Acts 13:1-22 ▼

1 Now Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, Lucius from Cyrene, Manaen, who grew up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul were prophets and teachers in the church at Antioch.

2 While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, |Set Barnabas and Saul apart for me to do the work for which I called them.|

3 Then they fasted and prayed, laid their hands on them, and let them go.

4 After they had been sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went to Seleucia and from there sailed to Cyprus.

5 Arriving in Salamis, they began to preach God's word in the Jewish synagogues. They also had John to help them.

6 They went through the whole island as far as Paphos, where they found a Jewish occult practitioner and false prophet named Bar-jesus.

7 He was associated with the proconsul Sergius Paulus, who was an intelligent man. He sent for Barnabas and Saul because he wanted to hear the word of God.

8 But Elymas the occult practitioner (that is the meaning of his name) continued to oppose them and tried to turn the proconsul away from the faith.

9 But Saul, also known as Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked him straight in the eye

10 and said, |You're full of every form of deception and trickery, you son of the devil, you enemy of all that is right! You'll never stop perverting the straight ways of the Lord, will you?

11 The Lord is against you now, and you'll be blind and unable to see the sun for a while!| At that moment a dark mist came over him, and he went around looking for someone to lead him by the hand.

12 When the proconsul saw what had happened, he believed, because he was astonished at the Lord's teaching.

13 Then Paul and his men set sail from Paphos and arrived in Perga in Pamphylia, where John left them and went back to Jerusalem.

14 They left Perga and arrived in Antioch in Pisidia. On the Sabbath day, they went into the synagogue and sat down.

15 After the reading of the Law and the Prophets, the synagogue leaders asked them, |Brothers, if you have any message of encouragement for the people, you may speak.|

16 Then Paul stood up, motioned with his hand, and said: |Men of Israel and you who fear God, listen!

17 The God of this people Israel chose our ancestors and made them a great people during their stay in the land of Egypt, and with a public display of power he led them out of there.

18 After he had put up with them for 40 years in the wilderness,

19 he destroyed seven nations in the land of Canaan. Then God gave their land to the Israelis as an inheritance

20 for about 450 years. |After that, he gave them judges until the time of the prophet Samuel.

21 When they demanded a king, God gave them Kish's son Saul, from the tribe of Benjamin, for 40 years.

22 Then God removed Saul and made David their king, about whom he testified, 'I have found that David, the son of Jesse, is a man after my own heart, who will carry out all my wishes.'