Birth and Youth of Moses

2 Now a man from the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman.^{(A) 2} The woman conceived and bore a son, and when she saw that he was a fine baby, she hid him three months.^{(B) 3} When she could hide him no longer she got a papyrus basket for him and plastered it with bitumen and pitch; she put the child in it and placed it among the reeds on the bank of the river. ⁴ His sister stood at a distance, to see what would happen to him.^(C)

⁵ The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river, while her attendants walked beside the river. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her maid to bring it. ⁶ When she opened it, she saw the child. He was crying, and she took pity on him. “This must be one of the Hebrews’ children,” she said. ⁷ Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?” ⁸ Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Yes.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother. ⁹ Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give you your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed it. ¹⁰ When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses,^[a] “because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.”^(D)

Moses Flees to Midian

¹¹ One day after Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and saw their forced labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people.^{(E) 12} He looked this way and that, and seeing no one he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. ¹³ When he went out the next day, he saw two Hebrews fighting, and he said to the one who was in the wrong, “Why do you strike your fellow Hebrew?”^{(F) 14} He answered, “Who made you a ruler and judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid and thought, “Surely the thing is known.”^{(G) 15} When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses.

So Moses fled from Pharaoh. He settled in the land of Midian and sat down by a well.^{(H) 16} The priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came to draw water and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock. ¹⁷ But some shepherds came and drove them away. Moses got up and came to their defense and watered their flock.^{(I) 18} When they returned to their father Reuel, he said, “How is it that you have come back so soon today?”^{(J) 19} They said, “An Egyptian helped us against the shepherds; he even drew water for us and watered the flock.” ²⁰ He said to his daughters, “Where is he? Why did you leave the man? Invite him to share a meal.”^{(K) 21} Moses agreed to stay with the man, and he gave Moses his daughter Zipporah in marriage.^{(L) 22} She bore a son, and he named him Gershom,^[b] for he said, “I have been an alien residing in a foreign land.”^(M)

²³ After a long time the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned under their slavery and cried out. Their cry for help rose up to God from their slavery.^{(N) 24} God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.^{(O) 25} God looked upon the Israelites, and God took notice of them.^(P)

²⁵ “When you have had children and children’s children and become complacent in the land, if you act corruptly by making an idol in the form of anything, thus doing what is evil in the sight of the Lord your God and provoking him to anger,^{(A) 26} I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that you will soon utterly perish from the land that you are crossing the Jordan to occupy; you will not live long on it but will be utterly destroyed.^{(B) 27} The Lord will scatter you among the peoples; only a few of you will be left among the nations where the Lord will lead you.^{(C) 28} There you will serve gods made by human hands, objects of wood and stone that neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell.^{(D) 29} From there you will seek the Lord your God, and you will find him if you search after him with all your heart and soul.^{(E) 30} In your distress, when all these things have happened to you in time to come, you will return to the Lord your God and heed him. ³¹ Because the Lord your God is a merciful God, he will neither abandon you nor destroy you; he will not forget the covenant with your ancestors that he swore to them.^(F)

³² “For ask now about former ages, long before your own, ever since the day that God created human beings on the earth; ask from one end of heaven to the other: Has anything so great as this ever happened, or has its like ever been heard of?^{(G) 33} Has any people ever heard the voice of a god speaking out of a fire, as you have heard, and lived?^{(H) 34} Or has any god ever attempted to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs and wonders, by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by terrifying displays of power, as the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your very eyes?^{(I) 35} To you it was shown so that you would acknowledge that the Lord is God; there is no other besides him.^{(J) 36} From heaven he made you hear his voice to discipline you. On earth he showed you his great fire, while you heard his words coming out of the fire.^{(K) 37} And because he loved your ancestors, he chose their descendants after them. He brought you out of Egypt with his own presence, by his great power,^{(L) 38} driving out before you nations greater and mightier than yourselves, to bring you in, giving you their land for a possession, as it is still today.^{(M) 39} So acknowledge today and take to heart that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other.^{(N) 40} Keep his statutes and his commandments, which I am commanding you today for your own well-being and that of your descendants after you, so that you may long remain in the land that the Lord your God is giving you for all time.”^(O)

Jesus Appears to Seven Disciples

21 After these things Jesus showed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias, and he showed himself in this way.^{(A) 2} Gathered there together were Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin,^[a] Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples.^{(B) 3} Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.” They said to him, “We will go with you.” They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.^(C)

⁴ Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach, but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus.^{(D) 5} Jesus said to them, “Children, you have no fish, have you?” They answered him, “No.”^{(E) 6} He said to them, “Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish.^{(F) 7} That disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment, for he had taken it off, and jumped into the sea.^{(G) 8} But the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, only about a hundred yards off.

⁹ When they had gone ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish on it, and bread.^{(H) 10} Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” ¹¹ So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred fifty-three of them, and though there were so many, the net was not torn. ¹² Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?” because they knew it was the Lord. ¹³ Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them and did the same with the fish.^{(I) 14} This was now the third time that Jesus appeared to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.^(J)

The Thousand Years

20 Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. ² He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years^{(A) 3} and threw him into the pit and locked and sealed it over him, so that he would deceive the nations no more, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be let out for a little while.^(B)

⁴ Then I saw thrones, and those seated on them were given authority to judge. I also saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their testimony to Jesus^[a] and for the word of God. They had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its brand on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years.^{(C) 5} (The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.) This is the first resurrection. ⁶ Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection. Over these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him a thousand years.^(D)

Satan’s Doom

⁷ When the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison ⁸ and will come out to deceive the nations at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, in order to gather them for battle; they are as numerous as the sands of the sea.^{(E) 9} They marched up over the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city. And fire came down from heaven^[b] and consumed them.^{(F) 10} And the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.

The Dead Are Judged

¹¹ Then I saw a great white throne and the one who sat on it; the earth and the heaven fled from his^[c] presence, and no place was found for them.^{(G) 12} And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Also another book was opened, the book of life. And the dead were judged according to their works, as recorded in the books.^{(H) 13} And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and all were judged according to what they had done.^{(I) 14} Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire,^{(J) 15} and anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.