INTRODUCTION

TOPIC – to do with the transforming power of the Gospel

You will remember in Corrie ten Boom’s book ‘The Hiding Place’ when she speaks of the time years after her release from Auschwitz, and following a message she gave (I think in Germany) on forgiveness, and she was confronted with one of the guards who had been responsible for so many deaths, including her sister Betsie’s. Remember the turmoil in her mind as he reached out his hand and asked her for forgiveness? He had since come to faith in Jesus Christ … she could tell by the transformed look on his face, maybe a little like Stephen’s as we read it in 6:14.

A LOOK AT STEPHEN

1. HIS CHARACTER JESUS CHARACTER

a) Full of faith (6:5) (Heb12:2) Lived in dependence on the Father b) Full of the Holy Spirit (6:5, 7:55) (Mt4:1, Heb12:2) Life was under control of the Spirit c) Full of power, did great wonders and (Mk4:41 miracles among the people (6:8) (Mt28:18) d) Full of grace (6:8) (Jn1:14,17) Lived closely to his Lord e) Full of wisdom and knowledge (6:10) (Luke24:27) Note his profound knowledge of Script

2. HIS TESTIMONY

a) Brought before the Sanhedrin (6:12) (Mt26:59) b) False witnesses brought against him (6:13) (Mt26:60) c) Rulers unable withstand his wisdom and the Spirit with which he spoke (6:10) (1Tim6:13) d) He reflected the glory of the Lord (6:15) (Jn1:14) e) His words convicted them (7:54) (Jn3:18, 8:40)

If Stephen resembled the Lord in his character and his testimony, he also does so in his death, which like his Lord’s was undeserved.

3. HIS DEATH

a) He saw Jesus at the right of God (7:55,56) (Luke22:55,56) b) Cast out of the city (7:58) (Heb13:12) c) His death was triumphant (7:60) (Luke23:45) d) Though still a young man his prayer ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them (7:60) (Luke 23:34) e) ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit’ (7:59) (Luke 23:46)

IN SUMMARY

a) Prayer was the essence of Stephen’s life (7:60) b) Why should such a Christlike, fruitful, God-honouring life be snuffed out even before its prime? You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand (Jn13:7). Yes, Father, for such was your gracious will (Mt11:26). John the Baptist’s life came to an end also in his prime, and we cannot fully understand the reasons but Rom 11:33 says ‘O the depth of the riches and the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgements and how inscrutable his ways!’ We are immortal until our life’s work is done and may rest content in the perfect will of God c) Stephen was able to bear the pain and persecution to which he was subjected because his eyes were fixed upon the Lord (7:55). We should be asking at this point why Jesus was standing at the right hand of the Father instead of sitting as portrayed in Acts2:34 & Heb1:3. It’s possible that his intense interest in the noble witness of His servant caused him to rise, or simply to welcome the one who was being faithful unto death (Rev2:10) as he entered the pearly gates where he would receive a crown of life. d) Note the effect of his testimony upon Paul who subsequently spoke so lovingly of him (Acts22:20). Augustine says that the church owes the great apostle to the prayers of Stephen. He prayed, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them’ and it seems that God at oncebegan to answer his prayer by saving the ring-leader. Here is an answer to our question whether our prayers bring about the salvation of others e) Acts 7 closes with one of the most expressive statements in all of Scripture ‘And when he had said this, he fell asleep’. Death for the believer is simply to fall asleep. f) It is significant that the name ‘Stephan’ means ‘a crown’, and his faithfulness to death earned for him a crown of life (Rev2:10). I think that like Paul Stephen could say ‘I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us’ (Ro8:18) and again ‘if we suffer, we shall also reign with him’ (2Tim2:12).

You are probably wondering about the contents of Stephen’s speech which brought on such a catastrophe. I know we can’t grasp it without this background knowledge of Stephen.

Here we have the story of the very first martyr. It may not be so unrealistic to ask how we would feel if we woke up one morning to find that other religions became so dominant in Australia that it became illegal to be a Christian. I often wonder whether I would have grace to stand firm or whether I would run. But someone once said that you can only be faithful in such circumstances if you have been faithful in the lesser trials. People have been known to lose their jobs for being a Christian if the boss is antagonistic. If we have trusted Christ in these lesser things we may find the grace to be strong.

Stephen knew only too well the risks he took in saying what he said. He was on charges of blasphemy against the temple and the law. These were the 2 pillars of the Jewish religion. The high priest the judge said ‘Stephen, is this so?’ Are you attacking the 2 main pillars of our religion?. The next bit seems surprising, almost irrelevant to the question. He asks for a hearing and then takes off on a balloon trip through the OT. It is a bit boring and dull when you are on trial for your life. Why did he go right back and do that resume of the vital chunk of their history from Abraham to Solomon. It first seems as if he is playing for time, saying things they know already but as you read it over and over you begin to see that he is accusing them, putting them in the dock, attacking their understanding of their religion, accusing them of twisting things.

