Acts 7

¹Then the high priest said, 'Are these things so?'

²And he said, 'Brothers and fathers, listen. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he settled in Haran,'

³and said to him, 'Go out from your land and from your kindred, and come into the land that I will show you.'

⁴Then having gone out from the land of the Chaldeans, he settled in Haran. And from there, after his father died, God made him move into this land in which you now dwell.

⁵Yet he gave him no inheritance in it, not even a foot's breadth, but promised to give it to him as a possession, and to his offspring after him, though he had no child.

⁶And God spoke to this effect: that his offspring would be sojourners in a foreign land, and they would enslave them and mistreat them for four hundred years.

⁷And the nation to which they will be enslaved I will judge, said God, and after these things they will come out and will worship me in this place.

⁸And he gave him the covenant of circumcision. And so Abraham became the father of Isaac, and circumcised him on the eighth day, and Isaac became the father of Jacob, and Jacob of the twelve patriarchs.

⁹And the patriarchs, moved by jealousy, sold Joseph into Egypt. But God was with him

¹⁰and rescued him from all his afflictions and gave him favor and wisdom before Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and he appointed him ruler over Egypt and over all his household.

¹¹Then a famine came over all the land of Egypt and Canaan, and great affliction, and our fathers could find no food.

¹²But when Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt, he sent our fathers out first.

¹³And on the second visit Joseph was made known to his brothers, and Joseph's family became known to Pharaoh.

¹⁴Then Joseph sent and summoned his father Jacob and all his kindred, seventy-five persons in all.

¹⁵And Jacob went down into Egypt, and he died, as did our fathers.

¹⁷Now as the time of the promise drew near that God had pledged to Abraham, the people increased and multiplied in Egypt

¹⁸until another king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph.

¹⁹He dealt treacherously with our race and mistreated our fathers by making them expose their infants so that they would not be kept alive.

²⁰At that very season Moses was born, and he was beautiful in God's sight. He was brought up for three months in his father's house.

²¹When he had been exposed, Pharaoh's daughter took him up and brought him up as her own son.

²²And Moses was educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was powerful in his words and deeds.

²³Now when he was forty years old, it arose in his heart to visit his brothers, the sons of Israel.

²⁴Seeing one of them being wronged, he came to his defense and struck down the Egyptian, avenging the one who was being oppressed.

²⁵He supposed that his brothers would understand that God was granting them deliverance through his hand, but they did not understand.

²⁶And on the following day he appeared to them as they were quarreling and tried to reconcile them to peace, saying, 'Men, you are brothers! Why do you wrong one another?'

²⁷But the one who was wronging his neighbor pushed him away, saying, 'Who appointed you as ruler and judge over us?'

²⁸'You do not want to do away with me the way you did away with the Egyptian yesterday, do you?'

²⁹At this word Moses fled and became a sojourner in the land of Midian, where he became the father of two sons.

³⁰And when forty years had passed, an angel appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai, in a flame of fire in a bush.

³¹And when Moses saw it, he marveled at the vision; and as he was approaching to look more closely, the voice of the Lord came to him:

³²'I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.' And Moses trembled and did not dare to look.

³³Then the Lord said to him, 'Take off the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.'

³⁴'I have surely seen the oppression of my people who are in Egypt, and I have heard their groanings, and I have come down to deliver them. And now, come, let me send you to Egypt.'

³⁵This Moses whom they rejected, saying, 'Who appointed you ruler and judge?' — this one God sent as both ruler and redeemer, by the hand of the angel who appeared to him in the bush.

³⁶This one led them out, performing wonders and signs in the land of Egypt and in the Red Sea and in the wilderness for forty years.

³⁷This is the Moses who said to the sons of Israel, 'The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers; you shall listen to him.'

³⁸This is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness, with the angel who was speaking to him at Mount Sinai, and with our fathers, who received living oracles to give to us.

³⁹Our fathers were unwilling to obey him, but thrust him aside, and in their hearts they turned back to Egypt,

⁴⁰saying to Aaron, 'Make us gods who will go before us, for this Moses who led us out of the land of Egypt — we do not know what has happened to him.'

⁴¹And they made a calf in those days and offered a sacrifice to the idol and were rejoicing in the works of their hands.

⁴²But God turned away and handed them over to worship the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the prophets: 'Did you offer slain beasts and sacrifices to me forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?

⁴³You took up the tent of Moloch and the star of your god Rephan, the images that you made to worship them. And I will remove you beyond Babylon.'

⁴⁴The tabernacle of testimony was among our fathers in the wilderness, just as he who was speaking to Moses had commanded him to make it according to the pattern that he had seen.

⁴⁵This our fathers in turn brought in with Joshua when they entered on the possession of the nations, whom God drove out from before the face of our fathers, until the days of David.

⁴⁷But it was Solomon who built a house for him.

⁴⁸Yet the Most High does not dwell in things made by hands, as the prophet says:

⁴⁹'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 is the place of my rest?'

⁵⁰Did not my hand make all these things?

⁵¹Stiff-necked and uncircumcised in hearts and ears, you yourselves always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.

⁵²Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? They killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, of whom you have now become the betrayers and murderers.

⁵³You who received the law by decrees of angels and did not keep it.

⁵⁴Now when they heard these things, they were cut to the heart and they were gnashing their teeth at him.

⁵⁵But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed intently into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.

⁵⁶He said, 'Look, I see the heavens opened up and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.'

⁵⁷Then they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and rushed upon him with one accord.

⁵⁸And they cast him out of the city and were stoning him. And the witnesses laid their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul.

⁵⁹And they were stoning Stephen as he called out and said, 'Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.'

⁶⁰Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, 'Lord, do not hold this sin against them.' And when he had said this, he fell asleep.