Acts 6:3-13

³Therefore, brothers, select from among you seven men of good reputation, full of Holy Spirit and wisdom, whom we will appoint over this need.

⁴But we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the Word.”

⁵The statement pleased the whole multitude; and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and Holy Spirit, and Philip and Prochorus and Nicanor and Timon and Parmenas and Nicholas, a proselyte from Antioch,

⁶whom they set before the Apostles; and after praying they laid hands on them.

⁷Well the Word of God kept spreading, and the number of disciples in Jerusalem kept multiplying at a great rate, and a large company of the priests were obeying the faith.

⁸While Stephen, full of faith and power, was doing great wonders and signs among the people.

⁹Then there arose some from what is called the Synagogue of the Freedmen (Cyrenians, Alexandrians, and those from Cilicia and Asia), disputing with Stephen.

¹⁰And they were not able to withstand the wisdom and the Spirit with which he spoke.

¹¹Then they instigated men to say, “We have heard him speaking blasphemous words against Moses and God.”

¹²And they stirred up the people, and the elders and the scribes; and coming upon him they seized him, and brought him in to the Sanhedrin;

¹³and they put forward false witnesses who said: “This man never stops speaking blasphemous words against the holy place and the law;