Daily Text and Bible Reading: Sunday, November 24 [Press play below]

17.1 They now traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia and came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews.
17.2 So according to Paul’s custom he went inside to them, and for three sabbaths he reasoned with them from the Scriptures,
17.3 explaining and proving by references that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead, saying: “This is the Christ, this Jesus whom I am proclaiming to you.”
17.4 As a result, some of them became believers and associated themselves with Paul and Silas, and so did a great multitude of the Greeks who worshipped God, along with quite a few of the principal women.
17.5 But the Jews, getting jealous, gathered together some wicked men who were loitering at the marketplace and formed a mob and proceeded to throw the city into an uproar. They assaulted the house of Jason and were seeking to have Paul and Silas brought out to the mob.
17.6 When they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brothers to the city rulers, crying out: “These men who have overturned the inhabited earth are present here also,
17.7 and Jason has received them as his guests. All these men act in opposition to the decrees of Caesar, saying there is another king, Jesus.”
17.8 When they heard these things, the crowd and the city rulers were alarmed;
17.9 and after taking sufficient security from Jason and the others, they let them go.
17.10 Immediately by night the brothers sent both Paul and Silas to Beroea. On arriving, they went into the synagogue of the Jews.
17.11 Now these were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they accepted the word with the greatest eagerness of mind, carefully examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so.
17.12 Therefore, many of them became believers, and so did quite a few of the reputable Greek women as well as some of the men.
17.13 But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the word of God was also being proclaimed by Paul in Beroea, they came there to incite and agitate the crowds.
17.14 Then the brothers immediately sent Paul away to the sea, but both Silas and Timothy remained behind there.
17.15 However, those accompanying Paul brought him as far as Athens, and they departed after receiving instructions that Silas and Timothy should come to Paul as quickly as possible.
17.16 Now while Paul was waiting for them in Athens, his spirit within him became irritated on seeing that the city was full of idols.
17.17 So he began to reason in the synagogue with the Jews and the other people who worshipped God and every day in the marketplace with those who happened to be on hand.
17.18 But some of both the Epicurean and the Stoic philosophers began disputing with him, and some were saying: “What is it this chatterer would like to tell?” Others: “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign deities.” This was because he was declaring the good news of Jesus and the resurrection.
17.19 So they took hold of him and led him to the Areopagus, saying: “Can we get to know what this new teaching is that you are speaking about?
17.20 For you are introducing some things that are strange to our ears, and we want to know what these things mean.”
17.21 In fact, all Athenians and the foreigners staying there would spend their leisure time doing nothing else but telling or listening to something new.
17.22 Paul now stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said: “Men of Athens, I see that in all things you seem to be more given to the fear of the deities than others are.
17.23 For instance, while passing along and carefully observing your objects of veneration, I found even an altar on which had been inscribed ‘To an Unknown God.’ Therefore, what you are unknowingly worshipping, this I am declaring to you.
17.24 The God who made the world and all the things in it, being, as he is, Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in handmade temples;
17.25 nor is he served by human hands as if he needed anything, because he himself gives to all people life and breath and all things.
17.26 And he made out of one man every nation of men to dwell on the entire surface of the earth, and he decreed the appointed times and the set limits of where men would dwell,
17.27 so that they would seek God, if they might grope for him and really find him, although, in fact, he is not far off from each one of us.
17.28 For by him we have life and move and exist, even as some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also his children.’
17.29 “Therefore, since we are the children of God, we should not think that the Divine Being is like gold or silver or stone, like something sculptured by the art and design of humans.
17.30 True, God has overlooked the times of such ignorance; but now he is declaring to all people everywhere that they should repent.
17.31 Because he has set a day on which he purposes to judge the inhabited earth in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, and he has provided a guarantee to all men by resurrecting him from the dead.”
17.32 Now when they heard of a resurrection of the dead, some began to scoff, while others said: “We will hear you again about this.”
