Thematic Bible




Thematic Bible






Then Paul got up, and motioning with his hand, said, "Men of Israel, and you who reverence God, listen! The God of this people of Israel chose our forefathers, and made the people great during their stay in Egypt, and then with uplifted hand led them out of Egypt. Then after he had taken care of them for forty years in the desert, read more.
he destroyed seven nations in Canaan, and settled them upon their land for about four hundred and fifty years. After that he gave them judges, down to the time of the prophet Samuel. Then they demanded a king and for forty years God gave them Saul, the son of Kish, a man of the tribe of Benjamin. Then he removed him and raised David up to be their king, bearing this testimony to him: 'I have found in David the son of Jesse a man after my own heart, who will do all that I desire.' It is from his descendants that God has brought to Israel as he promised to do, a savior in Jesus, in preparation for whose coming John had preached to all the people of Israel baptism in token of repentance. Toward the end of his career, John said, 'What do you suppose that I am? I am not he! No! Someone is coming after me, the shoes on whose feet I am not fit to untie!' Brothers! Descendants of the house of Abraham, and those others among you who reverence God! It is to us that this message of salvation has been sent. For the people of Jerusalem and their leaders refused to recognize him, and condemned him, thus fulfilling the very utterances of the prophets which are read every Sabbath, and though they could find no ground for putting him to death, they demanded of Pilate that he be executed. When they had carried out everything that had been said about him in the Scriptures, 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 to Jerusalem with him from Galilee, and they are now witnesses for him to the people. So we now bring you the good news that God has fulfilled to us, their children, the promise that he made to our forefathers, by raising Jesus to life, just as the Scripture says in the second psalm, You are my Son! Today I have become your Father!' Now as evidence that he has raised him from the dead, never again to return to decay, he said this: 'I will fulfil to you my sacred promises to David.' For in another psalm he says, 'You will not let your Holy One undergo decay.' Now David, after serving God's purposes in his own generation, fell asleep and was laid among his forefathers and did undergo decay, but he whom God raised to life did not undergo it. You must understand therefore, my brothers, that through him the forgiveness of your sins is announced to you, and that through union with him everyone who believes is cleared of every charge of which the Law of Moses could not clear you. Take care, therefore, that what is said in the prophets does not prove true of you: " 'Look, you scoffers! Then wonder and begone! For I am doing something in your times Which you will never believe even when it is related to you!' " As they were going out, the people begged to have all this said to them again on the following Sabbath, and after the congregation had broken up, many of the Jews and the devout converts to Judaism went away with Paul and Barnabas, and they talked with them, and urged them to rely on the favor of God.

For no matter how many guides you may have in the Christian life, you will not have many fathers; for in this matter of union with Christ, I became your father, through preaching the good news to you.

If I am not an apostle to other people, I certainly am one to you, for you yourselves, in your relation to the Lord, are the certificate of my apostleship.

But whether it was I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.

You are my recommendations, written on my heart, for everybody to read and understand. You show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by me, written not in ink, but in the Spirit of the living God, and not on tablets of stone, but on the human heart.



But Crispus, the leader of the synagogue, believed in the Lord, and so did all his household, and many of the people of Corinth heard Paul and believed and were baptized.

But whether it was I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.