Acts 26:5-27

⁵since they have known me for a long time, if they are willing to testify, that according to the strictest sect of our religion I lived as a Pharisee.

⁶And now for the hope of the promise having been made by God to the fathers, I stand before you judged,

⁷a promise to which our twelve tribes, as they earnestly serve God night and day, hope to attain. Concerning which hope I am accused by the Jews, King Agrippa.

⁸Why is it considered such an unbelievable thing by you people if God raises the dead?

⁹“Therefore I thought in myself that it was necessary to do many hostile things against the name of Jesus the Nazarene;

¹⁰which also I did in Jerusalem, and many of the saints I shut up in prisons, having received authority from the chief priests; and when they were being put to death, I cast my vote against them.

¹¹And I punished them often in all the synagogues, and compelled them to blaspheme; and being exceedingly enraged against them, I persecuted them even as far as to foreign cities.

¹²“In which pursuits also, as I traveled to Damascus with authority and commission from the chief priests,

¹³at midday, O king, along the road I saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining around me and those traveling with me.

¹⁴And when we all had fallen down to the ground, I heard a voice speaking to me and saying in the Hebrew language, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’

¹⁵So I said, ‘Who are You, Lord?’ And He said, ‘I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.

¹⁶But arise and stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you, to appoint you a minister and a witness both of the things which you have seen, and of the things which I will appear to you,

¹⁷delivering you from the people, and from the Gentiles, to whom I am sending you,

¹⁸to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light, and from the authority of Satan to God, in order for them to receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me.’

¹⁹“Therefore, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision,

²⁰but to those first in Damascus and in Jerusalem, and throughout all the region of Judea, and to the Gentiles, proclaiming that they must repent and turn to God, and do works worthy of repentance.

²¹Because of these things the Jews arrested me in the temple and attempted to kill me.

²²Therefore, having obtained help from God, until this day I stand, witnessing both to common people and great people, saying nothing except the things which both the prophets and Moses spoke of as being about to happen,

²³that the Christ was to suffer, that as the first to rise from the dead, He was about to proclaim light to the Jewish people and to the Gentiles.”

²⁴Now as he spoke these things, Festus said with a loud voice, “You are mad, Paul! Your higher learning is driving you to madness!”

²⁵But he said, “I am not mad, most excellent Festus, but I boldly declare words of truth and reason.

²⁶For the king knows about these things, to whom also I speak freely; for I am persuaded that none of these things escapes his notice, since this thing was not done in a corner.

²⁷Do you believe the prophets, King Agrippa? I know that you believe.”