⁷ And I heard a voice from the altar,^[a] saying,

³ As he was approaching Damascus on this mission, a light from heaven suddenly shone down around him. ⁴ He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul! Saul! Why are you persecuting me?”

⁵ “Who are you, lord?” Saul asked.

And the voice replied, “I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting!

²⁰ “But God said to him, ‘You fool! You will die this very night. Then who will get everything you worked for?’

¹⁷ And a voice from heaven said, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.”

³ When people are saying, “Everything is peaceful and secure,” then disaster will fall on them as suddenly as a pregnant woman’s labor pains begin. And there will be no escape.

²² The people gave him a great ovation, shouting, “It’s the voice of a god, not of a man!”

²³ Instantly, an angel of the Lord struck Herod with a sickness, because he accepted the people’s worship instead of giving the glory to God. So he was consumed with worms and died.

²⁸ Father, bring glory to your name.”

Then a voice spoke from heaven, saying, “I have already brought glory to my name, and I will do so again.”

⁴ While they drank from them they praised their idols made of gold, silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone.

⁵ Suddenly, they saw the fingers of a human hand writing on the plaster wall of the king’s palace, near the lampstand. The king himself saw the hand as it wrote,