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The Acts of the Apostles 21

21 Then, after we said goodbye to the elders from Ephesus, we got back onto the ship and sailed directly to the island of Cos. There the ship stopped for the night. The next day we sailed in the ship from Cos to the island of Rhodes. There the ship stopped again. The day after that, we went to the town of Patara. The ship was going no farther than that. 2 At Patara we left that ship, but we learned that there was another ship that would be leaving soon and going to the region of Phoenicia. So we got on that ship, and it left. 3 Now as we traveled across the sea, we saw the island of Cyprus. We sailed to the south of that island. We continued sailing until we arrived at the city of Tyre in the province of Syria. The ship had to stay there for several days because its workers needed to unload the cargo.

4 But we learned where the believers in Tyre lived, so we went and stayed with them for seven days. God’s Spirit revealed to some of the believers that Paul would suffer if he went to Jerusalem. So they encouraged Paul not to go there. 5 But when it was time for the ship to leave again, we prepared to continue on our way to Jerusalem. When we left Tyre, all the men and their wives and children went with us to the edge of the sea. We all knelt down there on the sand and prayed. 6 Then we all said goodbye to each other. We who were traveling with Paul got onto the ship with him, and the other believers returned to where they lived in Tyre.

7 After we left Tyre, we continued on that ship to the city of Ptolemais. There were believers there, and we greeted them and stayed with them that night. 8 Then, on the next day, we left Ptolemais and sailed to the city of Caesarea. There we went to visit Philip. He had a reputation for telling others how to become disciples of Jesus. He was one of the seven men whom the believers in Jerusalem had chosen to take care of the widows. He invited us to stay in his home. 9 Now he had four daughters who were not married. Each of them frequently spoke messages that the Holy Spirit gave them.

10 And after we had been in Philip’s house for several days, a believer whose name was Agabus arrived in Caesarea from the district of Judea. He frequently spoke messages that the Holy Spirit gave him. 11 Coming over to where we were, he removed the belt from Paul’s waist. He tied his own feet and hands with it. Then he said, “The Holy Spirit says, ‘The Jewish leaders in Jerusalem will tie up the hands and feet of the owner of this belt like this. Then they will ask the non-Jewish people to arrest him as a criminal.’ ” 12 When the rest of us heard that, we and the other believers there pled with Paul, “Please do not go up to Jerusalem!” 13 But Paul replied, “Please stop crying and trying to discourage me from going! You should not cry, because I am willing to go to prison and also to die in Jerusalem because I serve the Lord Jesus.” 14 Then we realized that Paul was determined to go to Jerusalem. So we did not try any longer to stop him. We said, “May the Lord’s will be done!”

15 Then, after those days in Caesarea, we prepared our possessions and left to go by land to Jerusalem. 16 Now some of the believers from Caesarea also went with us. They took us to stay in the house of a man whose name was Mnason. He was from the island of Cyprus. He had believed in Jesus when people were first beginning to hear the message about him.

