Professor Horner’s Reading Plan

¹Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

²And after He had fasted for forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry.

³And the tempter came and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”

⁴But He answered and said, “It is written: ‘MAN SHALL NOT LIVE ON BREAD ALONE, BUT ON EVERY WORD THAT COMES OUT OF THE MOUTH OF GOD.’ ”

⁵Then the devil *took Him along into the holy city and had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple,

⁶and he *said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down; for it is written: ‘HE WILL GIVE HIS ANGELS ORDERS CONCERNING YOU’; and ‘ON their hands they will lift YOU UP, SO THAT YOU DO NOT STRIKE YOUR FOOT AGAINST A STONE.’ ”

⁷Jesus said to him, “On the other hand, it is written: ‘YOU SHALL NOT PUT THE LORD YOUR GOD TO THE TEST.’ ”

⁸Again, the devil *took Him along to a very high mountain and *showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory;

⁹and he said to Him, “All these things I will give You, if You fall down and worship me.”

¹⁰Then Jesus *said to him, “Go away, Satan! For it is written: ‘YOU SHALL WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD, ANDSERVE HIM ONLY.’ ”

¹¹Then the devil *left Him; and behold, angels came and began to serve Him.

¹²Now when Jesus heard that John had been taken into custody, He withdrew into Galilee;

¹³and leaving Nazareth, He came and settled in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the region of Zebulun and Naphtali.

¹⁴This happened so that what was spoken through Isaiah the prophet would be fulfilled:

¹⁵“THE LAND OF ZEBULUN AND THE LAND OF NAPHTALI, BY THE WAY OF THE SEA, ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE JORDAN, GALILEE OF THE GENTILES—

¹⁶THE PEOPLE WHO WERE SITTING IN DARKNESS SAW A GREAT LIGHT, AND THOSE WHO WERE SITTING IN THE LAND AND SHADOW OF DEATH, UPON THEM A LIGHT DAWNED.”

¹⁷From that time Jesus began to preach and say, “Repent, for the kingdom of heavenis at hand.”

¹⁸Now as Jesus was walking by the Sea of Galilee, He saw two brothers, Simon, who was called Peter, and his brother Andrew, casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen.

¹⁹And He *said to them, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of people.”

²⁰Immediately they left their nets and followed Him.

²¹Going on from there He saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee, and his brother John, in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets; and He called them.

²²Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed Him.

²³Jesus was going about in all of Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every disease and every sickness among the people.

²⁴And the news about Him spread throughout Syria; and they brought to Him all who were ill, those suffering with various diseases and severe pain, demon-possessed, people with epilepsy, and people who were paralyzed; and He healed them.

²⁵Large crowds followed Him from Galilee and the Decapolis, and Jerusalem, and Judea, and from beyond the Jordan.

¹These are the words of the covenant which the LORD commanded Moses to make with the sons of Israel in the land of Moab, besides the covenant which He had made with them at Horeb.

²And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, “You have seen all that the LORD did before your eyes in the land of Egypt to Pharaoh and all his servants, and to all his land;

³the great trials which your eyes have seen, those great signs and wonders.

⁴Yet to this day the LORD has not given you a heart to know, nor eyes to see, nor ears to hear.

⁵And I have led you in the wilderness for forty years; your clothes have not worn out on you, and your sandal has not worn out on your foot.

⁶You have not eaten bread, nor have you drunk wine or other strong drink, in order that you might know that I am the LORD your God.

⁷When you reached this place, Sihon the king of Heshbon and Og the king of Bashan came out to meet us for battle, but we defeated them;

⁸and we took their land and gave it as an inheritance to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of the Manassites.

⁹So you will keep the words of this covenant and do them, in order that you may be successful in everything that you do.

