Acts 6:5Plain English VersionAll the Christians agreed with those 12 men. So they picked Stephen. He was a man that really trusted God, and that God’s Holy Spirit controlled properly. And they picked Philip, and Procorus, and Nicanor, and Timon, and Parmenas, and Nicolas. Nicolas was from a city called Antioch. He was not born a Jew, but he turned to God and started to follow the Jewish ceremonies, and after that, he believed in Jesus. See the chapter |
At the time when some men killed Stephen, those men wanted to kill the rest of the Christians too. So a lot of Christians ran away from Jerusalem, and they went a long way, even to other countries. They told people in those places the message about Jesus, but they only told it to their own countrymen, the Jews. Some of those Christians went to Fonisha country, and some of them went to the island called Cyprus, and some of them went to the city called Antioch.
He found Saul there, and he took him back to Antioch. They both stayed there for a year, and they met with the Christians in the church there, and they kept on teaching them. A lot of people in Antioch followed Jesus, and that was the place where people first used the name Christians for the people that followed Jesus Christ.
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.
So, friends, you pick 7 of your own men to do that job. They can give the money and food to the widows. You have to pick men that other people say are good men. They have to be men that God’s Holy Spirit controls properly, and they have to be men that always think properly. We will let those men take over that work. They will give money and food to the widows,