To these he also showed himself alive after he suffered, by many proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days, and speaking about God's Kingdom.

Even on My bond-servants, both men and women,
I will in those days pour out My Spirit
And they shall prophesy.

Though He was delivered up according to God’s determined plan and foreknowledge, you used lawless people to nail Him to a cross and kill Him.

Uplifted then by God's right hand, and receiving from the Father the long-promised holy Spirit, he has poured on us what you now see and hear.)

Therefore, let all those who make up the household of Israel [i.e., God's people] know with certainty that God has made this Jesus, whom you have crucified, both Lord and Christ."

For the promise [of forgiveness and the Holy Spirit] is being given to you [Jews] and to your descendants and [also] to all those who are far away [i.e., Gentiles. See Eph. 2:17]. [This promise is] to as many as [respond to] the Lord, our God's call [through the Gospel, See II Thess. 2:14]."

Now a man who had been crippled from birth was being carried in. Every day people would lay him at what was called the Beautiful Gate so that he could beg from those who were going into the Temple.

So then, let your hearts be changed and be turned to God, so that your sins may be completely taken away, and times of blessing may come from the Lord;

who must be received into heaven until [God's appointed] times when everything will be restored [to its intended purpose]. God had spoken about this through the proclamations of His holy prophets of long ago.

[Deut. 18:19 says], 'And it will be [at that time] that every person who does not listen to that prophet will be completely destroyed [spiritually] from among [God's] people.'

But Peter and John replied, "Judge whether it is right in God's sight to listen to you instead of listening to God.

When they had prayed, the place where they were assembled was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak God’s message with boldness.

The Apostles continued with great power to bear their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and God's blessing rested upon them all abundantly.

and Peter said to her, "Tell me if you got so much for the land." "Yes," she said, "so much."

But if it is from God, you will not be able to overthrow them, lest you even be found fighting against God." So they were persuaded by him.

So, every day, they never stopped teaching and preaching that Jesus was the Christ [i.e., God's specially chosen one], in the Temple and in private homes.

So the Twelve called together the general body of the disciples and said, "It does not seem fitting that we Apostles should neglect the delivery of God's Message and minister at tables.

But we will continue earnestly in prayer and the preaching of God's word."

Meanwhile God's Message continued to spread, and the number of the disciples in Jerusalem very greatly increased, and very many priests obeyed the faith.

And Stephen [i.e., one of the seven men chosen to minister to widows, verse 5], who was full of [God's] favor and power, performed great wonders and [miraculous] signs in front of the [Jewish] people.

God's words were these--'Abraham's descendants shall live in a foreign country, where they will be enslaved and ill-treated for four hundred years.

It was at this [critical] time that Moses was born; and he was lovely in the sight of God, and for three months he was nourished in his father’s house.

This is the man who was in the church in the waste land with the angel who was talking to him in Sinai, and with our fathers; and to him were given the living words of God, so that he might give them to you.

He found favor in God’s sight and asked that he might provide a dwelling place for the God of Jacob.

But he, being full of the Holy Spirit and led by Him, gazed into heaven and saw the glory [the great splendor and majesty] of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God;

and he said, “Look! I see the heavens opened up [in welcome] and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!”

Those, however, who were scattered abroad went from place to place spreading the Good News of God's Message;

When people believed the good news about God's kingdom and the name of Jesus Christ, which Philip was preaching, both men and women were immersed [in water].

When the apostles who were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had welcomed God’s message, they sent Peter and John to them.

"Perish your money and yourself," replied Peter, "because you have imagined that you can obtain God's free gift with money!

You have no part or share in this matter, because your heart (motive, purpose) is not right before God.

Now the place in the book where he was reading was this: He was taken, like a sheep, to be put to death; and as a lamb is quiet when its wool is being cut, so he made no sound:

Now Peter, as he went to town after town, came down also to God's people at Lud.

And he gave her his hand and helped her up; and then he called in the saints (God’s people) and the widows, and he presented her [to them] alive.

and he said, ‘Cornelius, your prayer has been heard, and your acts of charity have been remembered before God [so that He is about to help you].

"Immediately, therefore, I sent to you, and I thank you heartily for having come. That is why all of us are now assembled here in God's presence, to listen to what the Lord has commanded you to say."

The apostles and the brothers who were throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles had welcomed God’s message also.

Therefore if God gave to them the same gift as He gave to us also after believing in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could stand in God’s way?”

On hearing this statement, they said no more, but broke out into praise of God. "So even to the Gentiles," they exclaimed, "God has granted the repentance which leads to Life!"

