Acts of the Apostles 11

¹ The apostles and the brothers in Judaea heard that the pagans too had accepted the word of God,

² and when Peter came up to Jerusalem the Jews criticised him

³ and said, ‘So you have been visiting the uncircumcised and eating with them, have you?’

⁴ Peter in reply gave them the details point by point:

⁵ ‘One day, when I was in the town of Jaffa,’ he began ‘I fell into a trance as I was praying and had a vision of something like a big sheet being let down from heaven by its four corners. This sheet reached the ground quite close to me.

⁶ I watched it intently and saw all sorts of animals and wild beasts – everything possible that could walk, crawl or fly.

⁷ Then I heard a voice that said to me, “Now, Peter; kill and eat!”

⁸ But I answered: Certainly not, Lord; nothing profane or unclean has ever crossed my lips.

⁹ And a second time the voice spoke from heaven, “What God has made clean, you have no right to call profane”.

¹⁰ This was repeated three times, before the whole of it was drawn up to heaven again.

¹¹ Just at that moment, three men stopped outside the house where we were staying; they had been sent from Caesarea to fetch me,

¹² and the Spirit told me to have no hesitation about going back with them. The six brothers here came with me as well, and we entered the man’s house.

¹³ He told us he had seen an angel standing in his house who said, “Send to Jaffa and fetch Simon known as Peter;

¹⁴ he has a message for you that will save you and your entire household”.

¹⁵ I had scarcely begun to speak when the Holy Spirit came down on them in the same way as it came on us at the beginning,

¹⁶ and I remembered that the Lord had said, “John baptised with water, but you will be baptised with the Holy Spirit”.

¹⁷ I realised then that God was giving them the identical thing he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ; and who was I to stand in God’s way?’

¹⁸ This account satisfied them, and they gave glory to God. ‘God’ they said ‘can evidently grant even the pagans the repentance that leads to life.’

¹⁹ Those who had escaped during the persecution that happened because of Stephen travelled as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch,[*a] but they usually proclaimed the message only to Jews.

²⁰ Some of them, however, who came from Cyprus and Cyrene, went to Antioch where they started preaching to the Greeks, proclaiming the Good News of the Lord Jesus to them as well.

²¹ The Lord helped them, and a great number believed and were converted to the Lord.

²² The church in Jerusalem heard about this and they sent Barnabas to Antioch.

²³ There he could see for himself that God had given grace, and this pleased him, and he urged them all to remain faithful to the Lord with heartfelt devotion;

²⁴ for he was a good man, filled with the Holy Spirit and with faith. And a large number of people were won over to the Lord.

²⁵ Barnabas then left for Tarsus to look for Saul,

²⁶ and when he found him he brought him to Antioch. As things turned out they were to live together in that church a whole year, instructing a large number of people. It was at Antioch that the disciples were first called ‘Christians’.

²⁷ While they were there some prophets[*b] came down to Antioch from Jerusalem,

²⁸ and one of them whose name was Agabus, seized by the Spirit, stood up and predicted that a famine would spread over the whole empire. This in fact happened before the reign of Claudius came to an end.[*c]

²⁹ The disciples decided to send relief, each to contribute what he could afford, to the brothers living in Judaea.

³⁰ They did this and delivered their contributions to the elders in the care of Barnabas and Saul.