These brethren had gone on and were waiting for us in the Troad.

Now there were a good many lamps in the room upstairs where we all were,

They had taken the lad home alive, and were greatly comforted.

grieved above all things at his having told them that after that day they were no longer to see his face. And they went with him to the ship.

Now Philip had four unmarried daughters who were prophetesses;

Some of the disciples from Caesarea also joined our party, and brought with them Mnason, a Cyprian, one of the early disciples, at whose house we were to lodge.

So Paul associated with the men; and the next day, having purified himself with them, he went into the Temple, giving every one to understand that the days of their purification were finished, and there he remained until the sacrifice for each of them was offered.

But, when the seven days were nearly over, the Jews from the province of Asia, having seen Paul in the Temple, set about rousing the fury of all the people against him.

The excitement spread through the whole city, and the people rushed in crowds to the Temple, and there laid hold of Paul and began to drag him out; and the Temple gates were immediately closed.

But while they were trying to kill Paul, word was taken up to the Tribune in command of the battalion, that all Jerusalem was in a ferment.

"Now the men who were with me, though they saw the light, did not hear the words of Him who spoke to me.

"And as I could not see because the light had been so dazzling, those who were with me had to lead me by the arm, and so I came to Damascus.

and when they were shedding the blood of Stephen, Thy witness, I was standing by, fully approving of it, and I held the clothes of those who were killing him.'

On hearing this the High Priest Ananias ordered those who were standing near Paul to strike him on the mouth.

There were more than forty of them who bound themselves by this oath.

He also wrote a letter of which these were the contents:

This man Paul had been seized by the Jews, and they were on the point of killing him, when I came upon them with the troops and rescued him, for I had been informed that he was a Roman citizen.

And, wishing to know with certainty the offense of which they were accusing him, I brought him down into their Sanhedrin,

The Jews also joined in the charge, maintaining that these were facts.

While I was busy about these, they found me in the Temple purified, with no crowd around me and no uproar; but there were certain Jews from the province of Asia.

And he gave orders to the Captain that Paul was to be kept in custody, but be treated with indulgence, and that his personal friends were not to be prevented from showing him kindness.

asking it as a favour, to Paul's prejudice--to have him brought to Jerusalem. They were planning an ambush to kill him on the way.

Upon Paul's arrival, the Jews who had come down from Jerusalem stood round him, and brought many grave charges against him which they were unable to substantiate.

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.

and on the journey, at noon, Sir, I saw a light from Heaven--brighter than the brightness of the sun--shining around me and around those who were travelling with me.

So the King rose, and the Governor, and Bernice, and those who were sitting with them;

Putting to sea again, we sailed under the lee of Cyprus, because the winds were against us;

and as the harbour was inconvenient for wintering in, the majority were in favour of putting out to sea, to try whether they could get to Phoenix--a harbour on the coast of Crete facing north-east and south-east--to winter there.

And a light breeze from the south sprang up, so that they supposed they were now sure of their purpose. So weighing anchor they ran along the coast of Crete, hugging the shore.

and, after hoisting it on board, they used frapping-cables to undergird the ship, and, as they were afraid of being driven on the Syrtis quicksands, they lowered the gear and lay to.

Then, when for several days neither sun nor stars were seen and the terrific gale still harassed us, the last ray of hope was now vanishing.

It was now the fourteenth night, and we were drifting through the Sea of Adria, when, about midnight, the sailors suspected that land was close at hand.

The sailors, however, wanted to make their escape from the ship, and had lowered the boat into the sea, pretending that they were going to lay out anchors from the bow.

There were 276 of us, crew and passengers, all told.

Now in the same part of the island there were estates belonging to the Governor, whose name was Publius. He welcomed us to his house, and for three days generously made us his guests.

After this, all the other sick people in the island came and were cured.

After one complete day he invited the leading men among the Jews to meet him; and, when they were come together, he said to them, "As for me, brethren, although I had done nothing prejudicial to our people or contrary to the customs of our forefathers, I was handed over as a prisoner from Jerusalem into the power of the Romans.

They, after they had sharply questioned me, were willing to set me at liberty, because they found no offence in me for which I deserve to die.

So they arranged a day with him and came to him in considerable numbers at the house of the friends who were entertaining him. And then, with solemn earnestness, he explained to them the subject of the Kingdom of God, endeavouring from morning till evening to convince them about Jesus, both from the Law of Moses and from the Prophets.

Some were convinced; others refused to believe.

For when they had come to know God, they did not give Him glory as God nor render Him thanks, but they became absorbed in useless discussions, and their senseless minds were darkened.

Their hearts overflowed with all sorts of dishonesty, mischief, greed, malice. They were full of envy and murder, and were quarrelsome, crafty, and spiteful.

They were secret backbiters, open slanderers; hateful to God, insolent, haughty, boastful; inventors of new forms of sin, disobedient to parents, destitute of common sense,

The privilege is great from every point of view. First of all, because the Jews were entrusted with God's truth.

What then were the circumstances under which this took place? Was it after he had been circumcised, or before?

For already, while we were still helpless, Christ at the right moment died for the ungodly.

But God gives proof of His love to us in Christ's dying for us while we were still sinners.

For if while we were hostile to God we were reconciled to Him through the death of His Son, it is still more certain that now that we are reconciled, we shall obtain salvation through Christ's life.

For as through the disobedience of the one individual the mass of mankind were constituted sinners, so also through the obedience of the One the mass of mankind will be constituted righteous.

And do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?

Well, then, we by our baptism were buried with Him in death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from among the dead by the Father's glorious power, we also should live an entirely new life.

But thanks be to God that though you were once in thraldom to Sin, you have now yielded a hearty obedience to that system of truth in which you have been instructed.

