Professor Horner’s Reading Plan

¹Now when Jesus had finished instructing his twelve disciples, he went on from there to teach and proclaim his message in their cities.

²When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples

³and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?”

⁴Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see:

⁵the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.

⁶And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”

⁷As they went away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds about John: “What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind?

⁸What then did you go out to see? Someone dressed in soft robes? Look, those who wear soft robes are in royal palaces.

⁹What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet.

¹⁰This is the one about whom it is written, ‘See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you.’

¹¹Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.

¹²From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force.

¹³For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John came;

¹⁴and if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come.

¹⁵Let anyone with ears listen!

¹⁶“But to what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another,

¹⁷‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.’

¹⁸For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’;

¹⁹the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.”

²⁰Then he began to reproach the cities in which most of his deeds of power had been done, because they did not repent.

²¹“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.

²²But I tell you, on the day of judgment it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon than for you.

²³And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? No, you will be brought down to Hades. For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day.

²⁴But I tell you that on the day of judgment it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom than for you.”

²⁵At that time Jesus said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants;

²⁶yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.

²⁷All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.

²⁸“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.

²⁹Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

³⁰For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

¹Now Aaron’s sons, Nadab and Abihu, each took his censer, put fire in it, and laid incense on it; and they offered unholy fire before the LORD, such as he had not commanded them.

²And fire came out from the presence of the LORD and consumed them, and they died before the LORD.

³Then Moses said to Aaron, “This is what the LORD meant when he said, ‘Through those who are near me I will show myself holy, and before all the people I will be glorified.’” And Aaron was silent.

⁴Moses summoned Mishael and Elzaphan, sons of Uzziel the uncle of Aaron, and said to them, “Come forward, and carry your kinsmen away from the front of the sanctuary to a place outside the camp.”

⁵They came forward and carried them by their tunics out of the camp, as Moses had ordered.

⁶And Moses said to Aaron and to his sons Eleazar and Ithamar, “Do not dishevel your hair, and do not tear your vestments, or you will die and wrath will strike all the congregation; but your kindred, the whole house of Israel, may mourn the burning that the LORD has sent.

⁷You shall not go outside the entrance of the tent of meeting, or you will die; for the anointing oil of the LORD is on you.” And they did as Moses had ordered.

⁸And the LORD spoke to Aaron:

⁹Drink no wine or strong drink, neither you nor your sons, when you enter the tent of meeting, that you may not die; it is a statute forever throughout your generations.

¹⁰You are to distinguish between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean;

¹¹and you are to teach the people of Israel all the statutes that the LORD has spoken to them through Moses.

¹²Moses spoke to Aaron and to his remaining sons, Eleazar and Ithamar: Take the grain offering that is left from the LORD’s offerings by fire, and eat it unleavened beside the altar, for it is most holy;

¹³you shall eat it in a holy place, because it is your due and your sons’ due, from the offerings by fire to the LORD; for so I am commanded.

¹⁴But the breast that is elevated and the thigh that is raised, you and your sons and daughters as well may eat in any clean place; for they have been assigned to you and your children from the sacrifices of the offerings of well-being of the people of Israel.

¹⁵The thigh that is raised and the breast that is elevated they shall bring, together with the offerings by fire of the fat, to raise for an elevation offering before the LORD; they are to be your due and that of your children forever, as the LORD has commanded.

¹⁶Then Moses made inquiry about the goat of the sin offering, and — it had already been burned! He was angry with Eleazar and Ithamar, Aaron’s remaining sons, and said,

¹⁷“Why did you not eat the sin offering in the sacred area? For it is most holy, and God has given it to you that you may remove the guilt of the congregation, to make atonement on their behalf before the LORD.

¹⁸Its blood was not brought into the inner part of the sanctuary. You should certainly have eaten it in the sanctuary, as I commanded.”

¹⁹And Aaron spoke to Moses, “See, today they offered their sin offering and their burnt offering before the LORD; and yet such things as these have befallen me! If I had eaten the sin offering today, would it have been agreeable to the LORD?”

²⁰And when Moses heard that, he agreed.

¹When any of you has a grievance against another, do you dare to take it to court before the unrighteous, instead of taking it before the saints?

²Do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases?

³Do you not know that we are to judge angels — to say nothing of ordinary matters?

⁴If you have ordinary cases, then, do you appoint as judges those who have no standing in the church?

