Acts 7:54
Please remain standing and turn
in your copy of God’s word to the book of Acts chapter seven.
I will read verse 54 and then just a couple of verses in chapter
eight. While you’re making your way
there, I’ll point out to you, we’re hitting a significant turning
point in the story of the resurrected Jesus. continued ministry on
earth through his apostles. Remember he told his apostles,
you’ll go preach to Jerusalem, then Judea, Samaria, and then
to the ends of the earth. Well, this matter of persecution
we’ll read of will scatter scatter the Christians into the world.
And so we go from Jerusalem, then to the Judea, Samaria, and
the ends of the earth. So this is a big shift, not just
in persecution. The apostles no longer have favor
in Jerusalem. They experienced great duress,
but it scatters the people so that Jesus’ mission is geographically
continuing as he promised. So hear the word of God. Acts
chapter seven, verse 54. It says, now, when they heard
these things, they were enraged and they ground their teeth at
him, but he full of the Holy Spirit gazed into heaven and
saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of
God. And he said, behold, I see the heavens opened. I see the
son of man standing at the right hand of God. But they cried out
with a loud voice and stopped their ears and rushed together
at him. They cast him out of the city
and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their
garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. And as they were
stoning Stephen, he called out, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. And falling to his knees, he
cried out with a loud voice, Lord, do not hold this sin against
them. And when he had said this, he
fell asleep. And Saul approved of his execution. And there arose
on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem.
And they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea, Samaria,
except the apostles. Devout men buried Stephen and
made great lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging the church
and entering house after house. He dragged off men and women
and committed them to prison. Pray with me. Lord, What a terrible
thing, but you said your servants would receive what was lacking
in your sufferings. So give us courage now as we
hear your word to be persecuted, to be reviled, to be spoken against
for your name’s sake. And encourage us through this
word, through this life of Stephen, to be people who see the big
picture, the whole picture. Help us now in this hour, we
pray in the name of Jesus, amen. You may be seated. Stephen has gotten himself in
a bit of trouble. Remember our study last week,
he recounted through scriptural references to these leaders,
to the officials of this court of the Sanhedrin, this court
of Jewish officials. He said to them, you believe
in the land. Well, God can work outside the
land. He said to them, you, you believe in the temple. Well,
God is too big to dwell in temples. And then he said, you, you, you
say I’ve blasphemed against Moses. You yourselves don’t keep this
law. And he spent verse after verse,
uh, word after word telling them, no, you’re the law breakers.
You’re the blasphemers. Uh, you’re the bad ones. And then he says
to them, uh, this is where you can tell he did not read, uh,
Dale Carnegie, how to win. friends and influence people.
He says to them, you stiff necked people, you, you uncircumcised
in heart. And this is when their, their
anger peaks. This is when the words of Isaiah
come true. Remember Isaiah’s call, you’ll
go to a people and you will preach and they will not hear. You’ll
preach and they will not see. You’ll preach, their hearts will
be dull. You’ll preach, their ears will
be heavy, their eyes blind. And this is exactly what is taking
place as Peter, or I’m sorry, as Stephen proclaims the goodness
of God before this council of Israel. You’ve read the passage,
they’re unhappy. You’ve seen they’re provoked
and now they’re gonna kill him. Stephen will be our first martyr.
He’ll be our first witness, witness to the, the, the ministry, the
life, the death, the resurrection of Jesus, the goodness of the
gospel. He will be the first to lose his life because of his
beliefs. I’ve got a little folder in my
file cabinet on persecution and I flipped through it this week.
