Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, "Get up and go south by the road that leads from Jerusalem to Gaza; this is the desert road."

Justice was denied Him in His humiliation, who can tell of His times? For His life is removed from the earth."

Then Philip opened his mouth, and starting from this passage, he told him the good news about Jesus.

As they continued down the road, they came to some water, and the official said, "Look! here is some water! What is there to keep me from being baptized?"

As he traveled on he finally approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.

And the Lord said to him, "Get up and go to the street called 'The Straight Street,' and ask at the house of Judas for one named Saul, from Tarsus, for he is now praying there.

Now he is here and has authority from the high priests to put in chains all who call upon your name."

And all at once something like scales fell from his eyes, he regained his sight, got up and was baptized,

So when the brothers found this out, they took him down to Caesarea, and from there sent him back to Tarsus.

The next day, while those men were traveling on and not far from the town, Peter went up on the housetop about noon to pray.

You know the story yourselves that spread all over Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John preached,

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 Peter explained the whole matter to them from beginning to end. He said,

Then the voice from heaven answered again, 'The things that God has cleansed you must not call unclean.'

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

Now the fugitives from the persecution that started over Stephen went all the way to Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch, telling the message to none but Jews.

But there were some of them, men from Cyprus and Cyrene, who on reaching Antioch began to speak to the Greeks too, and proceeded to tell them the good news about the Lord Jesus.

At that time some prophets from Jerusalem came down to Antioch,

Then Peter came to himself and said, "Now I really know that the Lord has sent His angel and rescued me from the power of Herod and from all that the Jewish people were expecting to do to me."

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

So, as they were sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia, and from that port sailed away to Cyprus.

But Elymas the magician -- for this is the meaning of his name -- continued to oppose them by trying to keep the governor from accepting the faith.

Then Paul and his party set sail from Paphos and crossed over to Perga in Pamphylia. Here John quit them and returned to Jerusalem,

but they went on from Perga and arrived at Antioch in Pisidia. On the sabbath they went to the synagogue and took seats.

It is from this man's descendants that God, as He promised, has brought to Israel a Saviour in the person of Jesus,

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.

But God raised Him from the dead,

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.

Now as a proof that He has raised Him from the dead, no more to return to decay, He has spoken this, 'I will fulfill to you the holy promises made to David.'

and that through union with Him every one of you who believes is given right standing with God and freed from every charge from which you could not be freed by the law of Moses.

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.

But they shook off the dust from their feet as a protest against them, and went to Iconlure;

In spite of this, however, they stayed there a considerable time and continued to speak with courage from the Lord, who continued to bear testimony to His gracious message and kept on granting signs and wonders to be done by them.

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.

and shouted, "Men, why are you doing this? We are merely men with natures like your own, who are telling you the good news, so that you may turn from these foolish things to the living God, who made heaven and earth and sea and all that they contain.

though He did not fail to furnish evidences about Himself, in constantly showing His kindness to you, in sending you rain from heaven and fruit-producing seasons, in giving you food and happiness to your heart's content."

Even by saying this it was all that they could do to keep the crowds from offering sacrifices to them.

But some Jews came from Antioch and Iconium, and won the crowds by persuasion, and they stoned Paul, and dragged him outside the town, supposing he was dead.

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.

Some people came down from Judea and began to teach the brothers, "Unless you are circumcised in accordance with the custom that Moses handed down, you cannot be saved."

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.

Symeon has told how God at first graciously visited the heathen to take from among them a people to bear His name.

who has been making this known from ages past.'

but we should write them to abstain from everything that is contaminated by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals, and from tasting blood.

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

They sent this letter by them: "The apostles and elders as brothers send greeting to the brothers from among the heathen in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia.

that you abstain from everything that is offered to idols, from tasting blood, from the meat of animals that have been strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves free from these things, you will prosper. Good-by."

As they journeyed on from town to town, they delivered to the brothers to keep the decisions reached by the apostles and elders at Jerusalem.

So the churches through faith continued to grow in strength and to increase in numbers from day to day.

Then they crossed Phrygia and Galatia. But because they were prevented by the Holy Spirit from speaking the message in Asia,

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!"

So we sailed away from Troy and struck a bee line for Samothrace, and the next day on to Neapolis.

From there we went on to Philippi, a Roman colony, the leading town in that part of Macedonia. In this town we stayed some days.

Among them was a woman named Lydia, a dealer in purple goods from the town of Thyatira, and she stayed to listen to us. She was already a worshiper of God, and the Lord so moved upon her heart that she accepted the message spoken by Paul.

explaining them and proving that the Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead, and said, "This very Jesus whom I proclaim to you is the Christ."

From one forefather He made every nation of mankind, for living all over the face of the earth, fixing their appointed times and the limits of their lands,

so that they might search for God, possibly they might grope for Him, and find Him, though He is really not far from any of us.

since He has set a day on which He will justly judge the world through a man whom He has appointed. He has made this credible to all by raising Him from the dead."