¹⁰“You stand today, all of you, before the LORD your God: your heads, your tribes, your elders and your officers, that is, all the men of Israel,

¹¹your little ones, your wives, and the stranger who is within your camps, from the one who gathers your firewood to the one who draws your water,

¹²so that you may enter into the covenant with the LORD your God, and into His oath which the LORD your God is making with you today,

¹³in order that He may establish you today as His people, and that He may be your God, just as He spoke to you and as He swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

¹⁴“Now it is not with you alone that I am making this covenant and this oath,

¹⁵but both with those who stand here with us today in the presence of the LORD our God, and with those who are not with us here today

¹⁶(for you know how we lived in the land of Egypt, and how we passed through the midst of the nations through which you passed;

¹⁷moreover, you have seen their abominations and their idols made of wood and stone, silver and gold, which they had with them);

¹⁸so that there will not be among you a man or woman, or family or tribe, whose heart turns away today from the LORD our God, to go to serve the gods of those nations; that there will not be among you a root bearing poisonous fruit and wormwood.

¹⁹And it shall be when he hears the words of this curse, that he will consider himself fortunate in his heart, saying, ‘I will do well though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart in order to destroy the watered land along with the dry.’

²⁰The LORD will not be willing to forgive him, but rather the anger of the LORD and His wrath will burn against that person, and every curse that is written in this book will lie upon him, and the LORD will wipe out his name from under heaven.

²¹Then the LORD will single him out for disaster from all the tribes of Israel, in accordance with all the curses of the covenant which is written in this Book of the Law.

²²“Now the future generation, your sons who rise up after you and the foreigner who comes from a distant land, when they see the plagues of that land and the diseases with which the LORD has afflicted it, will say,

²³‘All its land is brimstone and salt, burned debris, unsown and unproductive, and no grass grows on it, like the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which the LORD overthrew in His anger and in His wrath.’

²⁴All the nations will say, ‘Why has the LORD done all this to this land? Why this great outburst of anger?’

²⁵Then people will say, ‘It is because they abandoned the covenant of the LORD, the God of their fathers, which He made with them when He brought them out of the land of Egypt.

²⁶And they went and served other gods and worshiped them, gods that they have not known and whom He had not assigned to them.

²⁷Therefore, the anger of the LORD burned against that land, to bring upon it every curse which is written in this book;

²⁸and the LORD uprooted them from their land in anger, fury, and in great wrath, and hurled them into another land, as it is this day.’

²⁹“The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever, so that we may follow all the words of this Law.

¹For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our fathers were all under the cloud and they all passed through the sea;

²and they all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea;

³and they all ate the same spiritual food,

⁴and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them; and the rock was Christ.

⁵Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased; for their dead bodies were spread out in the wilderness.

⁶Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things as they indeed craved them.

⁷Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written: “THE PEOPLE SAT DOWN TO EAT AND TO DRINK, AND ROSE UP TO PLAY.”

⁸Nor are we to commit sexual immorality, as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in one day.

⁹Nor are we to put the Lord to the test, as some of them did, and were killed by the snakes.

¹⁰Nor grumble, as some of them did, and were killed by the destroyer.

¹¹Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.

¹²Therefore let the one who thinks he stands watch out that he does not fall.

¹³No temptation has overtaken you except something common to mankind; and God is faithful, so He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.

¹⁴Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.

¹⁵I speak as to wise people; you then, judge what I say.

¹⁶Is the cup of blessing which we bless not a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is the bread which we break not a sharing in the body of Christ?

¹⁷Since there is one loaf, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the one loaf.

¹⁸Look at the people of Israel; are those who eat the sacrifices not partners in the altar?

¹⁹What do I mean then? That food sacrificed to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything?

²⁰No, but I say that things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God; and I do not want you to become partners with demons.

²¹You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; you cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons.

²²Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? We are not stronger than He, are we?

²³All things are permitted, but not all things are of benefit. All things are permitted, but not all things build people up.

²⁴No one is to seek his own advantage, but rather that of his neighbor.

²⁵Eat anything that is sold in the meat market without asking questions, for the sake of conscience;

²⁶FOR THE EARTH IS THE LORD’S, AND ALL IT CONTAINS.

²⁷If one of the unbelievers invites you and you want to go, eat anything that is set before you without asking questions, for the sake of conscience.

