Professor Horner’s Reading Plan

¹After this Jesus went about in Galilee. He did not wish to go about in Judea because the Jews were looking for an opportunity to kill him.

²Now the Jewish festival of Booths was near.

³So his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea so that your disciples also may see the works you are doing;

⁴for no one who wants to be widely known acts in secret. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.”

⁵(For not even his brothers believed in him.)

⁶Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always here.

⁷The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify against it that its works are evil.

⁸Go to the festival yourselves. I am not going to this festival, for my time has not yet fully come.”

⁹After saying this, he remained in Galilee.

¹⁰But after his brothers had gone to the festival, then he also went, not publicly but as it were in secret.

¹¹The Jews were looking for him at the festival and saying, “Where is he?”

¹²And there was considerable complaining about him among the crowds. While some were saying, “He is a good man,” others were saying, “No, he is deceiving the crowd.”

¹³Yet no one would speak openly about him for fear of the Jews.

¹⁴About the middle of the festival Jesus went up into the temple and began to teach.

¹⁵The Jews were astonished at it, saying, “How does this man have such learning, when he has never been taught?”

¹⁶Then Jesus answered them, “My teaching is not mine but his who sent me.

¹⁷Anyone who resolves to do the will of God will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own.

¹⁸Those who speak on their own seek their own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and there is nothing false in him.

¹⁹“Did not Moses give you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law. Why are you looking for an opportunity to kill me?”

²⁰The crowd answered, “You have a demon! Who is trying to kill you?”

²¹Jesus answered them, “I performed one work, and all of you are astonished.

²²Moses gave you circumcision (it is, of course, not from Moses, but from the patriarchs), and you circumcise a man on the sabbath.

²³If a man receives circumcision on the sabbath in order that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because I healed a man’s whole body on the sabbath?

²⁴Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.”

²⁵Now some of the people of Jerusalem were saying, “Is not this the man whom they are trying to kill?

²⁶And here he is, speaking openly, but they say nothing to him! Can it be that the authorities really know that this is the Messiah?

²⁷Yet we know where this man is from; but when the Messiah comes, no one will know where he is from.”

²⁸Then Jesus cried out as he was teaching in the temple, “You know me, and you know where I am from. I have not come on my own. But the one who sent me is true, and you do not know him.

²⁹I know him, because I am from him, and he sent me.”

³⁰Then they tried to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him, because his hour had not yet come.

³¹Yet many in the crowd believed in him and were saying, “When the Messiah comes, will he do more signs than this man has done?”

³²The Pharisees heard the crowd muttering such things about him, and the chief priests and Pharisees sent temple police to arrest him.

³³Jesus then said, “I will be with you a little while longer, and then I am going to him who sent me.

³⁴You will search for me, but you will not find me; and where I am, you cannot come.”

³⁵The Jews said to one another, “Where does this man intend to go that we will not find him? Does he intend to go to the Dispersion among the Greeks and teach the Greeks?

³⁶What does he mean by saying, ‘You will search for me and you will not find me’ and ‘Where I am, you cannot come’?”

³⁷On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me,

³⁸and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.’”

³⁹Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive; for as yet there was no Spirit, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

⁴⁰When they heard these words, some in the crowd said, “This is really the prophet.”

⁴¹Others said, “This is the Messiah.” But some asked, “Surely the Messiah does not come from Galilee, does he?

⁴²Has not the scripture said that the Messiah is descended from David and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David lived?”

⁴³So there was a division in the crowd because of him.

⁴⁴Some of them wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him.

⁴⁵Then the temple police went back to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, “Why did you not arrest him?”

⁴⁶The police answered, “Never has anyone spoken like this!”

⁴⁷Then the Pharisees replied, “Surely you have not been deceived too, have you?

⁴⁸Has any one of the authorities or of the Pharisees believed in him?

⁴⁹But this crowd, which does not know the law — they are accursed.”

⁵⁰Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus before, and who was one of them, asked,

⁵¹“Our law does not judge people without first giving them a hearing to find out what they are doing, does it?”

⁵²They replied, “Surely you are not also from Galilee, are you? Search and you will see that no prophet is to arise from Galilee.”

⁵³[52] [[Then each of them went home,

¹You shall love the LORD your God, therefore, and keep his charge, his decrees, his ordinances, and his commandments always.

