Professor Horner’s Reading Plan

¹In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

²He was with God in the beginning.

³All things were created through him, and apart from him not one thing was created that has been created.

⁴In him was life, and that life was the light of men.

⁵That light shines in the darkness, and yet the darkness did not overcome it.

⁶There was a man sent from God whose name was John.

⁷He came as a witness to testify about the light, so that all might believe through him.

⁸He was not the light, but he came to testify about the light.

⁹The true light that gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.

¹⁰He was in the world, and the world was created through him, and yet the world did not recognize him.

¹¹He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.

¹²But to all who did receive him, he gave them the right to be children of God, to those who believe in his name,

¹³who were born, not of natural descent, or of the will of the flesh, or of the will of man, but of God.

¹⁴The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. We observed his glory, the glory as the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

¹⁵(John testified concerning him and exclaimed, “This was the one of whom I said, ‘The one coming after me ranks ahead of me, because he existed before me.’”)

¹⁶Indeed, we have all received grace upon grace from his fullness,

¹⁷for the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

¹⁸No one has ever seen God. The one and only Son, who is himself God and is at the Father’s side —he has revealed him.

¹⁹This was John’s testimony when the Jews from Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him, “Who are you?”

²⁰He didn’t deny it but confessed: “I am not the Messiah.”

²¹“What then?” they asked him. “Are you Elijah?” “I am not,” he said. “Are you the Prophet?” “No,” he answered.

²²“Who are you, then?” they asked. “We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What can you tell us about yourself?”

²³He said, “I am a voice of one crying out in the wilderness: Make straight the way of the Lord  — just as Isaiah the prophet said.”

²⁴Now they had been sent from the Pharisees.

²⁵So they asked him, “Why then do you baptize if you aren’t the Messiah, or Elijah, or the Prophet?”

²⁶“I baptize with water,” John answered them. “Someone stands among you, but you don’t know him.

²⁷He is the one coming after me, whose sandal strap I’m not worthy to untie.”

²⁸All this happened in Bethany across the Jordan, where John was baptizing.

²⁹The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Here is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!

³⁰This is the one I told you about: ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me, because he existed before me.’

³¹I didn’t know him, but I came baptizing with water so he might be revealed to Israel.”

³²And John testified, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and he rested on him.

³³I didn’t know him, but he who sent me to baptize with water told me, ‘The one you see the Spirit descending and resting on — he is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’

³⁴I have seen and testified that this is the Son of God.”

³⁵The next day, John was standing with two of his disciples.

³⁶When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”

³⁷The two disciples heard him say this and followed Jesus.

³⁸When Jesus turned and noticed them following him, he asked them, “What are you looking for?” They said to him, “Rabbi” (which means “Teacher”), “where are you staying?”

³⁹“Come and you’ll see,” he replied. So they went and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day. It was about four in the afternoon.

⁴⁰Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of the two who heard John and followed him.

⁴¹He first found his own brother Simon and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated “the Christ”),

⁴²and he brought Simon to Jesus. When Jesus saw him, he said, “You are Simon, son of John. You will be called Cephas” (which is translated “Peter” ).

⁴³The next day Jesus decided to leave for Galilee. He found Philip and told him, “Follow me.”

⁴⁴Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the hometown of Andrew and Peter.

⁴⁵Philip found Nathanael and told him, “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the law (and so did the prophets ): Jesus the son of Joseph, from Nazareth.”

⁴⁶“Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Nathanael asked him. “Come and see,” Philip answered.

⁴⁷Then Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said about him, “Here truly is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit.”

⁴⁸“How do you know me?” Nathanael asked. “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you,” Jesus answered.

⁴⁹“Rabbi,” Nathanael replied, “You are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel!”

⁵⁰Jesus responded to him, “Do you believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than this.”

⁵¹Then he said, “Truly I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”

¹Then the LORD said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may do these miraculous signs of mine among them,

²and so that you may tell your son and grandson how severely I dealt with the Egyptians and performed miraculous signs among them, and you will know that I am the LORD.”

³So Moses and Aaron went in to Pharaoh and told him, “This is what the LORD, the God of the Hebrews, says: How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go, that they may worship me.

