Acts 16:16

On another day, we started to go to a place where people meet together and pray to God. There was a young woman on that road that had a bad spirit in her. That spirit showed her things that were going to happen to people later on. Some men made this young woman work for them with no pay. People used to pay a lot of money to her bosses, and then she told those people things that will happen to them later.

Plain English Version

In The King James Version

And it came to pass, as we went to prayer, a certain damsel possessed with a spirit of divination met us, which brought her masters much gain by soothsaying:

In Context

15Then we baptised Lydia and her family. After that, Lydia asked us to come and stay at her house. She said, “You mob know that I really believe in our leader Jesus now, so please come and stay at my house.” She kept on asking us until we agreed, so we stayed at her house.

17That young woman saw Paul and the rest of us going on that road, and she followed us, and she kept on shouting, “These men serve the God that is the greatest of all gods. They can tell you what to do so that God will save you and not punish you.”

Read all of Acts 16

Cross References

1 Samuel 28:3A long time before this, Saul stopped the clever men and women from talking to the spirits of dead people, and he hunted them away from Israel. You see, that is in God’s law. When the old man Samuel died, the Israel mob all cried for him, and they buried him in his own town, called Ramah.

Acts 8:9A man that used to do magic lived in that town in Samaria. His name was Simon. He did that magic for a long time before Philip went there. Everyone there was surprised by the things he did. He used to say, “I am a great man.”

Acts 16:18She kept on doing that for a lot of days. In the end Paul got angry. He turned around to the young woman and said to that bad spirit, “My boss, Jesus Christ, says, ‘Get out of her.’” Then the bad spirit came out of that young woman.

Matthew Henry on Acts 16:7-16

Paul Invited into Macedonia; The Conversion of Lydia. 6 Now when they had gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia, and were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia, 7 After they were come to Mysia, they assayed to go into Bithynia: but the Spirit suffered them not. 8 And they passing by Mysia came down to Troas. 9 And a vision appeared to Paul in the night; There stood a man of Macedonia, and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia, and help us. 10 And after he had seen the vision,… Read the whole commentary →

This Verse In Other Editions

Study Acts 16:16