that have been known for ages.’
Parallel translations
- WEB All of God’s works are known to him from eternity.’
- KJV Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.
- NKJV “Known to God from eternity are all His works.
- NASB Says the Lord, who makes these things known from long ago.
- NLT he who made these things known so long ago.’
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
All God's works have been known to Him from eternity. Gentile inclusion is no afterthought but God's eternal plan.
Overview
James concludes the citation by affirming God's foreknowledge of all He does. The salvation of the Gentiles was not an emergency adjustment but part of God's settled, eternal purpose. This assures the council that they are recognizing, not inventing, what God had always intended.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Eph 3:9and to illuminate for everyone the stewardship of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things.
- Eph 1:4For He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless in His presence. In love
- Isa 46:9–10Remember what happened long ago, for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like Me.
- Eph 1:11In Him we were also chosen as God’s own, having been predestined according to the plan of Him who works out everything by the counsel of His will,
- 1 Pet 1:20He was known before the foundation of the world, but was revealed in the last times for your sake.
- Acts 17:26From one man He made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and He determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their lands.
- Num 23:19God is not a man, that He should lie, or a son of man, that He should change His mind. Does He speak and not act? Does He promise and not fulfill?
- 2 Th 2:13But we should always thank God for you, brothers who are loved by the Lord, because God has chosen you from the beginning to be saved by the sanctification of the Spirit and by faith in the truth.
- Matt 13:35So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet: “I will open My mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden since the foundation of the world.”
- Rev 17:8The beast that you saw—it was, and now is no more, but is about to come up out of the Abyss and go to its destruction. And those who dwell on the earth whose names were not written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world will marvel when they see the beast that was, and is not, and yet will be.
- Isa 44:7Who then is like Me? Let him say so! Let him declare his case before Me, since I established an ancient people. Let him foretell the things to come, and what is to take place.
- Rev 13:8And all who dwell on the earth will worship the beast—all whose names have not been written from the foundation of the world in the Book of Life belonging to the Lamb who was slain.
- Isa 41:22–23“Let them come and tell us what will happen. Tell the former things, so that we may reflect on them and know the outcome. Or announce to us what is coming.
- Matt 25:34Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
- Isa 45:21Speak up and present your case—yes, let them take counsel together. Who foretold this long ago? Who announced it from ancient times? Was it not I, the LORD? There is no other God but Me, a righteous God and Savior; there is none but Me.
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Christ at the center
Acts is the risen Christ continuing his work by the Spirit through the church, as the apostles preach that there is salvation in no other name under heaven.
How Acts 15:18 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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