²⁸But if anyone says to you, “This is meat sacrificed to idols,” do not eat it, for the sake of that one who informed you and for the sake of conscience;

²⁹Now by “conscience” I do not mean your own, but the other person’s; for why is my freedom judged by another’s conscience?

³⁰If I partake with thankfulness, why am I slandered about that for which I give thanks?

³¹Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all things for the glory of God.

³²Do not offend Jews or Greeks, or the church of God;

³³just as I also please everyone in all things, not seeking my own benefit but the benefit of the many, so that they may be saved.

¹Then the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star from heaven which had fallen to the earth; and the key to the shaft of the abyss was given to him.

²He opened the shaft of the abyss, and smoke ascended out of the shaft like the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened from the smoke of the shaft.

³Then out of the smoke came locusts upon the earth, and power was given them, as the scorpions of the earth have power.

⁴They were told not to hurt the grass of the earth, nor any green thing, nor any tree, but only the people who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads.

⁵And they were not permitted to kill anyone, but to torment for five months; and their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it stings a person.

⁶And in those days people will seek death and will not find it; they will long to die, and death will flee from them!

⁷The appearance of the locusts was like horses prepared for battle; and on their heads appeared to be crowns like gold, and their faces were like human faces.

⁸They had hair like the hair of women, and their teeth were like the teeth of lions.

⁹They had breastplates like breastplates of iron; and the sound of their wings was like the sound of chariots, of many horses rushing to battle.

¹⁰They have tails like scorpions, and stings; and in their tails is their power to hurt people for five months.

¹¹They have as king over them, the angel of the abyss; his name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in the Greek he has the name Apollyon.

¹²The first woe has passed; behold, two woes are still coming after these things.

¹³Then the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God,

¹⁴saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, “Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.”

¹⁵And the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour and day and month and year, were released, so that they would kill a third of mankind.

¹⁶The number of the armies of the horsemen was two hundred million; I heard the number of them.

¹⁷And this is how I saw in my vision the horses and those who sat on them: the riders had breastplates the color of fire, of hyacinth, and of brimstone; and the heads of the horses are like the heads of lions; and out of their mouths *came fire and smoke and brimstone.

¹⁸A third of mankind was killed by these three plagues, by the fire, the smoke, and the brimstone which came out of their mouths.

¹⁹For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails; for their tails are like serpents and have heads, and with them they do harm.

²⁰The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands so as not to worship demons and the idols of gold, silver, brass, stone, and wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk;

²¹and they did not repent of their murders, nor of their witchcraft, nor of their sexual immorality, nor of their thefts.

¹“How beautiful you are, my darling, How beautiful you are! Your eyes are like doves behind your veil; Your hair is like a flock of goats That have descended from Mount Gilead.

²Your teeth are like a flock of newly shorn sheep Which have come up from their watering place, All of which bear twins, And not one among them has lost her young.

³Your lips are like a scarlet thread, And your mouth is beautiful. Your temples are like a slice of a pomegranate Behind your veil.

⁴Your neck is like the tower of David, Built with layers of stones On which are hung a thousand shields, All the round shields of the warriors.

⁵Your two breasts are like two fawns, Twins of a gazelle That graze among the lilies.

⁶Until the cool of the day When the shadows flee, I will go my way to the mountain of myrrh And to the hill of frankincense.

⁷“You are altogether beautiful, my darling, And there is no blemish on you.

⁸Come with me from Lebanon, my bride, You shall come with me from Lebanon. You shall come down from the summit of Amana, From the summit of Senir and Hermon, From the dens of lions, From the mountains of leopards.

⁹You have enchanted my heart, my sister, my bride; You have enchanted my heart with a single glance of your eyes, With a single strand of your necklace.

¹⁰How beautiful is your love, my sister, my bride! How much sweeter is your love than wine, And the fragrance of your oils Than that of all kinds of balsam oils!

¹¹Your lips drip honey, my bride; Honey and milk are under your tongue, And the fragrance of your garments is like the fragrance of Lebanon.

