Professor Horner’s Reading Plan

¹“Do not judge others, and you will not be judged.

²For you will be treated as you treat others. The standard you use in judging is the standard by which you will be judged.

³“And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own?

⁴How can you think of saying to your friend, ‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye?

⁵Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye.

⁶“Don’t waste what is holy on people who are unholy. Don’t throw your pearls to pigs! They will trample the pearls, then turn and attack you.

⁷“Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you.

⁸For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.

⁹“You parents — if your children ask for a loaf of bread, do you give them a stone instead?

¹⁰Or if they ask for a fish, do you give them a snake? Of course not!

¹¹So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him.

¹²“Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.

¹³“You can enter God’s Kingdom only through the narrow gate. The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose that way.

¹⁴But the gateway to life is very narrow and the road is difficult, and only a few ever find it.

¹⁵“Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves.

¹⁶You can identify them by their fruit, that is, by the way they act. Can you pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?

¹⁷A good tree produces good fruit, and a bad tree produces bad fruit.

¹⁸A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit.

¹⁹So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire.

²⁰Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions.

²¹“Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter.

²²On judgment day many will say to me, ‘Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and performed many miracles in your name.’

²³But I will reply, ‘I never knew you. Get away from me, you who break God’s laws.’

²⁴“Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock.

²⁵Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock.

²⁶But anyone who hears my teaching and doesn’t obey it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand.

²⁷When the rains and floods come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash.”

²⁸When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching,

²⁹for he taught with real authority — quite unlike their teachers of religious law.

¹When everything was ready, the LORD said to Noah, “Go into the boat with all your family, for among all the people of the earth, I can see that you alone are righteous.

²Take with you seven pairs — male and female — of each animal I have approved for eating and for sacrifice, and take one pair of each of the others.

³Also take seven pairs of every kind of bird. There must be a male and a female in each pair to ensure that all life will survive on the earth after the flood.

⁴Seven days from now I will make the rains pour down on the earth. And it will rain for forty days and forty nights, until I have wiped from the earth all the living things I have created.”

⁵So Noah did everything as the LORD commanded him.

⁶Noah was 600 years old when the flood covered the earth.

⁷He went on board the boat to escape the flood — he and his wife and his sons and their wives.

⁸With them were all the various kinds of animals — those approved for eating and for sacrifice and those that were not — along with all the birds and the small animals that scurry along the ground.

⁹They entered the boat in pairs, male and female, just as God had commanded Noah.

¹⁰After seven days, the waters of the flood came and covered the earth.

¹¹When Noah was 600 years old, on the seventeenth day of the second month, all the underground waters erupted from the earth, and the rain fell in mighty torrents from the sky.

¹²The rain continued to fall for forty days and forty nights.

¹³That very day Noah had gone into the boat with his wife and his sons — Shem, Ham, and Japheth — and their wives.

¹⁴With them in the boat were pairs of every kind of animal — domestic and wild, large and small — along with birds of every kind.

¹⁵Two by two they came into the boat, representing every living thing that breathes.

¹⁶A male and female of each kind entered, just as God had commanded Noah. Then the LORD closed the door behind them.

¹⁷For forty days the floodwaters grew deeper, covering the ground and lifting the boat high above the earth.

¹⁸As the waters rose higher and higher above the ground, the boat floated safely on the surface.

¹⁹Finally, the water covered even the highest mountains on the earth,

²⁰rising more than twenty-two feet above the highest peaks.

²¹All the living things on earth died — birds, domestic animals, wild animals, small animals that scurry along the ground, and all the people.

²²Everything that breathed and lived on dry land died.

²³God wiped out every living thing on the earth — people, livestock, small animals that scurry along the ground, and the birds of the sky. All were destroyed. The only people who survived were Noah and those with him in the boat.

²⁴And the floodwaters covered the earth for 150 days.

¹Now, dear brothers and sisters — you who are familiar with the law — don’t you know that the law applies only while a person is living?

