Acts 21:19

For God didn’t give us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and self-control.

Oh how great is your goodness, which you have laid up for those who fear you, which you have worked for those who take refuge in you, before the sons of men!

“If anyone comes to me, and doesn’t disregard his own father, mother, wife, children, brothers, and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he can’t be my disciple.

Then Paul answered, “What are you doing, weeping and breaking my heart? For I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.”

for a great and effective door has opened to me, and there are many adversaries.

not that we are sufficient of ourselves, to account anything as from ourselves; but our sufficiency is from God,

He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Most gladly therefore I will rather glory in my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may rest on me.

“He said to me, ‘Depart, for I will send you out far from here to the Gentiles.’”

Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the Good News of God,

for by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,

Now to him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us,

For it is God who works in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure.

If it happens, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace; and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king.

but the very hairs of your head are all numbered.

even as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word delivered them to us,

He said, ‘The God of our fathers has appointed you to know his will, and to see the Righteous One, and to hear a voice from his mouth.

Therefore I urge you, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service.

Now when I came to Troas for the Good News of Christ, and when a door was opened to me in the Lord,

praying together for us also, that God may open to us a door for the word, to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in bonds,

But the Lord stood by me and strengthened me, that through me the message might be fully proclaimed, and that all the Gentiles might hear. So I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion.

Then she said, “Please let the king remember Yahweh your God, that the avenger of blood destroy not any more, lest they destroy my son.” He said, “As Yahweh lives, not one hair of your son shall fall to the earth.”

Solomon said, “If he shows himself a worthy man, not a hair of his shall fall to the earth; but if wickedness is found in him, he shall die.”

“Go, gather together all the Jews who are present in Susa, and fast for me, and neither eat nor drink three days, night or day. I and my maidens will also fast the same way. Then I will go in to the king, which is against the law; and if I perish, I perish.”

You have delivered me from the strivings of the people. You have made me the head of the nations. A people whom I have not known shall serve me.

And not a hair of your head will perish.

For he was counted with us, and received his portion in this ministry.

to take part in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas fell away, that he might go to his own place.”

As they served the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, “Separate Barnabas and Saul for me, for the work to which I have called them.”

When they had arrived, and had gathered the assembly together, they reported all the things that God had done with them, and that he had opened a door of faith to the nations.

They, being sent on their way by the assembly, passed through both Phoenicia and Samaria, declaring the conversion of the Gentiles. They caused great joy to all the brothers.

testifying both to Jews and to Greeks repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus.

Agrippa said to Festus, “I also would like to hear the man myself.” “Tomorrow,” he said, “you shall hear him.”

delivering you from the people, and from the Gentiles, to whom I send you,

Therefore I beg you to take some food; for this is for your safety; for not a hair will perish from any of your heads.”

through whom we received grace and apostleship for obedience of faith among all the nations for his name’s sake;

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which will be revealed toward us.

Or hasn’t the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump to make one part a vessel for honor, and another for dishonor?

For I say through the grace that was given me, to every man who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think reasonably, as God has apportioned to each person a measure of faith.

For I will not dare to speak of any things except those which Christ worked through me, for the obedience of the Gentiles, by word and deed,

in the power of signs and wonders, in the power of God’s Spirit; so that from Jerusalem, and around as far as to Illyricum, I have fully preached the Good News of Christ;

Therefore also I was hindered these many times from coming to you,

Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Haven’t I seen Jesus Christ, our Lord? Aren’t you my work in the Lord?

Therefore seeing we have this ministry, even as we obtained mercy, we don’t faint.

We are therefore ambassadors on behalf of Christ, as though God were entreating by us: we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.

I have become foolish in boasting. You compelled me, for I ought to have been commended by you, for I am in no way inferior to the very best apostles, though I am nothing.

Paul, an apostle—not from men, nor through man, but through Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead—

and what is the exceeding greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to that working of the strength of his might

Yes most certainly, and I count all things to be a loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I suffered the loss of all things, and count them nothing but refuse, that I may gain Christ

Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect; but I press on, that I may take hold of that for which also I was taken hold of by Christ Jesus.

For I desire to have you know how greatly I struggle for you, and for those at Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh;

but in his own time revealed his word in the message with which I was entrusted according to the commandment of God our Savior;

Beloved, I beg you as foreigners and pilgrims, to abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;

“I know your works (behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one can shut), that you have a little power, and kept my word, and didn’t deny my name.

As clouds and wind without rain, so is he who boasts of gifts deceptively.

For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.

Now after these things had ended, Paul determined in the Spirit, when he had passed through Macedonia and Achaia, to go to Jerusalem, saying, “After I have been there, I must also see Rome.”

I ask then, did God reject his people? May it never be! For I also am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.

For I speak to you who are Gentiles. Since then as I am an apostle to Gentiles, I glorify my ministry;

For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s farming, God’s building.

For who makes you different? And what do you have that you didn’t receive? But if you did receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?

In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, you being gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ,

by which also you are saved, if you hold firmly the word which I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.

Not that I seek for the gift, but I seek for the fruit that increases to your account.

Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ, salutes you, always striving for you in his prayers, that you may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God.

to which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle—I am telling the truth in Christ, not lying—a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.

looking carefully lest there be any man who falls short of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and many be defiled by it,

He who reaps receives wages and gathers fruit to eternal life; that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together.

The people said to Saul, “Shall Jonathan die, who has worked this great salvation in Israel? Far from it! As Yahweh lives, there shall not one hair of his head fall to the ground; for he has worked with God today!” So the people rescued Jonathan, that he didn’t die.

He supposed that his brothers understood that God, by his hand, was giving them deliverance; but they didn’t understand.

But the Lord said to him, “Go your way, for he is my chosen vessel to bear my name before the nations and kings, and the children of Israel.

When they had come to Jerusalem, they were received by the assembly and the apostles and the elders, and they reported everything that God had done with them.

All the multitude kept silence, and they listened to Barnabas and Paul reporting what signs and wonders God had done among the nations through them.

But these things don’t count; nor do I hold my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to fully testify to the Good News of the grace of God.

When we had finished the voyage from Tyre, we arrived at Ptolemais. We greeted the brothers and stayed with them one day.

As Paul was about to be brought into the barracks, he asked the commanding officer, “May I speak to you?” He said, “Do you know Greek?

But arise, and stand on your feet, for I have appeared to you for this purpose: to appoint you a servant and a witness both of the things which you have seen, and of the things which I will reveal to you;

Now I don’t desire to have you unaware, brothers, that I often planned to come to you, and was hindered so far, that I might have some fruit among you also, even as among the rest of the Gentiles.

I planted. Apollos watered. But God gave the increase.

But by the grace of God I am what I am. His grace which was given to me was not futile, but I worked more than all of them; yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.

Working together, we entreat also that you do not receive the grace of God in vain,

Truly the signs of an apostle were worked among you in all perseverance, in signs and wonders and mighty works.

for he who worked through Peter in the apostleship with the circumcised also worked through me with the Gentiles—

for which I also labor, striving according to his working, which works in me mightily.