1After they traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a Jewish synagogue.
2Paul went to the Jews in the synagogue, as he customarily did, and on three Sabbath days he addressed them from the scriptures,
3explaining and demonstrating that the Christ had to suffer and to rise from the dead, saying, “This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Christ.”
4Some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with a large group of God-fearing Greeks and quite a few prominent women.
5But the Jews became jealous, and gathering together some worthless men from the rabble in the marketplace, they formed a mob and set the city in an uproar. They attacked Jason’s house, trying to find Paul and Silas to bring them out to the assembly.
6When they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brothers before the city officials, screaming, “These people who have stirred up trouble throughout the world have come here too,
7and Jason has welcomed them as guests! They are all acting against Caesar’s decrees, saying there is another king named Jesus!”
8They caused confusion among the crowd and the city officials who heard these things.
9After the city officials had received bail from Jason and the others, they released them.
Paul and Silas at Berea
10The brothers sent Paul and Silas off to Berea at once, during the night. When they arrived, they went to the Jewish synagogue.
11These Jews were more open-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they eagerly received the message, examining the scriptures carefully every day to see if these things were so.
12Therefore many of them believed, along with quite a few prominent Greek women and men.
13But when the Jews from Thessalonica heard that Paul had also proclaimed the word of God in Berea, they came there too, inciting and disturbing the crowds.
14Then the brothers sent Paul away to the coast at once, but Silas and Timothy remained in Berea.
15Those who accompanied Paul escorted him as far as Athens, and after receiving an order for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible, they left.
Paul at Athens
16While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, his spirit was greatly upset because he saw the city was full of idols.
17So he was addressing the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles in the synagogue, and in the marketplace every day those who happened to be there.
18Also some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers were conversing with him, and some were asking, “What does this foolish babbler want to say?” Others said, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods.” (They said this because he was proclaiming the good news about Jesus and the resurrection.)
19So they took Paul and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching is that you are proclaiming?
20For you are bringing some surprising things to our ears, so we want to know what they mean.”
21(All the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there used to spend their time in nothing else than telling or listening to something new.)
22So Paul stood before the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I see that you are very religious in all respects.
23For as I went around and observed closely your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: ‘To an unknown god.’ Therefore what you worship without knowing it, this I proclaim to you.
24The God who made the world and everything in it, who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by human hands,
25nor is he served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives life and breath and everything to everyone.
26From one man he made every nation of the human race to inhabit the entire earth, determining their set times and the fixed limits of the places where they would live,
27so that they would search for God and perhaps grope around for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.
28For in him we live and move about and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we too are his offspring.’
29So since we are God’s offspring, we should not think the deity is like gold or silver or stone, an image made by human skill and imagination.
30Therefore, although God has overlooked such times of ignorance, he now commands all people everywhere to repent,
31because he has set a day on which he is going to judge the world in righteousness, by a man whom he designated, having provided proof to everyone by raising him from the dead.”
32Now when they heard about the resurrection from the dead, some began to scoff, but others said, “We will hear you again about this.”
33So Paul left the Areopagus.
34But some people joined him and believed. Among them were Dionysius, who was a member of the Areopagus, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.