Professor Horner’s Reading Plan

¹Then Jesus said to the disciples, “There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering his property.

²So he summoned him and said to him, ‘What is this that I hear about you? Give me an accounting of your management, because you cannot be my manager any longer.’

³Then the manager said to himself, ‘What will I do, now that my master is taking the position away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg.

⁴I have decided what to do so that, when I am dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.’

⁵So, summoning his master’s debtors one by one, he asked the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’

⁶He answered, ‘A hundred jugs of olive oil.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.’

⁷Then he asked another, ‘And how much do you owe?’ He replied, ‘A hundred containers of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill and make it eighty.’

⁸And his master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light.

⁹And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes.

¹⁰“Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much.

¹¹If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches?

¹²And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own?

¹³No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.”

¹⁴The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all this, and they ridiculed him.

¹⁵So he said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of others; but God knows your hearts; for what is prized by human beings is an abomination in the sight of God.

¹⁶“The law and the prophets were in effect until John came; since then the good news of the kingdom of God is proclaimed, and everyone tries to enter it by force.

¹⁷But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away, than for one stroke of a letter in the law to be dropped.

¹⁸“Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and whoever marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery.

¹⁹“There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day.

²⁰And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores,

²¹who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores.

²²The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried.

²³In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side.

²⁴He called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.’

²⁵But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony.

²⁶Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.’

²⁷He said, ‘Then, father, I beg you to send him to my father’s house —

²⁸for I have five brothers — that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.’

²⁹Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.’

³⁰He said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’

³¹He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”

¹Now the Reubenites and the Gadites owned a very great number of cattle. When they saw that the land of Jazer and the land of Gilead was a good place for cattle,

²the Gadites and the Reubenites came and spoke to Moses, to Eleazar the priest, and to the leaders of the congregation, saying,

³“Ataroth, Dibon, Jazer, Nimrah, Heshbon, Elealeh, Sebam, Nebo, and Beon —

⁴the land that the LORD subdued before the congregation of Israel — is a land for cattle; and your servants have cattle.”

⁵They continued, “If we have found favor in your sight, let this land be given to your servants for a possession; do not make us cross the Jordan.”

⁶But Moses said to the Gadites and to the Reubenites, “Shall your brothers go to war while you sit here?

⁷Why will you discourage the hearts of the Israelites from going over into the land that the LORD has given them?

⁸Your fathers did this, when I sent them from Kadesh-barnea to see the land.

⁹When they went up to the Wadi Eshcol and saw the land, they discouraged the hearts of the Israelites from going into the land that the LORD had given them.

¹⁰The LORD’s anger was kindled on that day and he swore, saying,

¹¹‘Surely none of the people who came up out of Egypt, from twenty years old and upward, shall see the land that I swore to give to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, because they have not unreservedly followed me —

¹²none except Caleb son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite and Joshua son of Nun, for they have unreservedly followed the LORD.’

¹³And the LORD’s anger was kindled against Israel, and he made them wander in the wilderness for forty years, until all the generation that had done evil in the sight of the LORD had disappeared.

¹⁴And now you, a brood of sinners, have risen in place of your fathers, to increase the LORD’s fierce anger against Israel!

¹⁵If you turn away from following him, he will again abandon them in the wilderness; and you will destroy all this people.”

¹⁶Then they came up to him and said, “We will build sheepfolds here for our flocks, and towns for our little ones,

¹⁷but we will take up arms as a vanguard before the Israelites, until we have brought them to their place. Meanwhile our little ones will stay in the fortified towns because of the inhabitants of the land.

¹⁸We will not return to our homes until all the Israelites have obtained their inheritance.

¹⁹We will not inherit with them on the other side of the Jordan and beyond, because our inheritance has come to us on this side of the Jordan to the east.”

²⁰So Moses said to them, “If you do this — if you take up arms to go before the LORD for the war,

²¹and all those of you who bear arms cross the Jordan before the LORD, until he has driven out his enemies from before him

²²and the land is subdued before the LORD — then after that you may return and be free of obligation to the LORD and to Israel, and this land shall be your possession before the LORD.

²³But if you do not do this, you have sinned against the LORD; and be sure your sin will find you out.

²⁴Build towns for your little ones, and folds for your flocks; but do what you have promised.”