²For example, when a woman marries, the law binds her to her husband as long as he is alive. But if he dies, the laws of marriage no longer apply to her.

³So while her husband is alive, she would be committing adultery if she married another man. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law and does not commit adultery when she remarries.

⁴So, my dear brothers and sisters, this is the point: You died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the one who was raised from the dead. As a result, we can produce a harvest of good deeds for God.

⁵When we were controlled by our old nature, sinful desires were at work within us, and the law aroused these evil desires that produced a harvest of sinful deeds, resulting in death.

⁶But now we have been released from the law, for we died to it and are no longer captive to its power. Now we can serve God, not in the old way of obeying the letter of the law, but in the new way of living in the Spirit.

⁷Well then, am I suggesting that the law of God is sinful? Of course not! In fact, it was the law that showed me my sin. I would never have known that coveting is wrong if the law had not said, “You must not covet.”

⁸But sin used this command to arouse all kinds of covetous desires within me! If there were no law, sin would not have that power.

⁹At one time I lived without understanding the law. But when I learned the command not to covet, for instance, the power of sin came to life,

¹⁰and I died. So I discovered that the law’s commands, which were supposed to bring life, brought spiritual death instead.

¹¹Sin took advantage of those commands and deceived me; it used the commands to kill me.

¹²But still, the law itself is holy, and its commands are holy and right and good.

¹³But how can that be? Did the law, which is good, cause my death? Of course not! Sin used what was good to bring about my condemnation to death. So we can see how terrible sin really is. It uses God’s good commands for its own evil purposes.

¹⁴So the trouble is not with the law, for it is spiritual and good. The trouble is with me, for I am all too human, a slave to sin.

¹⁵I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate.

¹⁶But if I know that what I am doing is wrong, this shows that I agree that the law is good.

¹⁷So I am not the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it.

¹⁸And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. I want to do what is right, but I can’t.

¹⁹I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway.

²⁰But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it.

²¹I have discovered this principle of life — that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong.

²²I love God’s law with all my heart.

²³But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me.

²⁴Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death?

²⁵Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. So you see how it is: In my mind I really want to obey God’s law, but because of my sinful nature I am a slave to sin.

¹Now, dear brothers and sisters, let us clarify some things about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and how we will be gathered to meet him.

²Don’t be so easily shaken or alarmed by those who say that the day of the Lord has already begun. Don’t believe them, even if they claim to have had a spiritual vision, a revelation, or a letter supposedly from us.

³Don’t be fooled by what they say. For that day will not come until there is a great rebellion against God and the man of lawlessness is revealed — the one who brings destruction.

⁴He will exalt himself and defy everything that people call god and every object of worship. He will even sit in the temple of God, claiming that he himself is God.

⁵Don’t you remember that I told you about all this when I was with you?

⁶And you know what is holding him back, for he can be revealed only when his time comes.

⁷For this lawlessness is already at work secretly, and it will remain secret until the one who is holding it back steps out of the way.

⁸Then the man of lawlessness will be revealed, but the Lord Jesus will slay him with the breath of his mouth and destroy him by the splendor of his coming.

⁹This man will come to do the work of Satan with counterfeit power and signs and miracles.

¹⁰He will use every kind of evil deception to fool those on their way to destruction, because they refuse to love and accept the truth that would save them.

¹¹So God will cause them to be greatly deceived, and they will believe these lies.

¹²Then they will be condemned for enjoying evil rather than believing the truth.

¹³As for us, we can’t help but thank God for you, dear brothers and sisters loved by the Lord. We are always thankful that God chose you to be among the first to experience salvation — a salvation that came through the Spirit who makes you holy and through your belief in the truth.

¹⁴He called you to salvation when we told you the Good News; now you can share in the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.

¹⁵With all these things in mind, dear brothers and sisters, stand firm and keep a strong grip on the teaching we passed on to you both in person and by letter.

