In many languages one cannot say time drew near. One may say that “people approach a time,” but time does not itself “move.” In such languages one can sometimes say “when it was about that day,” “when the day was not far away,” or “when they would soon see the day.”

To keep is not expressed in the Greek (“when the time of the promise which God made to Abraham was drawing near”), but the meaning is clearly implicit in the text (see Jerusalem Bible “as the time drew near for God to fulfill the promise”; and also New English Bible, Phillips, An American Translation*). Had grown much larger translates two verbs which are almost synonyms: “grow” and “multiply.” The Jerusalem Bible translates “grew larger and larger.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on The Acts of the Apostles. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1972. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .