Peter Freed from Prison

⁵ Peter was therefore kept in prison, but ^[a]constant prayer was offered to God for him by the church. ⁶ And when Herod was about to bring him out, that night Peter was sleeping, bound with two chains between two soldiers; and the guards before the door were ^[b]keeping the prison. ⁷ Now behold, ^(A)an angel of the Lord stood by him, and a light shone in the prison; and he struck Peter on the side and raised him up, saying, “Arise quickly!” And his chains fell off his hands. ⁸ Then the angel said to him, “Gird yourself and tie on your sandals”; and so he did. And he said to him, “Put on your garment and follow me.” ⁹ So he went out and followed him, and ^(B)did not know that what was done by the angel was real, but thought ^(C)he was seeing a vision. ¹⁰ When they were past the first and the second guard posts, they came to the iron gate that leads to the city, ^(D)which opened to them of its own accord; and they went out and went down one street, and immediately the angel departed from him.

¹¹ And when Peter had come to himself, he said, “Now I know for certain that ^(E)the Lord has sent His angel, and ^(F)has delivered me from the hand of Herod and from all the expectation of the Jewish people.”

¹² So, when he had considered this, ^(G)he came to the house of Mary, the mother of ^(H)John whose surname was Mark, where many were gathered together ^(I)praying. ¹³ And as Peter knocked at the door of the gate, a girl named Rhoda came to answer. ¹⁴ When she recognized Peter’s voice, because of her gladness she did not open the gate, but ran in and announced that Peter stood before the gate. ¹⁵ But they said to her, “You are beside yourself!” Yet she kept insisting that it was so. So they said, ^(J)“It is his angel.”

¹⁶ Now Peter continued knocking; and when they opened the door and saw him, they were astonished. ¹⁷ But ^(K)motioning to them with his hand to keep silent, he declared to them how the Lord had brought him out of the prison. And he said, “Go, tell these things to James and to the brethren.” And he departed and went to another place.

¹⁸ Then, as soon as it was day, there was no small ^[c]stir among the soldiers about what had become of Peter. ¹⁹ But when Herod had searched for him and not found him, he examined the guards and commanded that they should be put to death.

And he went down from Judea to Caesarea, and stayed there.

^24 (A)God, who made the world and everything in it, since He is ^(B)Lord of heaven and earth, ^(C)does not dwell in temples made with hands. ²⁵ Nor is He worshiped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He ^(D)gives to all life, breath, and all things. ²⁶ And He has made from one ^[a]blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and ^(E)the boundaries of their dwellings, ^27 (F)so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, ^(G)though He is not far from each one of us; ²⁸ for ^(H)in Him we live and move and have our being, ^(I)as also some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also His offspring.’ ²⁹ Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, ^(J)we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man’s devising. ³⁰ Truly, ^(K)these times of ignorance God overlooked, but ^(L)now commands all men everywhere to repent, ³¹ because He has appointed a day on which ^(M)He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by ^(N)raising Him from the dead.”