²Remember today that it was not your children (who have not known or seen the discipline of the LORD your God), but it is you who must acknowledge his greatness, his mighty hand and his outstretched arm,

³his signs and his deeds that he did in Egypt to Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, and to all his land;

⁴what he did to the Egyptian army, to their horses and chariots, how he made the water of the Red Sea flow over them as they pursued you, so that the LORD has destroyed them to this day;

⁵what he did to you in the wilderness, until you came to this place;

⁶and what he did to Dathan and Abiram, sons of Eliab son of Reuben, how in the midst of all Israel the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up, along with their households, their tents, and every living being in their company;

⁷for it is your own eyes that have seen every great deed that the LORD did.

⁸Keep, then, this entire commandment that I am commanding you today, so that you may have strength to go in and occupy the land that you are crossing over to occupy,

⁹and so that you may live long in the land that the LORD swore to your ancestors to give them and to their descendants, a land flowing with milk and honey.

¹⁰For the land that you are about to enter to occupy is not like the land of Egypt, from which you have come, where you sow your seed and irrigate by foot like a vegetable garden.

¹¹But the land that you are crossing over to occupy is a land of hills and valleys, watered by rain from the sky,

¹²a land that the LORD your God looks after. The eyes of the LORD your God are always on it, from the beginning of the year to the end of the year.

¹³If you will only heed his every commandment that I am commanding you today — loving the LORD your God, and serving him with all your heart and with all your soul —

¹⁴then he will give the rain for your land in its season, the early rain and the later rain, and you will gather in your grain, your wine, and your oil;

¹⁵and he will give grass in your fields for your livestock, and you will eat your fill.

¹⁶Take care, or you will be seduced into turning away, serving other gods and worshiping them,

¹⁷for then the anger of the LORD will be kindled against you and he will shut up the heavens, so that there will be no rain and the land will yield no fruit; then you will perish quickly off the good land that the LORD is giving you.

¹⁸You shall put these words of mine in your heart and soul, and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and fix them as an emblem on your forehead.

¹⁹Teach them to your children, talking about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise.

²⁰Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates,

²¹so that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land that the LORD swore to your ancestors to give them, as long as the heavens are above the earth.

²²If you will diligently observe this entire commandment that I am commanding you, loving the LORD your God, walking in all his ways, and holding fast to him,

²³then the LORD will drive out all these nations before you, and you will dispossess nations larger and mightier than yourselves.

²⁴Every place on which you set foot shall be yours; your territory shall extend from the wilderness to the Lebanon and from the River, the river Euphrates, to the Western Sea.

²⁵No one will be able to stand against you; the LORD your God will put the fear and dread of you on all the land on which you set foot, as he promised you.

²⁶See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse:

²⁷the blessing, if you obey the commandments of the LORD your God that I am commanding you today;

²⁸and the curse, if you do not obey the commandments of the LORD your God, but turn from the way that I am commanding you today, to follow other gods that you have not known.

²⁹When the LORD your God has brought you into the land that you are entering to occupy, you shall set the blessing on Mount Gerizim and the curse on Mount Ebal.

³⁰As you know, they are beyond the Jordan, some distance to the west, in the land of the Canaanites who live in the Arabah, opposite Gilgal, beside the oak of Moreh.

³¹When you cross the Jordan to go in to occupy the land that the LORD your God is giving you, and when you occupy it and live in it,

³²you must diligently observe all the statutes and ordinances that I am setting before you today.

¹There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

²For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.

³For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh,

⁴so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

⁵For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.

⁶To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.

⁷For this reason the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law — indeed it cannot,

⁸and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

⁹But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

¹⁰But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

¹¹If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you.

¹²So then, brothers and sisters, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh —

¹³for if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

¹⁴For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God.

¹⁵For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba! Father!”

¹⁶it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God,

¹⁷and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ — if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.

¹⁸I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us.

¹⁹For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God;

²⁰for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope

²¹that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

²²We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now;

²³and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.

²⁴For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen?

²⁵But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

²⁶Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.

²⁷And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

²⁸We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.

²⁹For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn within a large family.

³⁰And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified.

³¹What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us?

³²He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else?

³³Who will bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies.

³⁴Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us.

³⁵Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

³⁶As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.”

³⁷No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.

³⁸For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,

³⁹nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

¹But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive opinions. They will even deny the Master who bought them — bringing swift destruction on themselves.

²Even so, many will follow their licentious ways, and because of these teachers the way of truth will be maligned.

