Acts 7:36-53

This man led them out, performing wonders and signs in the land of Egypt and in the Red Sea, and in the wilderness for forty years. This is the Moses who said to the sons of Israel, ‘God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your countrymen.’ This is the one who was in the assembly in the wilderness together with the angel who spoke to him at length on Mount Sinai, and who was with our fathers; and he received living words to pass on to you. Our fathers were unwilling to be obedient to him; on the contrary they rejected him and turned back to Egypt in their hearts, saying to Aaron, ‘Make us a god who will go before us; for this Moses who led us out of the land of Egypt—we do not know what happened to him.’ At that time they made a calf and brought a sacrifice to the idol, and were rejoicing in the works of their hands. But God turned away and gave them over to serve the heavenly lights; as it is written in the book of the prophets: ‘You did not offer Me victims and sacrifices for forty years in the wilderness, did you, house of Israel? You also took along the tabernacle of Moloch and the star of your god Rompha, the images which you made to worship. I also will deport you beyond Babylon.’ “Our fathers had the tabernacle of testimony in the wilderness, just as He who spoke to Moses directed him to make it according to the pattern which he had seen. Our fathers in turn received it, and they also brought it in with Joshua upon dispossessing the nations that God drove out from our fathers, until the time of David. David found favor in God’s sight, and asked that he might find a dwelling place for the house of Jacob. But it was Solomon who built a house for Him. However, the Most High does not dwell in houses made by human hands; as the prophet says: ‘Heaven is My throne, And the earth is the footstool of My feet; What kind of house will you build for Me?’ says the Lord, ‘Or what place is there for My rest? ‘Was it not My hand that made all these things?’ “You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are doing just as your fathers did. Which one of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? They killed those who had previously announced the coming of the Righteous One, and you have now become betrayers and murderers of Him; you who received the Law as ordained by angels, and yet did not keep it.”