² In the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the Word of God [^[a]concerning the attainment through Christ of salvation in the kingdom of God] came to John son of Zachariah in the wilderness (desert).

³ And he went into all the country round about the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance (^[b]of hearty amending of their ways, with abhorrence of past wrongdoing) unto the forgiveness of sin.

⁴ As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet, The voice of one crying in the wilderness [shouting in the desert]: Prepare the way of the Lord, make His beaten paths straight.