up to the day when through the Holy Spirit He gave the apostles whom He had chosen their orders, and then was taken up to heaven.

After He had suffered, He had shown Himself alive to them, by many convincing proofs, appearing to them through a period of forty days, and telling them the things about the kingdom of God.

And once while He was eating with them, He charged them not to leave Jerusalem but to wait for what the Father had promised. "You have heard me speak of it," He said,

When they reached the city, they went to the room upstairs where they had been staying; they were: Peter and John, James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alpheus, Simon the Zealot, and Judas the son of James.

"Brothers, that Scripture had to be fulfilled which the Holy Spirit uttered by the mouth of David in the former times about Judas who became the guide to those who arrested Jesus;

When the day of Pentecost had now come, they were all meeting in one mind,

this very Jesus, I say, after He was betrayed, in accordance with the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you had wicked men kill by nailing Him to a cross;

So, as he was a prophet and knew that God with an oath had promised to put one of his descendants on his throne,

And all the believers lived together and held all they had as common goods to be shared by one another.

And so they continued to sell their property and goods and to distribute the money to all, as anyone had special need.

When Peter saw this, he said to the people, "Fellow Israelites, why are you so surprised at this? Why do you keep staring at us, as though we had by our own power or piety made this man walk?

The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our forefathers, has glorified His Servant Jesus, whom you yourselves betrayed and disowned before Pilate, although he had decided to set Him free.

They had the men stand before them and repeatedly inquired of them, "By what sort of power and authority have you done this?"

They were surprised to see the courage shown by Peter and John and to find that they were uneducated men, and especially untrained in the schools, but they recognized the fact that they had been companions of Jesus,

and since they saw the man who had been cured standing with them, they had nothing to say in reply.

So, after further threatening them, they turned them loose, because they could not find any way to punish them, on account of the people, because they all continued to praise God for what had taken place,

for the man on whom the wonderful cure had been performed was more than forty years old.

When they were turned loose, the apostles went back to their companions and told them what the high priests and elders had said to them.

"For in this city they actually met against your holy Servant Jesus, whom you had consecrated -- Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the heathen and the peoples of Israel,

to do all that your hand and will had predetermined to take place.

When they had prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and continued courageously to speak God's message.

Now there was but one heart and soul in the vast number of those who had become believers, and not one of them claimed that anything that he had was his own, but they shared everything that they had as common property.

sold the farm he had and brought the money and put it at the disposal of the apostles.

About three hours later, his wife came in, without having learned what had taken place.

they had the apostles arrested and put into the common jail.

So they brought them and had them stand before the council. And the high priest asked them,

The God of our forefathers raised Jesus to life after you had hanged Him on a cross and killed Him.

So they went out from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they had been considered worthy to suffer disgrace for Jesus' name;

They presented these men to the apostles, and after they had prayed, they laid their hands upon them.

So he left the country of the Chaldeans and for a time made his home in Haran. Then after the death of his father, God had him move to this country in which you now live.

He gave him no property in it, not even a foot of land, and yet He promised to give it to him and his descendants after him, as a permanent possession, although he had no child at that time.

and were carried back to Shechem and laid in the tomb which Abraham had bought with a sum of money from the sons of Hamor in Shechem.

As the time approached for realizing the promise which God had made to Abraham, the people multiplied and became more numerous in Egypt,

When forty years had passed, an angel appeared to him in the desert of Mount Sinai, in the flame of a burning bush.

That very Moses whom they refused, saying, 'Who made you our ruler and referee?' was the man whom God sent to be both their ruler and deliverer, by the help of the angel who had appeared to him in the bush.

No, you offered me the tent of Moloch and the star of your god Rompha, the images you had made to worship! So I will now remove you beyond Babylon.'

"In the desert our forefathers had the tent of the testimony, like the model Moses had seen, as God who spoke to him ordered him to make it.

There was a man named Simon in the city, who had kept the Samaritan people thrilled by practicing magic there and by claiming to be a great man.

They kept running after him, because for a long time he had thrilled them with his magical performances.

When the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted God's message, they sent Peter and John there.

for as yet He had not come upon any of them, but they had been baptized merely in the name of the Lord Jesus.

So after they had given their testimony and spoken the Lord's message, they started back to Jerusalem, and on the way continued to tell the good news in many Samaritan villages.

So he got up and went. Now there was an Ethiopian official, a member of the court of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, her chief treasurer, who had come to Jerusalem to worship,

After several days had gone by, the Jews laid a plot to murder him,

Barnabas, however, took him up and presented him to the apostles, and he told them how on the road he had seen the Lord, and how the Lord had spoken to him, and how courageously he had spoken in the name of Jesus at Damascus.

There he found a man named Aeneas, who had been bedridden for eight years as a paralytic.

At Joppa there was a woman, a disciple, whose name was Tabitha, which in Greek means Dorcas, that is, Gazelle. She had filled her life with good deeds and works of charity, which she was always doing.

Just at that time it happened that she had been taken ill and had died. They washed her body and laid her out in a room upstairs.

So Peter at once got up and went with them. When he reached there, they took him to the room upstairs, and all the widows took their stand around him, crying and showing him the shirts and coats that Dorcas had made while she was still with them.

a religious man, too, who revered God with all his household, who was always liberal in his many deeds of charity to the people, and who had the habit of praying to God.

One afternoon about three o'clock he had a vision and clearly saw an angel of God come to him and say, "Cornelius!"

