Acts 17:16

Plain English Version

Paul was in Athens waiting for Silas and Timothy to come, and he walked around in that city. He saw a lot of statues everywhere, and he saw that people thought they were gods. They respected them and prayed to them. That upset Paul a lot.

Cross References

Mark 3:5

Jesus looked at them. They didn’t care about people, they only worried about their law, and that made Jesus really angry. And it made him really sad too. Then Jesus said to the man with the useless hand, “Hold out your hand.” The man put his hand out, and straight away it was better. It wasn’t dried up any more.

John 2:13

Later on, it was nearly time for the Jewish ceremony called Passover, so Jesus and his followers went to Jerusalem city for that ceremony.

Acts 17:15

Then Paul said to the men that took him to Athens, “As soon as you get back to Beria, tell Silas and Timothy to come to me here. Tell them to hurry and come here as soon as they can.” Then those men left Paul in Athens and went back to Beria.

Acts 17:21

You see, the Athens people, and the people from other places that lived there, they liked to talk about new ideas all the time, and they liked to hear anything new that other people told them.

Acts 17:23

I walked around this city, and I saw a lot of statues that you set up, to show respect to a lot of gods. And I saw a stone table that you set up, and you wrote on it, ‘This is for that god that we don’t know.’ Look, you don’t know that God, but you show respect to him anyway. Listen, I do know him, so now I want to tell you all about him. I’ll tell you about that God that you don’t know.

Acts 18:1

After that, Paul left Athens, and he went to a city called Corinth.

Acts 20:22

Paul kept on talking to them. He said, “And now I want to tell you this. God’s spirit clearly showed me that I have to go to Jerusalem, so I’m going there. I don’t know what will happen to me at Jerusalem.

1 Thessalonians 3:1

But back at the time just after we left you, we worried about you for a while. We didn’t know if you kept on trusting Jesus or not. We tried to go back to find out about you, but we couldn’t do it. And we couldn’t wait to get some news about you. So we reckoned, “We’ll send Timothy by himself, and we’ll stay here in this city called Athens and wait for him to come back.” Timothy is like our brother. He works with us for God, telling people the good news about Jesus Christ. We sent Timothy to you so that he could help you to be strong and to trust Jesus better.