Acts 3:25

3:25 You are the sons of the prophets and of the covenant that God made with your ancestors, ¹  saying to Abraham, ‘And in your descendants ²  all the nations ³  of the earth will be blessed.’ ⁴ 

Acts 4:24

4:24 When they heard this, they raised their voices to God with one mind ⁵  and said, “Master of all, ⁶  you who made the heaven, the earth, ⁷  the sea, and everything that is in them,

Acts 14:27

14:27 When they arrived and gathered the church together, they reported ⁸  all the things God ⁹  had done with them, and that he had opened a door ¹⁰  of faith for the Gentiles.

Acts 17:23

17:23 For as I went around and observed closely your objects of worship, ¹¹  I even found an altar with this inscription: ¹²  ‘To an unknown god.’ Therefore what you worship without knowing it, ¹³  this I proclaim to you.

Acts 20:32

20:32 And now I entrust ¹⁴  you to God and to the message ¹⁵  of his grace. This message ¹⁶  is able to build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified.

[3:25]  ¹ tn Or “forefathers”; Grk “fathers.”

[3:25]  ² tn Or “in your offspring”; Grk “in your seed.”

[3:25]  ³ tn Or “families.” The Greek word πατριά (patria) can indicate persons of succeeding generations who are related by birth (“lineage,” “family”) but it can also indicate a relatively large unit of people who make up a sociopolitical group and who share a presumed biological descent. In many contexts πατριά is very similar to ἔθνος (eqnos) and λαός (laos). In light of the context of the OT quotation, it is better to translate πατριά as “nations” here.

[3:25]  ⁴ sn A quotation from Gen 22:18.

[4:24]  ⁵ sn With one mind. Compare Acts 1:14.

[4:24]  ⁶ tn Or “Lord of all.”

[4:24]  ⁷ tn Grk “and the earth, and the sea,” but καί (kai) has not been translated before “the earth” and “the sea” since contemporary English normally uses a coordinating conjunction only between the last two elements in a series of three or more.

[14:27]  ⁹ tn Or “announced.”

[14:27]  ¹⁰ sn Note that God is the subject of the activity. The outcome of this mission is seen as a confirmation of the mission to the Gentiles.

[14:27]  ¹¹ sn On the image of opening, or of the door, see 1 Cor 16:9; 2 Cor 2:12; Col 4:3.

[17:23]  ¹³ tn Or “your sanctuaries.” L&N 53.54 gives “sanctuary” (place of worship) as an alternate meaning for the word σεβάσματα (sebasmata).

[17:23]  ¹⁴ tn Grk “on which was written,” but since it would have been carved in stone, it is more common to speak of an “inscription” in English. To simplify the English the relative construction with a passive verb (“on which was inscribed”) was translated as a prepositional phrase with a substantive (“inscription”).

[17:23]  ¹⁵ tn BDAG 13 s.v. ἀγνοέω 1.b has “Abs. ὅ ἀγνοοῦντες εὐσεβεῖτε what you worship without knowing it (on the subject matter Maximus Tyr. 11, 5e: all sorts of philosophers ἴσασιν οὐκ ἑκόντες καὶ λέγουσιν ἄκοντες sc. τὸ θεῖον = they know and name God without intending to do so) Ac 17:23.” Paul, in typical Jewish Christian style, informs them of the true God, of whom their idols are an ignorant reflection.

[20:32]  ¹⁷ tn Or “commend.” BDAG 772 s.v. παρατίθημι 3.b has “τινά τινι entrust someone to the care or protection of someone…Of divine protection παρέθεντο αὐτοὺς τῷ κυρίῳ Ac 14:23; cp. 20:32.”

[20:32]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “word.”

[20:32]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “the message of his grace, which.” The phrase τῷ δυναμένῳ οἰκοδομῆσαι… (tw dunamenw oikodomhsai…) refers to τῷ λόγω (tw logw), not τῆς χάριτος (ths caritos); in English it could refer to either “the message” or “grace,” but in Greek, because of agreement in gender, the referent can only be “the message.” To make this clear, a new sentence was begun in the translation and the referent “the message” was repeated at the beginning of this new sentence.