The Acts 22
22
Paul Speaks to the People
1Paul said, “Brothers and fathers, listen to me! I will make my defense to you.” 2When the Jews heard him speaking the Jewish language,# Aramaic, the language of the Jews in the first century. they became very quiet. Paul said, 3“I am a Jew. I was born in Tarsus in the country of Cilicia. I grew up in this city. I was a student of Gamaliel.# A very important teacher of the Pharisees, a Jewish religious group (Acts 5:34). He carefully taught me everything about the law of our ancestors. I was very serious about serving God, just as are all of you here today. 4I hurt the people who followed the Way of Jesus. Some of them were even killed. I arrested men and women and put them in jail. 5The high priest and the whole council of Jewish elders can tell you that this is true. These leaders gave me letters to the Jewish brothers in Damascus. So I was going there to arrest these people and bring them back to Jerusalem to be punished.
6“But something happened to me on my way to Damascus. It was about noon when I came near Damascus. Suddenly a bright light from heaven flashed all around me. 7I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you doing things against me?’ 8I asked, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ The voice said, ‘I am Jesus from Nazareth. I am the One you are trying to hurt.’ 9The men who were with me did not understand the voice. But they saw the light. 10I said, ‘What shall I do, Lord?’ The Lord answered, ‘Get up and go to Damascus. There you will be told about all the things I have planned for you to do.’ 11I could not see, because the bright light had made me blind. So the men led me into Damascus.
12“There a man named Ananias came to me. He was a religious man; he obeyed the law of Moses. All the Jews who lived there respected him. 13Ananias came to me, stood by me, and said, ‘Brother Saul, see again!’ Immediately I was able to see him. 14Ananias told me, ‘The God of our fathers chose you long ago. He chose you to know his plan. He chose you to see the Righteous One and to hear words from him. 15You will be his witness to all people. You will tell them about the things you have seen and heard. 16Now, why wait any longer? Get up, be baptized, and wash your sins away. Do this, trusting in him to save you.’
17“Later, I returned to Jerusalem. I was praying in the Temple, and I saw a vision. 18I saw the Lord saying to me, ‘Hurry! Leave Jerusalem now! The people here will not accept the truth about me.’ 19But I said, ‘Lord, they know that in every synagogue I put the believers in jail and beat them. 20They also know that I was there when Stephen, your witness, was killed. I stood there and agreed that they should kill him. I even held the coats of the men who were killing him!’ 21But the Lord said to me, ‘Leave now. I will send you far away to the non-Jewish people.’”
22The crowd listened to Paul until he said this. Then they began shouting, “Get rid of him! A man like this doesn’t deserve to live!” 23They shouted and threw off their coats.# This showed that the Jews were very angry at Paul. They threw dust into the air.# This showed even greater anger.
24Then the commander ordered the soldiers to take Paul into the army building and beat him. The commander wanted to make Paul tell why the people were shouting against him like this. 25So the soldiers were tying him up, preparing to beat him. But Paul said to an officer there, “Do you have the right to beat a Roman citizen# Roman law said that Roman citizens must not be beaten before they had a trial. who has not been proven guilty?”
26When the officer heard this, he went to the commander and told him about it. The officer said, “Do you know what you are doing? This man is a Roman citizen!”
27The commander came to Paul and said, “Tell me, are you really a Roman citizen?”
He answered, “Yes.”
28The commander said, “I paid a lot of money to become a Roman citizen.”
But Paul said, “I was born a citizen.”
29The men who were preparing to question Paul moved away from him immediately. The commander was frightened because he had already tied Paul, and Paul was a Roman citizen.
Paul Speaks to Jewish Leaders
30The next day the commander decided to learn why the Jews were accusing Paul. So he ordered the leading priests and the Jewish council to meet. The commander took Paul’s chains off. Then he brought Paul out and stood him before their meeting.
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Copyright © 2015 by Tommy Nelson™, a Division of Thomas Nelson, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Acts 22
22
1-2a “My dear brothers and fathers, listen carefully to what I have to say before you jump to conclusions about me.” When they heard him speaking Hebrew, they grew even quieter. No one wanted to miss a word of this.