17 And when we arrived in Jerusalem, a group of the believers greeted us happily. 18 Then, the next day, Paul and the rest of us went to speak with James. He was the main leader of the group of believers in Jerusalem. All of the other leaders were also there. 19 So Paul greeted them, and then he told them all of the things that God had enabled him to do among the non-Jewish people. 20 And when they heard what God had done, James and the other elders thanked God. Then one of them said to Paul, “Brother, you know that there are very many thousands of us Jewish people who have believed in the Lord Jesus. You also know that we continue very carefully to obey the laws that Moses gave us. 21 But people have told our fellow Jewish believers that when you are with non-Jews, you tell the Jewish believers who live among them that they should stop obeying the laws of Moses. People say that you tell those Jewish believers not to circumcise their sons and not to practice our other customs. We do not believe that they are telling the truth about you. 22 But our fellow Jewish believers will surely learn that you have come here to Jerusalem. They will be angry with you because of what they have heard about you. So you need to do something to show them that what they have heard about you is not true. 23 So please do what we suggest to you. There are four men among us who have made a vow to God. 24 Go with these men to the temple courts and do the ceremonies that are necessary for you and for them to be able to worship in the temple. Then, when it is time for them to offer the sacrifices that they need to offer because they have made these vows, pay for what they offer. After that, they can shave their heads to show that they have done what they promised God they would do. When people see you in the courts of the temple with those men, they will know that what people have told them about you is not true. Instead, they will know that you obey all our Jewish laws. 25 Now as for the non-Jewish believers, we elders here in Jerusalem talked about which of our laws they should obey. We wrote them a letter telling them what we decided. We wrote that they should not eat meat that people have offered as a sacrifice to any idol. They should not eat any blood. They should not eat meat from animals that people have killed by strangling them. We also told them that they should not have sexual relations with someone to whom they are not married.” 26 Paul agreed to do what James and the other leaders asked him to do. The next day he took the four men and together they did the ceremonies that were necessary for them to worship in the temple. After that, Paul went to the temple courts and told the priests that these men had done everything they had promised God they would do. He told the priests that they just needed to offer the sacrifices that the law required. Paul kept going to the temple courts with the men until each one of them had offered the necessary sacrifices.

27 Now it took seven days for the ceremonies that allowed the men to return to their regular lives after their vows. Near the end of that time, some Jews from the province of Asia saw Paul in the temple courtyard. They were very upset with him, and they made many other Jews who were there upset with Paul as well. The Jews from Asia grabbed on to Paul. 28 They shouted, “Fellow Israelites, come and help us to punish this man! This is the one who is teaching people wherever he goes that the Jewish people are not special. He teaches people that they should no longer obey the laws of Moses and that they do not need to respect this temple. He has even brought non-Jews here into the court of our temple, causing this holy place to become polluted!” 29 They said these things because they had seen Paul walking around in Jerusalem with Trophimus. He was a non-Jew from Ephesus. The Jews did not permit non-Jews to be in certain parts of the temple courtyard. These Jews from the province of Asia thought that Paul had brought Trophimus into the temple courtyard that day. 30 People all over the city heard that there was trouble at the temple courtyard and they came running there. The crowd seized Paul and dragged him outside of the temple area. The temple guards quickly shut the gates to the temple courtyard so that the people could not do anything violent inside the temple area.

31 While they were trying to kill Paul, someone ran to the fortress near the temple and told the Roman commander that many people in Jerusalem were rioting at the temple. 32 The commander quickly gathered some officers and a large group of soldiers. They ran down the fortress steps to the temple area where the crowd was. When the crowd of people who were yelling at Paul and beating him saw the commander and the soldiers coming, they stopped beating him.

33 Then the commander came to where Paul was and took hold of him. He commanded soldiers to fasten a chain to each of Paul’s arms. Then he asked the people in the crowd, “Who is this man, and what has he done?” 34 But some of the many people there were shouting one thing and some were shouting something else. And because the situation was so confused, the commander could not find out who Paul was. So he commanded that Paul be taken into the fortress that was connected with the temple court so that he could question him there. 35 The soldiers led Paul to the steps of the fortress. But many people followed them, still trying to kill Paul. So the commander told the soldiers to carry Paul up the steps into the fortress. 36 The commander knew that Paul was in danger because the crowd that was following the soldiers kept shouting, “Kill him! Kill him!”

37 And as the soldiers were about to bring Paul into the fortress, he said in Greek to the commander, “May I speak with you?” And the commander said, “I am surprised that you can speak Greek! 38 That must mean that you are that man from Egypt who rebelled against the Roman government not long ago. He took 4,000 violent men with him out into the desert so that we could not catch him.” 39 Paul said in reply, “I am a Jew. I was born in Tarsus, which is an important city in the province of Cilicia. I request that you let me speak to the people.” 40 Then the commander permitted Paul to speak. So Paul stood on the steps that led up to the fortress. He motioned with his hand for the crowd to be quiet. And after the people in the crowd became very quiet, Paul spoke to them in their own Hebrew language.

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