¹⁷ “When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death!

²⁸ Because they consider all the offenses they have committed and turn away from them, that person will surely live; they will not die.^(A)

⁴ But because of his great love for us,^(A) God, who is rich in mercy, ⁵ made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions^(B)—it is by grace you have been saved.^(C)

¹⁴ This is why it is said:

¹⁸ I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned^(A) against heaven and against you. ¹⁹ I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.’

²⁹ The jailer called for lights, rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and Silas.^{(A) 30} He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”^(B)

¹¹ Many a time I went from one synagogue to another to have them punished,^(A) and I tried to force them to blaspheme. I was so obsessed with persecuting them that I even hunted them down in foreign cities.

¹² “On one of these journeys I was going to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests. ¹³ About noon, King Agrippa, as I was on the road, I saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, blazing around me and my companions. ¹⁴ We all fell to the ground, and I heard a voice^(B) saying to me in Aramaic,^[a](C) ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’

¹⁵ “Then I asked, ‘Who are you, Lord?’

“ ‘I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,’ the Lord replied. ¹⁶ ‘Now get up and stand on your feet.^(D) I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what you have seen and will see of me.^{(E) 17} I will rescue you^(F) from your own people and from the Gentiles.^(G) I am sending you to them ¹⁸ to open their eyes^(H) and turn them from darkness to light,^(I) and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins^(J) and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’^(K)

¹⁹ “So then, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient^(L) to the vision from heaven.

⁴ But when the kindness^(A) and love of God our Savior^(B) appeared,^{(C) 5} he saved us,^(D) not because of righteous things we had done,^(E) but because of his mercy.^(F) He saved us through the washing^(G) of rebirth and renewal^(H) by the Holy Spirit, ⁶ whom he poured out on us^(I) generously through Jesus Christ our Savior,