Professor Horner’s Reading Plan

¹Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him,

²they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them.

³(For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders;

⁴and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles.)

⁵So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?”

⁶He said to them, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me;

⁷in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.’

⁸You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.”

⁹Then he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition!

¹⁰For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever speaks evil of father or mother must surely die.’

¹¹But you say that if anyone tells father or mother, ‘Whatever support you might have had from me is Corban’ (that is, an offering to God) —

¹²then you no longer permit doing anything for a father or mother,

¹³thus making void the word of God through your tradition that you have handed on. And you do many things like this.”

¹⁴Then he called the crowd again and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and understand:

¹⁵there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.”

¹⁶

¹⁷When he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about the parable.

¹⁸He said to them, “Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile,

¹⁹since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.)

²⁰And he said, “It is what comes out of a person that defiles.

²¹For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder,

²²adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly.

²³All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”

²⁴From there he set out and went away to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice,

²⁵but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet.

²⁶Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter.

²⁷He said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”

²⁸But she answered him, “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”

²⁹Then he said to her, “For saying that, you may go — the demon has left your daughter.”

³⁰So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.

³¹Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis.

³²They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him.

³³He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue.

³⁴Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be opened.”

³⁵And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly.

³⁶Then Jesus ordered them to tell no one; but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it.

³⁷They were astounded beyond measure, saying, “He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.”

¹God said to Jacob, “Arise, go up to Bethel, and settle there. Make an altar there to the God who appeared to you when you fled from your brother Esau.”

²So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, “Put away the foreign gods that are among you, and purify yourselves, and change your clothes;

³then come, let us go up to Bethel, that I may make an altar there to the God who answered me in the day of my distress and has been with me wherever I have gone.”

⁴So they gave to Jacob all the foreign gods that they had, and the rings that were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak that was near Shechem.

⁵As they journeyed, a terror from God fell upon the cities all around them, so that no one pursued them.

⁶Jacob came to Luz (that is, Bethel), which is in the land of Canaan, he and all the people who were with him,

⁷and there he built an altar and called the place El-bethel, because it was there that God had revealed himself to him when he fled from his brother.

⁸And Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, died, and she was buried under an oak below Bethel. So it was called Allon-bacuth.

⁹God appeared to Jacob again when he came from Paddan-aram, and he blessed him.

¹⁰God said to him, “Your name is Jacob; no longer shall you be called Jacob, but Israel shall be your name.” So he was called Israel.

¹¹God said to him, “I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall come from you, and kings shall spring from you.

¹²The land that I gave to Abraham and Isaac I will give to you, and I will give the land to your offspring after you.”

¹³Then God went up from him at the place where he had spoken with him.

¹⁴Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he had spoken with him, a pillar of stone; and he poured out a drink offering on it, and poured oil on it.

¹⁵So Jacob called the place where God had spoken with him Bethel.

¹⁶Then they journeyed from Bethel; and when they were still some distance from Ephrath, Rachel was in childbirth, and she had hard labor.

¹⁷When she was in her hard labor, the midwife said to her, “Do not be afraid; for now you will have another son.”

¹⁸As her soul was departing (for she died), she named him Ben-oni; but his father called him Benjamin.

¹⁹So Rachel died, and she was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem),

²⁰and Jacob set up a pillar at her grave; it is the pillar of Rachel’s tomb, which is there to this day.

²¹Israel journeyed on, and pitched his tent beyond the tower of Eder.

²²While Israel lived in that land, Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father’s concubine; and Israel heard of it. Now the sons of Jacob were twelve.

²³The sons of Leah: Reuben (Jacob’s firstborn), Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun.

²⁴The sons of Rachel: Joseph and Benjamin.

²⁵The sons of Bilhah, Rachel’s maid: Dan and Naphtali.

²⁶The sons of Zilpah, Leah’s maid: Gad and Asher. These were the sons of Jacob who were born to him in Paddan-aram.

²⁷Jacob came to his father Isaac at Mamre, or Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron), where Abraham and Isaac had resided as aliens.

²⁸Now the days of Isaac were one hundred eighty years.

²⁹And Isaac breathed his last; he died and was gathered to his people, old and full of days; and his sons Esau and Jacob buried him.

¹Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Surely we do not need, as some do, letters of recommendation to you or from you, do we?

²You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all;

³and you show that you are a letter of Christ, prepared by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.

⁴Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God.

⁵Not that we are competent of ourselves to claim anything as coming from us; our competence is from God,

⁶who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of letter but of spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

⁷Now if the ministry of death, chiseled in letters on stone tablets, came in glory so that the people of Israel could not gaze at Moses’ face because of the glory of his face, a glory now set aside,

⁸how much more will the ministry of the Spirit come in glory?

