(4) They that were scattered abroad.--These. As has been said above, would in all probability be Stephen's Hellenistic fellow-workers and followers. As in later ages, the axiom that "the blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church," held true from the beginning. The attempt to stamp out the new faith did but give it a wider scope of action, and urged it on to pass the limits within which it might otherwise have been confined for a much longer period.

Preaching the word.--Better, preaching the glad tidings of the word.

Verse 4. - They therefore for therefore they, A.V.; about for everywhere, A.V. Went about; i.e. from place to place, and wherever they went they preached the Word. Διέρχομαι here is used in the same sense as in ver. 40, and in Acts 10:38; Acts 17:23; Acts 20:25, and elsewhere.

8:1-4 Though persecution must not drive us from our work, yet it may send us to work elsewhere. Wherever the established believer is driven, he carries the knowledge of the gospel, and makes known the preciousness of Christ in every place. Where a simple desire of doing good influences the heart, it will be found impossible to shut a man out from all opportunities of usefulness.Therefore they that were scattered abroad,.... By reason of the persecution in Jerusalem: the seventy disciples, and other ministers of the word; or the hundred and twenty, excepting the apostles,

went every where; or

went through the countries of Judea and Samaria, as far as Phenice, Cyrus, and Antioch:

preaching the word; the Vulgate Latin, Syriac, and Ethiopic versions add, "of God", and so some copies; the Gospel, which is the word of God, and not man; which was not of men, nor received from men, but came from God, and by the revelation of Christ; and which was good news and glad tidings, of peace, pardon, righteousness and salvation, by Jesus Christ.