⁴But if you refuse to let my people go, then tomorrow I will bring locusts into your territory.

⁵They will cover the surface of the land so that no one will be able to see the land. They will eat the remainder left to you that escaped the hail; they will eat every tree you have growing in the fields.

⁶They will fill your houses, all your officials’ houses, and the houses of all the Egyptians — something your fathers and grandfathers never saw since the time they occupied the land until today.” Then he turned and left Pharaoh’s presence.

⁷Pharaoh’s officials asked him, “How long must this man be a snare to us? Let the men go, so that they may worship the LORD their God. Don’t you realize yet that Egypt is devastated?”

⁸So Moses and Aaron were brought back to Pharaoh. “Go, worship the LORD your God,” Pharaoh said. “But exactly who will be going?”

⁹Moses replied, “We will go with our young and with our old; we will go with our sons and with our daughters, with our flocks and with our herds because we must hold the LORD’s festival.”

¹⁰He said to them, “The Lord would have to be with you if I would ever let you and your families go! Look out — you’re heading for trouble.

¹¹No, go — just able-bodied men — worship the LORD, since that’s what you want.” And they were driven from Pharaoh’s presence.

¹²The LORD then said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand over the land of Egypt, and the locusts will come up over it and eat every plant in the land, everything that the hail left.”

¹³So Moses stretched out his staff over the land of Egypt, and the LORD sent an east wind over the land all that day and through the night. By morning the east wind had brought in the locusts.

¹⁴The locusts went up over the entire land of Egypt and settled on the whole territory of Egypt. Never before had there been such a large number of locusts, and there never will be again.

¹⁵They covered the surface of the whole land so that the land was black, and they consumed all the plants on the ground and all the fruit on the trees that the hail had left. Nothing green was left on the trees or the plants in the field throughout the land of Egypt.

¹⁶Pharaoh urgently sent for Moses and Aaron and said, “I have sinned against the LORD your God and against you.

¹⁷Please forgive my sin once more and make an appeal to the LORD your God, so that he will just take this death away from me.”

¹⁸Moses left Pharaoh’s presence and appealed to the LORD.

¹⁹Then the LORD changed the wind to a strong west wind, and it carried off the locusts and blew them into the Red Sea. Not a single locust was left in all the territory of Egypt.

²⁰But the LORD hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he did not let the Israelites go.

²¹Then the LORD said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand toward heaven, and there will be darkness over the land of Egypt, a darkness that can be felt.”

²²So Moses stretched out his hand toward heaven, and there was thick darkness throughout the land of Egypt for three days.

²³One person could not see another, and for three days they did not move from where they were. Yet all the Israelites had light where they lived.

²⁴Pharaoh summoned Moses and said, “Go, worship the LORD. Even your families may go with you; only your flocks and herds must stay behind.”

²⁵Moses responded, “You must also let us have sacrifices and burnt offerings to prepare for the LORD our God.

²⁶Even our livestock must go with us; not a hoof will be left behind because we will take some of them to worship the LORD our God. We will not know what we will use to worship the LORD until we get there.”

²⁷But the LORD hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he was unwilling to let them go.

²⁸Pharaoh said to him, “Leave me! Make sure you never see my face again, for on the day you see my face, you will die.”

²⁹“As you have said,” Moses replied, “I will never see your face again.”

¹Let everyone submit to the governing authorities, since there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are instituted by God.

²So then, the one who resists the authority is opposing God’s command, and those who oppose it will bring judgment on themselves.

³For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have its approval.

⁴For it is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, because it does not carry the sword for no reason. For it is God’s servant, an avenger that brings wrath on the one who does wrong.

⁵Therefore, you must submit, not only because of wrath but also because of your conscience.

⁶And for this reason you pay taxes, since the authorities are God’s servants, continually attending to these tasks.

⁷Pay your obligations to everyone: taxes to those you owe taxes, tolls to those you owe tolls, respect to those you owe respect, and honor to those you owe honor.

⁸Do not owe anyone anything, except to love one another, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.

⁹The commandments, Do not commit adultery; do not murder; do not steal; do not covet; and any other commandment, are summed up by this commandment: Love your neighbor as yourself.

¹⁰Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Love, therefore, is the fulfillment of the law.

