They said, “Cornelius, a centurion, an upright and God-fearing man, who has a good reputation with the whole Jewish nation, was divinely directed by a holy angel to call you to his house and to hear a message from you.”

While talking with him, he went on in and found that many had come together there.

Therefore I immediately sent for you, and you did the right thing in coming. So we are all present before God, to hear everything you have been commanded by the Lord.”

He sent the message to the Israelites, proclaiming the good news of peace through Jesus Christ—He is Lord of all.

You know the events that took place throughout Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John preached:

how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good and healing all who were under the tyranny of the Devil, because God was with Him.

not by all the people, but by us, witnesses appointed beforehand by God, who ate and drank with Him after He rose from the dead.

All the prophets testify about Him that through His name everyone who believes in Him will receive forgiveness of sins.”

While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit came down on all those who heard the message.

Then the Spirit told me to accompany them with no doubts at all. These six brothers accompanied me, and we went into the man’s house.

He will speak a message to you that you and all your household will be saved by.’

Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how He said, ‘John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’

When he arrived and saw the grace of God, he was glad and encouraged all of them to remain true to the Lord with a firm resolve of the heart,

and when he found him he brought him to Antioch. For a whole year they met with the church and taught large numbers. The disciples were first called Christians at Antioch.

On the night before Herod was to bring him out for execution, Peter, bound with two chains, was sleeping between two soldiers, while the sentries in front of the door guarded the prison.

Then Peter came to himself and said, “Now I know for certain that the Lord has sent His angel and rescued me from Herod’s grasp and from all that the Jewish people expected.”

When they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they came across a sorcerer, a Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus.

and said, “You son of the Devil, full of all deceit and all fraud, enemy of all righteousness! Won’t you ever stop perverting the straight paths of the Lord?

Now, look! The Lord’s hand is against you. You are going to be blind, and will not see the sun for a time.” Suddenly a mist and darkness fell on him, and he went around seeking someone to lead him by the hand.

This all took about 450 years. After this, He gave them judges until Samuel the prophet.

After removing him, He raised up David as their king and testified about him: ‘I have found David the son of Jesse, a man loyal to Me, who will carry out all My will.’

Before He came to public attention, John had previously proclaimed a baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel.

When they had fulfilled all that had been written about Him, they took Him down from the tree and put Him in a tomb.

Since He raised Him from the dead, never to return to decay, He has spoken in this way, I will grant you the faithful covenant blessings made to David.

Therefore He also says in another passage, You will not allow Your Holy One to see decay.

Look, you scoffers,
marvel and vanish away,
because I am doing a work in your days,
a work that you will never believe,
even if someone were to explain it to you.”

The following Sabbath almost the whole town assembled to hear the message of the Lord.

When the Gentiles heard this, they rejoiced and glorified the message of the Lord, and all who had been appointed to eternal life believed.

So the message of the Lord spread through the whole region.

In past generations He allowed all the nations to go their own way,

When they had been sent on their way by the church, they passed through both Phoenicia and Samaria, explaining in detail the conversion of the Gentiles, and they created great joy among all the brothers.

When they arrived at Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church, the apostles, and the elders, and they reported all that God had done with them.

Then the whole assembly fell silent and listened to Barnabas and Paul describing all the signs and wonders God had done through them among the Gentiles.

After these things I will return
and rebuild David’s fallen tent.
I will rebuild its ruins
and set it up again,

so the rest of humanity
may seek the Lord—
even all the Gentiles
who are called by My name,
declares the Lord who does these things,

Then the apostles and the elders, with the whole church, decided to select men who were among them and to send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas: Judas, called Barsabbas, and Silas, both leading men among the brothers.

Therefore we have sent Judas and Silas, who will personally report the same things by word of mouth.

that you abstain from food offered to idols, from blood, from eating anything that has been strangled, and from sexual immorality. You will do well if you keep yourselves from these things.

Farewell.

Paul wanted Timothy to go with him, so he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in those places, since they all knew that his father was a Greek.

When they came to Mysia, they tried to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them.

Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the jail were shaken, and immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone’s chains came loose.

But Paul called out in a loud voice, “Don’t harm yourself, because all of us are here!”

So they said, “Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.”

He took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds. Right away he and all his family were baptized.

Then some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, including a great number of God-fearing Greeks, as well as a number of the leading women.

and Jason has received them as guests! They are all acting contrary to Caesar’s decrees, saying that there is another king—Jesus!”

Consequently, many of them believed, including a number of the prominent Greek women as well as men.

While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, his spirit was troubled within him when he saw that the city was full of idols.

Now all the Athenians and the foreigners residing there spent their time on nothing else but telling or hearing something new.

Neither is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives everyone life and breath and all things.

From one man He has made every nationality to live over the whole earth and has determined their appointed times and the boundaries of where they live.

“Therefore, having overlooked the times of ignorance, God now commands all people everywhere to repent,

When they heard about resurrection of the dead, some began to ridicule him. But others said, “We’d like to hear from you again about this.”

where he found a Jewish man named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla because Claudius had ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. Paul came to them,

But when they resisted and blasphemed, he shook his robe and told them, “Your blood is on your own heads! I am innocent. From now on I will go to the Gentiles.”

