²When the mob heard him speak to them in Hebrew, they became even more quiet. Then Paul continued, ³“I’m a Jew. I was born and raised in the city of Tarsus in Cilicia and received my education from Gamaliel here in Jerusalem. My education was in the strict laws handed down by our ancestors. I was as devoted to God as all of you are today. ⁴I persecuted people who followed the way ⸤of Christ⸥: I tied up men and women and put them into prison until they were executed. ⁵The chief priest and the entire council of our leaders can prove that I did this. In fact, they even gave me letters to take to the Jewish community in the city of Damascus. I was going there to tie up believers and bring them back to Jerusalem to punish them.

⁶“But as I was on my way and approaching the city of Damascus about noon, a bright light from heaven suddenly flashed around me. ⁷I fell to the ground and heard a voice asking me, ‘Saul! Saul! Why are you persecuting me?’

⁸“I answered, ‘Who are you, sir?’

“The person told me, ‘I’m Jesus from Nazareth, the one you’re persecuting.’

⁹“The men who were with me saw the light but didn’t understand what the person who was speaking to me said.

¹⁰“Then I asked, ‘What do you want me to do, Lord?’

“The Lord told me, ‘Get up! Go into the city of Damascus, and you’ll be told everything I’ve arranged for you to do.’

¹¹“I was blind because the light had been so bright. So the men who were with me led me into the city of Damascus.

¹²“A man named Ananias lived in Damascus. He was a devout person who followed Moses’ Teachings. All the Jews living in Damascus spoke highly of him. ¹³He came to me, stood beside me, and said, ‘Brother Saul, receive your sight!’ At that moment my sight came back and I could see Ananias.

¹⁴“Ananias said, ‘The God of our ancestors has chosen you to know his will, to see the one who has God’s approval, and to hear him speak to you. ¹⁵You will be his witness and will tell everyone what you have seen and heard. ¹⁶What are you waiting for now? Get up! Be baptized, and have your sins washed away as you call on his name.’

¹⁷“After that, I returned to Jerusalem. While I was praying in the temple courtyard, I fell into a trance ¹⁸and saw the Lord. He told me, ‘Hurry! Get out of Jerusalem immediately. The people here won’t accept your testimony about me.’

¹⁹“I said, ‘Lord, people here know that I went from synagogue to synagogue to imprison and whip those who believe in you. ²⁰When Stephen, who witnessed about you, was being killed, I was standing there. I approved of his death and guarded the coats of those who were murdering him.’

²¹“But the Lord told me, ‘Go! I’ll send you on a mission. You’ll go far away to people who aren’t Jewish.’ ”

²²Up to that point the mob listened. Then they began to shout, “Kill him! The world doesn’t need a man like this. He shouldn’t have been allowed to live this long!”

²³The mob was yelling, taking off their coats, and throwing dirt into the air. ²⁴So the officer ordered the soldiers to take Paul into the barracks and told them to question Paul as they whipped him. The officer wanted to find out why the people were yelling at Paul like this. ²⁵But when the soldiers had Paul stretch out ⸤to tie him to the whipping post⸥ with the straps, Paul asked the sergeant who was standing there, “Is it legal for you to whip a Roman citizen who hasn’t had a trial?”

²⁶When the sergeant heard this, he reported it to his commanding officer. The sergeant asked him, “What are you doing? This man is a Roman citizen.”

²⁷The officer went to Paul and asked him, “Tell me, are you a Roman citizen?”

Paul answered, “Yes.”

²⁸The officer replied, “I paid a lot of money to become a Roman citizen.”

Paul replied, “But I was born a Roman citizen.”

²⁹Immediately, the soldiers who were going to question Paul stepped away from him. The officer was afraid when he found out that he had tied up a Roman citizen.

Paul in Front of the Jewish Council

³⁰The officer wanted to find out exactly what accusation the Jews had against Paul. So the officer released Paul the next day and ordered the chief priests and the entire Jewish council to meet. Then the officer brought Paul and had him stand in front of them.

23RD CHAPTER

¹Paul stared at the Jewish council and said, “Brothers, my relationship with God has always given me a perfectly clear conscience.”

²The chief priest Ananias ordered the men standing near Paul to strike him on the mouth. ³Then Paul said to him, “God will strike you, you hypocrite! You sit there and judge me by Moses’ Teachings and yet you break those teachings by ordering these men to strike me!”