²⁵Then the Gadites and the Reubenites said to Moses, “Your servants will do as my lord commands.

²⁶Our little ones, our wives, our flocks, and all our livestock shall remain there in the towns of Gilead;

²⁷but your servants will cross over, everyone armed for war, to do battle for the LORD, just as my lord orders.”

²⁸So Moses gave command concerning them to Eleazar the priest, to Joshua son of Nun, and to the heads of the ancestral houses of the Israelite tribes.

²⁹And Moses said to them, “If the Gadites and the Reubenites, everyone armed for battle before the LORD, will cross over the Jordan with you and the land shall be subdued before you, then you shall give them the land of Gilead for a possession;

³⁰but if they will not cross over with you armed, they shall have possessions among you in the land of Canaan.”

³¹The Gadites and the Reubenites answered, “As the LORD has spoken to your servants, so we will do.

³²We will cross over armed before the LORD into the land of Canaan, but the possession of our inheritance shall remain with us on this side of the Jordan.”

³³Moses gave to them — to the Gadites and to the Reubenites and to the half-tribe of Manasseh son of Joseph — the kingdom of King Sihon of the Amorites and the kingdom of King Og of Bashan, the land and its towns, with the territories of the surrounding towns.

³⁴And the Gadites rebuilt Dibon, Ataroth, Aroer,

³⁵Atroth-shophan, Jazer, Jogbehah,

³⁶Beth-nimrah, and Beth-haran, fortified cities, and folds for sheep.

³⁷And the Reubenites rebuilt Heshbon, Elealeh, Kiriathaim,

³⁸Nebo, and Baal-meon (some names being changed), and Sibmah; and they gave names to the towns that they rebuilt.

³⁹The descendants of Machir son of Manasseh went to Gilead, captured it, and dispossessed the Amorites who were there;

⁴⁰so Moses gave Gilead to Machir son of Manasseh, and he settled there.

⁴¹Jair son of Manasseh went and captured their villages, and renamed them Havvoth-jair.

⁴²And Nobah went and captured Kenath and its villages, and renamed it Nobah after himself.

¹Therefore let us go on toward perfection, leaving behind the basic teaching about Christ, and not laying again the foundation: repentance from dead works and faith toward God,

²instruction about baptisms, laying on of hands, resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment.

³And we will do this, if God permits.

⁴For it is impossible to restore again to repentance those who have once been enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit,

⁵and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come,

⁶and then have fallen away, since on their own they are crucifying again the Son of God and are holding him up to contempt.

⁷Ground that drinks up the rain falling on it repeatedly, and that produces a crop useful to those for whom it is cultivated, receives a blessing from God.

⁸But if it produces thorns and thistles, it is worthless and on the verge of being cursed; its end is to be burned over.

⁹Even though we speak in this way, beloved, we are confident of better things in your case, things that belong to salvation.

¹⁰For God is not unjust; he will not overlook your work and the love that you showed for his sake in serving the saints, as you still do.

¹¹And we want each one of you to show the same diligence so as to realize the full assurance of hope to the very end,

¹²so that you may not become sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.

¹³When God made a promise to Abraham, because he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself,

¹⁴saying, “I will surely bless you and multiply you.”

¹⁵And thus Abraham, having patiently endured, obtained the promise.

¹⁶Human beings, of course, swear by someone greater than themselves, and an oath given as confirmation puts an end to all dispute.

¹⁷In the same way, when God desired to show even more clearly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it by an oath,

¹⁸so that through two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible that God would prove false, we who have taken refuge might be strongly encouraged to seize the hope set before us.

¹⁹We have this hope, a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters the inner shrine behind the curtain,

²⁰where Jesus, a forerunner on our behalf, has entered, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

¹Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, for the sake of the faith of God’s elect and the knowledge of the truth that is in accordance with godliness,

²in the hope of eternal life that God, who never lies, promised before the ages began —

³in due time he revealed his word through the proclamation with which I have been entrusted by the command of God our Savior,

⁴To Titus, my loyal child in the faith we share: Grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior.

⁵I left you behind in Crete for this reason, so that you should put in order what remained to be done, and should appoint elders in every town, as I directed you:

⁶someone who is blameless, married only once, whose children are believers, not accused of debauchery and not rebellious.

