How to read this page

An Intertextuality Pair — one connection between two passages, shown as linked verse cards: the Later text and the Earlier text it quotes, alludes to or echoes. The Significance essay explains why the link matters and where it points in Christ.

Reference Type— how explicit the link is: Quotation, Allusion, or Echo
Connection Method(s)— how it carries meaning: e.g. Typology, Promise-Fulfillment, Analogy, Longitudinal Theme
Found via— where the connection was identified, e.g. the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge or an Anchor-Text Network

Graph View — tap the constellation icon in the top bar to see this page's connections as a web of light: gold points are passages, and the coloured threads are the connection types. Click any type in the graph's own legend to filter it in or out, and use the expand control for the full-screen night sky.

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Intertextuality Pair

Acts 9:31 → Job 28:28

Echo

Later text

Acts 9:31BSB

Then the church throughout Judea, Galilee, and Samaria experienced a time of peace. It grew in strength and numbers, living in the fear of the Lord and the encouragement of the Holy Spirit.

Earlier text

Job 28:28BSB

And He said to man, ‘Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, and to turn away from evil is understanding.’”

+ 2 more earlier texts

Earlier text

Psalms 111:10BSB

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; all who follow His precepts gain rich understanding. His praise endures forever!

Earlier text

Proverbs 1:7BSB

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.

Walk the Square · a single-voice walk of this pair around the Clowney square14:01

Significance

Luke's summary of the church's health — it "walked in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, and it multiplied" — gathers up the great wisdom refrain that "the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom / knowledge" (Job 28:28; Ps 111:10; Prov 1:7). Reverence for God is the settled disposition of the Spirit-filled people, the root from which their growth springs. Christ-terminus: what is striking is that the fear of the Lord is here joined to "the comfort of the Holy Spirit" — awe and consolation together. The God who is rightly feared has, in Christ, become the God who comforts His people through the indwelling Spirit; so wisdom's ancient beginning flowers into the joy of the new-covenant community, whose reverence is warmed by the nearness of the risen Lord.

Found via: Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type: Echo
Connection Method(s): Longitudinal Theme