You were set free from the tyranny of Sin, and became the bondservants of Righteousness--

For when you were the bondservants of sin, you were under no sort of subjection to Righteousness.

For whilst we were under the thraldom of our earthly natures, sinful passions-- made sinful by the Law--were always being aroused to action in our bodily faculties that they might yield fruit to death.

and even then, though they were not then born and had not done anything either good or evil, yet in order that God's electing purpose might not be frustrated, based, as it was, not on their actions but on the will of Him who called them, she was told,

Even as Isaiah says in an earlier place, "Were it not that the Lord, the God of Hosts, had left us some few descendants, we should have become like Sodom, and have come to resemble Gomorrah."

To what conclusion does this bring us? Why, that the Gentiles, who were not in pursuit of righteousness, have overtaken it--a righteousness, however, which arises from faith;

while the descendants of Israel, who were in pursuit of a Law that could give righteousness, have not arrived at one.

And why? Because they were pursuing a righteousness which should arise not from faith, but from what they regarded as merit. They stuck their foot against the stone which lay in their way;

And Isaiah, with strange boldness, exclaims, "I have been found by those who were not looking for Me, I have revealed Myself to those who were not inquiring of Me."

And if some of the branches have been pruned away, and you, although you were but a wild olive, have been grafted in among them and have become a sharer with others in the rich sap of the root of the olive tree,

and if you were cut from that which by nature is a wild olive and contrary to nature were grafted into the good olive tree, how much more certainly will these natural branches be grafted on their own olive tree?

but just as you were formerly disobedient to Him, but now have received mercy at a time when they are disobedient,

God is ever true to His promises, and it was by Him that you were, one and all, called into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ, our Lord.

Is the Christ in fragments? Is it Paul who was crucified on your behalf? Or were you baptized to be Paul's adherents?

for fear people should say that you were baptized to be my adherents.

And my language and the Message that I proclaimed were not adorned with persuasive words of earthly wisdom, but depended upon truths which the Spirit taught and mightily carried home;

I fed you with milk and not with solid food, since for this you were not yet strong enough. And even now you are not strong enough:

If any one's work is burnt up, he will suffer the loss of it; yet he will himself be rescued, but only, as it were, by passing through the fire.

Why, who gives you your superiority, my brother? Or what have you that you did not receive? And if you really did receive it, why boast as if this were not so?

For even if you were to have ten thousand spiritual instructors--for all that you could not have several fathers. It is I who in Christ Jesus became your father through the Good News.

I for my part, present with you in spirit although absent in body, have already, as though I were present, judged him who has so acted.

I wrote to you in that letter that you were not to associate with fornicators;

But what I meant was that you were not to associate with any one bearing the name of "brother," if he was addicted to fornication or avarice or idol-worship or abusive language or hard-drinking or greed of gain. With such a man you ought not even to eat.

And all this describes what some of you were. But now you have had every stain washed off: now you have been set apart as holy: now you have been pronounced free from guilt; in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and through the Spirit of our God.

Were you a slave when God called you? Let not that weigh on your mind. And yet if you can get your freedom, take advantage of the opportunity.

For if any one were to see you, who know the real truth of this matter, reclining at table in an idol's temple, would not his conscience (supposing him to be a weak believer)

To the Jews I have become like a Jew in order to win Jews; to men under the Law as if I were under the Law--although I am not--in order to win those who are under the Law;

to men without Law as if I were without Law--although I am not without Law in relation to God but am abiding in Christ's Law--in order to win those who are without Law.

For I would have you remember, brethren, how our forefathers were all of them sheltered by the cloud, and all got safely through the Red Sea.

All were baptized in the cloud and in the sea to be followers of Moses.

But with most of them God was not well pleased; for they were laid low in the Desert.

And in this they became a warning to us, to teach us not to be eager, as they were eager, in pursuit of what is evil.

And you must not be worshippers of idols, as some of them were. For it is written, "The People sat down to eat and drink, and stood up to dance."

And do not let us test the Lord too far, as some of them tested Him and were destroyed by the serpents.

And do not be discontented, as some of them were, and they were destroyed by the Destroyer.

You know that when you were heathens you went astray after dumb idols, wherever you happened to be led.

For, in fact, in one Spirit all of us--whether we are Jews or Gentiles, slaves or free men--were baptized to form but one body; and we were all nourished by that one Spirit.

Were the foot to say, "Because I am not a hand I am not a part of the body," that would not make it any the less a part of the body.

Or were the ear to say, "Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body," that would not make it any the less a part of the body.

If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the nostrils be?

If they were all one part, where would the body be?

I should be right glad were you all to speak in 'tongues,' but yet more glad were you all to prophesy. And, in fact, the man who prophesies is superior to him who speaks in 'tongues,' except when the latter can interpret in order that the Church may get a blessing.

And I beseech you, brethren--you know the household of Stephanas, how they were the earliest Greek converts to Christ, and have devoted themselves to the service of God's people--

For as for our troubles which came upon us in the province of Asia, we would have you know, brethren, that we were exceedingly weighed down, and felt overwhelmed, so that we renounced all hope even of life.

Nay, their minds were made dull; for to this very day during the reading of the book of the ancient Covenant, the same veil remains unlifted, because it is only in Christ that it is to be abolished.

On Christ's behalf therefore we come as ambassadors, God, as it were, making entreaty through our lips: we, on Christ's behalf, beseech men to be reconciled to God.

For even after our arrival in Macedonia we could get no relief such as human nature craves. We were greatly harassed; there were conflicts without and fears within.

If, however, I were to boast more loudly of our Apostolic authority, which the Lord has given us that we may build you up, not pull you down, I should have no reason to feel ashamed.