⁷For a bishop, as God’s steward, must be blameless; he must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or addicted to wine or violent or greedy for gain;

⁸but he must be hospitable, a lover of goodness, prudent, upright, devout, and self-controlled.

⁹He must have a firm grasp of the word that is trustworthy in accordance with the teaching, so that he may be able both to preach with sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict it.

¹⁰There are also many rebellious people, idle talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision;

¹¹they must be silenced, since they are upsetting whole families by teaching for sordid gain what it is not right to teach.

¹²It was one of them, their very own prophet, who said, “Cretans are always liars, vicious brutes, lazy gluttons.”

¹³That testimony is true. For this reason rebuke them sharply, so that they may become sound in the faith,

¹⁴not paying attention to Jewish myths or to commandments of those who reject the truth.

¹⁵To the pure all things are pure, but to the corrupt and unbelieving nothing is pure. Their very minds and consciences are corrupted.

¹⁶They profess to know God, but they deny him by their actions. They are detestable, disobedient, unfit for any good work.

¹Then Bildad the Shuhite answered:

²“Dominion and fear are with God; he makes peace in his high heaven.

³Is there any number to his armies? Upon whom does his light not arise?

⁴How then can a mortal be righteous before God? How can one born of woman be pure?

⁵If even the moon is not bright and the stars are not pure in his sight,

⁶how much less a mortal, who is a maggot, and a human being, who is a worm!”

¹Praise the LORD! Sing to the LORD a new song, his praise in the assembly of the faithful.

²Let Israel be glad in its Maker; let the children of Zion rejoice in their King.

³Let them praise his name with dancing, making melody to him with tambourine and lyre.

⁴For the LORD takes pleasure in his people; he adorns the humble with victory.

⁵Let the faithful exult in glory; let them sing for joy on their couches.

⁶Let the high praises of God be in their throats and two-edged swords in their hands,

⁷to execute vengeance on the nations and punishment on the peoples,

⁸to bind their kings with fetters and their nobles with chains of iron,

⁹to execute on them the judgment decreed. This is glory for all his faithful ones. Praise the LORD!

¹These are other proverbs of Solomon that the officials of King Hezekiah of Judah copied.

²It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.

³Like the heavens for height, like the earth for depth, so the mind of kings is unsearchable.

⁴Take away the dross from the silver, and the smith has material for a vessel;

⁵take away the wicked from the presence of the king, and his throne will be established in righteousness.

⁶Do not put yourself forward in the king’s presence or stand in the place of the great;

⁷for it is better to be told, “Come up here,” than to be put lower in the presence of a noble. What your eyes have seen

⁸do not hastily bring into court; for what will you do in the end, when your neighbor puts you to shame?

⁹Argue your case with your neighbor directly, and do not disclose another’s secret;

¹⁰or else someone who hears you will bring shame upon you, and your ill repute will have no end.

¹¹A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in a setting of silver.

¹²Like a gold ring or an ornament of gold is a wise rebuke to a listening ear.

¹³Like the cold of snow in the time of harvest are faithful messengers to those who send them; they refresh the spirit of their masters.

¹⁴Like clouds and wind without rain is one who boasts of a gift never given.

¹⁵With patience a ruler may be persuaded, and a soft tongue can break bones.

¹⁶If you have found honey, eat only enough for you, or else, having too much, you will vomit it.

¹⁷Let your foot be seldom in your neighbor’s house, otherwise the neighbor will become weary of you and hate you.

¹⁸Like a war club, a sword, or a sharp arrow is one who bears false witness against a neighbor.

¹⁹Like a bad tooth or a lame foot is trust in a faithless person in time of trouble.

²⁰Like vinegar on a wound is one who sings songs to a heavy heart. Like a moth in clothing or a worm in wood, sorrow gnaws at the human heart.

²¹If your enemies are hungry, give them bread to eat; and if they are thirsty, give them water to drink;

²²for you will heap coals of fire on their heads, and the LORD will reward you.

²³The north wind produces rain, and a backbiting tongue, angry looks.

²⁴It is better to live in a corner of the housetop than in a house shared with a contentious wife.

²⁵Like cold water to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country.

²⁶Like a muddied spring or a polluted fountain are the righteous who give way before the wicked.

²⁷It is not good to eat much honey, or to seek honor on top of honor.

