Acts 7

Acts 7:1

Here in chapter 7, Stephen gives a defense that is absolutely brilliant. A masterpiece of logic and theological understanding, it is one of the most profound and powerful arguments in all of Scripture. Serving faithfully first as a waiter, then as a deacon, then as a miracle-worker, we now see Stephen as a theologian par excellence. This is precisely what Paul said would happen when he wrote that those who use the office of deacon well purchase for themselves a great degree of boldness (1Ti_3:13). But as Stephen boldly proclaimed and declared the truth of the gospel, it caused great consternation among the enemies of the church. Unable to refute his wisdom and his logic, their only recourse was to hire false witnesses to lie about him and indict him on trumped-up charges. What were the charges? Stephen was accused of speaking blasphemy concerning the temple and the law, which was tantamount to charging him with undermining the entire Jewish faith. Stephen began his defense by reminding his accusers that God appeared to their father, Abraham, not in the Holy City of Jerusalem, but in the pagan city of Mesopotamia, where worship centered around a moon goddess.

Acts 7:3

Abraham became a pilgrim because spirituality is not staticit’s dynamic. We keep flowing. We keep growing. We keep expanding our understanding if we remain open to the moving of God.

Acts 7:4

Abraham left Mesopotamia and stopped in Haran, evidently at the suggestion of his father, Terah. The years in Haran were lost until Terah passed away and Abraham got moving again. The point for you and me is simply this: Whenever we stop and park, we’re missing it. There must be continual movement and growth in spirituality. It’s a pilgrimage we’re onnot a place we arrive.

Acts 7:5

Abraham owned no landonly a promise. Even at the end of his life, the only portion of the land he actually possessed was the cave he purchased in which to bury his wife (Gen_23:9).

Acts 7:6

What happened while Abraham’s descendants were in Egyptaway from the Promised Land? They grew and multiplied. In recounting Jewish history, Stephen is reiterating the fact that “place” is not important. The Jews grew and multiplied not in the Promised Land, but in Egypt.

Acts 7:8

God said, “Abraham, I want you to circumcise your son. Deal with the area that speaks of reproductive energy in the flesh.” And Abraham did it. Without a temple, Abraham obeyed God. When was God with Joseph? Not when he was in Israel, but when he was in Egypt. Joseph is a perfect picture of Jesus Christ… Joseph’s brothers were “moved with envy.” Pilate “knew that for envy” they delivered Jesus unto him (see Mat_27:18). Joseph was sold for twenty pieces of silver. Jesus was sold for thirty pieces of silver. Joseph was punished for sins he did not commit. Jesus, the sinless One, was punished for our sins. Joseph was cast into prison. Jesus descended into the “prison” of the earth (see Eph_4:9). Joseph became ruler of the prison. Jesus preached in hell and led captivity captive (Eph_4:8). Joseph miraculously was freed from prison. Jesus miraculously arose from the grave. The picture is perfect.

Acts 7:11

When his brothers rejected Joseph, what happened? Famine came. The same was true in Stephen’s day. When the Jews rejected Jesus Christ, a spiritual famine descended upon the land.

Acts 7:12

During a time of famine, Joseph’s brothers went to Egypt for help. They stood before the Prime Minister of Egypt, not recognizing him to be their own brother. As Joseph began to question them when they appeared before him a second time, they admitted that they had sinned greatly against their brother. Then, in that powerful emotional scene, Joseph said, “I am Joseph” (Gen_45:4). It wasn’t until the second time they saw him that Joseph’s brothers realized who he was. So, too, after going through a time of famine, drought, and tribulation, Israel will finally recognize Jesus in His Second Coming (Rom_11:26).

Acts 7:17

Stephen continued his history lesson. As the nation of Israel multiplied and grewnot in Israel, but in EgyptPharaoh saw their number grow from seventy-five to two million. Fearing a rebellion, he sought to reduce their population by ordering the destruction of all Jewish baby boys.

Acts 7:20

Stephen shifts gears here. He had spoken of Abraham in relation to “the place"the land of Israelas he proved that the land was not really the issue, since Abraham had an encounter with God in Babylon, and since God’s people had prospered and multiplied even in Egypt. God is not confined to a piece of property, argued Stephen, but to a PersonJesus Christ. And now he develops his argument further as he speaks of Moses in relation to a procedure, proving that God is not confined to the law. Where did Moses’ mother get the idea of putting him in a boat? I suggest that, being a godly woman, she had pondered the Scriptures and was reminded of another family in danger during dark timesNoah’s. I point this out not merely for the sake of speculationbut for application. Reading the Bible is a wonderful thing to do. It will help you out in very practical ways and in all areas of life. Ask Jochabed!