⁴The men standing near Paul said to him, “You’re insulting God’s chief priest!”

⁵Paul answered, “Brothers, I didn’t know that he is the chief priest. After all, Scripture says, ‘Don’t speak evil about a ruler of your people.’ ”

⁶When Paul saw that some of them were Sadducees and others were Pharisees, he shouted in the council, “Brothers, I’m a Pharisee and a descendant of Pharisees. I’m on trial because I expect that the dead will come back to life.”

⁷After Paul said that, the Pharisees and Sadducees began to quarrel, and the men in the meeting were divided. ⁸(The Sadducees say that the dead won’t come back to life and that angels and spirits don’t exist. The Pharisees believe in all these things.) ⁹The shouting became very loud. Some of the experts in Moses’ Teachings were Pharisees who argued their position forcefully. They said, “We don’t find anything wrong with this man. Maybe a spirit or an angel actually spoke to him!”

¹⁰The quarrel was becoming violent, and the officer was afraid that they would tear Paul to pieces. So the officer ordered his soldiers to drag Paul back to the barracks.

¹¹The Lord stood near Paul the next night and said to him, “Don’t lose your courage! You’ve told the truth about me in Jerusalem. Now you must tell the truth about me in Rome.”

Some Jews Plot to Kill Paul

¹²In the morning the Jews formed a conspiracy. They asked God to curse them if they ate or drank anything before they had killed Paul. ¹³More than forty men took part in this plot.

¹⁴They went to the chief priests and leaders ⸤of the people⸥ and said, “We’ve asked God to curse us if we taste any food before we’ve killed Paul. ¹⁵Here’s our plan: You and the council must go to the Roman officer on the pretext that you need more information from Paul. You have to make it look as though you want to get more accurate information about him. We’ll be ready to kill him before he gets to you.”

¹⁶But Paul’s nephew heard about the ambush. He entered the barracks and told Paul. ¹⁷Then Paul called one of the sergeants and told him, “Take this young man to the officer. He has something to tell him.”

¹⁸The sergeant took the young man to the officer and said, “The prisoner Paul called me. He asked me to bring this young man to you because he has something to tell you.”

¹⁹The officer took the young man by the arm, went where they could be alone, and asked him, “What do you have to tell me?”

²⁰The young man answered, “The Jews have planned to ask you to bring Paul to the Jewish council tomorrow. They’re going to make it look as though they want more accurate information about him. ²¹Don’t let them persuade you to do this. More than forty of them are planning to ambush him. They have asked God to curse them if they eat or drink anything before they have murdered him. They are ready now and are expecting you to promise ⸤that you will bring Paul⸥.”

²²The officer dismissed the young man and ordered him not to tell this information to anyone else.

²³Then the officer summoned two of his sergeants and told them, “I want 200 infantrymen, 70 soldiers on horseback, and 200 soldiers with spears. Have them ready to go to Caesarea at nine o’clock tonight. ²⁴Provide an animal for Paul to ride, and take him safely to Governor Felix.” ²⁵The officer wrote a letter to the governor with the following message:

²⁶Claudius Lysias sends greetings to Your Excellency, Governor Felix:

²⁷The Jews had seized this man and were going to murder him. When I found out that he was a Roman citizen, I went with my soldiers to rescue him. ²⁸I wanted to know what they had against him. So I took him to their Jewish council ²⁹and found their accusations had to do with disputes about their own laws. He wasn’t accused of anything for which he deserved to die or to be put into prison. ³⁰Since I was informed that there was a plot against this man, I immediately sent him to you. I have also ordered his accusers to state their case against him in front of you.

³¹So the infantrymen did as they had been ordered. They took Paul to the city of Antipatris during the night. ³²They returned to their barracks the next day and let the soldiers on horseback travel with Paul. ³³When the soldiers arrived in the city of Caesarea with Paul, they delivered the letter to the governor and handed Paul over to him.

³⁴After the governor had read the letter, he asked Paul which province he was from. When he found out that Paul was from the province of Cilicia, ³⁵he said, “I’ll hear your case when your accusers arrive.” Then the governor gave orders to keep Paul under guard in Herod’s palace.

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