¹¹Besides this, since you know the time, it is already the hour for you to wake up from sleep, because now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed.

¹²The night is nearly over, and the day is near; so let us discard the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light.

¹³Let us walk with decency, as in the daytime: not in carousing and drunkenness; not in sexual impurity and promiscuity; not in quarreling and jealousy.

¹⁴But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and don’t make plans to gratify the desires of the flesh.

¹The fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from heaven to earth. The key for the shaft to the abyss was given to him.

²He opened the shaft to the abyss, and smoke came up out of the shaft like smoke from a great furnace so that the sun and the air were darkened by the smoke from the shaft.

³Then locusts came out of the smoke on to the earth, and power was given to them like the power that scorpions have on the earth.

⁴They were told not to harm the grass of the earth, or any green plant, or any tree, but only those people who do not have God’s seal on their foreheads.

⁵They were not permitted to kill them but were to torment them for five months; their torment is like the torment caused by a scorpion when it stings someone.

⁶In those days people will seek death and will not find it; they will long to die, but death will flee from them.

⁷The appearance of the locusts was like horses prepared for battle. Something like golden crowns was on their heads; their faces were like human faces;

⁸they had hair like women’s hair; their teeth were like lions’ teeth;

⁹they had chests like iron breastplates; the sound of their wings was like the sound of many chariots with horses rushing into battle;

¹⁰and they had tails with stingers like scorpions, so that with their tails they had the power to harm people for five months.

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

¹²The first woe has passed. There are still two more woes to come after this.

¹³The sixth angel blew his trumpet. From the four horns of the golden altar that is before God, I heard a voice

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

¹⁵So the four angels who were prepared for the hour, day, month, and year were released to kill a third of the human race.

¹⁶The number of mounted troops was two hundred million; I heard their number.

¹⁷This is how I saw the horses and their riders in the vision: They had breastplates that were fiery red, hyacinth blue, and sulfur yellow. The heads of the horses were like the heads of lions, and from their mouths came fire, smoke, and sulfur.

¹⁸A third of the human race was killed by these three plagues — by the fire, the smoke, and the sulfur that came from their mouths.

¹⁹For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails, because their tails, which resemble snakes, have heads that inflict injury.

²⁰The rest of the people, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands to stop worshiping demons and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone, and wood, which cannot see, hear, or walk.

²¹And they did not repent of their murders, their sorceries, their sexual immorality, or their thefts.

¹How beautiful are your sandaled feet, princess! The curves of your thighs are like jewelry, the handiwork of a master.

²Your navel is a rounded bowl; it never lacks mixed wine. Your belly is a mound of wheat surrounded by lilies.

³Your breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle.

⁴Your neck is like a tower of ivory, your eyes like pools in Heshbon by Bath-rabbim’s gate. Your nose is like the tower of Lebanon looking toward Damascus.

⁵Your head crowns you like Mount Carmel, the hair of your head like purple cloth — a king could be held captive in your tresses.

⁶How beautiful you are and how pleasant, my love, with such delights!

⁷Your stature is like a palm tree; your breasts are clusters of fruit.

⁸I said, “I will climb the palm tree and take hold of its fruit.” May your breasts be like clusters of grapes, and the fragrance of your breath like apricots.

⁹Your mouth is like fine wine  — flowing smoothly for my love, gliding past my lips and teeth!

¹⁰I am my love’s, and his desire is for me.

¹¹Come, my love, let’s go to the field; let’s spend the night among the henna blossoms.

¹²Let’s go early to the vineyards; let’s see if the vine has budded, if the blossom has opened, if the pomegranates are in bloom. There I will give you my caresses.

¹³The mandrakes give off a fragrance, and at our doors is every delicacy, both new and old. I have treasured them up for you, my love.

¹The LORD reigns! Let the earth rejoice; let the many coasts and islands be glad.

²Clouds and total darkness surround him; righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne.

³Fire goes before him and burns up his foes on every side.

⁴His lightning lights up the world; the earth sees and trembles.

⁵The mountains melt like wax at the presence of the LORD  — at the presence of the Lord of the whole earth.

⁶The heavens proclaim his righteousness; all the peoples see his glory.