And some of the things I have in there are really old. They
go back some 20 years and, and I found this one story. It goes like this. A church of
20,000 in a big American city was gathering. And in the back
of this church came two armed men in dark clothing with heavy,
heavy weaponry. And they said, everyone who names
the name of Jesus stand up. And one by one, hundred by a
hundred, thousand by a thousand, every one but 10 or so left. Two men take off their ski mask
and say, now preacher, we’ve got rid of the hypocrites preach
on. Now you think through that and
realize for sure the security team, the people with the, you
know, the guns under their shirts, whatever they would have jumped
up and taken. And so don’t look at too many
of the details there, but wouldn’t that be interesting to see who
was left standing. Who is left worshiping? Who is
left witnessing? Who is left proclaiming? Friends,
it takes guts to walk with the Lord in this day and age. Oh,
we’re not the most persecuted country. No, not yet. But as
we look today at how the gospel of God may require everything
of us, how the gospel of God may require everything of you,
We want to think through four themes from this passage. The
first theme is this. The gospel brings hostility. The gospel will bring hostility
in your life. It will come maybe with an unbelieving
spouse. It will come when you invite
your children to church over a holiday. It will come as you
speak the words of God to someone who doesn’t believe and so you
begin to see the The separation of your worldview, your standards,
it will come in the workplace when you’re told to hush. But
everyone else’s religion, whatever they may be, identity and politics
and whatever else, it’s allowed, not yours. The gospel will bring
hostility in your life. And here we see the leaders of
Israel, they go from mad to madder to maddest. Right? This group brought Stephen, they
dragged him into the Sanhedrin court, accusing him of blaspheming
God and Moses. And after he gives this speech,
this long impassioned speech, they believe he has betrayed
Israel. He has rejected their authority,
but no, in fact, it is they who’ve betrayed Jesus. It’s their fathers
who’ve killed the prophets. They persecuted all who announced
Jesus, and now they’re going to kill this man, Stephen. It’s interesting, this mob rule. We think it’s new. We think it’s
in our culture only, mob rule, cancel culture. But no, this
mob rule brings in lying witnesses. This mob rule brings in those
who will bear false witness. Do you connect Psalm 35 now with
Stephen’s plot? They become so enraged they gnash
their teeth. Have you ever had somebody gnash
their teeth at you? I mean, you’ve had the tall finger in traffic,
right? You know, you cut somebody off or you go too slow and you
get the, the, the, you know, the finger, right? You get, you
get the fist, you get the, the mouth. What are you doing? You
know, you stupid, whatever. Um, they, they, they are so enraged. They gnash their teeth there.
angry. They’re snarling. They’re like
a pit bull, a Doberman. They’re crying out. They’re stopping
their ears like a two year old. Notice how the passage begins
in 754. It says, after they heard these
things, they were enraged. What was it that enraged them?
It was the gospel. And we have to understand, dear
brothers and sisters, the gospel will bring hostility. They will stop their ears. They’ll
rush you. They will stone you. They will
bring a great persecution on the church. There will be systematic
ravaging of the church. The gospel of God preached does
two things, according to Paul. Rather ironic, I bring him up
because he comes up in our passage as unconverted Saul, who’s ravaging
the church. He’s holding the feet of the
garments of the stoners, the witnesses. But Paul in first
Corinthians chapter two says the preaching of the gospel either
is a fragrance of life to those who are being saved, or it is
a stench of death to those who are perishing. It is a stench
to speak of sin and judgment, and it brings rage and wrath
and well stoning. This stoning takes place outside
the camp. This stoning would have been
in the historic sense of we strip a man, we stone him in the head,
we heap many, many stones on his body. Remember Achan who
stole from Jericho. Remember Naboth whose vineyard
was stolen by Jezebel and her husband. Others, Zechariah, James,
even Timothy were stoned to death. Stephen’s in good company here
as a martyr. But the gospel brings hostility. It brings anger and rage. It
brings murder. But the Bible brings encouragement
to those of us under hostility. Be faithful, persevere, press
on, keep the faith, look to Jesus. God will give you the words to
say, the spirit will help you in your time of trial. There’s
even a beatitude in the book of Revelation. Blessed are the
dead who die in the Lord from their labors. They now rest. The gospel brings hostility.
We see a little of it. We see a little of it. You’re
intellectual, intellectually persecuted. Oh, you can’t believe
that possibly, can you? Your Christianity is a crutch.
It’s the opiate of the masses has been said. but you’re still here today.
Uh, our building hasn’t been bulldozed. Uh, nobody has chained
our door shut and stood guard outside and said, no, you, you
can’t be here. We’re not being monitored. We’re
not being persecuted. We’re, we’re blessed, which is
why two things are true. You have no excuse not to be
here. There are people across the world
desperate to be in worship and they can’t. But we get off to
the mountains, we get off to the coast, we get off to the
whatever, you name it. And there are people across the
world desperate to be in church and they can’t be because they’re
met at the door with hostility, but we pick and choose. That’s
one truth. You ought to be here. A second
truth, we need to pray for others. Pick up on one of the tables,
the copies of the voice of the martyrs. Read up on the internet. of Christians being persecuted
around the world. It’ll change your perspective.
