David and the Holy Bread

21 ^[a]David came to Nob to the priest Ahimelech. Ahimelech came trembling to meet David and said to him, “Why are you alone and no one with you?”^{(A) 2} David said to the priest Ahimelech, “The king has charged me with a matter and said to me, ‘No one must know anything of the matter about which I send you and with which I have charged you.’ I have made an appointment^[b] with the young men for such and such a place. ³ Now then, what have you at hand? Give me five loaves of bread or whatever is here.” ⁴ The priest answered David, “I have no ordinary bread at hand, only holy bread—provided that the young men have kept themselves from women.”^{(B) 5} David answered the priest, “Indeed, women have been kept from us as always when I go on an expedition; the vessels of the young men are holy even when it is a common journey; how much more today will their vessels be holy?”^{(C) 6} So the priest gave him the holy bread, for there was no bread there except the bread of the Presence, which is removed from before the Lord, to be replaced by hot bread on the day it is taken away.^(D)

⁷ Now a certain man of the servants of Saul was there that day, detained before the Lord; his name was Doeg the Edomite, the chief of Saul’s shepherds.^(E)

⁸ David said to Ahimelech, “Is there no spear or sword here with you? I did not bring my sword or my weapons with me because the king’s business required haste.” ⁹ The priest said, “The sword of Goliath the Philistine, whom you killed in the valley of Elah, is here wrapped in a cloth behind the ephod; if you will take that, take it, for there is none here except that one.” David said, “There is none like it; give it to me.”^(F)

David Flees to Gath

¹⁰ David rose and fled that day from Saul; he went to King Achish of Gath. ¹¹ The servants of Achish said to him, “Is this not David the king of the land? Did they not sing to one another of him in dances,

¹² David took these words to heart and was very much afraid of King Achish of Gath.^{(H) 13} So he changed his behavior before them; he pretended to be mad when in their presence.^[c] He scratched marks on the doors of the gate and let his spittle run down his beard. ¹⁴ Achish said to his servants, “Look, you see the man is mad; why then have you brought him to me? ¹⁵ Do I lack madmen, that you have brought this fellow to play the madman in my presence? Shall this fellow come into my house?”

Paul and Barnabas in Antioch of Pisidia

¹³ Then Paul and his companions set sail from Paphos and came to Perga in Pamphylia. John, however, left them and returned to Jerusalem,^{(A) 14} but they went on from Perga and came to Antioch in Pisidia. And on the Sabbath day they went into the synagogue and sat down.^{(B) 15} After the reading of the Law and the Prophets, the officials of the synagogue sent them a message, saying, “Brothers,^[a] if you have any word of exhortation for the people, give it.” ¹⁶ So Paul stood up and with a gesture began to speak:

“Fellow Israelites^[b] and others who fear God, listen. ¹⁷ The God of this people Israel chose our ancestors and made the people great during their stay in the land of Egypt, and with uplifted arm he led them out of it.^{(C) 18} For about forty years he put up with^[c] them in the wilderness.^{(D) 19} After he had destroyed seven peoples in the land of Canaan, he gave them their land as an inheritance^{(E) 20} for about four hundred fifty years. After that he gave them judges until the time of the prophet Samuel.^{(F) 21} Then they asked for a king, and God gave them Saul son of Kish, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, who reigned for forty years.^{(G) 22} When he had removed him, he made David their king. In his testimony about him he said, ‘I have found David, son of Jesse, to be a man after my heart, who will carry out all my wishes.’^{(H) 23} Of this man’s posterity God has brought to Israel a Savior, Jesus, as he promised;^{(I) 24} before his coming John had already proclaimed a baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel.^{(J) 25} And as John was finishing his work, he said, ‘What do you suppose that I am? I am not he. No, but one is coming after me; I am not worthy to untie the strap of the sandals^[d] on his feet.’^(K)

A Multitude at the Seaside

⁷ Jesus departed with his disciples to the sea, and a great multitude from Galilee followed him;^{(A) 8} hearing all that he was doing, they came to him in great numbers from Judea, Jerusalem, Idumea, beyond the Jordan, and the region around Tyre and Sidon.^{(B) 9} He told his disciples to have a boat ready for him because of the crowd, so that they would not crush him, ¹⁰ for he had cured many, so that all who had diseases pressed upon him to touch him.^{(C) 11} Whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they fell down before him and shouted, “You are the Son of God!”^{(D) 12} But he sternly ordered them not to make him known.^(E)

Jesus Appoints the Twelve

¹³ He went up the mountain and called to him those whom he wanted, and they came to him.^{(F) 14} And he appointed twelve^[a] to be with him and to be sent out to preach ¹⁵ and to have authority to cast out demons. ¹⁶ So he appointed the twelve:^[b] Simon (to whom he gave the name Peter),^{(G) 17} James son of Zebedee and John the brother of James (to whom he gave the name Boanerges, that is, Sons of Thunder), ¹⁸ and Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Cananaean, ¹⁹ and Judas Iscariot, who handed him over.