¹⁶Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal comfort and a wonderful hope,

¹⁷comfort you and strengthen you in every good thing you do and say.

¹“Is not all human life a struggle? Our lives are like that of a hired hand,

²like a worker who longs for the shade, like a servant waiting to be paid.

³I, too, have been assigned months of futility, long and weary nights of misery.

⁴Lying in bed, I think, ‘When will it be morning?’ But the night drags on, and I toss till dawn.

⁵My body is covered with maggots and scabs. My skin breaks open, oozing with pus.

⁶“My days fly faster than a weaver’s shuttle. They end without hope.

⁷O God, remember that my life is but a breath, and I will never again feel happiness.

⁸You see me now, but not for long. You will look for me, but I will be gone.

⁹Just as a cloud dissipates and vanishes, those who die will not come back.

¹⁰They are gone forever from their home — never to be seen again.

¹¹“I cannot keep from speaking. I must express my anguish. My bitter soul must complain.

¹²Am I a sea monster or a dragon that you must place me under guard?

¹³I think, ‘My bed will comfort me, and sleep will ease my misery,’

¹⁴but then you shatter me with dreams and terrify me with visions.

¹⁵I would rather be strangled — rather die than suffer like this.

¹⁶I hate my life and don’t want to go on living. Oh, leave me alone for my few remaining days.

¹⁷“What are people, that you should make so much of us, that you should think of us so often?

¹⁸For you examine us every morning and test us every moment.

¹⁹Why won’t you leave me alone, at least long enough for me to swallow!

²⁰If I have sinned, what have I done to you, O watcher of all humanity? Why make me your target? Am I a burden to you?

²¹Why not just forgive my sin and take away my guilt? For soon I will lie down in the dust and die. When you look for me, I will be gone.”

¹I come to you for protection, O LORD my God. Save me from my persecutors — rescue me!

²If you don’t, they will maul me like a lion, tearing me to pieces with no one to rescue me.

³O LORD my God, if I have done wrong or am guilty of injustice,

⁴if I have betrayed a friend or plundered my enemy without cause,

⁵then let my enemies capture me. Let them trample me into the ground and drag my honor in the dust. Interlude

⁶Arise, O LORD, in anger! Stand up against the fury of my enemies! Wake up, my God, and bring justice!

⁷Gather the nations before you. Rule over them from on high.

⁸The LORD judges the nations. Declare me righteous, O LORD, for I am innocent, O Most High!

⁹End the evil of those who are wicked, and defend the righteous. For you look deep within the mind and heart, O righteous God.

¹⁰God is my shield, saving those whose hearts are true and right.

¹¹God is an honest judge. He is angry with the wicked every day.

¹²If a person does not repent, God will sharpen his sword; he will bend and string his bow.

¹³He will prepare his deadly weapons and shoot his flaming arrows.

¹⁴The wicked conceive evil; they are pregnant with trouble and give birth to lies.

¹⁵They dig a deep pit to trap others, then fall into it themselves.

¹⁶The trouble they make for others backfires on them. The violence they plan falls on their own heads.

¹⁷I will thank the LORD because he is just; I will sing praise to the name of the LORD Most High.

¹Follow my advice, my son; always treasure my commands.

²Obey my commands and live! Guard my instructions as you guard your own eyes.

³Tie them on your fingers as a reminder. Write them deep within your heart.

⁴Love wisdom like a sister; make insight a beloved member of your family.

⁵Let them protect you from an affair with an immoral woman, from listening to the flattery of a promiscuous woman.

⁶While I was at the window of my house, looking through the curtain,

⁷I saw some naive young men, and one in particular who lacked common sense.

⁸He was crossing the street near the house of an immoral woman, strolling down the path by her house.

⁹It was at twilight, in the evening, as deep darkness fell.

¹⁰The woman approached him, seductively dressed and sly of heart.

¹¹She was the brash, rebellious type, never content to stay at home.

