Just 13 short verses in this week's chapter, but plenty to discuss. I hope you have a Bible nearby, but remember, you can always visit biblegateway.com to find whatever you're looking for in God's Word.
Unless I missed something from earlier chapters, verse 1 gives us the first taste of the young church failing its people, as the Hellenistic widows were being neglected in the daily distribution of food. I wonder what was behind all that, but I'm glad the solution to the problem was handled quickly and apparently satisfactorily. We see a great example of the 'one body, many parts' theme, as seven men who were known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom were chosen to handle the food. How cool is it that being full of the Spirit was a requirement to serve food? Would church leaders today take that much care in choosing people to do such a seemingly mundane task? Do we value those who do that type of work in the Body of Christ?
Here we meet Stephen, one of the seven chosen to handle the food service issues, and apparently a guy who made the powers that be uncomfortable; reminiscent of Peter and John from a few chapters earlier. We'll see how Stephen's story turns out next week, but do you notice how his accusations remind us of those that were thrown not only at Jesus, but also the accusations of Daniel from the Old Testament? It seems, that there's something about righteousness that can make evil really, really nervous.
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