Acts 7:1-7

The high priest said, "Is this so?" And Stephen said, "Men, brothers and fathers, listen to what I have to say. The God of glory appeared to Abraham our father when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Charran. He said to him, 'Get out from your country and from your kindred and come here to a land which I will show you.' Then he came out from the land of the Chaldaeans and took up his residence in Charran. After the death of his father he removed from there and took up his residence in this land where you now live. God did not give him an inheritance in it, not even enough to set his foot upon. But he did promise him that he would some day give it to him for a possession and to his descendants after him, although at that time he had no child. God spoke thus--that his descendants would be sojourners in an alien land, that they would make slaves of them and treat them badly for four hundred years. As for the nations to which they will be slaves--God said--'l will judge them, and after these years have passed, they will come out and they will serve me in this place.'"

As we have already seen, it was Stephen's method of defence to take a panoramic view of Jewish history. It was not the mere sequence of events which was in Stephen's mind. To him every person and event symbolized something. He began with Abraham, for in the most literal way it was with him that, for the Jew, history began. In him Stephen sees three things.

(i) Abraham was a man who answered God's summons. As the writer to the Hebrews put it, Abraham left home without knowing where he was to go (Hebrews 11:8). He was a man of adventurous spirit. Lesslie Newbigin of the Church of South India tells us that negotiations towards that union were often held up by people demanding to know just where such and such a step might lead. In the end someone had to say to these careful souls, "A Christian has no right to demand to know where he is going." For Stephen the man of God was he who obeyed God's command even when he had no idea what the consequences might be.

(ii) Abraham was a man of faith. He did not know where he was going but he believed that, under God's guidance, the best was yet to be. Even when he had no children and when, humanly speaking, it seemed impossible that he ever should have any, he believed that some day his descendants would inherit the land God had promised to them.

(iii) Abraham was a man of hope. To the end of the day he never saw the promise fully fulfilled but he never doubted that it would be.

So Stephen presents the Jews with the picture of an adventurous life, ever ready to answer God's summons in contrast to their desire to cling to the past.

DOWN INTO EGYPT (Acts 7:8-16)