⁹For if there was glory in the ministry of condemnation, much more does the ministry of justification abound in glory!

¹⁰Indeed, what once had glory has lost its glory because of the greater glory;

¹¹for if what was set aside came through glory, much more has the permanent come in glory!

¹²Since, then, we have such a hope, we act with great boldness,

¹³not like Moses, who put a veil over his face to keep the people of Israel from gazing at the end of the glory that was being set aside.

¹⁴But their minds were hardened. Indeed, to this very day, when they hear the reading of the old covenant, that same veil is still there, since only in Christ is it set aside.

¹⁵Indeed, to this very day whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their minds;

¹⁶but when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed.

¹⁷Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

¹⁸And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

¹Elihu continued and said:

²“Do you think this to be just? You say, ‘I am in the right before God.’

³If you ask, ‘What advantage have I? How am I better off than if I had sinned?’

⁴I will answer you and your friends with you.

⁵Look at the heavens and see; observe the clouds, which are higher than you.

⁶If you have sinned, what do you accomplish against him? And if your transgressions are multiplied, what do you do to him?

⁷If you are righteous, what do you give to him; or what does he receive from your hand?

⁸Your wickedness affects others like you, and your righteousness, other human beings.

⁹“Because of the multitude of oppressions people cry out; they call for help because of the arm of the mighty.

¹⁰But no one says, ‘Where is God my Maker, who gives strength in the night,

¹¹who teaches us more than the animals of the earth, and makes us wiser than the birds of the air?’

¹²There they cry out, but he does not answer, because of the pride of evildoers.

¹³Surely God does not hear an empty cry, nor does the Almighty regard it.

¹⁴How much less when you say that you do not see him, that the case is before him, and you are waiting for him!

¹⁵And now, because his anger does not punish, and he does not greatly heed transgression,

¹⁶Job opens his mouth in empty talk, he multiplies words without knowledge.”

¹Contend, O LORD, with those who contend with me; fight against those who fight against me!

²Take hold of shield and buckler, and rise up to help me!

³Draw the spear and javelin against my pursuers; say to my soul, “I am your salvation.”

⁴Let them be put to shame and dishonor who seek after my life. Let them be turned back and confounded who devise evil against me.

⁵Let them be like chaff before the wind, with the angel of the LORD driving them on.

⁶Let their way be dark and slippery, with the angel of the LORD pursuing them.

⁷For without cause they hid their net for me; without cause they dug a pit for my life.

⁸Let ruin come on them unawares. And let the net that they hid ensnare them; let them fall in it — to their ruin.

⁹Then my soul shall rejoice in the LORD, exulting in his deliverance.

¹⁰All my bones shall say, “O LORD, who is like you? You deliver the weak from those too strong for them, the weak and needy from those who despoil them.”

¹¹Malicious witnesses rise up; they ask me about things I do not know.

¹²They repay me evil for good; my soul is forlorn.

¹³But as for me, when they were sick, I wore sackcloth; I afflicted myself with fasting. I prayed with head bowed on my bosom,

¹⁴as though I grieved for a friend or a brother; I went about as one who laments for a mother, bowed down and in mourning.

¹⁵But at my stumbling they gathered in glee, they gathered together against me; ruffians whom I did not know tore at me without ceasing;

¹⁶they impiously mocked more and more, gnashing at me with their teeth.

¹⁷How long, O LORD, will you look on? Rescue me from their ravages, my life from the lions!

¹⁸Then I will thank you in the great congregation; in the mighty throng I will praise you.

¹⁹Do not let my treacherous enemies rejoice over me, or those who hate me without cause wink the eye.

²⁰For they do not speak peace, but they conceive deceitful words against those who are quiet in the land.

²¹They open wide their mouths against me; they say, “Aha, Aha, our eyes have seen it.”

²²You have seen, O LORD; do not be silent! O Lord, do not be far from me!

²³Wake up! Bestir yourself for my defense, for my cause, my God and my Lord!

²⁴Vindicate me, O LORD, my God, according to your righteousness, and do not let them rejoice over me.

²⁵Do not let them say to themselves, “Aha, we have our heart’s desire.” Do not let them say, “We have swallowed you up.”

²⁶Let all those who rejoice at my calamity be put to shame and confusion; let those who exalt themselves against me be clothed with shame and dishonor.

²⁷Let those who desire my vindication shout for joy and be glad, and say evermore, “Great is the LORD, who delights in the welfare of his servant.”