²⁸Like a city breached, without walls, is one who lacks self-control.

¹Then the king directed that all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem should be gathered to him.

²The king went up to the house of the LORD, and with him went all the people of Judah, all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the priests, the prophets, and all the people, both small and great; he read in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant that had been found in the house of the LORD.

³The king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the LORD, to follow the LORD, keeping his commandments, his decrees, and his statutes, with all his heart and all his soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book. All the people joined in the covenant.

⁴The king commanded the high priest Hilkiah, the priests of the second order, and the guardians of the threshold, to bring out of the temple of the LORD all the vessels made for Baal, for Asherah, and for all the host of heaven; he burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron, and carried their ashes to Bethel.

⁵He deposed the idolatrous priests whom the kings of Judah had ordained to make offerings in the high places at the cities of Judah and around Jerusalem; those also who made offerings to Baal, to the sun, the moon, the constellations, and all the host of the heavens.

⁶He brought out the image of Asherah from the house of the LORD, outside Jerusalem, to the Wadi Kidron, burned it at the Wadi Kidron, beat it to dust and threw the dust of it upon the graves of the common people.

⁷He broke down the houses of the male temple prostitutes that were in the house of the LORD, where the women did weaving for Asherah.

⁸He brought all the priests out of the towns of Judah, and defiled the high places where the priests had made offerings, from Geba to Beer-sheba; he broke down the high places of the gates that were at the entrance of the gate of Joshua the governor of the city, which were on the left at the gate of the city.

⁹The priests of the high places, however, did not come up to the altar of the LORD in Jerusalem, but ate unleavened bread among their kindred.

¹⁰He defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of Ben-hinnom, so that no one would make a son or a daughter pass through fire as an offering to Molech.

¹¹He removed the horses that the kings of Judah had dedicated to the sun, at the entrance to the house of the LORD, by the chamber of the eunuch Nathan-melech, which was in the precincts; then he burned the chariots of the sun with fire.

¹²The altars on the roof of the upper chamber of Ahaz, which the kings of Judah had made, and the altars that Manasseh had made in the two courts of the house of the LORD, he pulled down from there and broke in pieces, and threw the rubble into the Wadi Kidron.

¹³The king defiled the high places that were east of Jerusalem, to the south of the Mount of Destruction, which King Solomon of Israel had built for Astarte the abomination of the Sidonians, for Chemosh the abomination of Moab, and for Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites.

¹⁴He broke the pillars in pieces, cut down the sacred poles, and covered the sites with human bones.

¹⁵Moreover, the altar at Bethel, the high place erected by Jeroboam son of Nebat, who caused Israel to sin — he pulled down that altar along with the high place. He burned the high place, crushing it to dust; he also burned the sacred pole.

¹⁶As Josiah turned, he saw the tombs there on the mount; and he sent and took the bones out of the tombs, and burned them on the altar, and defiled it, according to the word of the LORD that the man of God proclaimed, when Jeroboam stood by the altar at the festival; he turned and looked up at the tomb of the man of God who had predicted these things.

¹⁷Then he said, “What is that monument that I see?” The people of the city told him, “It is the tomb of the man of God who came from Judah and predicted these things that you have done against the altar at Bethel.”

¹⁸He said, “Let him rest; let no one move his bones.” So they let his bones alone, with the bones of the prophet who came out of Samaria.

¹⁹Moreover, Josiah removed all the shrines of the high places that were in the towns of Samaria, which kings of Israel had made, provoking the LORD to anger; he did to them just as he had done at Bethel.

²⁰He slaughtered on the altars all the priests of the high places who were there, and burned human bones on them. Then he returned to Jerusalem.

²¹The king commanded all the people, “Keep the passover to the LORD your God as prescribed in this book of the covenant.”

²²No such passover had been kept since the days of the judges who judged Israel, even during all the days of the kings of Israel and of the kings of Judah;

²³but in the eighteenth year of King Josiah this passover was kept to the LORD in Jerusalem.

²⁴Moreover Josiah put away the mediums, wizards, teraphim, idols, and all the abominations that were seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem, so that he established the words of the law that were written in the book that the priest Hilkiah had found in the house of the LORD.

²⁵Before him there was no king like him, who turned to the LORD with all his heart, with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses; nor did any like him arise after him.