¹²A locked garden is my sister, my bride, A locked spring, a sealed fountain.

¹³Your branches are an orchard of pomegranates With delicious fruits, henna with nard plants,

¹⁴Nard and saffron, spice reed and cinnamon, With all the trees of frankincense, Myrrh, and aloes, along with all the finest balsam oils.

¹⁵You are a garden spring, A well of fresh water, And flowing streams from Lebanon.”

¹⁶“Awake, north wind, And come, wind of the south; Make my garden breathe out fragrance, May its balsam oils flow. May my beloved come into his garden And eat its delicious fruits!”

¹How blessed is he whose wrongdoing is forgiven, Whose sin is covered!

²How blessed is a person whose guilt the LORD does not take into account, And in whose spirit there is no deceit!

³When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away Through my groaning all day long.

⁴For day and night Your hand was heavy upon me; My vitality failed as with the dry heat of summer. Selah

⁵I acknowledged my sin to You, And I did not hide my guilt; I said, “I will confess my wrongdoings to the LORD”; And You forgave the guilt of my sin. Selah

⁶Therefore, let everyone who is godly pray to You in a time when You may be found; Certainly in a flood of great waters, they will not reach him.

⁷You are my hiding place; You keep me from trouble; You surround me with songs of deliverance. Selah

⁸I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go; I will advise you with My eye upon you.

⁹Do not be like the horse or like the mule, which have no understanding, Whose trappings include bit and bridle to hold them in check, Otherwise they will not come near to you.

¹⁰The sorrows of the wicked are many, But the one who trusts in the LORD, goodness will surround him.

¹¹Be glad in the LORD and rejoice, you righteous ones; And shout for joy, all you who are upright in heart.

¹Do not boast about tomorrow, For you do not know what a day may bring.

²Let another praise you, and not your own mouth; A stranger, and not your own lips.

³A stone is heavy and the sand weighty, But the provocation of a fool is heavier than both of them.

⁴Wrath is fierce and anger is a flood, But who can stand before jealousy?

⁵Better is open rebuke Than love that is concealed.

⁶Faithful are the wounds of a friend, But deceitful are the kisses of an enemy.

⁷A satisfied person despises honey, But to a hungry person any bitter thing is sweet.

⁸Like a bird that wanders from its nest, So is a person who wanders from his home.

⁹Oil and perfume make the heart glad, And a person’s advice is sweet to his friend.

¹⁰Do not abandon your friend or your father’s friend, And do not go to your brother’s house on the day of your disaster; Better is a neighbor who is near than a brother far away.

¹¹Be wise, my son, and make my heart glad, So that I may reply to one who taunts me.

¹²A prudent person sees evil and hides himself; But the naive proceed, and pay the penalty.

¹³Take his garment when he becomes a guarantor for a stranger; And for a foreign woman seize a pledge from him.

¹⁴One who blesses his friend with a loud voice early in the morning, It will be considered a curse to him.

¹⁵A constant dripping on a day of steady rain And a contentious woman are alike;

¹⁶He who would restrain her restrains the wind, And grasps oil with his right hand.

¹⁷As iron sharpens iron, So one person sharpens another.

¹⁸One who tends the fig tree will eat its fruit, And one who cares for his master will be honored.

¹⁹As in water a face reflects the face, So the heart of a person reflects the person.

²⁰Sheol and Abaddon are never satisfied, Nor are the eyes of a person ever satisfied.

²¹The crucible is for silver and the furnace for gold, And each is tested by the praise accorded him.

²²Though you pound the fool in a mortar with a pestle along with crushed grain, His foolishness still will not leave him.

²³Know well the condition of your flocks, And pay attention to your herds;

²⁴For riches are not forever, Nor does a crown endure to all generations.

²⁵When the grass disappears, the new growth is seen, And the herbs of the mountains are gathered in,

²⁶The lambs will be for your clothing, And the goats will bring the price of a field,

²⁷And there will be enough goats’ milk for your food, For the food of your household, And sustenance for your attendants.

