Acts 17; Acts 18; Acts 19

Acts 17

1 Then they traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia and came to Thessalonica, where there was a Jewish synagogue.

2 As usual, Paul went to them, and on three Sabbath days reasoned with them from the Scriptures,

3 explaining and showing that the Messiah had to suffer and rise from the dead, and saying: "This is the Messiah, Jesus, whom I am proclaiming to you."

4 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.

5 But the Jews became jealous, and when they had brought together some scoundrels from the marketplace and formed a mob, they set the city in an uproar. Attacking Jason's house, they searched for them to bring them out to the public assembly.

6 When they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brothers before the city officials, shouting, "These men who have turned the world upside down have come here too,

7 and Jason has received them as guests! They are all acting contrary to Caesar's decrees, saying that there is another king-Jesus!"

8 The Jews stirred up the crowd and the city officials who heard these things.

9 So taking a security bond from Jason and the others, they released them.

10 As soon as it was night, the brothers sent Paul and Silas off to Beroea. On arrival, they went into the synagogue of the Jews.

11 The people here were more open-minded than those in Thessalonica, since they welcomed the message with eagerness and examined the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.

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

13 But when the Jews from Thessalonica found out that God's message had been proclaimed by Paul at Beroea, they came there too, agitating and disturbing the crowds.

14 Then the brothers immediately sent Paul away to go to the sea, but Silas and Timothy stayed on there.

15 Those who escorted Paul brought him as far as Athens, and after receiving instructions for Silas and Timothy to come to him as quickly as possible, they departed.

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

17 So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and with those who worshiped God, and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there.

18 Then also, some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers argued with him. Some said, "What is this pseudo-intellectual trying to say?" Others replied, "He seems to be a preacher of foreign deities"-because he was telling the good news about Jesus and the resurrection.

19 They took him and brought him to the Areopagus, and said, "May we learn about this new teaching you're speaking of?

20 For what you say sounds strange to us, and we want to know what these ideas mean."

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

22 Then Paul stood in the middle of the Areopagus and said: "Men of Athens! I see that you are extremely religious in every respect.

23 For as I was passing through and observing the objects of your worship, I even found an altar on which was inscribed: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD Therefore, what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you.

24 The God who made the world and everything in it-He is Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in shrines made by hands.

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

26 From one man He has made every nation of men to live all over the earth and has determined their appointed times and the boundaries of where they live,

27 so that they might seek God, and perhaps they might reach out and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us.

28 For in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, 'For we are also His offspring.' Gk poet.

29 Being God's offspring, then, we shouldn't think that the divine nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image fashioned by human art and imagination.

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

31 because He has set a day on which He is going to judge the world in righteousness by the Man He has appointed. He has provided proof of this to everyone by raising Him from the dead."

32 When they heard about resurrection of the dead, some began to ridicule him. But others said, "We will hear you about this again."

33 So Paul went out from their presence.

34 However, some men joined him and believed, among whom were Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.

Acts 18

1 After this, he left from Athens and went to Corinth,

2 where he found a Jewish man named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla because Claudius 41-54; he expelled all Jews from Rome in a.d. 49. had ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. Paul came to them,

3 and being of the same occupation, stayed with them and worked, for they were tentmakers by trade.

4 He reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath and tried to persuade both Jews and Greeks.

5 When Silas and Timothy came down from Macedonia, Paul was occupied with preaching the message and solemnly testified to the Jews that the Messiah is Jesus.

6 But when they resisted and blasphemed, he shook out his clothes and told them, "Your blood is on your own heads! I am clean. From now on I will go to the Gentiles."

7 So he left there and went to the house of a man named Titius Justus, a worshiper of God, whose house was next door to the synagogue.

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

9 Then the Lord said to Paul in a night vision, "Don't be afraid, but keep on speaking and don't be silent.

10 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."

11 And he stayed there a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them.

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

13 "This man," they said, "persuades people to worship God contrary to the law!"

14 And as Paul was about to open his mouth, Gallio said to the Jews, "If it were a matter of a crime or of moral evil, it would be reasonable for me to put up with you Jews.

