bottom of the sea, rather than that he should cause even one of these little ones to fall.

17:3 Be on your guard. "If your brother acts wrongly, reprove him; and if he is sorry, forgive him;

17:4 and if seven times in a day he acts wrongly towards you, and seven times turns again to you and says, `I am sorry,' you must forgive him."

17:5 And the Apostles said to the Lord, "Give us faith."

17:6 "If your faith," replied the Lord, "is like a mustard seed, you might command this black-mulberry-tree, `Tear up your roots and plant yourself in the sea,' and instantly it would obey you.

17:7 But which of you who has a servant ploughing, or tending sheep, will say to him when he comes in from the farm, `Come at once and take your place at table,'

17:8 and will not rather say to him, `Get my dinner ready, make yourself tidy, and wait upon me till I have finished my dinner, and then you shall have yours'?

17:9 Does he thank the servant for obeying his orders?

17:10 So you also, when you have obeyed all the orders given you, must say, "`There is no merit in our service: what we have done is only what we were in duty bound to do.'"

17:11 As they pursued their journey to Jerusalem, He passed through Samaria and Galilee.

17:12 And as He entered a certain village, ten men met Him who were lepers and stood at a distance.

17:13 In loud voices they cried out, "Jesus, Rabbi, take pity on us."

17:14 Perceiving this, He said to them, "Go and show yourselves to the Priests." And while on their way to do this they were made clean.

17:15 One of them, seeing that he was cured, came back, adoring and praising God in a loud voice,

17:16 and he threw himself at the feet of Jesus, thanking Him. He was a Samaritan.

17:17 "Were not all ten made clean?" Jesus asked; "but where are the nine?

17:18 Have none been found to come back and give glory to God except this foreigner?"

17:19 And He said to him, "Rise and go: your faith has cured you."

17:20 Being asked by the Pharisees when the Kingdom of God was coming, He answered, "The Kingdom of God does not so come that you can stealthily watch for it.

17:21 Nor will they say, `See here!' or `See there!' --for the Kingdom of God is within you."

17:22 Then, turning to His disciples, He said, "There will come a time when you will wish you could see a single one of the days of the Son of Man, but will not see one.

17:23 And they will say to you, `See there!' `See here!' Do not start off and go in pursuit.

17:24 For just as the lightning, when it flashes, shines from one part of the horizon to the opposite part, so will the Son of Man be on His day.

17:25 But first He must endure much suffering, and be rejected by the present generation.

17:26 "And as it was in the time of Noah, so will it also be in the time of the Son of Man.

17:27 Men were eating and drinking, taking wives and giving wives, up to the very day on which Noah entered the Ark, and the Deluge came and destroyed them all.

17:28 The same was true in the time of Lot: they were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building;

17:29 but on the day that Lot left Sodom, God rained fire and brimstone from the sky and destroyed them all.

17:30 Exactly so will it be on the day that the veil is lifted from the Son of Man.

17:31 "On that day, if a man is on the roof and his property indoors, let him not go down to fetch it; and, in the same way, he who is in the field, let him not turn back.

17:32 Remember Lot's wife.

17:33 Any man who makes it his object to keep his own life safe, will lose it; but whoever loses his life will preserve it.

17:34 On that night, I tell you, there will be two men in one bed: one will be taken away and the other left behind.

17:35 There will be two women turning the mill together: one will be taken away and the other left behind."

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