¹Now Solomon decided to build a house for the name of the LORD, and a royal palace for himself.

²So Solomon assigned seventy thousand men to carry loads, eighty thousand men to quarry stone in the mountains, and 3,600 to supervise them.

³Then Solomon sent word to Huram the king of Tyre, saying, “As you dealt with my father David and sent him cedars to build him a house to live in, do it for me.

⁴Behold, I am about to build a house for the name of the LORD my God, dedicating it to Him, to burn fragrant incense before Him and to set out the showbread continually, and to offer burnt offerings morning and evening, on Sabbaths, on new moons, and on the appointed feasts of the LORD our God. This is to be done in Israel forever.

⁵The house which I am about to build will be great, for our God is greater than all the gods.

⁶But who is able to build a house for Him, since the heavens and the highest heavens cannot contain Him? And who am I, that I should build a house for Him, except to burn incense before Him?

⁷Now send me a skilled man to work in gold, silver, brass, iron, and in purple, crimson, and violet fabrics, one who knows how to make engravings, to work with the skilled workers whom I have in Judah and Jerusalem, whom my father David provided.

⁸Send me also cedar, juniper, and algum timber from Lebanon, for I know that your servants know how to cut timber of Lebanon; and indeed my servants will work with your servants,

⁹to prepare timber in abundance for me, for the house which I am about to build will be great and wonderful.

¹⁰Now behold, I will give your servants, the woodsmen who cut the timber, twenty thousand kors of crushed wheat, twenty thousand kors of barley, twenty thousand baths of wine, and twenty thousand baths of oil.”

¹¹Then Huram, king of Tyre, answered in a letter sent to Solomon: “Because the LORD loves His people, He has made you king over them.”

¹²Then Huram continued, “Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, who made heaven and earth, who has given King David a wise son, endowed with discretion and understanding, who will build a house for the LORD and a royal palace for himself.

¹³“Now then, I am sending Huram-abi, a skilled man, endowed with understanding,

¹⁴the son of a Danite woman and a Tyrian father, who knows how to work in gold, silver, bronze, iron, stone, and wood, and in purple, violet, linen, and crimson fabrics, and who knows how to make all kinds of engravings and to execute any design which is assigned to him, to work with your skilled workers and with those of my lord, your father David.

¹⁵Now then, let my lord send his servants wheat and barley, oil and wine, of which he has spoken.

¹⁶We will cut whatever timber you need from Lebanon and bring it to you as rafts by sea to Joppa, so that you may carry it up to Jerusalem.”

¹⁷Solomon counted all the foreigners who were in the land of Israel, following the census which his father David had taken; and 153,600 were found.

¹⁸He appointed seventy thousand of them to carry loads and eighty thousand to quarry stones in the mountains, and 3,600 supervisors to make the people work.

¹“In the first year of Darius the Mede, I arose to be of assistance and a protection for him.

²And now I will tell you the truth. Behold, three more kings are going to arise in Persia. Then a fourth will gain far more riches than all of them; as soon as he becomes strong through his riches, he will stir up the entire empire against the realm of Greece.

³And a mighty king will arise, and he will rule with great authority and do as he pleases.

⁴But as soon as he has arisen, his kingdom will be broken up and parceled out toward the four points of the compass, though not to his own descendants, nor according to his authority which he wielded, because his sovereignty will be removed and given to others besides them.

⁵“Then the king of the South will grow strong, along with one of his princes who will gain ascendancy over him and rule; his domain will be a great realm indeed.

⁶And after some years they will form an alliance, and the daughter of the king of the South will come to the king of the North to reach an agreement. But she will not keep her position of power, nor will he remain with his power, but she will be given up, along with those who brought her in and the one who fathered her as well as he who supported her in those times.

⁷But one of the descendants of her line will arise in his place, and he will come against their army and enter the fortress of the king of the North, and he will deal with them and prevail.

⁸And he will also take into captivity to Egypt their gods with their cast metal images and their precious vessels of silver and gold, and he on his part will refrain from attacking the king of the North for some years.