15 But if these are questions about words, names, and your own law, see to it yourselves. I don't want to be a judge of such things."

16 So he drove them from the judge's bench.

17 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.

18 So Paul, having stayed on for many days, said good-bye to the brothers and sailed away to Syria. Priscilla and Aquila were with him. He shaved his head at Cenchreae, because he had taken a vow.

19 When they reached Ephesus he left them there, but he himself entered the synagogue and engaged in discussion with the Jews.

20 And though they asked him to stay for a longer time, he declined,

21 but said good-bye and stated, "I'll come back to you again, if God wills." Then he set sail from Ephesus.

22 On landing at Caesarea, he went up and greeted the church, and went down to Antioch.

23 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.

24 A Jew named Apollos, a native Alexandrian, an eloquent man who was powerful in the Scriptures, arrived in Ephesus.

25 This man had been instructed in the way of the Lord; and being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught the things about Jesus accurately, although he knew only John's baptism.

26 He began to speak boldly in the synagogue. After Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him home and explained the way of God to him more accurately.

27 When he wanted to cross over to Achaia, the brothers wrote to the disciples urging them to welcome him. After he arrived, he greatly helped those who had believed through grace.

28 For he vigorously refuted the Jews in public, demonstrating through the Scriptures that Jesus is the Messiah.

Acts 19

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

2 and asked them, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?" "No," they told him, "we haven't even heard that there is a Holy Spirit."

3 "Then with what [baptism] were you baptized?" he asked them. "With John's baptism," they replied.

4 Paul said, "John baptized with a baptism of repentance, telling the people that they should believe in the One who would come after him, that is, in Jesus."

5 On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.

6 And when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began to speak with [other] languages and to prophesy.

7 Now there were about 12 men in all.

8 Then he entered the synagogue and spoke boldly over a period of three months, engaging in discussion and trying to persuade them about the things related to the kingdom of God.

9 But when some became hardened and would not believe, slandering the Way in front of the crowd, he withdrew from them and met separately with the disciples, conducting discussions every day in the lecture hall of Tyrannus.

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

11 God was performing extraordinary miracles by Paul's hands,

12 so that even facecloths or work aprons that had touched his skin were brought to the sick, and the diseases left them, and the evil spirits came out of them.

13 Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists attempted to pronounce the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, "I command you by the Jesus whom Paul preaches!"

14 Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this.

15 The evil spirit answered them, "Jesus I know, and Paul I recognize-but who are you?"

16 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.

17 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.

18 And many who had become believers came confessing and disclosing their practices,

19 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.

20 In this way the Lord's message flourished and prevailed.

21 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!"

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

23 During that time there was a major disturbance about the Way.

24 For a person named Demetrius, a silversmith who made silver shrines of Artemis, provided a great deal of business for the craftsmen.

25 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.

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

27 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 whom the whole province of Asia and the world adore."

28 When they had heard this, they were filled with rage and began to cry out, "Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!"

29 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.

30 Though Paul wanted to go in before the people, the disciples did not let him.

31 Even some of the provincial officials of Asia, who were his friends, sent word to him, pleading with him not to take a chance by going into the amphitheater.

32 Meanwhile, some were shouting one thing and some another, because the assembly was in confusion, and most of them did not know why they had come together.

33 Then some of the crowd gave Alexander advice when the Jews pushed him to the front. So motioning with his hand, Alexander wanted to make his defense to the people.

34 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!"

35 However, when the city clerk had calmed the crowd down, he said, "Men of Ephesus! What man is there who doesn't know that the city of the Ephesians is the temple guardian of the great Artemis, and of the image that fell from heaven?

36 Therefore, since these things are undeniable, you must keep calm and not do anything rash.

37 For you have brought these men here who are not temple robbers or blasphemers of our goddess.

38 So if Demetrius and the craftsmen who are with him have a case against anyone, the courts are in session, and there are proconsuls. Let them bring charges against one another.

39 But if you want something else, it must be decided in a legal assembly.

40 In fact, we run a risk of being charged with rioting for what happened today, since there is no justification that we can give as a reason for this disorderly gathering."

41 After saying this, he dismissed the assembly.