²⁶Still the LORD did not turn from the fierceness of his great wrath, by which his anger was kindled against Judah, because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked him.

²⁷The LORD said, “I will remove Judah also out of my sight, as I have removed Israel; and I will reject this city that I have chosen, Jerusalem, and the house of which I said, My name shall be there.”

²⁸Now the rest of the acts of Josiah, and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Annals of the Kings of Judah?

²⁹In his days Pharaoh Neco king of Egypt went up to the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates. King Josiah went to meet him; but when Pharaoh Neco met him at Megiddo, he killed him.

³⁰His servants carried him dead in a chariot from Megiddo, brought him to Jerusalem, and buried him in his own tomb. The people of the land took Jehoahaz son of Josiah, anointed him, and made him king in place of his father.

³¹Jehoahaz was twenty-three years old when he began to reign; he reigned three months in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hamutal daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah.

³²He did what was evil in the sight of the LORD, just as his ancestors had done.

³³Pharaoh Neco confined him at Riblah in the land of Hamath, so that he might not reign in Jerusalem, and imposed tribute on the land of one hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold.

³⁴Pharaoh Neco made Eliakim son of Josiah king in place of his father Josiah, and changed his name to Jehoiakim. But he took Jehoahaz away; he came to Egypt, and died there.

³⁵Jehoiakim gave the silver and the gold to Pharaoh, but he taxed the land in order to meet Pharaoh’s demand for money. He exacted the silver and the gold from the people of the land, from all according to their assessment, to give it to Pharaoh Neco.

³⁶Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign; he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Zebidah daughter of Pedaiah of Rumah.

³⁷He did what was evil in the sight of the LORD, just as all his ancestors had done.

¹In the eleventh year, on the first day of the month, the word of the LORD came to me:

²Mortal, because Tyre said concerning Jerusalem, “Aha, broken is the gateway of the peoples; it has swung open to me; I shall be replenished, now that it is wasted,”

³therefore, thus says the Lord GOD: See, I am against you, O Tyre! I will hurl many nations against you, as the sea hurls its waves.

⁴They shall destroy the walls of Tyre and break down its towers. I will scrape its soil from it and make it a bare rock.

⁵It shall become, in the midst of the sea, a place for spreading nets. I have spoken, says the Lord GOD. It shall become plunder for the nations,

⁶and its daughter-towns in the country shall be killed by the sword. Then they shall know that I am the LORD.

⁷For thus says the Lord GOD: I will bring against Tyre from the north King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon, king of kings, together with horses, chariots, cavalry, and a great and powerful army.

⁸Your daughter-towns in the country he shall put to the sword. He shall set up a siege wall against you, cast up a ramp against you, and raise a roof of shields against you.

⁹He shall direct the shock of his battering rams against your walls and break down your towers with his axes.

¹⁰His horses shall be so many that their dust shall cover you. At the noise of cavalry, wheels, and chariots your very walls shall shake, when he enters your gates like those entering a breached city.

¹¹With the hoofs of his horses he shall trample all your streets. He shall put your people to the sword, and your strong pillars shall fall to the ground.

¹²They will plunder your riches and loot your merchandise; they shall break down your walls and destroy your fine houses. Your stones and timber and soil they shall cast into the water.

¹³I will silence the music of your songs; the sound of your lyres shall be heard no more.

¹⁴I will make you a bare rock; you shall be a place for spreading nets. You shall never again be rebuilt, for I the LORD have spoken, says the Lord GOD.

¹⁵Thus says the Lord GOD to Tyre: Shall not the coastlands shake at the sound of your fall, when the wounded groan, when slaughter goes on within you?

¹⁶Then all the princes of the sea shall step down from their thrones; they shall remove their robes and strip off their embroidered garments. They shall clothe themselves with trembling, and shall sit on the ground; they shall tremble every moment, and be appalled at you.

¹⁷And they shall raise a lamentation over you, and say to you: How you have vanished from the seas, O city renowned, once mighty on the sea, you and your inhabitants, who imposed your terror on all the mainland!

¹⁸Now the coastlands tremble on the day of your fall; the coastlands by the sea are dismayed at your passing.