⁵I say this to your shame. Can it be that there is no one among you wise enough to decide between one believer and another,

⁶but a believer goes to court against a believer — and before unbelievers at that?

⁷In fact, to have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be defrauded?

⁸But you yourselves wrong and defraud — and believers at that.

⁹Do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites,

¹⁰thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, robbers — none of these will inherit the kingdom of God.

¹¹And this is what some of you used to be. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.

¹²“All things are lawful for me,” but not all things are beneficial. “All things are lawful for me,” but I will not be dominated by anything.

¹³“Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food,” and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is meant not for fornication but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.

¹⁴And God raised the Lord and will also raise us by his power.

¹⁵Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Should I therefore take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never!

¹⁶Do you not know that whoever is united to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For it is said, “The two shall be one flesh.”

¹⁷But anyone united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.

¹⁸Shun fornication! Every sin that a person commits is outside the body; but the fornicator sins against the body itself.

¹⁹Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own?

²⁰For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body.

¹This is now, beloved, the second letter I am writing to you; in them I am trying to arouse your sincere intention by reminding you

²that you should remember the words spoken in the past by the holy prophets, and the commandment of the Lord and Savior spoken through your apostles.

³First of all you must understand this, that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and indulging their own lusts

⁴and saying, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since our ancestors died, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation!”

⁵They deliberately ignore this fact, that by the word of God heavens existed long ago and an earth was formed out of water and by means of water,

⁶through which the world of that time was deluged with water and perished.

⁷But by the same word the present heavens and earth have been reserved for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the godless.

⁸But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day.

⁹The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance.

¹⁰But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed.

¹¹Since all these things are to be dissolved in this way, what sort of persons ought you to be in leading lives of holiness and godliness,

¹²waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set ablaze and dissolved, and the elements will melt with fire?

¹³But, in accordance with his promise, we wait for new heavens and a new earth, where righteousness is at home.

¹⁴Therefore, beloved, while you are waiting for these things, strive to be found by him at peace, without spot or blemish;

¹⁵and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation. So also our beloved brother Paul wrote to you according to the wisdom given him,

¹⁶speaking of this as he does in all his letters. There are some things in them hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other scriptures.

¹⁷You therefore, beloved, since you are forewarned, beware that you are not carried away with the error of the lawless and lose your own stability.

¹⁸But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

¹Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind:

²“Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?

³Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me.

⁴“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding.

⁵Who determined its measurements — surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it?

⁶On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone

⁷when the morning stars sang together and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy?

⁸“Or who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb? —

⁹when I made the clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band,

¹⁰and prescribed bounds for it, and set bars and doors,

¹¹and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stopped’?

¹²“Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place,

¹³so that it might take hold of the skirts of the earth, and the wicked be shaken out of it?

¹⁴It is changed like clay under the seal, and it is dyed like a garment.

¹⁵Light is withheld from the wicked, and their uplifted arm is broken.

¹⁶“Have you entered into the springs of the sea, or walked in the recesses of the deep?

¹⁷Have the gates of death been revealed to you, or have you seen the gates of deep darkness?

¹⁸Have you comprehended the expanse of the earth? Declare, if you know all this.

¹⁹“Where is the way to the dwelling of light, and where is the place of darkness,

²⁰that you may take it to its territory and that you may discern the paths to its home?

²¹Surely you know, for you were born then, and the number of your days is great!

²²“Have you entered the storehouses of the snow, or have you seen the storehouses of the hail,

²³which I have reserved for the time of trouble, for the day of battle and war?

²⁴What is the way to the place where the light is distributed, or where the east wind is scattered upon the earth?

²⁵“Who has cut a channel for the torrents of rain, and a way for the thunderbolt,

²⁶to bring rain on a land where no one lives, on the desert, which is empty of human life,

²⁷to satisfy the waste and desolate land, and to make the ground put forth grass?

²⁸“Has the rain a father, or who has begotten the drops of dew?

²⁹From whose womb did the ice come forth, and who has given birth to the hoarfrost of heaven?

³⁰The waters become hard like stone, and the face of the deep is frozen.

³¹“Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades, or loose the cords of Orion?

³²Can you lead forth the Mazzaroth in their season, or can you guide the Bear with its children?

³³Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? Can you establish their rule on the earth?

³⁴“Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, so that a flood of waters may cover you?