2b-3 He continued, “I am a good Jew, born in Tarsus in the province of Cilicia, but educated here in Jerusalem under the exacting eye of Rabbi Gamaliel, thoroughly instructed in our religious traditions. And I’ve always been passionately on God’s side, just as you are right now.
4-5“I went after anyone connected with this ‘Way,’ went at them with all my might, ready to kill for God. I rounded up men and women right and left and had them thrown in prison. You can ask the Chief Priest or anyone in the High Council to verify this; they all knew me well. Then I went off to our brothers in Damascus, armed with official documents authorizing me to hunt down the followers of Jesus there, arrest them, and bring them back to Jerusalem for sentencing.
6-7“As I arrived on the outskirts of Damascus about noon, a blinding light blazed out of the skies and I fell to the ground, dazed. I heard a voice: ‘Saul, Saul, why are you out to get me?’
8-9“‘Who are you, Master?’ I asked.
“He said, ‘I am Jesus the Nazarene, the One you’re hunting down.’ My companions saw the light, but they didn’t hear the conversation.
10-11“Then I said, ‘What do I do now, Master?’
“He said, ‘Get to your feet and enter Damascus. There you’ll be told everything that’s been set out for you to do.’ And so we entered Damascus, but nothing like the entrance I had planned—I was blind as a bat and my companions had to lead me in by the hand.
12-13“And that’s when I met Ananias, a man with a sterling reputation in observing our laws—the Jewish community in Damascus is unanimous on that score. He came and put his arm on my shoulder. ‘Look up,’ he said. I looked, and found myself looking right into his eyes—I could see again!
14-16“Then he said, ‘The God of our ancestors has handpicked you to be briefed on his plan of action. You’ve actually seen the Righteous Innocent and heard him speak. You are to be a key witness to everyone you meet of what you’ve seen and heard. So what are you waiting for? Get up and get yourself baptized, scrubbed clean of those sins and personally acquainted with God.’
17-18“Well, it happened just as Ananias said. After I was back in Jerusalem and praying one day in the Temple, lost in the presence of God, I saw him, saw God’s Righteous Innocent, and heard him say to me, ‘Hurry up! Get out of here as quickly as you can. None of the Jews here in Jerusalem are going to accept what you say about me.’
19-20“At first I objected: ‘Who has better credentials? They all know how obsessed I was with hunting out those who believed in you, beating them up in the meeting places and throwing them in jail. And when your witness Stephen was murdered, I was right there, holding the coats of the murderers and cheering them on. And now they see me totally converted. What better qualification could I have?’
21“But he said, ‘Don’t argue. Go. I’m sending you on a long journey to outsider non-Jews.’”
A Roman Citizen
22-25The people in the crowd had listened attentively up to this point, but now they broke loose, shouting out, “Kill him! He’s an insect! Stomp on him!” They shook their fists. They filled the air with curses. That’s when the captain intervened and ordered Paul taken into the barracks. By now the captain was thoroughly exasperated. He decided to interrogate Paul under torture in order to get to the bottom of this, to find out what he had done that provoked this outraged violence. As they spread-eagled him with strips of leather, getting him ready for the whip, Paul said to the centurion standing there, “Is this legal: torturing a Roman citizen without a fair trial?”
26When the centurion heard that, he went directly to the captain. “Do you realize what you’ve done? This man is a Roman citizen!”
27The captain came back and took charge. “Is what I hear right? You’re a Roman citizen?”
Paul said, “I certainly am.”
28The captain was impressed. “I paid a huge sum for my citizenship. How much did it cost you?”
“Nothing,” said Paul. “It cost me nothing. I was free from the day of my birth.”
29That put a stop to the interrogation. And it put the fear of God into the captain. He had put a Roman citizen in chains and come within a whisker of putting him under torture!
30The next day, determined to get to the root of the trouble and know for sure what was behind the Jewish accusation, the captain released Paul and ordered a meeting of the high priests and the High Council to see what they could make of it. Paul was led in and took his place before them.
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.