Limitless Word
and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things to draw away the disciples after them.
Acts 20:30 · New American Standard Bible
Parallel translations
  • WEB Men will arise from among your own selves, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them.
  • KJV Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them.
  • BSB Even from your own number, men will rise up and distort the truth to draw away disciples after them.
  • NKJV Also from among yourselves men will rise up, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after themselves.
  • NLT Even some men from your own group will rise up and distort the truth in order to draw a following.

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

Even from among the elders themselves, men will arise teaching perverse things to draw away disciples. Danger will come from within as well as without.

Overview

Paul cautions that distortion of the truth will spring up inside the church, as leaders seek to gather followers to themselves rather than to Christ. This inward threat is often more subtle and damaging than outward attack. The warning calls for ongoing watchfulness, doctrinal faithfulness, and a refusal to follow any teaching that turns hearts from the Lord.

Cross-references & the web

Cross-references · 21

  • 2 Tim 4:3–4For the time will come when they will not listen to the sound doctrine, but, having itching ears, will heap up for themselves teachers after their own lusts;
  • 1 Tim 1:19–20holding faith and a good conscience; which some having thrust away made a shipwreck concerning the faith;
  • 1 Jn 2:19They went out from us, but they didn’t belong to us; for if they had belonged to us, they would have continued with us. But they left, that they might be revealed that none of them belong to us.
  • Prov 23:33Your eyes will see strange things, and your mind will imagine confusing things.
  • Prov 19:1Better is the poor who walks in his integrity than he who is perverse in his lips and is a fool.
  • Acts 11:26When he had found him, he brought him to Antioch. For a whole year they were gathered together with the assembly, and taught many people. The disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.
  • 2 Jn 1:7For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who don’t confess that Jesus Christ came in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the Antichrist.
  • 1 Cor 1:12–15Now I mean this, that each one of you says, “I follow Paul,” “I follow Apollos,” “I follow Cephas,” and, “I follow Christ.”
  • Gal 6:12–13As many as desire to look good in the flesh, they compel you to be circumcised; only that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ.
  • Acts 5:36–37For before these days Theudas rose up, making himself out to be somebody; to whom a number of men, about four hundred, joined themselves: who was slain; and all, as many as obeyed him, were dispersed, and came to nothing.
  • 2 Tim 2:17–18and those words will consume like gangrene, of whom is Hymenaeus and Philetus;
  • Matt 23:15Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel around by sea and land to make one proselyte; and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much of a son of Gehenna as yourselves.
  • 1 Tim 6:5constant friction of people of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain. Withdraw yourself from such.
  • Isa 59:3For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity. Your lips have spoken lies. Your tongue mutters wickedness.
  • 1 Tim 5:13Besides, they also learn to be idle, going about from house to house. Not only idle, but also gossips and busybodies, saying things which they ought not.
  • Acts 21:38Aren’t you then the Egyptian, who before these days stirred up to sedition and led out into the wilderness the four thousand men of the Assassins?”
  • Jude 1:4–16For there are certain men who crept in secretly, even those who were long ago written about for this condemnation: ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into indecency, and denying our only Master, God, and Lord, Jesus Christ.
  • 2 Pet 2:1–3But false prophets also arose among the people, as false teachers will also be among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, denying even the Master who bought them, bringing on themselves swift destruction.
  • Matt 26:21–25As they were eating, he said, “Most certainly I tell you that one of you will betray me.”
  • Rev 2:6But this you have, that you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.
  • 2 Pet 2:18For, uttering great swelling words of emptiness, they entice in the lusts of the flesh, by licentiousness, those who are indeed escaping from those who live in error;

Themes, concepts, people & topics

Topics (5)

Resources, by level

Commentaries & study tools

  • VideoBibleProject — Acts videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.

  • VideoWatch teaching on Acts 20:30YouTube · Lay · Free

    Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.

  • CommentaryEnduring Word — verse-by-verseDavid Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.

  • CommentaryClassic commentaries for this verseBibleHub (20+ works) · Pastoral · Free

    Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.

  • CommentaryMatthew Henry on ActsMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical

    The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).

  • ReferenceInterlinear, lexicon & Strong'sBlue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free

    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 20:30 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.