³And in their greed they will exploit you with deceptive words. Their condemnation, pronounced against them long ago, has not been idle, and their destruction is not asleep.

⁴For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of deepest darkness to be kept until the judgment;

⁵and if he did not spare the ancient world, even though he saved Noah, a herald of righteousness, with seven others, when he brought a flood on a world of the ungodly;

⁶and if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them to extinction and made them an example of what is coming to the ungodly;

⁷and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man greatly distressed by the licentiousness of the lawless

⁸(for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by their lawless deeds that he saw and heard),

⁹then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trial, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment

¹⁰— especially those who indulge their flesh in depraved lust, and who despise authority. Bold and willful, they are not afraid to slander the glorious ones,

¹¹whereas angels, though greater in might and power, do not bring against them a slanderous judgment from the Lord.

¹²These people, however, are like irrational animals, mere creatures of instinct, born to be caught and killed. They slander what they do not understand, and when those creatures are destroyed, they also will be destroyed,

¹³suffering the penalty for doing wrong. They count it a pleasure to revel in the daytime. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their dissipation while they feast with you.

¹⁴They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They entice unsteady souls. They have hearts trained in greed. Accursed children!

¹⁵They have left the straight road and have gone astray, following the road of Balaam son of Bosor, who loved the wages of doing wrong,

¹⁶but was rebuked for his own transgression; a speechless donkey spoke with a human voice and restrained the prophet’s madness.

¹⁷These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm; for them the deepest darkness has been reserved.

¹⁸For they speak bombastic nonsense, and with licentious desires of the flesh they entice people who have just escaped from those who live in error.

¹⁹They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption; for people are slaves to whatever masters them.

²⁰For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overpowered, the last state has become worse for them than the first.

²¹For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than, after knowing it, to turn back from the holy commandment that was passed on to them.

²²It has happened to them according to the true proverb, “The dog turns back to its own vomit,” and, “The sow is washed only to wallow in the mud.”

¹And the LORD said to Job:

²“Shall a faultfinder contend with the Almighty? Anyone who argues with God must respond.”

³Then Job answered the LORD:

⁴“See, I am of small account; what shall I answer you? I lay my hand on my mouth.

⁵I have spoken once, and I will not answer; twice, but will proceed no further.”

⁶Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind:

⁷“Gird up your loins like a man; I will question you, and you declare to me.

⁸Will you even put me in the wrong? Will you condemn me that you may be justified?

⁹Have you an arm like God, and can you thunder with a voice like his?

¹⁰“Deck yourself with majesty and dignity; clothe yourself with glory and splendor.

¹¹Pour out the overflowings of your anger, and look on all who are proud, and abase them.

¹²Look on all who are proud, and bring them low; tread down the wicked where they stand.

¹³Hide them all in the dust together; bind their faces in the world below.

¹⁴Then I will also acknowledge to you that your own right hand can give you victory.

¹⁵“Look at Behemoth, which I made just as I made you; it eats grass like an ox.

¹⁶Its strength is in its loins, and its power in the muscles of its belly.

¹⁷It makes its tail stiff like a cedar; the sinews of its thighs are knit together.

¹⁸Its bones are tubes of bronze, its limbs like bars of iron.

¹⁹“It is the first of the great acts of God — only its Maker can approach it with the sword.

²⁰For the mountains yield food for it where all the wild animals play.

²¹Under the lotus plants it lies, in the covert of the reeds and in the marsh.

²²The lotus trees cover it for shade; the willows of the wadi surround it.

²³Even if the river is turbulent, it is not frightened; it is confident though Jordan rushes against its mouth.

²⁴Can one take it with hooks or pierce its nose with a snare?

¹Fools say in their hearts, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds; there is no one who does good.

²The LORD looks down from heaven on humankind to see if there are any who are wise, who seek after God.

³They have all gone astray, they are all alike perverse; there is no one who does good, no, not one.

⁴Have they no knowledge, all the evildoers who eat up my people as they eat bread, and do not call upon the LORD?

⁵There they shall be in great terror, for God is with the company of the righteous.

⁶You would confound the plans of the poor, but the LORD is their refuge.

⁷O that deliverance for Israel would come from Zion! When the LORD restores the fortunes of his people, Jacob will rejoice; Israel will be glad.

¹Wisdom has built her house, she has hewn her seven pillars.