⁷All who serve carved images, those who boast in idols, will be put to shame. All the gods must worship him.

⁸Zion hears and is glad, Judah’s villages rejoice because of your judgments, LORD.

⁹For you, LORD, are the Most High over the whole earth; you are exalted above all the gods.

¹⁰You who love the LORD, hate evil! He protects the lives of his faithful ones; he rescues them from the power of the wicked.

¹¹Light dawns for the righteous, gladness for the upright in heart.

¹²Be glad in the LORD, you righteous ones, and give thanks to his holy name.

¹The words of Agur son of Jakeh. The pronouncement. The man’s oration to Ithiel, to Ithiel and Ucal:

²I am more stupid than any other person, and I lack a human’s ability to understand.

³I have not gained wisdom, and I have no knowledge of the Holy One.

⁴Who has gone up to heaven and come down? Who has gathered the wind in his hands? Who has bound up the waters in a cloak? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is his name, and what is the name of his son — if you know?

⁵Every word of God is pure; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.

⁶Don’t add to his words, or he will rebuke you, and you will be proved a liar.

⁷Two things I ask of you; don’t deny them to me before I die:

⁸Keep falsehood and deceitful words far from me. Give me neither poverty nor wealth; feed me with the food I need.

⁹Otherwise, I might have too much and deny you, saying, “Who is the LORD?” or I might have nothing and steal, profaning the name of my God.

¹⁰Don’t slander a servant to his master or he will curse you, and you will become guilty.

¹¹There is a generation that curses its father and does not bless its mother.

¹²There is a generation that is pure in its own eyes, yet is not washed from its filth.

¹³There is a generation — how haughty its eyes and pretentious its looks.

¹⁴There is a generation whose teeth are swords, whose fangs are knives, devouring the oppressed from the land and the needy from among mankind.

¹⁵The leech has two daughters: “Give, Give!” Three things are never satisfied; four never say, “Enough!”:

¹⁶Sheol; a childless womb; earth, which is never satisfied with water; and fire, which never says, “Enough!”

¹⁷As for the eye that ridicules a father and despises obedience to a mother, may ravens of the valley pluck it out and young vultures eat it.

¹⁸Three things are too wondrous for me; four I can’t understand:

¹⁹the way of an eagle in the sky, the way of a snake on a rock, the way of a ship at sea, and the way of a man with a young woman.

²⁰This is the way of an adulteress: she eats and wipes her mouth and says, “I’ve done nothing wrong.”

²¹The earth trembles under three things; it cannot bear up under four:

²²a servant when he becomes king, a fool when he is stuffed with food,

²³an unloved woman when she marries, and a servant girl when she ousts her queen.

²⁴Four things on earth are small, yet they are extremely wise:

²⁵ants are not a strong people, yet they store up their food in the summer;

²⁶hyraxes are not a mighty people, yet they make their homes in the cliffs;

²⁷locusts have no king, yet all of them march in ranks;

²⁸a lizard can be caught in your hands, yet it lives in kings’ palaces.

²⁹Three things are stately in their stride; four are stately in their walk:

³⁰a lion, which is mightiest among beasts and doesn’t retreat before anything;

³¹a strutting rooster; a goat; and a king at the head of his army.

³²If you have been foolish by exalting yourself or if you’ve been scheming, put your hand over your mouth.

³³For the churning of milk produces butter, and twisting a nose draws blood, and stirring up anger produces strife.

¹That same day King Ahasuerus awarded Queen Esther the estate of Haman, the enemy of the Jews. Mordecai entered the king’s presence because Esther had revealed her relationship to Mordecai.

²The king removed his signet ring he had recovered from Haman and gave it to Mordecai, and Esther put him in charge of Haman’s estate.

³Then Esther addressed the king again. She fell at his feet, wept, and begged him to revoke the evil of Haman the Agagite and his plot he had devised against the Jews.

⁴The king extended the gold scepter toward Esther, so she got up and stood before the king.

⁵She said, “If it pleases the king and I have found favor before him, if the matter seems right to the king and I am pleasing in his eyes, let a royal edict be written. Let it revoke the documents the scheming Haman son of Hammedatha the Agagite wrote to destroy the Jews who are in all the king’s provinces.