¹²She is often in the streets and markets, soliciting at every corner.

¹³She threw her arms around him and kissed him, and with a brazen look she said,

¹⁴“I’ve just made my peace offerings and fulfilled my vows.

¹⁵You’re the one I was looking for! I came out to find you, and here you are!

¹⁶My bed is spread with beautiful blankets, with colored sheets of Egyptian linen.

¹⁷I’ve perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.

¹⁸Come, let’s drink our fill of love until morning. Let’s enjoy each other’s caresses,

¹⁹for my husband is not home. He’s away on a long trip.

²⁰He has taken a wallet full of money with him and won’t return until later this month. ”

²¹So she seduced him with her pretty speech and enticed him with her flattery.

²²He followed her at once, like an ox going to the slaughter. He was like a stag caught in a trap,

²³awaiting the arrow that would pierce its heart. He was like a bird flying into a snare, little knowing it would cost him his life.

²⁴So listen to me, my sons, and pay attention to my words.

²⁵Don’t let your hearts stray away toward her. Don’t wander down her wayward path.

²⁶For she has been the ruin of many; many men have been her victims.

²⁷Her house is the road to the grave. Her bedroom is the den of death.

¹But Israel violated the instructions about the things set apart for the LORD. A man named Achan had stolen some of these dedicated things, so the LORD was very angry with the Israelites. Achan was the son of Carmi, a descendant of Zimri son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah.

²Joshua sent some of his men from Jericho to spy out the town of Ai, east of Bethel, near Beth-aven.

³When they returned, they told Joshua, “There’s no need for all of us to go up there; it won’t take more than two or three thousand men to attack Ai. Since there are so few of them, don’t make all our people struggle to go up there.”

⁴So approximately 3,000 warriors were sent, but they were soundly defeated. The men of Ai

⁵chased the Israelites from the town gate as far as the quarries, and they killed about thirty-six who were retreating down the slope. The Israelites were paralyzed with fear at this turn of events, and their courage melted away.

⁶Joshua and the elders of Israel tore their clothing in dismay, threw dust on their heads, and bowed face down to the ground before the Ark of the LORD until evening.

⁷Then Joshua cried out, “Oh, Sovereign LORD, why did you bring us across the Jordan River if you are going to let the Amorites kill us? If only we had been content to stay on the other side!

⁸Lord, what can I say now that Israel has fled from its enemies?

⁹For when the Canaanites and all the other people living in the land hear about it, they will surround us and wipe our name off the face of the earth. And then what will happen to the honor of your great name?”

¹⁰But the LORD said to Joshua, “Get up! Why are you lying on your face like this?

¹¹Israel has sinned and broken my covenant! They have stolen some of the things that I commanded must be set apart for me. And they have not only stolen them but have lied about it and hidden the things among their own belongings.

¹²That is why the Israelites are running from their enemies in defeat. For now Israel itself has been set apart for destruction. I will not remain with you any longer unless you destroy the things among you that were set apart for destruction.

¹³“Get up! Command the people to purify themselves in preparation for tomorrow. For this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: Hidden among you, O Israel, are things set apart for the LORD. You will never defeat your enemies until you remove these things from among you.

¹⁴“In the morning you must present yourselves by tribes, and the LORD will point out the tribe to which the guilty man belongs. That tribe must come forward with its clans, and the LORD will point out the guilty clan. That clan will then come forward, and the LORD will point out the guilty family. Finally, each member of the guilty family must come forward one by one.

¹⁵The one who has stolen what was set apart for destruction will himself be burned with fire, along with everything he has, for he has broken the covenant of the LORD and has done a horrible thing in Israel.”

¹⁶Early the next morning Joshua brought the tribes of Israel before the LORD, and the tribe of Judah was singled out.

¹⁷Then the clans of Judah came forward, and the clan of Zerah was singled out. Then the families of Zerah came forward, and the family of Zimri was singled out.