²⁸Then my tongue shall tell of your righteousness and of your praise all day long.

¹Listen, children, to a father’s instruction, and be attentive, that you may gain insight;

²for I give you good precepts: do not forsake my teaching.

³When I was a son with my father, tender, and my mother’s favorite,

⁴he taught me, and said to me, “Let your heart hold fast my words; keep my commandments, and live.

⁵Get wisdom; get insight: do not forget, nor turn away from the words of my mouth.

⁶Do not forsake her, and she will keep you; love her, and she will guard you.

⁷The beginning of wisdom is this: Get wisdom, and whatever else you get, get insight.

⁸Prize her highly, and she will exalt you; she will honor you if you embrace her.

⁹She will place on your head a fair garland; she will bestow on you a beautiful crown.”

¹⁰Hear, my child, and accept my words, that the years of your life may be many.

¹¹I have taught you the way of wisdom; I have led you in the paths of uprightness.

¹²When you walk, your step will not be hampered; and if you run, you will not stumble.

¹³Keep hold of instruction; do not let go; guard her, for she is your life.

¹⁴Do not enter the path of the wicked, and do not walk in the way of evildoers.

¹⁵Avoid it; do not go on it; turn away from it and pass on.

¹⁶For they cannot sleep unless they have done wrong; they are robbed of sleep unless they have made someone stumble.

¹⁷For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence.

¹⁸But the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until full day.

¹⁹The way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know what they stumble over.

²⁰My child, be attentive to my words; incline your ear to my sayings.

²¹Do not let them escape from your sight; keep them within your heart.

²²For they are life to those who find them, and healing to all their flesh.

²³Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.

²⁴Put away from you crooked speech, and put devious talk far from you.

²⁵Let your eyes look directly forward, and your gaze be straight before you.

²⁶Keep straight the path of your feet, and all your ways will be sure.

²⁷Do not swerve to the right or to the left; turn your foot away from evil.

¹Now Jephthah the Gileadite, the son of a prostitute, was a mighty warrior. Gilead was the father of Jephthah.

²Gilead’s wife also bore him sons; and when his wife’s sons grew up, they drove Jephthah away, saying to him, “You shall not inherit anything in our father’s house; for you are the son of another woman.”

³Then Jephthah fled from his brothers and lived in the land of Tob. Outlaws collected around Jephthah and went raiding with him.

⁴After a time the Ammonites made war against Israel.

⁵And when the Ammonites made war against Israel, the elders of Gilead went to bring Jephthah from the land of Tob.

⁶They said to Jephthah, “Come and be our commander, so that we may fight with the Ammonites.”

⁷But Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, “Are you not the very ones who rejected me and drove me out of my father’s house? So why do you come to me now when you are in trouble?”

⁸The elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “Nevertheless, we have now turned back to you, so that you may go with us and fight with the Ammonites, and become head over us, over all the inhabitants of Gilead.”

⁹Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, “If you bring me home again to fight with the Ammonites, and the LORD gives them over to me, I will be your head.”

¹⁰And the elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “The LORD will be witness between us; we will surely do as you say.”

¹¹So Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made him head and commander over them; and Jephthah spoke all his words before the LORD at Mizpah.

¹²Then Jephthah sent messengers to the king of the Ammonites and said, “What is there between you and me, that you have come to me to fight against my land?”

¹³The king of the Ammonites answered the messengers of Jephthah, “Because Israel, on coming from Egypt, took away my land from the Arnon to the Jabbok and to the Jordan; now therefore restore it peaceably.”

¹⁴Once again Jephthah sent messengers to the king of the Ammonites

¹⁵and said to him: “Thus says Jephthah: Israel did not take away the land of Moab or the land of the Ammonites,

¹⁶but when they came up from Egypt, Israel went through the wilderness to the Red Sea and came to Kadesh.

¹⁷Israel then sent messengers to the king of Edom, saying, ‘Let us pass through your land’; but the king of Edom would not listen. They also sent to the king of Moab, but he would not consent. So Israel remained at Kadesh.

¹⁸Then they journeyed through the wilderness, went around the land of Edom and the land of Moab, arrived on the east side of the land of Moab, and camped on the other side of the Arnon. They did not enter the territory of Moab, for the Arnon was the boundary of Moab.

¹⁹Israel then sent messengers to King Sihon of the Amorites, king of Heshbon; and Israel said to him, ‘Let us pass through your land to our country.’

²⁰But Sihon did not trust Israel to pass through his territory; so Sihon gathered all his people together, and encamped at Jahaz, and fought with Israel.

