CHAPTER 7 STEPHEN'S EVANGELISTIC DEFENCE. The words of Stephen in this chapter are a powerful defence against the charges made against him. That is unquestionable. But they are not a defence made by his proving that he did not say the words that he was accuse of. Indeed such a defence might have bee... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And the high priest said, “Are these things so?” ' We are left to recognise that the High Priest, the chairman of the tribunal, has had the charges laid out before the court. He then turns to Stephen and asks severely, ‘Is this true? Are these things so?'. It was a fair question.... [ Continue Reading ]
FROM ABRAHAM TO THE PROPHET LIKE MOSES - REPLY TO THE CHARGE OF BLASPHEMY AGAINST GOD AND MOSES (7:2-43). The only way Stephen had of replying to charges of blasphemy when he had no supporting witnesses was to make clear what his whole theological position was and demonmstrate that in fact it was h... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And he said, “Brethren and fathers, listen. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Haran, and said to him, ‘Get you out of your land, and from your kindred, and come into the land which I shall show you.' ” ' Stephen begins his reply in a co... [ Continue Reading ]
‘Then came he out of the land of the Chaldaeans, and dwelt in Haran, and from there, when his father was dead, God removed him into this land, in which you now dwell,' So Abraham had left behind him the land of the Chaldaeans at God's command and had dwelt in Haran. And from there he had later, when... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And he gave him no inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on, and he promised that he would give it to him in possession, and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no child.' But even though Abraham had at last made Canaan his ‘home' he had had no permanent possession in it. God... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And God spoke in this vein, that his seed would sojourn in a strange land, and that they would bring them into bondage, and treat them ill, four hundred years.' Nor did God promise immediate possession of the land for his seed. They also would be away from the land for four hundred years (Genesis... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And the nation to which they will be in bondage I will judge, said God, and after that shall they come forth, and serve me in this place.' And eventually God would act. God would judge those who held them in bondage, after which, God said, “they will come out and serve Me ‘in this place'.” In Exod... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And he gave him the covenant of circumcision. And so Abraham begat Isaac, and circumcised him the eighth day, and Isaac begat Jacob, and Jacob the twelve patriarchs.' As a seal on these promises God gave him the covenant of circumcision (Genesis 17), which included his descendants (he ‘circumcised... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And the patriarchs, moved with jealousy against Joseph, sold him into Egypt. And God was with him,' But now came the first sign of unbelief and disquiet that would become a hallmark of the people of Israel. The patriarchs, (the rulers of their tribes), became jealous of their brother and moved aga... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And delivered him out of all his afflictions, and gave him favour and wisdom before Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he made him governor over Egypt and all his house.' Thus God delivered him from his afflictions, and exalted him, and enthroned him (the parallel could hardly be missed with the One Who h... [ Continue Reading ]
‘Now there came a famine over all Egypt and Canaan, and great affliction: and our fathers found no sustenance, and when Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt, he sent forth our fathers the first time.' Meanwhile the whole world was suffering from famine so that ‘our fathers' (note the more pers... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And at the second time Joseph was made known to his brothers, and Joseph's race became openly made known to Pharaoh.' But their fathers had not remained in blindness. At the second opportunity, (the opportunity that the Sanhedrin was now experiencing), the tribal leaders had had their eyes opened.... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And Joseph sent, and called to him Jacob his father, and all his kindred, threescore and fifteen souls.' The result was that those selected of the people of Jacob responded to the call of their Deliverer, and all was well. And the number of them was threescore (three times twice ten - completeness... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And Jacob went down into Egypt, and he died, himself and our fathers; and they were carried over to Shechem, and laid in the tomb that Abraham bought for a price in silver of the sons of Hamor in Shechem.' So Joseph in Egypt was the source of their deliverance. And the final result of their delive... [ Continue Reading ]
‘But as the time of the promise drew near which God had vouchsafed to Abraham, the people grew and multiplied in Egypt, until there arose another king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph.' As a result of God's deliverance through Joseph, Israel prospered. ‘The people grew and multiplied', which was... [ Continue Reading ]