After the angel who had spoken to him had gone, Cornelius called two of his household servants, and a religious soldier who was one of his devoted attendants,

Now while Peter was still at a loss to know what the vision he had seen could mean, the men who had been sent by Cornelius had asked for the way to Simon's house and had stopped at the gate;

The next day he started off with them, and some of the brothers in Joppa went along with him. The day after that they reached Caesarea. Cornelius was waiting for him, as he had invited in his kinsmen and close friends.

As he continued to talk with him he went into the house and found a great crowd had gathered,

not by all the people but by witnesses whom God had beforehand appointed, namely, by us who ate and drank with Him after His resurrection from the dead.

Then the Jewish believers who had gone along with Peter were astounded because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been showered upon the heathen too,

Now the apostles and the brothers all over Judea heard that the heathen too had accepted God's message.

"I was praying in the town of Joppa, and while I was praying I fell in a trance and had a vision. I saw something like a great sheet coming down out of the sky, lowered by the four comers; and it came right down to me.

Just at that moment three men, who had been sent from Caesarea for me, stopped at the house where we were staying.

Then he told us how he had seen the angel stand in his house and say to him, 'Send to Joppa and invite Simon, who is called Peter, to come over;

So if God had given them the same gift that He gave us when we believed upon the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to try -- and how could I if I tried -- to thwart God?"

When they heard this, they had no answer to make, but gave God the glory, saying, "So God has given even the heathen the repentance that leads to life."

When he reached there and saw the spiritual blessing God had given them, he was delighted, and continuously encouraged them all with hearty purpose to continue to be devoted to the Lord;

and after he had found him, he brought him to Antioch. Now for a whole year their meeting with the church lasted, and they taught large numbers of people. It was at Antioch too that the disciples first came to be known as "Christians."

He had James the brother of John murdered with a sword,

He had him seized and put into prison, and turned him over to four squads of soldiers to guard him, planning after the Passover to bring him out again to the people.

When he became conscious of his situation, he went to the house of Mary, the mother of John who was also called Mark, were a large number of people had met and were praying.

With his hand he motioned to them to be quiet, and then he told them how the Lord had brought him out of the prison. He added, "Tell all these things to James and the brothers." Then he left them and went somewhere else.

When morning came, there was no little commotion among the soldiers as to what had become of Peter.

Herod had search made for him, and when he could not find him, he examined the guards and ordered them to be put to death. Then he left Judea for Caesarea, and stayed there.

When Barnabas and Saul had finished their helpful service, they returned from Jerusalem, and took along with them John who was called Mark.

When they reached Salamis, they began to preach God's message in the Jewish synagogues. They had John with them as their assistant.

The governor, because he saw what had occurred, was thunderstruck at the Lord's teaching, and so came to believe.

Then after He had fed them forty years in the desert,

as John, before His coming, had already preached baptism as an expression of repentance, for all the people of Israel.

When they had carried out everything that had been written in the Scriptures about Him, they took Him down from the cross and laid Him in a tomb.

and for many days He appeared to those who had come up with Him from Galilee to Jerusalem, and they are now witnesses for Him to the people.

and after the congregation had broken up, many Jews and devout converts to Judaism allied themselves with Paul and Barnabas, and they kept talking to them and urging them to continue to rely on the unmerited favor of God.

Then Paul and Barnabas courageously spoke out, "God's message had to be spoken to you Jews first, but since you continue to thrust it from you and since you show yourselves unworthy to receive eternal life, now and here we turn to the heathen.

The heathen kept on listening and rejoicing and giving the glory to God's message, and all who had been destined to eternal life believed,

Now in the streets of Lystra a man used to sit who had no strength in his feet, who had been crippled from his birth, and had never walked.

He continued listening to Paul as he spoke, and as Paul by looking straight at him observed that he had faith that he would be cured,

So the crowds, because they saw what Paul had done, shouted in the Lycaonian language, "The gods in human form have come down to us!"

They helped them select elders in each church, and after praying and fasting they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed.

and from there they sailed back to Antioch, where they had first been committed to God's favor for the work which they had finished.

On arriving there they called the church together, and in detail reported to them all that God had done through them as instruments, and how He had opened to the heathen the door of faith.

So, as a dire disturbance and a serious discussion had been created between Paul and Barnabas and them, they decided that Paul and Barnabas and some others from their number should go up to Jerusalem to confer with the apostles and elders about this question.

When they arrived at Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church, the apostles, and the elders, and they reported what God had done through them as instruments.

But some members of the Pharisaic party, who had become believers, arose and said that such converts must be circumcised and told to keep the law of Moses.

By this he quieted the whole congregation, and they listened to Barnabas and Paul tell of the signs and wonders which God had done through them among the heathen.

For Moses from the ancient generations has had his preachers in every town, and on every sabbath has been read aloud in the synagogues."

When they had read it, they were delighted with the encouragement it brought them.

But Paul selected Silas and set out, after the brothers had committed him to the favor of the Lord.

He had a high reputation among the brothers in Lystra and Iconium.

Paul wanted this man to join him in his journey; so on account of the Jews in that district he took him and had him circumcised, for everybody knew that his father was a Greek.

There Paul had a vision one night: a man from Macedonia kept standing and pleading with him in these words, "Come over to Macedonia and help us!"

As soon as he had this vision, we laid our plans to get off to Macedonia, because we confidently concluded that God had called us to tell them the good news.

On the sabbath we went outside the gate, to the bank of the river, where we supposed there was a place of prayer, and we sat down and began to talk with the women who had met there.

Once as we were on our way to the place of prayer, a slave girl met us who had the gift of magical fortune-telling, and continued to make great profits for her owners by fortune-telling.