Acts 7:22

Moses returned to his brethren not out of curiosity, but out of kinship. Raised in the house of Pharaoh, he left the palace to serve his brothers.

Acts 7:24

Notice that the ministry of Moses was two-fold. When he left the palace of Pharaoh to be linked with his suffering brothers as they baked bricks under the burning, brutal, blistering Egyptian sun and when he defended the Israelite who was smitten by the Egyptian, he sought to bring liberation to God’s people. When he intervened in the strife between two Israelites, he sought to bring reconciliation among God’s people. The same is true of Jesus. When He left the palaces of heaven and came to this desert called Earth, it was to bring liberation to us and reconciliation among us.

Acts 7:27

“Beat it,” the Israelites said to Moses. “We don’t want you to judge us or to rule over us.” So, too, they would say of Jesus, “We have no king but Caesar. Away with this man. Crucify Him.”

Acts 7:28

After he was rejected, Moses went into the land of the Gentiles, took a Gentile bride by the name of Zipporah, and had two sons. So, too, when the Jewish people rejected Jesus Christ, He went to the Gentiles, took a Gentile bride the churchand begat many sons.

Acts 7:30

The Lord declares, “I have seen,” then, “I have heard,” and finally, “I am come.” And He says the same thing today to you who are feeling the pressures of some Pharaoh or the bondage of some burden. “Where is He?” you say. “I’ve been waiting so long. Why isn’t He working?” He is workingbut in ways we won’t see for perhaps many years, or possibly until we get to heaven. Unbeknownst to the children of Israel, all the while they were slaving in Egypt, the Lord was working in the Promised Landwhich at that time was inhabited by Amorites, Jebusites, Hittites, Hivites, Canaanites, Perizzites, and probably termites! God, who is slow to anger and full of mercy, gave these people four hundred years to get it togetherto repent and to turn from their wicked ways. Yet for four centuries they fell deeper and deeper into depravityoffering their babies on the incandescent arms of Moloch, practicing indescribably aberrant sexual lifestyles, living heathen, pagan lives. Thus, after a grace period of four hundred years, God was fully justified in saying to the Jews upon their release from Egypt, “Rid the land of these people.” The Lord still declares, “I have seen. I have heard. I am come.” Trust Him to come at the right timethe fullness of timeto deliver you.

Acts 7:35

Stephen twisted the knife by reminding his Jewish audience that not only did they reject Joseph, failing to recognize him until they saw him the second timebut they did the same thing to Moses.

Acts 7:36

The church is not Israel, but she certainly parallels it. Israel was fed with bread from heaven. The church partakes of the bread of Jesus’ broken body. Israel was delivered by the blood of the Passover lamb. The church is delivered by the blood of the crucified Lamb. Israel came out of Egypt, which is a type of the world. The church is called from out of the world. Israel went through the waters of the Red Sea. The church goes through the waters of baptism. Not only did the Jews reject Moses when he first came on the scene, but later on even after they understood he was their deliverer, they rejected him again. When he went into the mountain and spent forty days in the presence of God, the people below said to Aaron, “What are we paying that guy for? We don’t know where he is or what he’s doing.” Jews today ask those same questions about Jesus: “Where is He? We who have been suffering these many centuries, we who have been oppressed and gassed in the chambers of the Holocaust, wonder where He is. If He’s our Messiah, our Saviorwhere is He?”

Acts 7:41

Aaron collected jewelry from which he fashioned a golden calf, and the people stripped off their clothes and danced around it. To these religious Jews, who took great pride in the heritage of Moses, Stephen said, “What did you do with Moses? When he was on the mountain, you were playing games.” And what about Jesus? When He was on Mount Calvary, they stripped off His clothes and played games to see who would get His robe (Mat_27:35).

Acts 7:42

Who was Moloch? He was the god of prosperity and success. He was the god to whom parents would offer their first-born children and watch them die, believing their families would be more prosperous and their businesses more successful as a result. Moloch is still worshiped by many today even in America. “We’ll abort the baby,” they say, “so we can have more success and prosperity. We don’t have time for children because we’re climbing the corporate ladder.” “If it’s idols you want,” God declared, “I’ll send you to Babylon where idolatry is flourishing.” For seventy years, the Jews would live in Babylon, where they became so sick of idolatry that to this day, devout Jews have a particular abhorrence of idols of any kind.

