Book of Common Prayer

¹⁵ Then all the judges who sat in the court looked at him and they saw that his face was like the face of an angel.

7 Then the high priest asked, `Is this true?'

² Stephen replied, `Men, brothers and fathers, listen to me. When our father Abraham was in the country of Mesopotamia, before he lived in the country of Haran, the God who is great and wonderful came to him.

³ God said, "Leave your country and your family and come to the country that I will show you."

⁴ Then Abraham came out of the country of the Chaldeans and lived for a while in the country of Haran. After his father died, God led him from there to this country where you are living now.

⁵ But God did not give any of the land to Abraham, not even a small part. But he promised that the land would belong to him. After him it would belong to his children, even though he did not have a child then.

⁶ This is what God told Abraham. He told him that his children would travel and live in another land. They would be slaves to the people there. They would have a hard time for four hundred years.

⁷ And God said, "I will judge the people who make them slaves. After that, they will come out of that land and serve me here."

⁸ God made the agreement of circumcision with Abraham. Abraham had a son Isaac. He made the mark of circumcision on the child's body and circumcised him on the eighth day. Isaac had a son Jacob, and Jacob had twelve sons who were our fathers.

⁹ `Because they were jealous, they sold Joseph to be a slave in the country of Egypt. But God was with Joseph.

¹⁰ He took him out of all his troubles. He blessed him and made him wise in the eyes of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. Pharaoh made him president in Egypt and a ruler over all the people of his house.

¹¹ For a long, long time there was no rain in Egypt and Canaan. And so there was very little food. This caused much trouble. Our fathers had nothing to eat.

¹² Then Jacob heard that there was food in Egypt. He sent his sons on their first trip to buy some. They were our fathers of long ago.

¹³ The second time they went, Joseph told his brothers who he was. And Pharaoh found out who Joseph's family was.

¹⁴ Then Joseph sent for Jacob his father and all the family to come. There were seventy-five people.

¹⁵ So Jacob went to Egypt. There he and our fathers died.

¹⁶ They were taken back to the place called Shechem and buried. Abraham had bought a grave from the family of Hamor in Shechem. He had paid money for it.

²⁷ The woman left her water-pot and went back to the town.

²⁸ She said to the people, `Come, I will show you a man who has told me everything I have done. Can this be the Christ?'

²⁹ The people left the town and went to him.

³⁰ While they were on the way coming to Jesus, the disciples asked him, `Teacher, will you please eat.'

³¹ Jesus said to them, `I have food that you do not know about.'

³² So the disciples asked one another, `Has anyone brought him food to eat?'

³³ Jesus said to them, `My food is to obey the one who sent me and to finish his work.

³⁴ Do you not say, "In four months it will be harvest time"? Listen, I say. Look up and see the fields. The harvest is ready to cut now.

³⁵ The one who gathers the harvest receives a reward for it. He gathers a harvest that will live for ever. Then the one who sows and the one who gathers will both be happy.

³⁶ This saying is true here: "One sows and another gathers."

³⁷ I sent you to gather what you did not help to plant. Other people have worked hard and you have been helped through their work.'

³⁸ Many of the people of the town believed in Jesus because of what the woman told them. She said, `He told me everything I have done.'

³⁹ When the people from Samaria came, they begged him to stay with them. So he stayed with them for two days.

⁴⁰ Many more people believed in Jesus because of his own word.

⁴¹ They said to the woman, `Now we believe, not because of what you told us, but because of what he himself has told us. We know it is true. This is the Saviour of the world.'

⁴² Two days after this, Jesus left Samaria and went to Galilee.