Acts 26:12-18

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

Paul Tells of His Conversion

¹² “With this in mind, I was traveling to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests,^{(A) 13} when at midday along the road, Your Excellency,^[a] I saw a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining around me and my companions. ¹⁴ When we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew^[b] language, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It hurts you to kick against the goads.’^{(B) 15} I asked, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ The Lord answered, ‘I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. ¹⁶ But get up and stand on your feet, for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you to serve and testify to the things in which you have seen me^[c] and to those in which I will appear to you.^{(C) 17} I will rescue you from your people and from the gentiles—to whom I am sending you^{(D) 18} to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’^(E)