⁶For how could I bear to see the disaster that would come on my people? How could I bear to see the destruction of my relatives?”

⁷King Ahasuerus said to Esther the queen and to Mordecai the Jew, “Look, I have given Haman’s estate to Esther, and he was hanged on the gallows because he attacked the Jews.

⁸Write in the king’s name whatever pleases you concerning the Jews, and seal it with the royal signet ring. A document written in the king’s name and sealed with the royal signet ring cannot be revoked.”

⁹On the twenty-third day of the third month — that is, the month Sivan — the royal scribes were summoned. Everything was written exactly as Mordecai commanded for the Jews, to the satraps, the governors, and the officials of the 127 provinces from India to Cush. The edict was written for each province in its own script, for each ethnic group in its own language, and to the Jews in their own script and language.

¹⁰Mordecai wrote in King Ahasuerus’s name and sealed the edicts with the royal signet ring. He sent the documents by mounted couriers, who rode fast horses bred in the royal stables.

¹¹The king’s edict gave the Jews in each and every city the right to assemble and defend themselves, to destroy, kill, and annihilate every ethnic and provincial army hostile to them, including women and children, and to take their possessions as spoils of war.

¹²This would take place on a single day throughout all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month Adar.

¹³A copy of the text, issued as law throughout every province, was distributed to all the peoples so the Jews could be ready to avenge themselves against their enemies on that day.

¹⁴The couriers rode out in haste on their royal horses at the king’s urgent command. The law was also issued in the fortress of Susa.

¹⁵Mordecai went from the king’s presence clothed in royal purple and white, with a great gold crown and a purple robe of fine linen. The city of Susa shouted and rejoiced,

¹⁶and the Jews celebrated with gladness, joy, and honor.

¹⁷In every province and every city, wherever the king’s command and his law reached, joy and rejoicing took place among the Jews. There was a celebration and a holiday. And many of the ethnic groups of the land professed themselves to be Jews because fear of the Jews had overcome them.

¹A pronouncement: The word of the LORD to Israel through Malachi.

²“I have loved you,” says the LORD. Yet you ask, “How have you loved us?” “Wasn’t Esau Jacob’s brother?” This is the LORD’s declaration. “Even so, I loved Jacob,

³but I hated Esau. I turned his mountains into a wasteland, and gave his inheritance to the desert jackals.”

⁴Though Edom says: “We have been devastated, but we will rebuild the ruins,” the LORD of Armies says this: “They may build, but I will demolish. They will be called a wicked country and the people the LORD has cursed forever.

⁵Your own eyes will see this, and you yourselves will say, ‘The LORD is great, even beyond the borders of Israel.’

⁶“A son honors his father, and a servant his master. But if I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is your fear of me? says the LORD of Armies to you priests, who despise my name.” Yet you ask: “How have we despised your name?”

⁷“By presenting defiled food on my altar.” “How have we defiled you?” you ask. When you say: “The LORD’s table is contemptible.”

⁸“When you present a blind animal for sacrifice, is it not wrong? And when you present a lame or sick animal, is it not wrong? Bring it to your governor! Would he be pleased with you or show you favor?” asks the LORD of Armies.

⁹“And now plead for God’s favor. Will he be gracious to us? Since this has come from your hands, will he show any of you favor?” asks the LORD of Armies.

¹⁰“I wish one of you would shut the temple doors, so that you would no longer kindle a useless fire on my altar! I am not pleased with you,” says the LORD of Armies, “and I will accept no offering from your hands.

¹¹“My name will be great among the nations, from the rising of the sun to its setting. Incense and pure offerings will be presented in my name in every place because my name will be great among the nations,” says the LORD of Armies.

¹²“But you are profaning it when you say: ‘The Lord’s table is defiled, and its product, its food, is contemptible.’

¹³You also say: ‘Look, what a nuisance! ’ And you scorn it,” says the LORD of Armies. “You bring stolen, lame, or sick animals. You bring this as an offering! Am I to accept that from your hands?” asks the LORD.

