Who caused \{these things to happen\}?\par Who did this?\par Who called all people from the beginning?\par \{I, the Lord, did these things\}!\par I, the Lord, am the first.\par I was here before the beginning.\par And I will be here when all things\par are finished.\par
But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah,\par are the smallest town in Judah.\par Your family is almost too small to count.\par But the “Ruler of Israel”\par will come from you for me.\par His beginnings {\cf2\super [60]} are from ancient times,\par from long, long ago.\par
They have written the same things that we learned from some other people—the people that saw those things from the beginning and served God by telling people his message.
(The one who saw this happen has told about it. He told about it so that you also can believe. The things he says are true. He knows that he tells the truth.)
This was after Jesus’ death, but he showed the apostles that he was alive. Jesus proved this by doing many powerful things. The apostles saw Jesus many times during the 40 days after he was raised from death. Jesus spoke to the apostles about the kingdom of God.
The salvation \{that was given to us\} is very great. So surely we also will be punished if we live like this salvation is not important. It was the Lord (Jesus) who first told people about this salvation. And the people who heard him proved to us that this salvation is true.
The voice said, “Write in a book all these things you see, and send it to the seven churches: to Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.”