²¹Then the LORD, the God of Israel, gave Sihon and all his people into the hand of Israel, and they defeated them; so Israel occupied all the land of the Amorites, who inhabited that country.

²²They occupied all the territory of the Amorites from the Arnon to the Jabbok and from the wilderness to the Jordan.

²³So now the LORD, the God of Israel, has conquered the Amorites for the benefit of his people Israel. Do you intend to take their place?

²⁴Should you not possess what your god Chemosh gives you to possess? And should we not be the ones to possess everything that the LORD our God has conquered for our benefit?

²⁵Now are you any better than King Balak son of Zippor of Moab? Did he ever enter into conflict with Israel, or did he ever go to war with them?

²⁶While Israel lived in Heshbon and its villages, and in Aroer and its villages, and in all the towns that are along the Arnon, three hundred years, why did you not recover them within that time?

²⁷It is not I who have sinned against you, but you are the one who does me wrong by making war on me. Let the LORD, who is judge, decide today for the Israelites or for the Ammonites.”

²⁸But the king of the Ammonites did not heed the message that Jephthah sent him.

²⁹Then the spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah, and he passed through Gilead and Manasseh. He passed on to Mizpah of Gilead, and from Mizpah of Gilead he passed on to the Ammonites.

³⁰And Jephthah made a vow to the LORD, and said, “If you will give the Ammonites into my hand,

³¹then whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return victorious from the Ammonites, shall be the LORD’s, to be offered up by me as a burnt offering.”

³²So Jephthah crossed over to the Ammonites to fight against them; and the LORD gave them into his hand.

³³He inflicted a massive defeat on them from Aroer to the neighborhood of Minnith, twenty towns, and as far as Abel-keramim. So the Ammonites were subdued before the people of Israel.

³⁴Then Jephthah came to his home at Mizpah; and there was his daughter coming out to meet him with timbrels and with dancing. She was his only child; he had no son or daughter except her.

³⁵When he saw her, he tore his clothes, and said, “Alas, my daughter! You have brought me very low; you have become the cause of great trouble to me. For I have opened my mouth to the LORD, and I cannot take back my vow.”

³⁶She said to him, “My father, if you have opened your mouth to the LORD, do to me according to what has gone out of your mouth, now that the LORD has given you vengeance against your enemies, the Ammonites.”

³⁷And she said to her father, “Let this thing be done for me: Grant me two months, so that I may go and wander on the mountains, and bewail my virginity, my companions and I.”

³⁸“Go,” he said and sent her away for two months. So she departed, she and her companions, and bewailed her virginity on the mountains.

³⁹At the end of two months, she returned to her father, who did with her according to the vow he had made. She had never slept with a man. So there arose an Israelite custom that

⁴⁰for four days every year the daughters of Israel would go out to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.

¹The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus

²it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon. They shall see the glory of the LORD, the majesty of our God.

³Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees.

⁴Say to those who are of a fearful heart, “Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come and save you.”

⁵Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped;

⁶then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert;

⁷the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes.

⁸A highway shall be there, and it shall be called the Holy Way; the unclean shall not travel on it, but it shall be for God’s people; no traveler, not even fools, shall go astray.

⁹No lion shall be there, nor shall any ravenous beast come up on it; they shall not be found there, but the redeemed shall walk there.

¹⁰And the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.

¹Then the high priest asked him, “Are these things so?”

²And Stephen replied: “Brothers and fathers, listen to me. The God of glory appeared to our ancestor Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran,

³and said to him, ‘Leave your country and your relatives and go to the land that I will show you.’

⁴Then he left the country of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. After his father died, God had him move from there to this country in which you are now living.

⁵He did not give him any of it as a heritage, not even a foot’s length, but promised to give it to him as his possession and to his descendants after him, even though he had no child.

⁶And God spoke in these terms, that his descendants would be resident aliens in a country belonging to others, who would enslave them and mistreat them during four hundred years.

⁷‘But I will judge the nation that they serve,’ said God, ‘and after that they shall come out and worship me in this place.’

⁸Then he gave him the covenant of circumcision. And so Abraham became the father of Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day; and Isaac became the father of Jacob, and Jacob of the twelve patriarchs.

⁹“The patriarchs, jealous of Joseph, sold him into Egypt; but God was with him,

¹⁰and rescued him from all his afflictions, and enabled him to win favor and to show wisdom when he stood before Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who appointed him ruler over Egypt and over all his household.

¹¹Now there came a famine throughout Egypt and Canaan, and great suffering, and our ancestors could find no food.

¹²But when Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt, he sent our ancestors there on their first visit.

