Acts 12:19

Plain English Version

Then Herod told them all to look everywhere to find him. But they didn’t find him. So Herod judged the soldiers that were guarding Peter. He asked them some questions, then he told the other soldiers to kill them. After that, Herod left Judea country and went to stay for a while in the town called Caesarea.

Cross References

Matthew 2:1

Jesus was born in Bethlehem, in Judea country. At that time, the big boss over that country was called Herod. There were some wise men in a country to the east of Judea. They always looked at the stars, and one night they saw a special star in the sky. So they went west to Jerusalem, the city in Judea country.

Matthew 2:13

After those wise men went away, Joseph had a dream. He heard God’s angel messenger say, “Herod will try to kill the boy, so get up and take Jesus and Mary to Egypt country, and stay there until I tell you to come back.”

Matthew 2:16

At the time when Joseph, Mary and Jesus were going to Egypt, Herod waited for those wise men to come back, but they tricked him. They didn’t come back to him. Then he got really angry. He remembered their story about when they first saw the star, so he sent his soldiers to Bethlehem, and he told them to kill all the little boys up to 2 years old. So they killed all the little boys around Bethlehem. Herod wanted to make sure that Jesus was dead.

Acts 12:18

After the sun came up, the soldiers in the jail saw that Peter wasn’t there, and they were really upset and worried. They were all saying things like, “What happened to Peter? Who let him get away?”

Acts 12:4

So Herod thought, “I will wait until the end of that ceremony, then I will judge Peter and kill him.” So they put Peter in jail, and Herod told 4 little mobs of soldiers to guard Peter there. Those little mobs had 4 soldiers each, and they took turns to guard Peter.

Acts 12:6

That Jewish ceremony was almost finished, and Herod was going to judge Peter the next day. That night, Peter was asleep in that jail. There was one soldier on each side of him, and they tied each of his hands with chains to those soldiers. And 2 other soldiers stood at the gate of the jail.

Acts 16:27

The jail boss woke up and saw that the doors of the jail were open, and he thought, “All those prisoners ran away. I’m in big trouble now.” So he got his big knife, and he was going to kill himself.

Acts 21:8

The next day, we got back on the ship, and we left Tolemayis and sailed to the town called Caesarea. We left the ship there and went to Philip’s place, and we stayed with him. He was a man that was always telling other people how to become followers of Jesus. (A few years before this, the Christians in Jerusalem picked 7 men to take care of the Christian widows, and Philip was one of those men.

Acts 25:13

After a few days, another country’s big boss came to Caesarea. His name was Agrippa. And his young sister came with him. Her name was Bernice. They came to say hello to Festus, and to say, “We are happy because you are the new government boss over this country.”

Acts 27:42

The soldiers said to their boss, “Let’s kill all the prisoners so they can’t swim to the beach and run away.”

Acts 8:40

But the Holy Spirit put Philip in a town called Azotus. Philip went around telling people the good news about Jesus. He walked north, and he told the good news about Jesus to the people in all the towns along the way, until he got to the town called Caesarea, and he stayed there.