⁹Then the latter will enter the realm of the king of the South, but will return to his own land.

¹⁰“And his sons will mobilize and assemble a multitude of great forces; and one of them will keep on coming and overflow and pass through, so that he may again wage war up to his fortress.

¹¹And the king of the South will be enraged and go out and fight with the king of the North. Then the latter will raise a great multitude, but that multitude will be handed over to the former.

¹²When the multitude is carried away, his heart will be haughty, and he will cause tens of thousands to fall; yet he will not prevail.

¹³For the king of the North will again raise a greater multitude than the former, and after an interval of some years he will press on with a great army and much equipment.

¹⁴“Now in those times many will rise up against the king of the South; the violent ones among your people will also raise themselves up to fulfill the vision, but they will fall down.

¹⁵Then the king of the North will come, pile up an assault ramp, and capture a well-fortified city; and the forces of the South will not stand their ground, not even their choicest troops, for there will be no strength to make a stand.

¹⁶But he who comes against him will do as he pleases, and no one will be able to withstand him; he will also stay for a time in the Beautiful Land, with destruction in his hand.

¹⁷And he will set his mind on coming with the power of his entire kingdom, bringing with him a proposal of peace which he will put into effect; he will also give him the daughter of women to ruin it. But she will not take a stand for him or be on his side.

¹⁸Then he will turn his face to the coastlands and capture many. But a commander will put a stop to his taunting against him; moreover, he will repay him for his taunting.

¹⁹So he will turn his face toward the fortresses of his own land, but he will stumble and fall and not be found.

²⁰“Then in his place one will arise who will allow an oppressor to pass through the Jewel of his kingdom; yet within a few days he will be broken, though not in anger nor in battle.

²¹And in his place a despicable person will arise, on whom the majesty of kingship has not been conferred; but he will come in a time of tranquility and seize the kingdom by intrigue.

²²And the overflowing forces will be flooded away from him and smashed, and also the prince of the covenant.

²³After an alliance is made with him he will practice deception, and he will go up and gain power with a small force of people.

²⁴In a time of tranquility he will enter the richest parts of the realm, and he will accomplish what his fathers did not, nor his ancestors; he will distribute plunder, spoils, and possessions among them, and he will devise his schemes against strongholds, but only for a time.

²⁵And he will stir up his strength and courage against the king of the South with a large army; so the king of the South will mobilize an extremely large and mighty army for war; but he will not stand, because schemes will be devised against him.

²⁶Those who eat his choice food will destroy him, and his army will overflow, but many will fall down slain.

²⁷As for both kings, their hearts will be intent on evil, and they will speak lies to each other at the same table; but it will not succeed, because the end is still to come at the appointed time.

²⁸Then he will return to his land with much plunder; but his heart will be set against the holy covenant, and he will take action and then return to his own land.

²⁹“At the appointed time he will return and come into the South, but this last time it will not turn out the way it did before.

³⁰For ships of Kittim will come against him; therefore he will withdraw in fear and will return and curse the holy covenant and take action; so he will come back and pay attention to those who abandon the holy covenant.

³¹Forces from him will arise, desecrate the sanctuary fortress, and do away with the regular sacrifice. And they will set up the abomination of desolation.

³²And by smooth words he will turn to godlessness those who act wickedly toward the covenant, but the people who know their God will be strong and take action.

³³And those who have insight among the people will give understanding to the many; yet they will fall by sword and by flame, by captivity and by plunder for many days.

³⁴Now when they fall they will be granted a little help, and many will join with them in hypocrisy.

³⁵And some of those who have insight will fall, to refine, purge, and cleanse them until the end time; because it is still to come at the appointed time.

³⁶“Then the king will do as he pleases, and he will exalt himself and boast against every god and will speak dreadful things against the God of gods; and he will be successful until the indignation is finished, because that which is determined will be done.

³⁷And he will show no regard for the gods of his fathers or for the desire of women, nor will he show regard for any other god; for he will boast against them all.