²She has slaughtered her animals, she has mixed her wine, she has also set her table.

³She has sent out her servant-girls, she calls from the highest places in the town,

⁴“You that are simple, turn in here!” To those without sense she says,

⁵“Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed.

⁶Lay aside immaturity, and live, and walk in the way of insight.”

⁷Whoever corrects a scoffer wins abuse; whoever rebukes the wicked gets hurt.

⁸A scoffer who is rebuked will only hate you; the wise, when rebuked, will love you.

⁹Give instruction to the wise, and they will become wiser still; teach the righteous and they will gain in learning.

¹⁰The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.

¹¹For by me your days will be multiplied, and years will be added to your life.

¹²If you are wise, you are wise for yourself; if you scoff, you alone will bear it.

¹³The foolish woman is loud; she is ignorant and knows nothing.

¹⁴She sits at the door of her house, on a seat at the high places of the town,

¹⁵calling to those who pass by, who are going straight on their way,

¹⁶“You who are simple, turn in here!” And to those without sense she says,

¹⁷“Stolen water is sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.”

¹⁸But they do not know that the dead are there, that her guests are in the depths of Sheol.

¹David consulted with the commanders of the thousands and of the hundreds, with every leader.

²David said to the whole assembly of Israel, “If it seems good to you, and if it is the will of the LORD our God, let us send abroad to our kindred who remain in all the land of Israel, including the priests and Levites in the cities that have pasture lands, that they may come together to us.

³Then let us bring again the ark of our God to us; for we did not turn to it in the days of Saul.”

⁴The whole assembly agreed to do so, for the thing pleased all the people.

⁵So David assembled all Israel from the Shihor of Egypt to Lebo-hamath, to bring the ark of God from Kiriath-jearim.

⁶And David and all Israel went up to Baalah, that is, to Kiriath-jearim, which belongs to Judah, to bring up from there the ark of God, the LORD, who is enthroned on the cherubim, which is called by his name.

⁷They carried the ark of God on a new cart, from the house of Abinadab, and Uzzah and Ahio were driving the cart.

⁸David and all Israel were dancing before God with all their might, with song and lyres and harps and tambourines and cymbals and trumpets.

⁹When they came to the threshing floor of Chidon, Uzzah put out his hand to hold the ark, for the oxen shook it.

¹⁰The anger of the LORD was kindled against Uzzah; he struck him down because he put out his hand to the ark; and he died there before God.

¹¹David was angry because the LORD had burst out against Uzzah; so that place is called Perez-uzzah to this day.

¹²David was afraid of God that day; he said, “How can I bring the ark of God into my care?”

¹³So David did not take the ark into his care into the city of David; he took it instead to the house of Obed-edom the Gittite.

¹⁴The ark of God remained with the household of Obed-edom in his house three months, and the LORD blessed the household of Obed-edom and all that he had.

¹Then he brought me to the nave, and measured the pilasters; on each side six cubits was the width of the pilasters.

²The width of the entrance was ten cubits; and the sidewalls of the entrance were five cubits on either side. He measured the length of the nave, forty cubits, and its width, twenty cubits.

³Then he went into the inner room and measured the pilasters of the entrance, two cubits; and the width of the entrance, six cubits; and the sidewalls of the entrance, seven cubits.

⁴He measured the depth of the room, twenty cubits, and its width, twenty cubits, beyond the nave. And he said to me, This is the most holy place.

⁵Then he measured the wall of the temple, six cubits thick; and the width of the side chambers, four cubits, all around the temple.

⁶The side chambers were in three stories, one over another, thirty in each story. There were offsets all around the wall of the temple to serve as supports for the side chambers, so that they should not be supported by the wall of the temple.

⁷The passageway of the side chambers widened from story to story; for the structure was supplied with a stairway all around the temple. For this reason the structure became wider from story to story. One ascended from the bottom story to the uppermost story by way of the middle one.

⁸I saw also that the temple had a raised platform all around; the foundations of the side chambers measured a full reed of six long cubits.

⁹The thickness of the outer wall of the side chambers was five cubits; and the free space between the side chambers of the temple

¹⁰and the chambers of the court was a width of twenty cubits all around the temple on every side.

¹¹The side chambers opened onto the area left free, one door toward the north, and another door toward the south; and the width of the part that was left free was five cubits all around.

¹²The building that was facing the temple yard on the west side was seventy cubits wide; and the wall of the building was five cubits thick all around, and its depth ninety cubits.