¹⁸Every member of Zimri’s family was brought forward person by person, and Achan was singled out.

¹⁹Then Joshua said to Achan, “My son, give glory to the LORD, the God of Israel, by telling the truth. Make your confession and tell me what you have done. Don’t hide it from me.”

²⁰Achan replied, “It is true! I have sinned against the LORD, the God of Israel.

²¹Among the plunder I saw a beautiful robe from Babylon, 200 silver coins, and a bar of gold weighing more than a pound. I wanted them so much that I took them. They are hidden in the ground beneath my tent, with the silver buried deeper than the rest.”

²²So Joshua sent some men to make a search. They ran to the tent and found the stolen goods hidden there, just as Achan had said, with the silver buried beneath the rest.

²³They took the things from the tent and brought them to Joshua and all the Israelites. Then they laid them on the ground in the presence of the LORD.

²⁴Then Joshua and all the Israelites took Achan, the silver, the robe, the bar of gold, his sons, daughters, cattle, donkeys, sheep, goats, tent, and everything he had, and they brought them to the valley of Achor.

²⁵Then Joshua said to Achan, “Why have you brought trouble on us? The LORD will now bring trouble on you.” And all the Israelites stoned Achan and his family and burned their bodies.

²⁶They piled a great heap of stones over Achan, which remains to this day. That is why the place has been called the Valley of Trouble ever since. So the LORD was no longer angry.

¹When Ahaz, son of Jotham and grandson of Uzziah, was king of Judah, King Rezin of Syria and Pekah son of Remaliah, the king of Israel, set out to attack Jerusalem. However, they were unable to carry out their plan.

²The news had come to the royal court of Judah: “Syria is allied with Israel against us!” So the hearts of the king and his people trembled with fear, like trees shaking in a storm.

³Then the LORD said to Isaiah, “Take your son Shear-jashub and go out to meet King Ahaz. You will find him at the end of the aqueduct that feeds water into the upper pool, near the road leading to the field where cloth is washed.

⁴Tell him to stop worrying. Tell him he doesn’t need to fear the fierce anger of those two burned-out embers, King Rezin of Syria and Pekah son of Remaliah.

⁵Yes, the kings of Syria and Israel are plotting against him, saying,

⁶‘We will attack Judah and capture it for ourselves. Then we will install the son of Tabeel as Judah’s king.’

⁷But this is what the Sovereign LORD says: “This invasion will never happen; it will never take place;

⁸for Syria is no stronger than its capital, Damascus, and Damascus is no stronger than its king, Rezin. As for Israel, within sixty-five years it will be crushed and completely destroyed.

⁹Israel is no stronger than its capital, Samaria, and Samaria is no stronger than its king, Pekah son of Remaliah. Unless your faith is firm, I cannot make you stand firm.”

¹⁰Later, the LORD sent this message to King Ahaz:

¹¹“Ask the LORD your God for a sign of confirmation, Ahaz. Make it as difficult as you want — as high as heaven or as deep as the place of the dead. ”

¹²But the king refused. “No,” he said, “I will not test the LORD like that.”

¹³Then Isaiah said, “Listen well, you royal family of David! Isn’t it enough to exhaust human patience? Must you exhaust the patience of my God as well?

¹⁴All right then, the Lord himself will give you the sign. Look! The virgin will conceive a child! She will give birth to a son and will call him Immanuel (which means ‘God is with us’).

¹⁵By the time this child is old enough to choose what is right and reject what is wrong, he will be eating yogurt and honey.

¹⁶For before the child is that old, the lands of the two kings you fear so much will both be deserted.

¹⁷“Then the LORD will bring things on you, your nation, and your family unlike anything since Israel broke away from Judah. He will bring the king of Assyria upon you!”

¹⁸In that day the LORD will whistle for the army of southern Egypt and for the army of Assyria. They will swarm around you like flies and bees.

