28 Once everyone was safe, we discovered that the island is called Malta. 2 And the people there showed incredible kindness to us as they welcomed us and lit a fire, as it started raining again and was very cold. 3 However when Paul was helping to pick up sticks and putting them on the fire, a viper was driven out by the heat and clamped its jaws down on his hand. 4 When the islanders saw the snake hanging from his hand they decided that he must be a murderer who had survived the shipwreck but now fate had finally decided his time was up. 5 However, Paul just shook the snake off into the fire and wasn’t harmed. 6 The locals were waiting for his arm to swell up or for him to fall down dead, but after a while when nothing happened they changed their minds and decided that instead, he must be a god.

7 The area that we had beached in belonged to the leader of the island named Publius. He welcomed us and looked after us for three days, 8 but while we were there, his father got sick with dysentery and fever. Paul went in and placing his hands on him, prayed for him and healed him. 9 As a result of that, anyone on the whole island who was sick came and was cured 10 and so the people brought us many gifts and when we left, they supplied us with provisions.