Acts 7:2-10

²Then Stephen said, “Listen to me, my countrymen and my leaders. Do you remember the story about our grand-fathers of a long time ago? Our great God came to our grand-father Abraham while he was still living in Mesopotamia country. God said to him, ‘Leave your country and your family. Go to the country that I will show you.’ Abraham listened to God and left that country of the Chaldean mob, and he went to live in Haran country. He lived there until his father died. Then God brought him here to this country that you live in now.

⁵God didn’t give any of this country to Abraham to be his own land, not even a little bit of it. But God promised that some time later his grand-kids to come will own all of this land, even though Abraham didn’t even have any kids at that time.

⁶But God told Abraham, ‘Your grand-kids will live in a country that belongs to other people. Those people will treat your grand-kids really bad and make them work hard for no pay. They will do that for 400 years.

⁷But after that I will pay back those other people for treating your grand-kids bad. Then your grand-kids will come out from that country and they will show respect to me here in this place.’

⁸Then God promised to look after Abraham, and Abraham agreed to follow him. God told Abraham, ‘Your mob will always have to do a young man’s operation on their boys, to show that they agree with God.’ After that Abraham had a son called Isaac, and 8 days later Abraham did a young man’s operation on him. After that Isaac grew up and had a son called Jacob, and he did that operation on him too. And Jacob did the same for his 12 sons, and those 12 men became our grand-fathers of a long time ago.

⁹Joseph was one of them. His brothers were jealous of him and sold him to some people that took him to Egypt. He had to work there for no pay. But God was with Joseph there in Egypt.

¹⁰Joseph got big trouble there, but God saved him from all that trouble. God helped Joseph to think properly about everything. The big boss of Egypt was called Pharaoh. God showed Pharaoh that Joseph was really good. He made Joseph the boss over all the people in Egypt, and he made him boss over Pharaoh’s own big house.