³⁵Can you send forth lightnings, so that they may go and say to you, ‘Here we are’?

³⁶Who has put wisdom in the inward parts, or given understanding to the mind?

³⁷Who has the wisdom to number the clouds? Or who can tilt the waterskins of the heavens,

³⁸when the dust runs into a mass and the clods cling together?

³⁹“Can you hunt the prey for the lion, or satisfy the appetite of the young lions,

⁴⁰when they crouch in their dens, or lie in wait in their covert?

⁴¹Who provides for the raven its prey, when its young ones cry to God, and wander about for lack of food?

¹Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth.

²Worship the LORD with gladness; come into his presence with singing.

³Know that the LORD is God. It is he that made us, and we are his; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

⁴Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him, bless his name.

⁵For the LORD is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.

¹My child, keep my words and store up my commandments with you;

²keep my commandments and live, keep my teachings as the apple of your eye;

³bind them on your fingers, write them on the tablet of your heart.

⁴Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,” and call insight your intimate friend,

⁵that they may keep you from the loose woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words.

⁶For at the window of my house I looked out through my lattice,

⁷and I saw among the simple ones, I observed among the youths, a young man without sense,

⁸passing along the street near her corner, taking the road to her house

⁹in the twilight, in the evening, at the time of night and darkness.

¹⁰Then a woman comes toward him, decked out like a prostitute, wily of heart.

¹¹She is loud and wayward; her feet do not stay at home;

¹²now in the street, now in the squares, and at every corner she lies in wait.

¹³She seizes him and kisses him, and with impudent face she says to him:

¹⁴“I had to offer sacrifices, and today I have paid my vows;

¹⁵so now I have come out to meet you, to seek you eagerly, and I have found you!

¹⁶I have decked my couch with coverings, colored spreads of Egyptian linen;

¹⁷I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.

¹⁸Come, let us take our fill of love until morning; let us delight ourselves with love.

¹⁹For my husband is not at home; he has gone on a long journey.

²⁰He took a bag of money with him; he will not come home until full moon.”

²¹With much seductive speech she persuades him; with her smooth talk she compels him.

²²Right away he follows her, and goes like an ox to the slaughter, or bounds like a stag toward the trap

²³until an arrow pierces its entrails. He is like a bird rushing into a snare, not knowing that it will cost him his life.

²⁴And now, my children, listen to me, and be attentive to the words of my mouth.

²⁵Do not let your hearts turn aside to her ways; do not stray into her paths.

²⁶For many are those she has laid low, and numerous are her victims.

²⁷Her house is the way to Sheol, going down to the chambers of death.

¹Now a scoundrel named Sheba son of Bichri, a Benjaminite, happened to be there. He sounded the trumpet and cried out, “We have no portion in David, no share in the son of Jesse! Everyone to your tents, O Israel!”

²So all the people of Israel withdrew from David and followed Sheba son of Bichri; but the people of Judah followed their king steadfastly from the Jordan to Jerusalem.

³David came to his house at Jerusalem; and the king took the ten concubines whom he had left to look after the house, and put them in a house under guard, and provided for them, but did not go in to them. So they were shut up until the day of their death, living as if in widowhood.

⁴Then the king said to Amasa, “Call the men of Judah together to me within three days, and be here yourself.”

⁵So Amasa went to summon Judah; but he delayed beyond the set time that had been appointed him.

⁶David said to Abishai, “Now Sheba son of Bichri will do us more harm than Absalom; take your lord’s servants and pursue him, or he will find fortified cities for himself, and escape from us.”

⁷Joab’s men went out after him, along with the Cherethites, the Pelethites, and all the warriors; they went out from Jerusalem to pursue Sheba son of Bichri.

⁸When they were at the large stone that is in Gibeon, Amasa came to meet them. Now Joab was wearing a soldier’s garment and over it was a belt with a sword in its sheath fastened at his waist; as he went forward it fell out.

⁹Joab said to Amasa, “Is it well with you, my brother?” And Joab took Amasa by the beard with his right hand to kiss him.

¹⁰But Amasa did not notice the sword in Joab’s hand; Joab struck him in the belly so that his entrails poured out on the ground, and he died. He did not strike a second blow. Then Joab and his brother Abishai pursued Sheba son of Bichri.

¹¹And one of Joab’s men took his stand by Amasa, and said, “Whoever favors Joab, and whoever is for David, let him follow Joab.”

