Acts 7:7

7 ‘But I will punish the nation that enslaves them,’ God said, ‘and in the end they will come out and worship me here in this place.’

Acts 7:7 Meaning and Commentary

Acts 7:7

And the nation to whom they shall be in bondage
At the end of the four hundred years, and which was the Egyptian nation:

I will judge, said God;
that is, condemn and punish them, as he did, by inflicting the ten plagues upon them:

and after that they shall come forth;
out of the land of Egypt, and their hard bondage there; and which was brought about by the judgments executed upon the Egyptians:

and serve me in this place;
in the land of Canaan; though these words are not to be found in ( Genesis 15:13 ) what comes nearest them is in ( Exodus 3:12 ) . "Ye shall serve God upon this mountain"; meaning Mount Horeb, where Moses then was, and from whence the law was afterwards given.

Acts 7:7 In-Context

5 “But God gave him no inheritance here, not even one square foot of land. God did promise, however, that eventually the whole land would belong to Abraham and his descendants—even though he had no children yet.

6 God also told him that his descendants would live in a foreign land, where they would be oppressed as slaves for 400 years.

7 ‘But I will punish the nation that enslaves them,’ God said, ‘and in the end they will come out and worship me here in this place.’

8 “God also gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision at that time. So when Abraham became the father of Isaac, he circumcised him on the eighth day. And the practice was continued when Isaac became the father of Jacob, and when Jacob became the father of the twelve patriarchs of the Israelite nation.

9 “These patriarchs were jealous of their brother Joseph, and they sold him to be a slave in Egypt. But God was with him

Footnotes

• [a]. Gen 12:7 ; 15:13-14 ; Exod 3:12 .