Acts 7:22-50

²²And Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in his worlds and deeds.

²³And when he was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brethren, the sons of Israel.

²⁴And seeing one of them suffer wrong, he defended him, and avenged him that was oppressed by smiting the Egyptian.

²⁵For he supposed his brethren would understand that God through his hand would give them salvation; but they understood not.

²⁶And the next day he showed himself to them as they were contending, and urged them to peace, saying, Ye are brethren; why do ye wrong one another?

²⁷But he who was wronging his neighbor thrust him away, saying, “Who made thee a ruler and a judge over us?

²⁸Dost thou mean to kill me, as thou didst kill the Egyptian yesterday?”

²⁹And Moses fled at this saying, and became a sojourner in the land of Midian, where he begat two sons.

³⁰And when forty years were completed, there appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai an angel in the flaming fire of a bush.

³¹And Moses seeing it wondered at the sight; and as he drew near to behold it, the voice of the Lord came to him,

³²saying, “I am the God of thy fathers, the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.” And Moses trembled and durst not behold.

³³And the Lord said to him, “Loose the sandals from thy feet; for the place where thou standest is holy ground.

³⁴I have surely seen the oppression of my people in Egypt, and I have heard their groaning, and am come down to deliver them; and now, come, I will send thee into Egypt.”

³⁵This Moses, whom they denied, saying, “Who made thee a ruler and a judge?” this very man did God send both as a ruler and a redeemer with the hand of the angel who appeared to him in the bush.

³⁶This very man brought them out, working wonders and signs in the land of Egypt, and in the Red Sea, and in the wilderness forty years.

³⁷This is the Moses who said to the sons of Israel, “A prophet will God raise up to you from among your brethren, as he raised up me.”

³⁸This is he that was in the assembly in the wilderness with the anger who spake to him on Mount Sinai, and with our fathers; who received the living oracles to give to us;

³⁹to whom our fathers would not be obedient, but thrust him from them, and in their hearts turned back into Egypt,

⁴⁰saying to Aaron, “Make us gods who shall go before us; for as for this Moses, who brought us out of the land of Egypt, we know not what is become of him.”

⁴¹And they made a calf in those days, and offered sacrifice to the idol, and rejoiced in the works of their own hands.

⁴²But God turned away, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven; as it is written in the book of the Prophets, “Did ye offer to me slain beasts and sacrifices for forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?

⁴³And ye took up the tabernacle of Moloch, and the star of the god Rephan, the figures which ye made to worship them; and I will carry you away beyond Babylon.”

⁴⁴Our fathers had the tabernacle of the testimony in the wilderness, as he that spoke to Moses commanded that he should make it according to the pattern that he had seen;

⁴⁵which also our fathers received and brought in with Joshua, at their taking possession of the gentiles whom God drove out from before our fathers, until the days of David;

⁴⁶who found favor before God, and asked that he might find a habitation for the God of Jacob.

⁴⁷But Solomon built him a house.

⁴⁸Yet the Most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands; as saith the prophet,

⁴⁹“Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What house will ye build for me? saith the Lord; or what is the place of my rest?

⁵⁰Did not my hands make all these things?”