¹²Amasa lay wallowing in his blood on the highway, and the man saw that all the people were stopping. Since he saw that all who came by him were stopping, he carried Amasa from the highway into a field, and threw a garment over him.

¹³Once he was removed from the highway, all the people went on after Joab to pursue Sheba son of Bichri.

¹⁴Sheba passed through all the tribes of Israel to Abel of Beth-maacah; and all the Bichrites assembled, and followed him inside.

¹⁵Joab’s forces came and besieged him in Abel of Beth-maacah; they threw up a siege ramp against the city, and it stood against the rampart. Joab’s forces were battering the wall to break it down.

¹⁶Then a wise woman called from the city, “Listen! Listen! Tell Joab, ‘Come here, I want to speak to you.’”

¹⁷He came near her; and the woman said, “Are you Joab?” He answered, “I am.” Then she said to him, “Listen to the words of your servant.” He answered, “I am listening.”

¹⁸Then she said, “They used to say in the old days, ‘Let them inquire at Abel’; and so they would settle a matter.

¹⁹I am one of those who are peaceable and faithful in Israel; you seek to destroy a city that is a mother in Israel; why will you swallow up the heritage of the LORD?”

²⁰Joab answered, “Far be it from me, far be it, that I should swallow up or destroy!

²¹That is not the case! But a man of the hill country of Ephraim, called Sheba son of Bichri, has lifted up his hand against King David; give him up alone, and I will withdraw from the city.” The woman said to Joab, “His head shall be thrown over the wall to you.”

²²Then the woman went to all the people with her wise plan. And they cut off the head of Sheba son of Bichri, and threw it out to Joab. So he blew the trumpet, and they dispersed from the city, and all went to their homes, while Joab returned to Jerusalem to the king.

²³Now Joab was in command of all the army of Israel; Benaiah son of Jehoiada was in command of the Cherethites and the Pelethites;

²⁴Adoram was in charge of the forced labor; Jehoshaphat son of Ahilud was the recorder;

²⁵Sheva was secretary; Zadok and Abiathar were priests;

²⁶and Ira the Jairite was also David’s priest.

¹The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, when King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon and all his army and all the kingdoms of the earth and all the peoples under his dominion were fighting against Jerusalem and all its cities:

²Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: Go and speak to King Zedekiah of Judah and say to him: Thus says the LORD: I am going to give this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire.

³And you yourself shall not escape from his hand, but shall surely be captured and handed over to him; you shall see the king of Babylon eye to eye and speak with him face to face; and you shall go to Babylon.

⁴Yet hear the word of the LORD, O King Zedekiah of Judah! Thus says the LORD concerning you: You shall not die by the sword;

⁵you shall die in peace. And as spices were burned for your ancestors, the earlier kings who preceded you, so they shall burn spices for you and lament for you, saying, “Alas, lord!” For I have spoken the word, says the LORD.

⁶Then the prophet Jeremiah spoke all these words to Zedekiah king of Judah, in Jerusalem,

⁷when the army of the king of Babylon was fighting against Jerusalem and against all the cities of Judah that were left, Lachish and Azekah; for these were the only fortified cities of Judah that remained.

⁸The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, after King Zedekiah had made a covenant with all the people in Jerusalem to make a proclamation of liberty to them —

⁹that all should set free their Hebrew slaves, male and female, so that no one should hold another Judean in slavery.

¹⁰And they obeyed, all the officials and all the people who had entered into the covenant that all would set free their slaves, male or female, so that they would not be enslaved again; they obeyed and set them free.

¹¹But afterward they turned around and took back the male and female slaves they had set free, and brought them again into subjection as slaves.

¹²The word of the LORD came to Jeremiah from the LORD:

¹³Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: I myself made a covenant with your ancestors when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, saying,

¹⁴“Every seventh year each of you must set free any Hebrews who have been sold to you and have served you six years; you must set them free from your service.” But your ancestors did not listen to me or incline their ears to me.

¹⁵You yourselves recently repented and did what was right in my sight by proclaiming liberty to one another, and you made a covenant before me in the house that is called by my name;

¹⁶but then you turned around and profaned my name when each of you took back your male and female slaves, whom you had set free according to their desire, and you brought them again into subjection to be your slaves.

¹⁷Therefore, thus says the LORD: You have not obeyed me by granting a release to your neighbors and friends; I am going to grant a release to you, says the LORD — a release to the sword, to pestilence, and to famine. I will make you a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.

