Acts 7:17-36

Second Division of the Speech, 17-36. The Age of Moses.

The second part of the defence commences with the long-looked-for approach of the time when ‘the promise,' now centuries old, should be fulfilled. Nothing apparently seemed less likely than that that vast horde of enslaved dispirited children of Israel, living a degraded and unhappy existence in Egypt, would in a few years, after the revelation to Moses, be in possession of the rich and desired land of Canaan, which was then held by a polished and warlike people. But with the appointed hour, the God of Israel raised up the man who should work this mighty deliverance for His people. But, as in the case of the first deliverer of the children of Israel (Joseph), though brought about in a very different way, so with the second: the people, his brethren, refused to listen to him; they were the cause of his expulsion and banishment from the country, though he held the position of a prince of the royal house of Egypt. It was literally against their will that Moses became their saviour.

This part of the speech (Acts 7:17-28) deals with the wrongs and injustice which the great patriot and deliverer had to suffer at the hands of the Jews, his fellow-countrymen and kinsmen. From the 28th verse to the 36th, Stephen relates the Theophany of the burning bush in almost the words of Exodus 3, and closes this part of his defence by dwelling on the fact, that this very Moses, whom the chosen people refused to acknowledge as ruler and judge, God sent to be not only their ruler but their deliverer.