¹⁹They will come in vast hordes and settle in the fertile areas and also in the desolate valleys, caves, and thorny places.

²⁰In that day the Lord will hire a “razor” from beyond the Euphrates River — the king of Assyria — and use it to shave off everything: your land, your crops, and your people.

²¹In that day a farmer will be fortunate to have a cow and two sheep or goats left.

²²Nevertheless, there will be enough milk for everyone because so few people will be left in the land. They will eat their fill of yogurt and honey.

²³In that day the lush vineyards, now worth 1,000 pieces of silver, will become patches of briers and thorns.

²⁴The entire land will become a vast expanse of briers and thorns, a hunting ground overrun by wildlife.

²⁵No one will go to the fertile hillsides where the gardens once grew, for briers and thorns will cover them. Cattle, sheep, and goats will graze there.

¹Then the high priest asked Stephen, “Are these accusations true?”

²This was Stephen’s reply: “Brothers and fathers, listen to me. Our glorious God appeared to our ancestor Abraham in Mesopotamia before he settled in Haran.

³God told him, ‘Leave your native land and your relatives, and come into the land that I will show you.’

⁴So Abraham left the land of the Chaldeans and lived in Haran until his father died. Then God brought him here to the land where you now live.

⁵“But God gave him no inheritance here, not even one square foot of land. God did promise, however, that eventually the whole land would belong to Abraham and his descendants — even though he had no children yet.

⁶God also told him that his descendants would live in a foreign land, where they would be oppressed as slaves for 400 years.

⁷‘But I will punish the nation that enslaves them,’ God said, ‘and in the end they will come out and worship me here in this place.’

⁸“God also gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision at that time. So when Abraham became the father of Isaac, he circumcised him on the eighth day. And the practice was continued when Isaac became the father of Jacob, and when Jacob became the father of the twelve patriarchs of the Israelite nation.

⁹“These patriarchs were jealous of their brother Joseph, and they sold him to be a slave in Egypt. But God was with him

¹⁰and rescued him from all his troubles. And God gave him favor before Pharaoh, king of Egypt. God also gave Joseph unusual wisdom, so that Pharaoh appointed him governor over all of Egypt and put him in charge of the palace.

¹¹“But a famine came upon Egypt and Canaan. There was great misery, and our ancestors ran out of food.

¹²Jacob heard that there was still grain in Egypt, so he sent his sons — our ancestors — to buy some.

¹³The second time they went, Joseph revealed his identity to his brothers, and they were introduced to Pharaoh.

¹⁴Then Joseph sent for his father, Jacob, and all his relatives to come to Egypt, seventy-five persons in all.

¹⁵So Jacob went to Egypt. He died there, as did our ancestors.

¹⁶Their bodies were taken to Shechem and buried in the tomb Abraham had bought for a certain price from Hamor’s sons in Shechem.

¹⁷“As the time drew near when God would fulfill his promise to Abraham, the number of our people in Egypt greatly increased.

¹⁸But then a new king came to the throne of Egypt who knew nothing about Joseph.

¹⁹This king exploited our people and oppressed them, forcing parents to abandon their newborn babies so they would die.

²⁰“At that time Moses was born — a beautiful child in God’s eyes. His parents cared for him at home for three months.

²¹When they had to abandon him, Pharaoh’s daughter adopted him and raised him as her own son.

²²Moses was taught all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was powerful in both speech and action.

²³“One day when Moses was forty years old, he decided to visit his relatives, the people of Israel.

²⁴He saw an Egyptian mistreating an Israelite. So Moses came to the man’s defense and avenged him, killing the Egyptian.

²⁵Moses assumed his fellow Israelites would realize that God had sent him to rescue them, but they didn’t.

²⁶“The next day he visited them again and saw two men of Israel fighting. He tried to be a peacemaker. ‘Men,’ he said, ‘you are brothers. Why are you fighting each other?’

²⁷“But the man in the wrong pushed Moses aside. ‘Who made you a ruler and judge over us?’ he asked.