And the people cried out, A god's voice and not a man's.

but at the instant an angel of the Lord smote him, because he did not glorify God: so that he became a prey to worms and died. In the mean time, the

Then God’s message flourished and multiplied.

Arriving in Salamis, they proclaimed God’s message in the Jewish synagogues. They also had John as their assistant.

He was with the proconsul, Sergius Paulus, an intelligent man. This man summoned Barnabas and Saul and desired to hear God’s message.

For David, after he had served the purpose of God in his own generation, fell asleep and was buried among his fathers and experienced decay [in the grave];

On the following Sabbath, almost all the city gathered to hear God's Message.

And [at the same time] Paul and Barnabas spoke out boldly and confidently, saying, “It was necessary that God’s message [of salvation through faith in Christ] be spoken to you [Jews] first. Since you repudiate it and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, now we turn to the Gentiles.

"For such is God's command to us, saying, "I have set thee for a light to the Gentiles, That thou shouldest be for salvation to the uttermost part of the earth."

On hearing this, the Gentiles were glad and extolled God's Message; and all those who had been enrolled for Immortal Life became believers in Christ;

[Along the way] they strengthened the hearts of the disciples, urging them to continue [to believe and practice] the faith and [explaining] that entering God's [heavenly] kingdom [See II Tim. 4:18] requires enduring many trials.

And from there they sailed to Antioch [in Syria], from where they had [originally] been committed to God's favor for [carrying out] the work which they had just completed.

And when there had been much discussion, Peter got up and said to them, My brothers, you have knowledge that some time back it was God's pleasure that by my mouth the good news might be given to the Gentiles so that they might have faith.

Symeon has explained how it was God's original concern to secure a People from among the Gentiles to bear his Name.

But Paul and Barnabas remained in Antioch, and with many others also continued teaching and proclaiming the good news, the word of the Lord [concerning eternal salvation through faith in Christ].

Then they spoke to him of God's Message, and to all his household as well.

But when the Jews from Thessalonica found out that God’s message had been proclaimed by Paul at Berea, they came there too, agitating and disturbing the crowds.

For as I was walking around and looking closely at the objects you worship, I even found an altar with this written on it: "To an unknown god.' So I am telling you about the unknown object you worship.

So then, being God’s children, we should not think that the Divine Nature (deity) is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination or skill of man.

So, Paul lived there [in Corinth] for eighteen months, teaching God's message among the inhabitants [of the city].

As he told them goodbye, he said, "I will come back to you again if it is God's will." Then he set sail from Ephesus.

He began to speak boldly in the synagogue, and Priscilla and Aquila, after hearing him, took him home and explained God's way to him more accurately.

And when Apollos wanted to go across to Achaia (southern Greece), the brothers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples, [urging them] to welcome him gladly. When he arrived, he was a great help to those who, through grace, had believed and had followed Jesus as Lord and Savior,

Then Paul placed his hands on them and [the supernatural power of] the Holy Spirit came on them and they [began to] speak in [other] languages and prophesy [i.e., speak God's message].

But I do not consider my life as something of value or dear to me, so that I may [with joy] finish my course and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify faithfully of the good news of God’s [precious, undeserved] grace [which makes us free of the guilt of sin and grants us eternal life].

For I have not shrunk from declaring to you God's whole truth.

Pay attention to yourselves and to the entire flock over which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to be shepherds of God's church, which he acquired with his own blood.

And now I commend you to God [placing you in His protective, loving care] and [I commend you] to the word of His grace [the counsel and promises of His unmerited favor]. His grace is able to build you up and to give you the [rightful] inheritance among all those who are sanctified [that is, among those who are set apart for God’s purpose—all believers].

When they heard him addressing them in Hebrew they were all the more quiet. So he went on.

"I am a Jew, a native of Tarsus in Cilicia, but I was brought up in this city under the teaching of Gamaliel, and educated in accordance with the strict system of our ancestral Law. I was as zealous in God's service as any of you who are here to-day.

And they that stood by said, Revilest thou God's high priest?

And now I am here to be judged because of the hope given by God's word to our fathers;

And that was how I acted in Jerusalem. Armed with authority received from the High Priests I shut up many of God's people in various prisons, and when they were about to be put to death I gave my vote against them.

to open their [spiritual] eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness and release from their sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified (set apart, made holy) by faith in Me.’

And so, by God's help, I am here today, witnessing to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said would come about;

King Agrippa, do you believe the [writings of the] Prophets [their messages and words]? I know that you do.”

"Be fully assured, therefore, that this salvation--God's salvation--has now been sent to the Gentiles, and that they, at any rate, will give heed."