God

When the believers heard this, they lifted up their voices to God with one accord. “Sovereign Lord,” they said, “You made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them.

After they had prayed, their meeting place was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.

Did it not belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? How could you conceive such a deed in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God!”

But Peter and the other apostles replied, “We must obey God rather than men.

The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging Him on a tree.

God exalted Him to His right hand as Prince and Savior, in order to grant repentance and forgiveness of sins to Israel.

We are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey Him.”

But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop them. You may even find yourselves fighting against God.”

So the Twelve summoned all the disciples and said, “It is unacceptable for us to neglect the word of God in order to wait on tables.

So the word of God continued to spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem grew rapidly, and a great number of priests became obedient to the faith.

Then they prompted some men to say, “We heard Stephen speak words of blasphemy against Moses and against God.”

And Stephen declared: “Brothers and fathers, listen to me! The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham while he was still in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran,

and told him, ‘Leave your country and your kindred and go to the land I will show you.’

God told him that his descendants would be foreigners in a strange land, and that they would be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years.

‘But I will punish the nation that enslaves them,’ God said, ‘and afterward they will come forth and worship Me in this place.’

Because the patriarchs were jealous of Joseph, they sold him as a slave into Egypt. But God was with him

As the time drew near for God to fulfill His promise to Abraham, our people in Egypt increased greatly in number.

He assumed his brothers would understand that God was using him to deliver them, but they did not.

‘I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.’ Moses trembled with fear and did not dare to look.

I have indeed seen the oppression of My people in Egypt. I have heard their groaning and have come down to deliver them. Now come, I will send you back to Egypt.’

This Moses, whom they had rejected with the words, ‘Who made you ruler and judge?’ is the one whom God sent to be their ruler and redeemer through the angel who appeared to him in the bush.

This is the same Moses who told the Israelites, ‘God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers.’

But God turned away from them and gave them over to the worship of the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the prophets: ‘Did you bring Me sacrifices and offerings forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?

You have taken along the tabernacle of Molech and the star of your god Rephan, the idols you made to worship. Therefore I will send you into exile beyond Babylon.’

And our fathers who received it brought it in with Joshua when they dispossessed the nations God drove out before them. It remained until the time of David,