17.33 So Paul left them,
17.34 but some men joined him and became believers. Among them were Dionysius, who was a judge of the court of the Areopagus, and a woman named Damaris, and others besides them.
18.1 After this he departed from Athens and came to Corinth.
18.2 And he found a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus who had recently come from Italy with Priscilla his wife, because Claudius had ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. So he went to them,
18.3 and because he had the same trade, he stayed at their home and worked with them, for they were tentmakers by trade.
18.4 He would give a talk in the synagogue every sabbath and would persuade Jews and Greeks.
18.5 When, now, both Silas and Timothy came down from Macedonia, Paul began to be intensely occupied with the word, witnessing to the Jews to prove that Jesus is the Christ.
18.6 But after they kept on opposing him and speaking abusively, he shook out his garments and said to them: “Let your blood be on your own heads. I am clean. From now on I will go to people of the nations.”
18.7 So he transferred from there and went into the house of a man named Titius Justus, a worshipper of God, whose house adjoined the synagogue.
18.8 But Crispus, the presiding officer of the synagogue, became a believer in the Lord, along with all his household. And many of the Corinthians who heard began to believe and be baptized.
18.9 Moreover, the Lord said to Paul in a vision by night: “Do not be afraid, but keep on speaking and do not keep silent,
18.10 for I am with you and no man will assault you to harm you; for I have many people in this city.”
18.11 So he stayed there for a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them.
18.12 While Gallio was proconsul of Achaia, the Jews made a concerted attack against Paul and led him to the judgment seat,
18.13 saying: “This man is persuading people to worship God in a way contrary to the law.”
18.14 But as Paul was about to speak, Gallio said to the Jews: “If, indeed, it were some wrong or a serious crime, O Jews, it would be reasonable for me to hear you out patiently.
18.15 But if it is controversies over speech and names and your own law, you yourselves must see to it. I do not wish to be a judge of these things.”
18.16 With that he drove them away from the judgment seat.
18.17 So they all seized Sosthenes, the presiding officer of the synagogue, and began beating him in front of the judgment seat. But Gallio would not get involved at all with these things.
18.18 However, after staying quite a few days longer, Paul said good-bye to the brothers and sailed away for Syria, accompanied by Priscilla and Aquila. He had his hair clipped short in Cenchreae, for he had made a vow.
18.19 So they arrived at Ephesus, and he left them there; but he entered the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews.
18.20 Although they kept requesting him to stay longer, he would not consent
18.21 but said good-bye and told them: “I will return to you again, if Jehovah is willing.” And he put out to sea from Ephesus
18.22 and came down to Caesarea. And he went up and greeted the congregation and then went down to Antioch.
18.23 After spending some time there, he departed and went from place to place through the country of Galatia and Phrygia, strengthening all the disciples.
18.24 Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, arrived in Ephesus; he was an eloquent man who was well-versed in the Scriptures.
18.25 This man had been instructed in the way of Jehovah, and aglow with the spirit, he was speaking and teaching accurately the things about Jesus, but he was acquainted only with the baptism of John.
18.26 He began to speak boldly in the synagogue, and when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him into their company and explained the way of God more accurately to him.
18.27 Further, because he wanted to go across to Achaia, the brothers wrote to the disciples, urging them to receive him kindly. So when he got there, he greatly helped those who through God’s undeserved kindness had become believers;
18.28 for publicly and with great intensity he thoroughly proved the Jews to be wrong, showing them from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ.
19.1 In the course of events, while Apollos was in Corinth, Paul went through the inland regions and came down to Ephesus. There he found some disciples
19.2 and said to them: “Did you receive holy spirit when you became believers?” They replied to him: “Why, we have never heard that there is a holy spirit.”
19.3 So he said: “In what, then, were you baptized?” They said: “In John’s baptism.”
19.4 Paul said: “John baptized with the baptism in symbol of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus.”
19.5 On hearing this, they got baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
19.6 And when Paul laid his hands on them, the holy spirit came upon them, and they began speaking in foreign languages and prophesying.
