Acts 6-8

To the Jews (part 2)

OK, last week we stopped at Acts chapter 5, and we will pick up with chapter 6 tonight.

I’ll need three readers:

???? - Acts 6:1-7

???? - Acts 7:44-53

???? - Acts 8:34-40

Last week we saw the apostles being arrested and punished as well as the continued explosive growth of the church.

In chapter 6 we get the first deacons, because of the ramifications of that explosive growth.

Now, does anyone know what a deacon does, or what the word deacon means?

Deacons are servants. The word means “to serve.”

????, read Acts 6:1-7

Acts 6:1–7 ESV

1 Now in these days when the disciples were increasing in number, a complaint by the Hellenists arose against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution. 2 And the twelve summoned the full number of the disciples and said, “It is not right that we should give up preaching the word of God to serve tables. 3 Therefore, brothers, pick out from among you seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we will appoint to this duty. 4 But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.” 5 And what they said pleased the whole gathering, and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, and Philip, and Prochorus, and Nicanor, and Timon, and Parmenas, and Nicolaus, a proselyte of Antioch. 6 These they set before the apostles, and they prayed and laid their hands on them. 7 And the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith.

So the first thing we see is that the disciples, who were followers of Christ but not the apostles - were continuing to grow in number. I mean, between Pentecost and the other passages so far, we are talking about somewhere around 8,000-10,000 new believers.

And with this type of growth, there are going to be problems.

We see that the Hellenists are now complaining about the Hebrews.

Who are the Hellenists?

Hellenists are Greek-speaking Jews. They are in Jerusalem from other places. They are part of the Diaspora, which just means dispersed. They live outside of Israel.

This is in contrast to Jews that are called “Hebrews,” who live natively in Israel and spoke Aramaic. They would have grown up Jewish, going to synagogue, and all of that.

The Hellenists are complaining because their widows are not being cared for, unlike the native Hebrews.

And this was a problem, primarily because of the exponential growth of the church.

So, the apostles gather together all of the disciples and try to come up with a solution.

The first thing we see is that the apostles are already hustling.

They have very full plates with the preaching of the Word, the miraculous signs that the Spirit is doing through them, the demands of spreading the Gospel, etc.

They are already working at max capacity.

The only way they could see to these neglected followers would be to stop doing the other things that God had called them to.

So, they task the disciples with finding some help.

Set aside seven guys who are full of the Spirit, who are wise, who have good character and reputation. We will assign this task to them, so that we can continue doing what God has tasked us to do - prayer and the ministry of the Word.

And everyone liked the plan.

That in itself is probably a miracle.

So the disciples use the criteria the apostles set out, and they choose 7 guys.