Acts 11:26
“When he had found him, he brought him to Antioch. For a whole year they were gathered together with the assembly, and taught many people. The disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.”
What does Acts 11:26 mean?
Barnabas had tracked down Saul (who would become Paul) and brought him to the thriving church in Antioch, where together they spent a year teaching and strengthening the growing community of believers. It was in this city, among these ordinary people learning to follow Jesus, that outsiders first noticed something distinctive enough to give them a new name: Christians, meaning "followers of Christ" or "Christ-ones." The name wasn't something the disciples chose for themselves, but rather how the pagan neighbors labeled this emerging movement. What started as perhaps a mocking label eventually became a badge of identity worn with pride.