¹³On the second visit Joseph made himself known to his brothers, and Joseph’s family became known to Pharaoh.

¹⁴Then Joseph sent and invited his father Jacob and all his relatives to come to him, seventy-five in all;

¹⁵so Jacob went down to Egypt. He himself died there as well as our ancestors,

¹⁶and their bodies were brought back to Shechem and laid in the tomb that Abraham had bought for a sum of silver from the sons of Hamor in Shechem.

¹⁷“But as the time drew near for the fulfillment of the promise that God had made to Abraham, our people in Egypt increased and multiplied

¹⁸until another king who had not known Joseph ruled over Egypt.

¹⁹He dealt craftily with our race and forced our ancestors to abandon their infants so that they would die.

²⁰At this time Moses was born, and he was beautiful before God. For three months he was brought up in his father’s house;

²¹and when he was abandoned, Pharaoh’s daughter adopted him and brought him up as her own son.

²²So Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was powerful in his words and deeds.

²³“When he was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his relatives, the Israelites.

²⁴When he saw one of them being wronged, he defended the oppressed man and avenged him by striking down the Egyptian.

²⁵He supposed that his kinsfolk would understand that God through him was rescuing them, but they did not understand.

²⁶The next day he came to some of them as they were quarreling and tried to reconcile them, saying, ‘Men, you are brothers; why do you wrong each other?’

²⁷But the man who was wronging his neighbor pushed Moses aside, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and a judge over us?

²⁸Do you want to kill me as you killed the Egyptian yesterday?’

²⁹When he heard this, Moses fled and became a resident alien in the land of Midian. There he became the father of two sons.

³⁰“Now when forty years had passed, an angel appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai, in the flame of a burning bush.

³¹When Moses saw it, he was amazed at the sight; and as he approached to look, there came the voice of the Lord:

³²‘I am the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.’ Moses began to tremble and did not dare to look.

³³Then the Lord said to him, ‘Take off the sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.

³⁴I have surely seen the mistreatment of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their groaning, and I have come down to rescue them. Come now, I will send you to Egypt.’

³⁵“It was this Moses whom they rejected when they said, ‘Who made you a ruler and a judge?’ and whom God now sent as both ruler and liberator through the angel who appeared to him in the bush.

³⁶He led them out, having performed wonders and signs in Egypt, at the Red Sea, and in the wilderness for forty years.

³⁷This is the Moses who said to the Israelites, ‘God will raise up a prophet for you from your own people as he raised me up.’

³⁸He is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him at Mount Sinai, and with our ancestors; and he received living oracles to give to us.

³⁹Our ancestors were unwilling to obey him; instead, they pushed him aside, and in their hearts they turned back to Egypt,

⁴⁰saying to Aaron, ‘Make gods for us who will lead the way for us; as for this Moses who led us out from the land of Egypt, we do not know what has happened to him.’

⁴¹At that time they made a calf, offered a sacrifice to the idol, and reveled in the works of their hands.

⁴²But God turned away from them and handed them over to worship the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the prophets: ‘Did you offer to me slain victims and sacrifices forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?

⁴³No; you took along the tent of Moloch, and the star of your god Rephan, the images that you made to worship; so I will remove you beyond Babylon.’

⁴⁴“Our ancestors had the tent of testimony in the wilderness, as God directed when he spoke to Moses, ordering him to make it according to the pattern he had seen.

⁴⁵Our ancestors in turn brought it in with Joshua when they dispossessed the nations that God drove out before our ancestors. And it was there until the time of David,

⁴⁶who found favor with God and asked that he might find a dwelling place for the house of Jacob.

⁴⁷But it was Solomon who built a house for him.

⁴⁸Yet the Most High does not dwell in houses made with human hands; as the prophet says,

⁴⁹‘Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me, says the Lord, or what is the place of my rest?

⁵⁰Did not my hand make all these things?’

⁵¹“You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you are forever opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors used to do.

⁵²Which of the prophets did your ancestors not persecute? They killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, and now you have become his betrayers and murderers.

⁵³You are the ones that received the law as ordained by angels, and yet you have not kept it.”

⁵⁴When they heard these things, they became enraged and ground their teeth at Stephen.

⁵⁵But filled with the Holy Spirit, he gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.

⁵⁶“Look,” he said, “I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!”

⁵⁷But they covered their ears, and with a loud shout all rushed together against him.

⁵⁸Then they dragged him out of the city and began to stone him; and the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul.

⁵⁹While they were stoning Stephen, he prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.”

⁶⁰Then he knelt down and cried out in a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” When he had said this, he died.