¹⁴“The deceiver is cursed who has an acceptable male in his flock and makes a vow but sacrifices a defective animal to the Lord. For I am a great King,” says the LORD of Armies, “and my name will be feared among the nations.

¹Paul looked straight at the Sanhedrin and said, “Brothers, I have lived my life before God in all good conscience to this day.”

²The high priest Ananias ordered those who were standing next to him to strike him on the mouth.

³Then Paul said to him, “God is going to strike you, you whitewashed wall! You are sitting there judging me according to the law, and yet in violation of the law are you ordering me to be struck?”

⁴Those standing nearby said, “Do you dare revile God’s high priest?”

⁵“I did not know, brothers, that he was the high priest,” replied Paul. “For it is written, You must not speak evil of a ruler of your people.”

⁶When Paul realized that one part of them were Sadducees and the other part were Pharisees, he cried out in the Sanhedrin, “Brothers, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees. I am being judged because of the hope of the resurrection of the dead!”

⁷When he said this, a dispute broke out between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided.

⁸For the Sadducees say there is no resurrection, and neither angel nor spirit, but the Pharisees affirm them all.

⁹The shouting grew loud, and some of the scribes of the Pharisees’ party got up and argued vehemently: “We find nothing evil in this man. What if a spirit or an angel has spoken to him?”

¹⁰When the dispute became violent, the commander feared that Paul might be torn apart by them and ordered the troops to go down, take him away from them, and bring him into the barracks.

¹¹The following night, the Lord stood by him and said, “Have courage! For as you have testified about me in Jerusalem, so it is necessary for you to testify in Rome.”

¹²When it was morning, the Jews formed a conspiracy and bound themselves under a curse not to eat or drink until they had killed Paul.

¹³There were more than forty who had formed this plot.

¹⁴These men went to the chief priests and elders and said, “We have bound ourselves under a solemn curse that we won’t eat anything until we have killed Paul.

¹⁵So now you, along with the Sanhedrin, make a request to the commander that he bring him down to you as if you were going to investigate his case more thoroughly. But, before he gets near, we are ready to kill him.”

¹⁶But the son of Paul’s sister, hearing about their ambush, came and entered the barracks and reported it to Paul.

¹⁷Paul called one of the centurions and said, “Take this young man to the commander, because he has something to report to him.”

¹⁸So he took him, brought him to the commander, and said, “The prisoner Paul called me and asked me to bring this young man to you, because he has something to tell you.”

¹⁹The commander took him by the hand, led him aside, and inquired privately, “What is it you have to report to me?”

²⁰“The Jews,” he said, “have agreed to ask you to bring Paul down to the Sanhedrin tomorrow, as though they are going to hold a somewhat more careful inquiry about him.

²¹Don’t let them persuade you, because there are more than forty of them lying in ambush — men who have bound themselves under a curse not to eat or drink until they have killed him. Now they are ready, waiting for your consent.”

²²So the commander dismissed the young man and instructed him, “Don’t tell anyone that you have informed me about this.”

²³He summoned two of his centurions and said, “Get two hundred soldiers ready with seventy cavalry and two hundred spearmen to go to Caesarea at nine tonight.

²⁴Also provide mounts for Paul to ride and bring him safely to Felix the governor.”

²⁵He wrote the following letter:

²⁶Claudius Lysias, To the most excellent governor Felix: Greetings.

²⁷When this man had been seized by the Jews and was about to be killed by them, I arrived with my troops and rescued him because I learned that he is a Roman citizen.

²⁸Wanting to know the charge they were accusing him of, I brought him down before their Sanhedrin.

²⁹I found out that the accusations were concerning questions of their law, and that there was no charge that merited death or imprisonment.

³⁰When I was informed that there was a plot against the man, I sent him to you right away. I also ordered his accusers to state their case against him in your presence.

³¹So the soldiers took Paul during the night and brought him to Antipatris as they were ordered.

³²The next day, they returned to the barracks, allowing the cavalry to go on with him.

³³When these men entered Caesarea and delivered the letter to the governor, they also presented Paul to him.

³⁴After he read it, he asked what province he was from. When he learned he was from Cilicia,

³⁵he said, “I will give you a hearing whenever your accusers also get here.” He ordered that he be kept under guard in Herod’s palace.