Acts 26:12–23

12 “1While so engaged aas I was journeying to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests,

13 at midday, O King, I saw on the way a light from heaven, 1brighter than the sun, shining all around me and those who were journeying with me.

14 “And when we had aall fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the 1bHebrew dialect, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me? 2It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’

15 “And I said, ‘Who are You, Lord?’ And the Lord said, ‘I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.

16 ‘But get up and astand on your feet; for this purpose I have appeared to you, to bappoint you a cminister and da witness not only to the things which you have 1seen, but also to the things in which I will appear to you;

17 arescuing you bfrom the Jewish people and from the Gentiles, to whom I am sending you,

18 to aopen their eyes so that they may turn from bdarkness to light and from the dominion of cSatan to God, that they may receive dforgiveness of sins and an einheritance among those who have been sanctified by ffaith in Me.’

19 “So, King Agrippa, I did not prove disobedient to the heavenly vision,

20 but kept declaring both ato those of Damascus first, and also bat Jerusalem and then throughout all the region of Judea, and even cto the Gentiles, that they should drepent and turn to God, performing deeds eappropriate to repentance.

21 “For this reason some Jews aseized me in the temple and tried bto put me to death.

22 “So, having obtained help from God, I stand to this day atestifying both to small and great, stating nothing but what bthe Prophets and Moses said was going to take place;

23 1athat 2the Christ was 3to suffer, and 1that bby reason of His resurrection from the dead He would be the first to proclaim clight both to the Jewish people and to the Gentiles.”