Study Desk

not to all the people, but to witnesses--men previously chosen by God--namely, to us, who ate and drank with Him after He rose from the dead.

And He has commanded us to preach to the people and solemnly declare that this is He who has been appointed by God to be the Judge of the living and the dead.

For they heard them speaking in tongues and extolling the majesty of God. Then Peter said,

"But a voice answered, speaking a second time from the sky, "`What God has purified, you must not regard as unholy.'

"If therefore God gave them the same gift as He gave us when we first believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, why, who was I to be able to thwart God?"

This statement of Peter's silenced his opponents. They extolled the goodness of God, and said, "So, then, to the Gentiles also God has given the repentance which leads to Life."

On getting there he was delighted to see the grace which God had bestowed; and he encouraged them all to remain, with fixed resolve, faithful to the Lord.

So Peter was kept in prison; but long and fervent prayer was offered to God by the Church on his behalf.

and the assembled people kept shouting, "It is the voice of a god, and not of a man!"

Instantly an angel of the Lord struck him, because he had not given the glory to God, and being eaten up by worms, he died.

So Paul rose, and motioning with his hand for silence, said, "Israelites, and you others who fear God, pay attention to me.

The God of this people of Israel chose our forefathers, and made the people great during their stay in Egypt, until with wondrous power He brought them out from that land.

Next they asked for a king, and God gave them Saul the son of Kish, a Benjamite, who reigned forty years.

"It is from among David's descendants that God, in fulfilment of His promise, has raised up a Saviour for Israel, even Jesus.

"Brethren, descendants of the family of Abraham, and all among you who fear God, to us has this Message of salvation been sent.

"But God raised Him from the dead.

that God has amply fulfilled it to our children in raising up Jesus; as it is also written in the second Psalm, `Thou art My Son: to-day I have become Thy Father.'

But He whom God raised to life underwent no decay.

And, when the congregation had broken up, many of the Jews and of the devout converts from heathenism continued with Paul and Barnabas, who talked to them and urged them to hold fast to the grace of God.

We also are but men, with natures kindred to your own; and we bring you the Good News that you are to turn from these unreal things, to worship the ever-living God, the Creator of earth and sky and sea and of everything that is in them.