‘The same dealt craftily with our race, and ill-treated our fathers, so that they cast out their babes with the purpose that they might not live.' The result was that affliction arose and attempts were made to slay all male babies at birth. There may be here a reminder of what had happened to the c... [ Continue Reading ]
‘At which season Moses was born, and was extremely handsome, and he was nourished three months in his father's house.' At Israel's worst time Moses was born, and he was ‘fair to God'. We can compare how after He was born God was with Jesus as he grew in wisdom and stature (Luke 2:40). Both were pro... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And when he was cast out, Pharaoh's daughter took him up, and nourished him for her own son. And Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was mighty in his words and works.' But the future deliverer was not brought up by his own people under the instruction of his own rulers... [ Continue Reading ]
‘But when he was almost forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brethren the children of Israel. And seeing one of them suffer wrong, he defended him, and avenged him who was oppressed, smiting the Egyptian, and he supposed that his brethren understood that God by his hand was giving th... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And the day following he appeared to them as they strove, and would have set them at one again, saying, “Sirs, you are brethren; why do you do wrong one to another?” But he who did his neighbour wrong thrust him away, saying, “Who made you a ruler and a judge over us? Would you kill me, as you kill... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And Moses fled at this saying, and became a sojourner in the land of Midian, where he begat two sons.' The result was that the deliverer had fled and became a sojourner in Midian. Having rejected their deliverer they had lost him. Note that the place to which he fled was the place where the mounta... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And when forty years were fulfilled, an angel appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai, in a flame of fire in a bush. And when Moses saw it, he wondered at the sight, and as he drew near to gaze at it, there came a voice of the Lord, “I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, and of... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And the Lord said to him, “Loose the shoes from your feet, for the place on which you stand is holy ground. I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and have heard their groaning, and I am come down to deliver them. And now come, I will send you into Egypt.' God had declare... [ Continue Reading ]
‘This Moses whom they refused, saying, “Who made you a ruler and a judge?” him has God sent to be both a ruler and a deliverer by the hand of the angel that appeared to him in the bush.' So the one whom Israel had first rejected, contemptuously refusing his rulership, God had now sent as Ruler and... [ Continue Reading ]
‘This man led them forth, having wrought wonders and signs in Egypt, and in the Red Sea, and in the wilderness forty years.' And this Moses had revealed himself as ruler and deliverer in performing many signs and wonders both before and after the great deliverance. (The hint was that the One Who ha... [ Continue Reading ]
‘This is that Moses, who said to the children of Israel, “A prophet shall God raise up to you from among your brethren, like to me.” ' Stephen then makes clear the parallel between Moses and Jesus by citing Deuteronomy 18:15 (compare Acts 3:22). All that he has been saying has had in mind not only... [ Continue Reading ]
‘This is he who was in the congregation (church) in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him in the Mount Sinai, and with our fathers, who received living oracles to give to us. To whom our fathers would not be obedient, but thrust him from them, and turned back in their hearts to Egypt,' ‘Th... [ Continue Reading ]
‘Saying to Aaron, “Make us gods who will go before us, for as for this Moses, who led us forth out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what is become of him.” ' Rather than responding to the living oracles they chose that Aaron should make them dead replacement gods, for they did not know where Mo... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And they made a calf in those days, and brought a sacrifice to the idol, and rejoiced in the works of their hands.' The people had quite blatantly made a calf and sacrificed to their idol, and rejoiced in what their own hands had made. There is a parallel between this last statement and the statem... [ Continue Reading ]
‘But God turned, and gave them up to serve the host of heaven; as it is written in the book of the prophets, “Did you offer to me slain beasts and sacrifices, Forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel? And did you take up the tabernacle of Moloch? And the star of the god Rephan? The figu... [ Continue Reading ]
‘Our fathers had the tabernacle of the testimony in the wilderness, even as he appointed who spoke to Moses, that he should make it according to the figure that he had seen.' Their fathers had ‘the Tabernacle of the Testimony in the wilderness', which was made according to God's pattern, just as th... [ Continue Reading ]
WHAT ISRAEL'S ATTITUDE TOWARDS GOD'S DWELLINGPLACE HAD BEEN (7:44-50). What Stephen said here would mainly have been acceptable to many Hellenistic Jews, certainly in Alexandria where they were used to allegorisation. But it was not going to be acceptable in the home of the Temple.... [ Continue Reading ]