19.7 There were about 12 men in all.
19.8 Entering the synagogue, for three months he spoke with boldness, giving talks and reasoning persuasively about the Kingdom of God.
19.9 But when some stubbornly refused to believe, speaking injuriously about The Way before the crowd, he withdrew from them and separated the disciples from them, giving talks daily in the school auditorium of Tyrannus.
19.10 This went on for two years, so that all those living in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks.
19.11 And God kept performing extraordinary powerful works through the hands of Paul,
19.12 so that even cloths and aprons that had touched his body were carried to the sick, and the diseases left them, and the wicked spirits came out.
19.13 But some of the Jews who traveled around casting out demons also tried to use the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had wicked spirits; they would say: “I solemnly charge you by Jesus whom Paul preaches.”
19.14 Now there were seven sons of a Jewish chief priest named Sceva doing this.
19.15 But in answer the wicked spirit said to them: “I know Jesus and I am acquainted with Paul; but who are you?”
19.16 At that the man with the wicked spirit leaped on them, overpowered them one after the other, and prevailed against them, so that they fled naked and wounded out of that house.
19.17 This became known to all, both the Jews and the Greeks who lived in Ephesus; and fear fell upon them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus went on being magnified.
19.18 And many of those who had become believers would come and confess and report their practices openly.
19.19 Indeed, quite a number of those who practiced magical arts brought their books together and burned them up before everybody. And they calculated their value and found them worth 50,000 pieces of silver.
19.20 Thus in a mighty way, the word of Jehovah kept growing and prevailing.
19.21 After these things had taken place, Paul resolved in his spirit that after going through Macedonia and Achaia, he would travel to Jerusalem. He said: “After going there, I must also see Rome.”
19.22 So he sent to Macedonia two of those who ministered to him, Timothy and Erastus, but he himself stayed on for some time in the province of Asia.
19.23 At that time quite a disturbance arose concerning The Way.
19.24 For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought considerable profit to the craftsmen.
19.25 He gathered them and others who worked at such things and said: “Men, you well know that from this business comes our prosperity.
19.26 Now you see and hear how, not only in Ephesus but in nearly all the province of Asia, this Paul has persuaded a considerable crowd and turned them to another opinion, saying that the gods made by hands are not really gods.
19.27 Moreover, the danger exists not only that this business of ours will come into disrepute but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis will be viewed as nothing, and she who is worshipped in the whole province of Asia and the inhabited earth will be deprived of her magnificence.”
19.28 Hearing this and becoming full of anger, the men began crying out: “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”
19.29 So the city became filled with confusion, and all together they rushed into the theater, dragging along with them Gaius and Aristarchus, Macedonians, traveling companions of Paul.
19.30 For his part, Paul was willing to go inside to the people, but the disciples would not permit him.
19.31 Even some of the commissioners of festivals and games who were friendly to him sent word to him, pleading with him not to risk going into the theater.
19.32 Some were, in fact, crying out one thing and others something else; for the assembly was in confusion and the majority of them did not know the reason why they had come together.
19.33 So they brought Alexander out of the crowd, the Jews shoving him forward, and Alexander motioned with his hand and wanted to make his defense to the people.
19.34 But when they recognized that he was a Jew, they all started shouting in unison for about two hours: “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”
19.35 When the city recorder had finally quieted the crowd, he said: “Men of Ephesus, who really is there among men who does not know that the city of the Ephesians is the temple keeper of the great Artemis and of the image that fell from heaven?
19.36 Since these things are indisputable, you should keep calm and not act rashly.
19.37 For you have brought these men here who are neither robbers of temples nor blasphemers of our goddess.
19.38 So if Demetrius and the craftsmen with him do have a case against someone, court days are held and there are proconsuls; let them bring charges against one another.
19.39 But if you are searching for anything beyond that, it must be decided in a regular assembly.
19.40 For we are really in danger of being charged with sedition over today’s affair, since there are no grounds we could present as a reason for this disorderly mob.”
19.41 And after saying this, he dismissed the assembly.