ACCUSATIONS 1.

a) He accused them firstly of restricting God to the temple. God is bigger than that. Stephen made two points:- a) Almost every time God spoke to one of our fore-fathers He spoke outside the holy land, never mind the temple. You think you’ve got God in this stone box here. Where did he speak to Abraham, Mesopotamia, Ur of the Caldees. Where did he speak to Joseph, in Egypt, to Moses – in Sinai in Midian, to the Jews in the wilderness. And you think you’ve got God locked up here, in his little dwelling place. I tell you God is far bigger than your ideas. You are restricting God’s dwelling. Everywhere God speaks is holy ground. You can’t limit God. We should never call our churches the house of God, because He is everywhere. Little boy who stung someone with a nettle and said it was OK because Jesus wasn’t looking.

b) God preferred to live in a tent than a temple. Because He is a God who is on the move. The symbol of the meeting place was a tent. Stephen says God didn’t want the temple. Stephen said BUT Solomon built him a house, got him nicely settled down in Jerusalem, God down to earth where you could manage him. The prophet had to come to Solomon and say ‘Heaven is my throne and earth is my footstool’ You can’t lock me up. The child said to his teacher ‘Where is God’ ‘Everywhere’, so the child asked ‘Is He in my lunch box’ ‘Well yes’. So the child snapped the lid on and said ‘Got him’. But tho it sounds childish, whenever humans construct their own religions and put up their own holy buildings, we are trying to say ‘Got Him – I’ve got him where I want Him’. The secret of true religion is to say ‘God has me where He wants me’. We can never imprison God in a building God made and holds in his hand the whole universe. So this was the first charge he made

2.

The second thing he accuses them of: he says ‘you think you’ve got the law of Moses. May I tell you that you don’t keep it. From the very first day it was given, you and your fathers refused to obey it. From the beginning they wanted a golden calf – some thing they could see, an image, an idol. They got sick of Moses staying up on the mountain with God and said to Aaron, ‘Build us a golden calf.’ And they brought their ear rings and other jewelry, and made a golden calf. And in the wilderness they were worshipping the stars which they thought would guide their lives. And in almost every newspaper and magazine you buy today people rush to read their stars – 20th century scientific Australia. Shakespeare put in the words of one of his characters ‘The fault dear Brutus is not in the stars it is in ourselves.’ When the prophets came to bring them back to the law, they stoned them. Stephen says you claim to have the law, to be true Jews. Then why is it that you betrayed and murdered the greatest prophet of them all, predicted by Moses, the holy and righteous one, Jesus. You always resist the Holy Spirit. Stephen says that is what you are doing. You are going to kill me because you killed him. You are resisting the truth, you are against me like all your fore-fathers. They may have had the law of Moses but they didn’t keep it. They may have had prophets from God, but they killed them. They may have had the temple but they locked God up in it, and God is too big for that. That was about as far as Stephen got.

They were so angry that they didn’t even get Pontius Pilate’s signature, no appeal, no trial, no counsel for the defence. Extraordinary parallel between Stephen’s trial and that of Jesus. The charge was blasphemy against the temple – same as Jesus. The counter charge, they had rejected the prophets. The contrast between their contorted faces and their blazing eyes and the face of an angel in the dock looking up to heaven could see the Son of man at the right hand of God in glory was stark. They were so angry that they rushed on him – it was a lynching. But before he died he said ‘Lord Jesus, do not hold this sin against them.’

Though it was absolutely forbidden to bury someone who had been stoned, we read that devout Jews came and buried Stephen, just as Joseph of Arimethea came and begged for the body of Jesus. Now there was a young theological student watching all this, a student of Gamaliel. Where was Gamaliel, that tolerant man – we don’t hear from him again. Saul was holding the jackets and he knew in his heart that they both could not be right. Saul had built his religion on the temple and the law. He had banked on all this to get him to heaven. I’m sure he saw in Stephen something that shook him to the depths of his being. He thought ‘Stephen must be wrong – he couldn’t face being wrong himself. He began to kick, he vowed he would wipe out every Christian. They fled to an alien country – the gospel spread. WE owe Saul to the prayer of Stephen. You can’t blot out the truth. ‘The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.

When we had the opportunity to be in Jerusalem in 1983, we were overwhelmed by the dome of the rock built on the sight of the demolished temple. That dome could be seen from almost every vantage point around the city. It is huge. The only thing remaining of Solomon’s temple is the large stone wall which is part of the foundations. And of course that is where devout Jews still go to wail and pray – the Wailing Wall. Our temporary quarters were adjacent to a minaret which broadcast the mezzowin’s call to prayer every few hours commencing before dawn which was at 4 am at the time we were there. Jerusalem is a city of despair and I couldn’t help but grieve over their totally missing the fantastic news that the temple was no longer needed. Stephen had it all worked out from the Scriptures, and he knew that any threat to the temple was a threat to the livelihood of those Jews.

In a nutshell we all know that we can not live up to the Law. Jesus has brought with his death and resurrection a new covenant, a covenant of love , one in which our salvation depends on one thing only, the recognition that Jesus paid the price for me. I am reconciled with the Father not by Law but by love. And even more than that. God is everywhere. He cannot be confined to the temple. In fact if I yield my life to Him, my body becomes a temple of the Holy Spirit. He lives in me and through me to bless the lives of those around me.

Our final hymn is one of commitment. I trust you are able to sing it from the depth of your being.

Benediction