REPLY TO THE CHARGE OF SPEAKING AGAINST THE LAW AND THE TEMPLE (7:44-53). Having been accused of speaking against the Law Stephen defends himself by speaking in favour of the oracles of God and pointing out how they and their fathers had not been obedient to them. This may be analysed as follows:... [ Continue Reading ]
‘Which also our fathers, in their turn, brought in with Joshua (Jesus) when they entered on the possession of the nations, whom God thrust out before the face of our fathers, to the days of David,' It was then brought into the land by another Jesus (Greek), by Joshua (Hebrew), when they took over ‘... [ Continue Reading ]
‘Who found favour in the sight of God, and asked to find a habitation for the house of Jacob (or in some MSS ‘the God of Jacob').' And David himself found favour in God's sight, and wanted to find some kind of habitation (skene - tent) for the house (or ‘God') of Jacob. However, as all knew, God ha... [ Continue Reading ]
‘But Solomon built him a house.' But it was Solomon who went about it. And what did he do? He built Him a house. And yet even Solomon had recognised that God did not dwell in a House made with hands, because He is Lord over all (1 Kings 8:27). How foolish then to build such a house which could only... [ Continue Reading ]
‘However the Most High does not dwell in houses made with hands; as says the prophet,' Thus the Temple was an error, a concession allowed by God but not really adequate (2 Samuel 7:6). The Most High does not dwell in houses made with hands, as the prophets have made clear. They had thrust aside God... [ Continue Reading ]
“The heaven is my throne, And the earth the footstool of my feet. What manner of house will you build Me? says the Lord, Or what is the place of my rest? Did not my hand make all these things?” And this is also what the prophet Isaiah 66:1 LXX had declared. God is the Creator of heaven and eart... [ Continue Reading ]
“You stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you do always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you.” Their attitude towards the Temple, exalting what God had not exalted, and turning from what God had provided, epitomised their whole attitude towards all that was of God. The... [ Continue Reading ]
“Which of the prophets did not your fathers persecute? And they killed those who showed before of the coming of the Righteous One, of whom you have now become betrayers and murderers,” Now Stephen gets to the heart of the matter. Their fathers had revealed what was in their uncircumcised hearts by... [ Continue Reading ]
“You who received the law as it was ordained by angels, and did not keep it.” But, he is saying, it is not really surprising that they had rejected the Righteous One, for these are the ones who had been privileged to receive the Law as ordained by angels, and still had not kept it. The two ideas we... [ Continue Reading ]
‘Now when they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed at him with their teeth.' The verbs here are very powerful. ‘Cut to the heart' indicates that his words had gone home, for good or bad. They were moved to the very depths of their beings. Every nerve was stretched. And... [ Continue Reading ]
THE FINAL CONCLUSION (7:54-60). Learned judges do not like those who are on trial trying to convict them of being criminals, and as they were unwilling to admit that they were wrong the result was inevitable. The uneasy feeling that had grown as Stephen's defence had gone on, had now become outrigh... [ Continue Reading ]
‘But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God,' For to Stephen a wonderful thing happened. Being full of the Holy Spirit (the continuous experience of his life) he looked up towards heaven and saw the... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God.” At what he saw he could not help himself, and he cried out and declared his interpretation of what he saw. It revealed that the Son of Man had truly come in the clouds to the throne of God and had re... [ Continue Reading ]
‘But they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and rushed on him with one accord, and they cast him out of the city, and stoned him. Everything broke at once. They could no longer restrain themselves. With cries of anguish the members of the Sanhedrin blocked their ears at this blas... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul.' The rules for stoning were observed so scrupulously that a mature young man called Saul, who had not been a witness, demonstrated his oneness with the sentence by guarding the coats of the witnesses as they carried... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And they stoned Stephen, calling on the Lord, and saying, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” But as they stoned him, Stephen looked up to heaven and prayed to ‘the Lord', calling out, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit”. He had no doubt in his heart, only joy, and concern for those who were doing this t... [ Continue Reading ]
‘And he knelt down, and cried with a loud voice, “Lord, do not lay this sin to their charge.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep.' And then as the stones rained down on him he knelt, and crying with a loud voice, pleaded, “Lord, do not lay this sin to their charge.” And with that he ‘fell as... [ Continue Reading ]