Crispus, the leader of the synagogue, believed the Lord, along with his whole household. Many of the Corinthians, when they heard, believed and were baptized.

For I am with you, and no one will lay a hand on you to hurt you, because I have many people in this city.”

While Gallio was proconsul of Achaia, the Jews made a united attack against Paul and brought him to the judge’s bench.

Then they all seized Sosthenes, the leader of the synagogue, and beat him in front of the judge’s bench. But none of these things concerned Gallio.

And after spending some time there, he set out, traveling through one place after another in the Galatian territory and Phrygia, strengthening all the disciples.

While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul traveled through the interior regions and came to Ephesus. He found some disciples

Now there were about 12 men in all.

And this went on for two years, so that all the inhabitants of Asia, both Jews and Greeks, heard the message about the Lord.

Then the man who had the evil spirit leaped on them, overpowered them all, and prevailed against them, so that they ran out of that house naked and wounded.

This became known to everyone who lived in Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks. Then fear fell on all of them, and the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified.

while many of those who had practiced magic collected their books and burned them in front of everyone. So they calculated their value and found it to be 50,000 pieces of silver.

When these events were over, Paul resolved in the Spirit to pass through Macedonia and Achaia and go to Jerusalem. “After I’ve been there,” he said, “I must see Rome as well!”

So after sending two of those who assisted him, Timothy and Erastus, to Macedonia, he himself stayed in Asia for a while.

When he had assembled them, as well as the workers engaged in this type of business, he said: “Men, you know that our prosperity is derived from this business.

You both see and hear that not only in Ephesus, but in almost all of Asia, this man Paul has persuaded and misled a considerable number of people by saying that gods made by hand are not gods!

So not only do we run a risk that our business may be discredited, but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis may be despised and her magnificence come to the verge of ruin—the very one all of Asia and the world adore.”

So the city was filled with confusion, and they rushed all together into the amphitheater, dragging along Gaius and Aristarchus, Macedonians who were Paul’s traveling companions.

But when they recognized that he was a Jew, a united cry went up from all of them for about two hours: “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”

And when they came to him, he said to them: “You know, from the first day I set foot in Asia, how I was with you the whole time—

serving the Lord with all humility, with tears, and with the trials that came to me through the plots of the Jews—

“And now I am on my way to Jerusalem, bound in my spirit, not knowing what I will encounter there,

“And now I know that none of you will ever see my face again—everyone I went about preaching the kingdom to.

for I did not shrink back from declaring to you the whole plan of God.

Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock that the Holy Spirit has appointed you to as overseers, to shepherd the church of God, which He purchased with His own blood.

I know that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock.

And men will rise up from your own number with deviant doctrines to lure the disciples into following them.

“And now I commit you to God and to the message of His grace, which is able to build you up and to give you an inheritance among all who are sanctified.

After he said this, he knelt down and prayed with all of them.

grieving most of all over his statement that they would never see his face again. Then they escorted him to the ship.

When our days there were over, we left to continue our journey, while all of them, with their wives and children, escorted us out of the city. After kneeling down on the beach to pray,

While we were staying there many days, a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea.

He came to us, took Paul’s belt, tied his own feet and hands, and said, “This is what the Holy Spirit says: ‘In this way the Jews in Jerusalem will bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him into Gentile hands.’”

Since he would not be persuaded, we stopped talking and simply said, “The Lord’s will be done!”

The following day Paul went in with us to James, and all the elders were present.

When they heard it, they glorified God and said, “You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews there are who have believed, and they are all zealous for the law.

But they have been told about you that you teach all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to abandon Moses, by telling them not to circumcise their children or to walk in our customs.

So what is to be done? They will certainly hear that you’ve come.

Take these men, purify yourself along with them, and pay for them to get their heads shaved. Then everyone will know that what they were told about you amounts to nothing, but that you yourself are also careful about observing the law.

As the seven days were about to end, the Jews from Asia saw him in the temple complex, stirred up the whole crowd, and seized him,

The whole city was stirred up, and the people rushed together. They seized Paul, dragged him out of the temple complex, and at once the gates were shut.

As they were trying to kill him, word went up to the commander of the regiment that all Jerusalem was in chaos.

He continued, “I am a Jewish man, born in Tarsus of Cilicia but brought up in this city at the feet of Gamaliel and educated according to the strict view of our patriarchal law. Being zealous for God, just as all of you are today,

as both the high priest and the whole council of elders can testify about me. After I received letters from them to the brothers, I traveled to Damascus to bring those who were prisoners there to be punished in Jerusalem.

“Then I said, ‘What should I do, Lord?’

“And the Lord told me, ‘Get up and go into Damascus, and there you will be told about everything that is assigned for you to do.’

Someone named Ananias, a devout man according to the law, having a good reputation with all the Jews residing there,