It’ll make you thankful that you have a copy of God’s word.
It’ll make you thankful that you can have a Bible verse, at
least for now, at the bottom of your email signature. Your
phones will still transmit scripture. That’s not been blocked. Oh,
but we’re getting close, aren’t we? Twitter. Put you in Twitter
jail. Facebook will put you in Facebook
jail and all those things. The gospel brings hostility.
Consider yourselves blessed for now, but pray for those who are
bearing the name of Jesus faithfully under great hostility. So the
gospel brings hostility, but the gospel also brings hope. I don’t know if you could imagine
yourself, put yourself in Stephen’s shoes under this angry mob, under
this injustice, Under all these lying witnesses about what Stephen
has been doing, Peter and John and the other apostles will certainly
go through this. Jesus is going to say to his
apostles, he’s going to say to the church, he’s going to say
it. Well, he did to Isaiah and he may say it to us in a generation.
Go to people who won’t hear. Go to people who won’t hear,
but you must speak and even be ready to die. Say to yourself,
Jesus is my trust. Jesus is my hope. He’ll see me
through hardship. Did you catch the imagery that
comes up in this passage? If we’re saying the gospel brings
hope, yes, it brings hope for us as we come to faith in Jesus
and realize our salvation. But the gospel brings us hope
along the way. What’s true about Jesus now? We often think of the gospel
bringing hope for salvation. Jesus died on the cross a long,
long time ago and that cross, his death benefits me now. Yes,
that’s true. But Jesus is sitting in heaven
as the risen and conquering Lord. He ever lives above for me, for
you to intercede. And he’s leading the cheer as
it were of the great cloud of witnesses saying to us, press
on, keep the faith work. Do not rest, not yet, until your
labor is finished. But this picture shows, this
passage shows Jesus standing at the right hand of God, not
sitting, but standing. And in a sense, in this vision
he gives to Stephen, saying, look, I’m right here. I am with
you in your persecution. I am with you in your hardship.
I’m with you in your stand for me as you bear my name faithfully. I’ve been there. Come on, brother.
Come on, sister. You acknowledge me before men. I will acknowledge you before
my father who is in heaven. There’s a special grace that
we see in this passage given to Stephen. And it’s a special
grace of a theophany, an appearance of God, a picture of the father
and the Holy Spirit, a beatific vision, the highest privilege
a Christian can experience to see God in all his fullness,
all his glory. How did God encourage Isaiah
before his commissioning? He showed him into heaven. How
did God encourage John on the Isle of Patmos? John, persecuted
for the gospel as the pastor of Ephesus, was put on Patmos,
a prison island. And history tells us that he
was unsuccessfully boiled. And how does Jesus encourage
him? Does he drop out of heaven a crummy New York Times bestselling
devotional book? No, he doesn’t. He shows him
into heaven. He shows him into the things
that will take place in the last days for the church. He shows
him Jesus, the faithful witness. And so, dear brothers and sisters,
when the gospel brings hostility, it also brings us hope because
God in his word has shown us the eternal realities of victorious
Jesus. Winning, ruling, reigning, interceding,
cheering you on, working on your behalf. You’re not just down
here suffering. It’s for a purpose. And there
is one watching you. And this special grace to Stephen
may not be ours in the same way, but it is written of and told
us. It’s written of for John. It’s written of for Isaiah. And
we can read about heaven’s gates being open wide and we can see
God, the righteous, Jesus, the just, and the Holy Spirit. above in heaven, cheering us
on. The gospel brings us great hope. The truth of the word brings
us great hope. And so while the gospel brings
hostility, it brings us hope. It also gives us humility. We live in a world of domination. Aren’t we seeing it now as one
nation is invading another? and we don’t know the plans,
we can guess what they are, but they’re probably not gonna stop
there. We live in a world of domination. And domination usually
leads us to evil, like shooting people, bombing things, or being
a man dressed as a woman trying to out-swim girls. We live in
a world where domination and sin do not mix well. We live in a world that says,
I’ve got to be the best, I’ve got to win, And I will cheat. I will lie. I will steal and
I will get revenge. Yet God in his economy, think
of the sermon on the Mount. Jesus said, all the blessed are
use. Blessed are the poor. Blessed
are the mourn. Blessed are the meek. Love your
enemy. Even those who persecute you.
