‘For in Him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are His offspring.’
Parallel translations
- WEB ‘For in him we live, and move, and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also his offspring.’
- KJV For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.
- NKJV for in Him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also His offspring.’
- NASB for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His descendants.’
- NLT For in him we live and move and exist. As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’
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
Paul quotes Greek poets that in God we live and move and exist, and are His offspring.
Overview
Using their own writers, Paul affirms that all people depend continually on God for existence. As creatures made by Him, humanity bears a relation to God that idolatry denies. Paul skillfully employs common grace insights in pagan thought to point his hearers toward the Creator they have ignored.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 13
- Job 12:10The life of every living thing is in His hand, as well as the breath of all mankind.
- Col 1:17He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.
- Heb 1:3The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His nature, upholding all things by His powerful word. After He had provided purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.
- Ps 36:9For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light we see light.
- Luke 20:38He is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for to Him all are alive.”
- John 5:26For as the Father has life in Himself, so also He has granted the Son to have life in Himself.
- John 11:25Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in Me will live, even though he dies.
- Ps 66:9He preserves our lives and keeps our feet from slipping.
- Heb 12:9Furthermore, we have all had earthly fathers who disciplined us, and we respected them. Should we not much more submit to the Father of our spirits and live?
- 1 Sam 25:29And should someone pursue you and seek your life, then the life of my lord will be bound securely by the LORD your God in the bundle of the living. But He shall fling away the lives of your enemies like stones from a sling.
- Dan 5:23Instead, you have exalted yourself against the Lord of heaven. The vessels from His house were brought to you, and as you drank wine from them with your nobles, wives, and concubines, you praised your gods of silver and gold, bronze and iron, wood and stone, which cannot see or hear or understand. But you have failed to glorify the God who holds in His hand your very breath and all your ways.
- Luke 3:38the son of Enosh, the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God.
- Titus 1:12As one of their own prophets has said, “Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons.”
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Commentaries & study tools
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
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 17:28 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
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.