¹⁹For thus says the Lord GOD: When I make you a city laid waste, like cities that are not inhabited, when I bring up the deep over you, and the great waters cover you,

²⁰then I will thrust you down with those who descend into the Pit, to the people of long ago, and I will make you live in the world below, among primeval ruins, with those who go down to the Pit, so that you will not be inhabited or have a place in the land of the living.

²¹I will bring you to a dreadful end, and you shall be no more; though sought for, you will never be found again, says the Lord GOD.

¹Meanwhile Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest

²and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any who belonged to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.

³Now as he was going along and approaching Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.

⁴He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”

⁵He asked, “Who are you, Lord?” The reply came, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.

⁶But get up and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.”

⁷The men who were traveling with him stood speechless because they heard the voice but saw no one.

⁸Saul got up from the ground, and though his eyes were open, he could see nothing; so they led him by the hand and brought him into Damascus.

⁹For three days he was without sight, and neither ate nor drank.

¹⁰Now there was a disciple in Damascus named Ananias. The Lord said to him in a vision, “Ananias.” He answered, “Here I am, Lord.”

¹¹The Lord said to him, “Get up and go to the street called Straight, and at the house of Judas look for a man of Tarsus named Saul. At this moment he is praying,

¹²and he has seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him so that he might regain his sight.”

¹³But Ananias answered, “Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints in Jerusalem;

¹⁴and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who invoke your name.”

¹⁵But the Lord said to him, “Go, for he is an instrument whom I have chosen to bring my name before Gentiles and kings and before the people of Israel;

¹⁶I myself will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.”

¹⁷So Ananias went and entered the house. He laid his hands on Saul and said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on your way here, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.”

¹⁸And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes, and his sight was restored. Then he got up and was baptized,

¹⁹and after taking some food, he regained his strength. Saul Preaches in Damascus For several days he was with the disciples in Damascus,

²⁰and immediately he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues, saying, “He is the Son of God.”

²¹All who heard him were amazed and said, “Is not this the man who made havoc in Jerusalem among those who invoked this name? And has he not come here for the purpose of bringing them bound before the chief priests?”

²²Saul became increasingly more powerful and confounded the Jews who lived in Damascus by proving that Jesus was the Messiah.

²³After some time had passed, the Jews plotted to kill him,

²⁴but their plot became known to Saul. They were watching the gates day and night so that they might kill him;

²⁵but his disciples took him by night and let him down through an opening in the wall, lowering him in a basket.

²⁶When he had come to Jerusalem, he attempted to join the disciples; and they were all afraid of him, for they did not believe that he was a disciple.

²⁷But Barnabas took him, brought him to the apostles, and described for them how on the road he had seen the Lord, who had spoken to him, and how in Damascus he had spoken boldly in the name of Jesus.

²⁸So he went in and out among them in Jerusalem, speaking boldly in the name of the Lord.

²⁹He spoke and argued with the Hellenists; but they were attempting to kill him.

³⁰When the believers learned of it, they brought him down to Caesarea and sent him off to Tarsus.

³¹Meanwhile the church throughout Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace and was built up. Living in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it increased in numbers.

³²Now as Peter went here and there among all the believers, he came down also to the saints living in Lydda.

³³There he found a man named Aeneas, who had been bedridden for eight years, for he was paralyzed.

³⁴Peter said to him, “Aeneas, Jesus Christ heals you; get up and make your bed!” And immediately he got up.

³⁵And all the residents of Lydda and Sharon saw him and turned to the Lord.

³⁶Now in Joppa there was a disciple whose name was Tabitha, which in Greek is Dorcas. She was devoted to good works and acts of charity.

³⁷At that time she became ill and died. When they had washed her, they laid her in a room upstairs.

³⁸Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, who heard that Peter was there, sent two men to him with the request, “Please come to us without delay.”

³⁹So Peter got up and went with them; and when he arrived, they took him to the room upstairs. All the widows stood beside him, weeping and showing tunics and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was with them.

⁴⁰Peter put all of them outside, and then he knelt down and prayed. He turned to the body and said, “Tabitha, get up.” Then she opened her eyes, and seeing Peter, she sat up.

⁴¹He gave her his hand and helped her up. Then calling the saints and widows, he showed her to be alive.

⁴²This became known throughout Joppa, and many believed in the Lord.

⁴³Meanwhile he stayed in Joppa for some time with a certain Simon, a tanner.