¹⁸And those who transgressed my covenant and did not keep the terms of the covenant that they made before me, I will make like the calf when they cut it in two and passed between its parts:

¹⁹the officials of Judah, the officials of Jerusalem, the eunuchs, the priests, and all the people of the land who passed between the parts of the calf

²⁰shall be handed over to their enemies and to those who seek their lives. Their corpses shall become food for the birds of the air and the wild animals of the earth.

²¹And as for King Zedekiah of Judah and his officials, I will hand them over to their enemies and to those who seek their lives, to the army of the king of Babylon, which has withdrawn from you.

²²I am going to command, says the LORD, and will bring them back to this city; and they will fight against it, and take it, and burn it with fire. The towns of Judah I will make a desolation without inhabitant.

¹Paul went on also to Derbe and to Lystra, where there was a disciple named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer; but his father was a Greek.

²He was well spoken of by the believers in Lystra and Iconium.

³Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him; and he took him and had him circumcised because of the Jews who were in those places, for they all knew that his father was a Greek.

⁴As they went from town to town, they delivered to them for observance the decisions that had been reached by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem.

⁵So the churches were strengthened in the faith and increased in numbers daily.

⁶They went through the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.

⁷When they had come opposite Mysia, they attempted to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them;

⁸so, passing by Mysia, they went down to Troas.

⁹During the night Paul had a vision: there stood a man of Macedonia pleading with him and saying, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.”

¹⁰When he had seen the vision, we immediately tried to cross over to Macedonia, being convinced that God had called us to proclaim the good news to them.

¹¹We set sail from Troas and took a straight course to Samothrace, the following day to Neapolis,

¹²and from there to Philippi, which is a leading city of the district of Macedonia and a Roman colony. We remained in this city for some days.

¹³On the sabbath day we went outside the gate by the river, where we supposed there was a place of prayer; and we sat down and spoke to the women who had gathered there.

¹⁴A certain woman named Lydia, a worshiper of God, was listening to us; she was from the city of Thyatira and a dealer in purple cloth. The Lord opened her heart to listen eagerly to what was said by Paul.

¹⁵When she and her household were baptized, she urged us, saying, “If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come and stay at my home.” And she prevailed upon us.

¹⁶One day, as we were going to the place of prayer, we met a slave-girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners a great deal of money by fortune-telling.

¹⁷While she followed Paul and us, she would cry out, “These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation.”

¹⁸She kept doing this for many days. But Paul, very much annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, “I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” And it came out that very hour.

¹⁹But when her owners saw that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace before the authorities.

²⁰When they had brought them before the magistrates, they said, “These men are disturbing our city; they are Jews

²¹and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to adopt or observe.”

²²The crowd joined in attacking them, and the magistrates had them stripped of their clothing and ordered them to be beaten with rods.

²³After they had given them a severe flogging, they threw them into prison and ordered the jailer to keep them securely.

²⁴Following these instructions, he put them in the innermost cell and fastened their feet in the stocks.

²⁵About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.

²⁶Suddenly there was an earthquake, so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were unfastened.

²⁷When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, since he supposed that the prisoners had escaped.

²⁸But Paul shouted in a loud voice, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.”

²⁹The jailer called for lights, and rushing in, he fell down trembling before Paul and Silas.

³⁰Then he brought them outside and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”

³¹They answered, “Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.”

³²They spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house.

³³At the same hour of the night he took them and washed their wounds; then he and his entire family were baptized without delay.

³⁴He brought them up into the house and set food before them; and he and his entire household rejoiced that he had become a believer in God.

³⁵When morning came, the magistrates sent the police, saying, “Let those men go.”

³⁶And the jailer reported the message to Paul, saying, “The magistrates sent word to let you go; therefore come out now and go in peace.”

³⁷But Paul replied, “They have beaten us in public, uncondemned, men who are Roman citizens, and have thrown us into prison; and now are they going to discharge us in secret? Certainly not! Let them come and take us out themselves.”

³⁸The police reported these words to the magistrates, and they were afraid when they heard that they were Roman citizens;

³⁹so they came and apologized to them. And they took them out and asked them to leave the city.

⁴⁰After leaving the prison they went to Lydia’s home; and when they had seen and encouraged the brothers and sisters there, they departed.