³⁸But instead he will honor a god of fortresses, a god whom his fathers did not know; he will honor him with gold, silver, precious stones, and treasures.

³⁹And he will take action against the strongest of fortresses with the help of a foreign god; he will give great honor to those who acknowledge him and will make them rulers over the many, and will parcel out land for a price.

⁴⁰“And at the end time the king of the South will wage war with him, and the king of the North will storm against him with chariots, horsemen, and with many ships; and he will enter countries, overflow them, and pass through.

⁴¹He will also enter the Beautiful Land, and many countries will fall; but these will be rescued out of his hand: Edom, Moab, and the foremost of the sons of Ammon.

⁴²Then he will reach out with his hand against other countries, and the land of Egypt will not escape.

⁴³But he will gain control over the hidden treasures of gold and silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt; and Libyans and Ethiopians will follow at his heels.

⁴⁴But rumors from the East and from the North will terrify him, and he will go out with great wrath to eliminate and annihilate many.

⁴⁵And he will pitch the tents of his royal pavilion between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain; yet he will come to his end, and no one will help him.

¹In Iconium they entered the synagogue of the Jews together, and spoke in such a way that a large number of people believed, both of Jews and of Greeks.

²But the unbelieving Jews stirred up the minds of the Gentiles and embittered them against the brothers.

³Therefore they spent a long time there speaking boldly with reliance upon the Lord, who was testifying to the word of His grace, granting that signs and wonders be performed by their hands.

⁴But the people of the city were divided; and some sided with the Jews, while others, with the apostles.

⁵And when an attempt was made by both the Gentiles and the Jews with their rulers, to treat them abusively and to stone them,

⁶they became aware of it and fled to the cities of Lycaonia, Lystra and Derbe, and the surrounding region;

⁷and there they continued to preach the gospel.

⁸In Lystra a man was sitting whose feet were incapacitated. He had been disabled from his mother’s womb, and had never walked.

⁹This man was listening to Paul as he spoke. Paul looked at him intently and saw that he had faith to be made well,

¹⁰and he said with a loud voice, “Stand upright on your feet!” And the man leaped up and began to walk.

¹¹When the crowds saw what Paul had done, they raised their voice, saying in the Lycaonian language, “The gods have become like men and have come down to us!”

¹²And they began calling Barnabas, Zeus, and Paul, Hermes, since he was the chief speaker.

¹³Moreover, the priest of Zeus, whose temple was just outside the city, brought oxen and garlands to the gates, and wanted to offer sacrifice with the crowds.

¹⁴But when the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard about it, they tore their robes and rushed out into the crowd, crying out

¹⁵and saying, “Men, why are you doing these things? We are also men, of the same nature as you, preaching the gospel to you, to turn from these useless things to a living God, who MADE THE HEAVEN AND THE EARTH AND THE SEA, AND EVERYTHING THAT IS IN THEM.

¹⁶In past generations He permitted all the nations to go their own ways;

¹⁷yet He did not leave Himself without witness, in that He did good and gave you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.”

¹⁸And even by saying these things, only with difficulty did they restrain the crowds from offering sacrifices to them.

¹⁹But Jews came from Antioch and Iconium, and having won over the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, thinking that he was dead.

²⁰But while the disciples stood around him, he got up and entered the city. The next day he left with Barnabas for Derbe.

²¹And after they had preached the gospel to that city and had made a good number of disciples, they returned to Lystra, to Iconium, and to Antioch,

²²strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying, “It is through many tribulations that we must enter the kingdom of God.”

²³When they had appointed elders for them in every church, having prayed with fasting, they entrusted them to the Lord in whom they had believed.

²⁴They passed through Pisidia and came into Pamphylia.

²⁵When they had spoken the word in Perga, they went down to Attalia.

²⁶From there they sailed to Antioch, where they had been entrusted to the grace of God for the work that they had accomplished.

²⁷When they had arrived and gathered the church together, they began to report all the things that God had done with them and how He had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles.

²⁸And they spent a long time with the disciples.