Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

The first Passover meal

12 The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron in the country of Egypt. ² He said, ‘This month will be the first month of each year for you. ³ Tell all the Israelite people to do this on the tenth day of this month: Each man must choose a lamb to kill as a sacrifice for his family. That will be one lamb for each home. ⁴ But the family may be too small to eat a whole lamb. Then they must share a lamb with another family that lives near. You must decide how much each person can eat and then count the number of people. ⁵ The lamb that you choose must have nothing wrong with it. It must be a male lamb that is one year old. It can be either a young sheep or a young goat.

⁶ Keep the lamb safe until the 14th day of this month. Then every Israelite family must kill their lamb in the evening. ⁷ They must take some of its blood. They must put the blood on the wood that is round the door of their house. They must put it on each side of the door and above the door. They must do this in every house where they will eat a lamb. ⁸ That night, they must cook the meat over the fire. They must eat it immediately, with bitter herbs and with bread that has no yeast in it. ⁹ You must cook the meat before you eat it. Cook it over the fire. Do not cook it in water. Cook the whole lamb, with its head, its legs and the inside parts of its body. ¹⁰ You must eat all the meat before morning arrives. If some of it still remains in the morning, then you must burn it. ¹¹ This is how you must eat the lamb: Dress yourselves so that you are ready to travel. Put your shoes on your feet. Take your stick in your hand. Then eat the food quickly. This is the Passover meal which shows that you obey me, the Lord.

¹² On the night that you eat the Passover meal, I will travel through the country of Egypt. I will kill every firstborn son and every firstborn male animal. I will punish all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord. ¹³ When you put the blood round the doors of your houses, that will be a sign to show that you live there. When I see the blood on your house, I will pass over you.^[a] No trouble will hurt you, when I attack the people of Egypt.

²¹ Then Moses called the leaders of the Israelites to come to him. He said to them, ‘Go immediately and choose a lamb for each of your families. Then kill the animals for the Passover feast. ²² Put the blood into a dish. Then take a branch of hyssop.^[a] Make it wet with the blood that is in the dish. Then put some of the blood on the wood that is round your door. Nobody must go out of the door of his house until the morning. ²³ The Lord will pass through the country and he will kill the Egyptians. But when the Lord sees the blood on the wood round the door, he will pass over that house. He will not let the death angel come into your houses. The Lord will not let him kill you.

²⁴ You must obey these rules always, both you and your descendants, for all time. ²⁵ You will go into the land that the Lord promised to give you. Then you must continue to obey these rules. ²⁶ Your children may say to you, “What does this feast mean?” ²⁷ Then you must say to them, “It is the Lord's Passover sacrifice. The Lord passed over the houses of the Israelites when they were in Egypt. He killed the Egyptians but he saved our families.” ’ Then the people bent their heads down to the ground and they worshipped God.

²⁸ The Israelites did everything that the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron.

Philip meets a man from Ethiopia

²⁶ Then an angel of the Lord God came to Philip. He said, ‘Philip, go south to the road between Jerusalem and Gaza which goes through the wilderness.’^[a]

²⁷ So Philip started on his journey. While he was going along this road, he met an important officer from Ethiopia. This man had authority over the queen of Ethiopia's money. The queen was called Candace. The officer was travelling home from Jerusalem. He had been there to worship God.^[b]

²⁸ Now the man was travelling home again in his chariot. He was reading something from the book that God's prophet Isaiah wrote. ²⁹ The Holy Spirit said to Philip, ‘Go to that chariot and walk beside it.’

³⁰ So Philip ran to the cart as it went along. The officer was reading aloud from the prophet Isaiah's book and Philip heard him. So Philip asked the man, ‘Do you understand the things that you are reading about?’

³¹ The man answered, ‘I cannot understand it. I need someone to explain it to me.’ Then he said to Philip, ‘Come up here and sit with me in the cart.’

³² The officer was reading these words from the book of Isaiah:

³³ People did not respect him at all.

³⁴ The officer said to Philip, ‘Please tell me who the prophet Isaiah wrote about. Was he writing about himself or about another person?’ ³⁵ Then Philip explained to the man the words that Isaiah had written. Then he went on to tell him the good news about Jesus. ³⁶ As they were travelling along the road, they came to a place with some water. The man said to Philip, ‘Look! There is some water here. Please will you baptize me? Is there anything to stop you?’

[³⁷ Philip said to him, ‘I can baptize you if you really believe in Jesus.’ The man said to Philip, ‘I do believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.’]^[d]

³⁸ The officer said to the man who was driving the chariot, ‘Stop the chariot!’ Then he went down with Philip into the water, and Philip baptized him. ³⁹ They both came up out of the water again. Immediately the Lord's Holy Spirit took Philip away from that place. The officer did not see Philip again. He continued his journey and he was very happy.

⁴⁰ Philip saw that he was now in Azotus.^[e] From there, he visited many towns and he told people the good news about Jesus. He did this as he went all the way to Caesarea.^[f]