²⁸‘Are you going to kill me as you killed that Egyptian yesterday?’

²⁹When Moses heard that, he fled the country and lived as a foreigner in the land of Midian. There his two sons were born.

³⁰“Forty years later, in the desert near Mount Sinai, an angel appeared to Moses in the flame of a burning bush.

³¹When Moses saw it, he was amazed at the sight. As he went to take a closer look, the voice of the LORD called out to him,

³²‘I am the God of your ancestors — the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.’ Moses shook with terror and did not dare to look.

³³“Then the LORD said to him, ‘Take off your sandals, for you are standing on holy ground.

³⁴I have certainly seen the oppression of my people in Egypt. I have heard their groans and have come down to rescue them. Now go, for I am sending you back to Egypt.’

³⁵“So God sent back the same man his people had previously rejected when they demanded, ‘Who made you a ruler and judge over us?’ Through the angel who appeared to him in the burning bush, God sent Moses to be their ruler and savior.

³⁶And by means of many wonders and miraculous signs, he led them out of Egypt, through the Red Sea, and through the wilderness for forty years.

³⁷“Moses himself told the people of Israel, ‘God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from among your own people.’

³⁸Moses was with our ancestors, the assembly of God’s people in the wilderness, when the angel spoke to him at Mount Sinai. And there Moses received life-giving words to pass on to us.

³⁹“But our ancestors refused to listen to Moses. They rejected him and wanted to return to Egypt.

⁴⁰They told Aaron, ‘Make us some gods who can lead us, for we don’t know what has become of this Moses, who brought us out of Egypt.’

⁴¹So they made an idol shaped like a calf, and they sacrificed to it and celebrated over this thing they had made.

⁴²Then God turned away from them and abandoned them to serve the stars of heaven as their gods! In the book of the prophets it is written, ‘Was it to me you were bringing sacrifices and offerings during those forty years in the wilderness, Israel?

⁴³No, you carried your pagan gods — the shrine of Molech, the star of your god Rephan, and the images you made to worship them. So I will send you into exile as far away as Babylon.’

⁴⁴“Our ancestors carried the Tabernacle with them through the wilderness. It was constructed according to the plan God had shown to Moses.

⁴⁵Years later, when Joshua led our ancestors in battle against the nations that God drove out of this land, the Tabernacle was taken with them into their new territory. And it stayed there until the time of King David.

⁴⁶“David found favor with God and asked for the privilege of building a permanent Temple for the God of Jacob.

⁴⁷But it was Solomon who actually built it.

⁴⁸However, the Most High doesn’t live in temples made by human hands. As the prophet says,

⁴⁹‘Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. Could you build me a temple as good as that?’ asks the LORD. ‘Could you build me such a resting place?

⁵⁰Didn’t my hands make both heaven and earth?’

⁵¹“You stubborn people! You are heathen at heart and deaf to the truth. Must you forever resist the Holy Spirit? That’s what your ancestors did, and so do you!

⁵²Name one prophet your ancestors didn’t persecute! They even killed the ones who predicted the coming of the Righteous One — the Messiah whom you betrayed and murdered.

⁵³You deliberately disobeyed God’s law, even though you received it from the hands of angels.”

⁵⁴The Jewish leaders were infuriated by Stephen’s accusation, and they shook their fists at him in rage.

⁵⁵But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed steadily into heaven and saw the glory of God, and he saw Jesus standing in the place of honor at God’s right hand.

⁵⁶And he told them, “Look, I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing in the place of honor at God’s right hand!”

⁵⁷Then they put their hands over their ears and began shouting. They rushed at him

⁵⁸and dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. His accusers took off their coats and laid them at the feet of a young man named Saul.

⁵⁹As they stoned him, Stephen prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.”

⁶⁰He fell to his knees, shouting, “Lord, don’t charge them with this sin!” And with that, he died.