¹³Then he measured the temple, one hundred cubits deep; and the yard and the building with its walls, one hundred cubits deep;

¹⁴also the width of the east front of the temple and the yard, one hundred cubits.

¹⁵Then he measured the depth of the building facing the yard at the west, together with its galleries on either side, one hundred cubits. The nave of the temple and the inner room and the outer vestibule

¹⁶were paneled, and, all around, all three had windows with recessed frames. Facing the threshold the temple was paneled with wood all around, from the floor up to the windows (now the windows were covered),

¹⁷to the space above the door, even to the inner room, and on the outside. And on all the walls all around in the inner room and the nave there was a pattern.

¹⁸It was formed of cherubim and palm trees, a palm tree between cherub and cherub. Each cherub had two faces:

¹⁹a human face turned toward the palm tree on the one side, and the face of a young lion turned toward the palm tree on the other side. They were carved on the whole temple all around;

²⁰from the floor to the area above the door, cherubim and palm trees were carved on the wall.

²¹The doorposts of the nave were square. In front of the holy place was something resembling

²²an altar of wood, three cubits high, two cubits long, and two cubits wide; its corners, its base, and its walls were of wood. He said to me, “This is the table that stands before the LORD.”

²³The nave and the holy place had each a double door.

²⁴The doors had two leaves apiece, two swinging leaves for each door.

²⁵On the doors of the nave were carved cherubim and palm trees, such as were carved on the walls; and there was a canopy of wood in front of the vestibule outside.

²⁶And there were recessed windows and palm trees on either side, on the sidewalls of the vestibule.

¹Five days later the high priest Ananias came down with some elders and an attorney, a certain Tertullus, and they reported their case against Paul to the governor.

²When Paul had been summoned, Tertullus began to accuse him, saying: “Your Excellency, because of you we have long enjoyed peace, and reforms have been made for this people because of your foresight.

³We welcome this in every way and everywhere with utmost gratitude.

⁴But, to detain you no further, I beg you to hear us briefly with your customary graciousness.

⁵We have, in fact, found this man a pestilent fellow, an agitator among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes.

⁶He even tried to profane the temple, and so we seized him.

⁷

⁸By examining him yourself you will be able to learn from him concerning everything of which we accuse him.”

⁹The Jews also joined in the charge by asserting that all this was true.

¹⁰When the governor motioned to him to speak, Paul replied: “I cheerfully make my defense, knowing that for many years you have been a judge over this nation.

¹¹As you can find out, it is not more than twelve days since I went up to worship in Jerusalem.

¹²They did not find me disputing with anyone in the temple or stirring up a crowd either in the synagogues or throughout the city.

¹³Neither can they prove to you the charge that they now bring against me.

¹⁴But this I admit to you, that according to the Way, which they call a sect, I worship the God of our ancestors, believing everything laid down according to the law or written in the prophets.

¹⁵I have a hope in God — a hope that they themselves also accept — that there will be a resurrection of both the righteous and the unrighteous.

¹⁶Therefore I do my best always to have a clear conscience toward God and all people.

¹⁷Now after some years I came to bring alms to my nation and to offer sacrifices.

¹⁸While I was doing this, they found me in the temple, completing the rite of purification, without any crowd or disturbance.

¹⁹But there were some Jews from Asia — they ought to be here before you to make an accusation, if they have anything against me.

²⁰Or let these men here tell what crime they had found when I stood before the council,

²¹unless it was this one sentence that I called out while standing before them, ‘It is about the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial before you today.’”

²²But Felix, who was rather well informed about the Way, adjourned the hearing with the comment, “When Lysias the tribune comes down, I will decide your case.”

²³Then he ordered the centurion to keep him in custody, but to let him have some liberty and not to prevent any of his friends from taking care of his needs.

²⁴Some days later when Felix came with his wife Drusilla, who was Jewish, he sent for Paul and heard him speak concerning faith in Christ Jesus.

²⁵And as he discussed justice, self-control, and the coming judgment, Felix became frightened and said, “Go away for the present; when I have an opportunity, I will send for you.”

²⁶At the same time he hoped that money would be given him by Paul, and for that reason he used to send for him very often and converse with him.

²⁷After two years had passed, Felix was succeeded by Porcius Festus; and since he wanted to grant the Jews a favor, Felix left Paul in prison.