There he found a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had issued an edict for all Jews to leave Rome. So Paul paid them a visit,

By the time Silas and Timothy arrived from Macedonia, Paul was wholly absorbed in preaching the message and was enthusiastically assuring the Jews that Jesus is the Christ.

But Crispus, the leader of the synagogue, became a believer in the Lord, and so did all his family, and from time to time many of the Corinthians heard, believed, and were baptized.

So he drove them away from the court.

But as he bade them goodbye, he promised, "I will come back to you again, if it is God's will." Then he set sail from Ephesus.

and asked them, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?" They answered him, "So far from that, we never even heard that there is a Holy Spirit."

Now the danger facing us is, not only that our business will lose its reputation but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis will be brought into contempt and that she whom all Asia and all the world now worship will soon be dethroned from her majestic glory!"

But as soon as they saw that he was a Jew, a shout went up from them all as the shout of one man, lasting for two hours: "Great Artemis of Ephesus!"

At last the city recorder quieted the mob and said: "Men of Ephesus, who in the world does not know that the city of Ephesus is the guardian of the temple of the great Artemis and of the image that fell down from heaven?

He had as companions Sopater, the son of Pyrrhus, from Berea, Aristarchus and Secundus from Thessalonica, Gaius from Derbe, Timothy, and Tychicus and Trophimus from the province of Asia.

while we, after the Feast of Unleavened Bread, sailed from Philippi, and five days after joined them at Troas, where we spent a week.

and a young man named Eutychus, who was sitting by the window, was gradually overcome by heavy drowsiness, as Paul kept speaking longer and longer, and at last he went fast asleep and fell from the third story to the ground and was picked up dead.

On the next day we sailed from there and arrived off Chios. On the next day we crossed to Samos, and the next we reached Miletus.

From Miletus he sent to Ephesus for the elders of the church.

When they arrived, he said to them: "You know how I lived among you all the time from the day I first set foot in the province of Asia, and how I continued

I never shrank from telling you anything that was for your good, nor from teaching you in public and in private,

for I never shrank from telling you God's whole plan.

Even from your own number men will appear who will try, by speaking perversions of truth, to draw away the disciples after them.

When we had torn ourselves away from them, we struck a bee line for Cos, and the next day on to Rhodes, and from there to Patara.

On finishing the sail from Tyre we landed at Ptolemais. Here we greeted the brothers and spent a day with them.

While we were spending some days here, a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea.

Some of the disciples from Caesarea went with us and took us to the house of Mnason, a man from Cyprus, one of the early disciples, to spend the night.

As the seven days were drawing to a close, the Jews from Asia caught a glimpse of him in the temple and began to stir up all the crowd, and seized him,

Paul answered, "I am a Jew from Tarsus, in Cilicia, a citizen of no insignificant city. Please let me speak to the people."

as the high priest and the whole council will bear me witness. Indeed, I had received letters from them to the brothers in Damascus, and I was on the way there to bind those who were there and bring them back to Jerusalem to be punished.

But on my way, just before I reached Damascus, suddenly about noon a blaze of light from heaven flashed around me,

So I said, 'Lord, they know for themselves that from one synagogue to another I used to imprison and flog those who believed in you,

They listened to him until he said this, and then all at once they shouted, "Away with such a fellow from the earth! He is certainly not fit to live!"

He read the letter and asked Paul what province he was from, and on learning that he was from Cilicia,

But there were some Jews from Asia who ought to be here before you and to present their charges, if they have any, against me.

He ordered the captain to keep Paul in custody but to let him have freedom and not to prevent his friends from showing him kindness.

At the same time he was hoping to get money from Paul, and so he kept on sending for him and talking with him.

Now three days after his arrival Festus went up from Caesarea to Jerusalem,

When he arrived, the Jews who had come down from Jerusalem surrounded him, and continued to bring a number of serious charges against him, none of which they could prove.

If I am guilty and have done anything that deserves death, I am not begging to keep from dying, but if there is nothing in the charges which these men make against me, no one can give me up as a favor to them. I appeal to the emperor."

Yet, I have nothing definite to write our Sovereign about him. So I have brought him before all of you, especially before you, King Agrippa, to get from your examination something to put in writing.

"The kind of life I have lived from my youth up, as spent in my early days among my own nation and in Jerusalem, is well known to all Jews,

for they have known all along from the first, if they would but testify to it, that I as a Pharisee have lived by the standard of the strictest sect of our religion.

That was what I did at Jerusalem; yes, I received authority from the high priests and shut behind the prison bars many of God's people. Yes, when they were put to death, I cast my vote against them, and often in all the synagogues

While in this business I once was on my way to Damascus with authority based on a commission from the high priests,

and on the road at noon, your Majesty, I saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, flash around me and my fellow-travelers.

I will continue to rescue you from the Jewish people and from the heathen to whom I am going to send you,