The Uproar in Thessalonica

17 When they had traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews. ² According to his custom, Paul went in, and on three Sabbaths he lectured to them from the Scriptures, ³ explaining and proving that the Christ had to suffer and to rise from the dead, and saying, “This Jesus, whom I preach to you, is the Christ.” ⁴ Some of them were persuaded and joined with Paul and Silas, including a great crowd of devout Greeks and many leading women.

⁵ But the Jews who did not believe became jealous and, taking some evil men from the marketplace, gathered a crowd, stirred up the city, and attacked the house of Jason, trying to bring them out to the mob. ⁶ But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some brothers to the city officials, crying out, “These men who have turned the world upside down have come here also, ⁷ and Jason has received them. They are all acting contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus.” ⁸ They troubled the crowd and the city officials when they heard these things. ⁹ When they had taken a bail payment from Jason and the rest, they released them.

The Apostles in Berea

¹⁰ The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews. ¹¹ These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with all eagerness, daily examining the Scriptures, to find out if these things were so. ¹² Therefore many of them believed, including honorable Greek women and many Greek men.

¹³ But when the Jews of Thessalonica learned that the word of God was preached by Paul at Berea, they came there also, stirring up the crowds. ¹⁴ The brothers immediately sent Paul away to the sea. But Silas and Timothy remained there. ¹⁵ Those who escorted Paul brought him to Athens and departed with instructions for Silas and Timothy to come to him quickly.

Paul in Athens

¹⁶ While Paul waited for them in Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full of idols. ¹⁷ Therefore he disputed in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace daily with those who happened to there. ¹⁸ Then some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him. And some said, “What will this babbler say?” Others said, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods,” because he preached Jesus and the resurrection to them. ¹⁹ They took hold of him and led him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new doctrine is of which you speak? ²⁰ For you are bringing strange things to our ears. Therefore we want to know what these things mean.” ²¹ For all the Athenians and foreigners who lived there spent their time in nothing else, but either telling or hearing something new.

²² Then Paul stood in the middle of the Areopagus, and said: “Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious. ²³ For as I passed by and looked up at your objects of worship, I found an altar with this inscription:

TO THE UNKNOWN GOD.

Whom you therefore unknowingly worship, Him I proclaim to you.

²⁴ “God who made the world and all things in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by hands. ²⁵ Nor is He served by men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives all men life and breath and all things. ²⁶ He has made from one blood every nation of men to live on the entire face of the earth, having appointed fixed times and the boundaries of their habitation, ²⁷ that they should seek the Lord so perhaps they might reach for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us. ²⁸ ‘For in Him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are His offspring.’

²⁹ “Therefore since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to suppose that the Deity is like gold or silver or stone or an engraved work of art or an image of the reflection of man. ³⁰ God overlooked the times of ignorance, but now He commands all men everywhere to repent. ³¹ For He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by a Man whom He has appointed, having given assurance of this to all men by raising Him from the dead.”

³² When they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some scoffed. But others said, “We will hear you again concerning this matter.” ³³ So Paul departed from them. ³⁴ However, some men joined him and believed. Among them were Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris, and others with them.