And what does Stephen say in the midst of all this hardship?
He looks up into heaven, seeing Christ, and he says, receive
my spirit into heaven. Friends, they can do what they
want to your body, but they can never, ever take your soul out
of union with Jesus. And remember at the resurrection,
your body, yes, may be tortured and in the grave. Rest in Christ
until the resurrection, when God will make it whole. And so
Stephen says two things, receive my spirit, but he also says,
just as his savior did, do not hold this sin against them. Faith in God will help us to
love our enemies. The gospel will bring hostility. It will bring hope, but it will
bring you to a place of humility and a world of domination. You’re
to take up the basin and the towel. Your faith in God will
help you love enemies. Well, what’s the result of this
hostility? What’s the purpose of this hope? What’s the blessing from having
humility? Well, the gospel is going to
keep going. Christians aren’t quitters. Christians
don’t dust off their hands and say, well, that’s enough of that
persecution. I didn’t sign up for this. No true Christians
will continue to preach the gospel. They’ll be like the apostles
who left the council earlier in Acts and they’ll say, We counted
a privilege to be beaten. We counted a privilege to be
persecuted and reviled and mistreated for the gospel. Many unexpected
visitors had come from all parts of the world to Jerusalem. In
God’s providence, in his sovereignty, Jerusalem was full of the world’s
people for Passover, for pilgrimage. And now the gospel has come.
And while they’re probably enjoying all this good stuff, persecution
sends them packing. It sends them running. And that
probably would not have been the case. They probably would
have stayed put and enjoyed the city, the shrines, the Just the
religious experience that was there. But persecution scatters
them across the world. It scatters them back to their
homes. Persecution is a catalyst for
the gospel. In fact, it has been well said
the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church. And so we
see God’s mighty hand as violence comes against Christians in the
world. you will very often see the strongest
faith. American church needs persecution.
It needs it badly because we pick and we choose. Did y’all
catch our confession of sin today? That’s one we’ve never used before.
Oh God, I’ve taken your story and I’ve changed it to suit my
needs. I’ve taken your law and I’ve softened it. We figure we’re
pretty good if we get to church. Christmas and Easter in America,
right? That makes you saved somehow. What will persecution do? It
will scatter the church, but it will purify her. Violence
against Christians in the world and even in the United States
will be a good challenge for us. But I want to encourage you
in this way. This is the encouragement that
Stephen had. It’s the encouragement that Others
in Christian history have had, it’s from John, his vision into
heaven and the words of Jesus to him. Be faithful unto death,
and I will give you the crown of life. Comes from Revelation,
one of the seven letters to the seven churches. Now, that verse
has some significance. Stephen’s name means the crowned
one. And don’t you know that as Jesus
is looking down on Stephen, faithfully witnessing the gospel, faithfully
saying to these men who are enraged against him and who take his
life, he’s saying to them, Jesus saves. He is the way, he is the
truth and the life. And Jesus is standing there in
heaven with a crown under his arm saying, when you get here,
it’s going to be seen. There’s a crown for you, crowned
one. They mean this for evil, but
God means it for good. The gospel will go forth from
Jerusalem that day into Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the
earth. And we sit here today because persecution often spreads
the gospel. And so we thank God for these
hardships that come into the church, for they do much good
for us. Pray with me. Our Lord, we thank
you for the gospel of God and that it may require everything
of us. might require us to sell or to run or to lose. It may
bring us to a place of humility and hardship. But Lord, you’ve
been there before us and no servant is above his master. So we follow
in the master’s way. We fill up what is lacking in
your sufferings. You’re in heaven on the throne
receiving glory. We’re here on earth receiving
hardship and pain and suffering and persecution. but it’s worth
the wounds because wounds save, wounds heal. We know that from
the cross. So give us courage and encouragement today. We pray
it in the name of Jesus, our great savior. Amen.