Acts 7:44

The tabernacle was constructed and God raised up Joshua to lead the people into the Promised Land.

Acts 7:46

Keep the context in mind. To these people who were so concerned about the temple, Stephen quotes the prophet, saying, “God never even asked for a temple. It’s foolish to think you can box the almighty God into a little temple.” By this time, I bet the blood of Stephen’s audience was beginning to boil. After all, they couldn’t have liked being reminded of their own history, of their own tendencies, of what God had spoken so pointedly. They couldn’t have liked being reminded that God never asked for a temple in the first place. They couldn’t have liked being reminded that they had a tendency to reject every prophet God had sent their way.

Acts 7:51

“The issue,” Stephen declared, “is not reviling the holy temple. The issue is resisting the Holy Spirit.”

Acts 7:52

The Jews were brutal to the prophets. They tried to stone Moses. They put Isaiah into a dead tree trunk and sawed it in half. They threw Jeremiah into dungeons several times before they finally stoned him to death. They killed Zechariah in the temple. “You accuse me of slighting Moses,” Stephen argued. “But you have slain the prophets and even Messiah Himself.”

Acts 7:53

“The issue is not my blaspheming the law,” declared Stephen. “The issue is your breaking the law.”

Acts 7:54

Stephen began his sermon by talking about the God of glory (Act_7:2). At the end of his sermon, he saw the glory of God. That’s the way it always is. Whenever you start talking to people about some quality of the Lord, by the time you’ve finished the conversation, you find yourself enjoying and seeing that very quality in your own heart. It’s incredible how that works. Start telling someone how wonderful Jesus is, and by the time you conclude, you’ll be totally in wonder of Jesus. Begin sharing about the God of grace, and you’ll find yourself receiving the grace of God. That is why I encourage you to share your faithnot because it is a job to dobut because it is a joy to experience. “I’m so dry,” you say. When was the last time you talked to someone about Jesus? “It’s just not very real to me.” When was the last time you got into an interesting full-on dialogue with someone about what you believe? “I’m just not experiencing joy.” When was the last time you ministered to someone who was depressed? “I just don’t know if I really have faith.” When was the last time you shared what faith you do have with someone who had less than you? Many times in Scripture, we read of Jesus sitting at the right hand of God. Here, however, we see Him standingnot in anxiety, but to welcome Stephen into glory.

Acts 7:56

The contrast is great between the uptightness, anger, and bitterness of the crowd and the peace and tranquility of Stephen, who had the “face of an angel” (see Act_6:15). While these men were frenzied, Stephen was totally at peace. Why? Because while the crowd looked down on Stephen, Stephen looked up to heaven. This is Paul, who would later become the great apostle.

Acts 7:59

How could Stephen be so peacefuldying, without fighting back or lashing out, crying, “O, Lord, don’t hold this against these guys”? He looked into heaven and saw Jesus. You see, Rev_5:6 tells us that when we see Him, we will see Him as a Lamb having been slain. Therefore, if I’m looking up to heaven and seeing the Lord, inevitably I will understand that the scars He still bears were caused by me. My sin, my rebellion, my carnality, my depravity caused Him to be slaughtered on Calvary. And as I look into heaven and see what my sin did, what my sin wrought, I have no other alternative but to say even of those who are gnashing their teeth and throwing stones at me, “Lord Jesus, forgive them. Don’t hold this against them.” When I truly see Jesus, I have no other choice but to be amazed at His grace and to be at peace with others. It’s only when I lower my sight and begin to look at people horizontally that I want to say, “Who do you think you are to say that about me?” It’s only when I take my eyes off Jesus that I become defensive and antagonistic, uptight and combative, abrasive, callous, and critical. What about you? Are you tense? Nervous? Uptight? Losing sleep, hair or teeth unnecessarily? The solution is so simple: Don’t look down on people. Look up into heaven and see the Lord. See how He has forgiven you. See the grace He has shown to you. See His mercies extended in your direction. In 2 Kings, we read the account of a battle between Israel and Moab. Losing the battle, and realizing his number was up, the king of Moab in desperation sacrificed his eldest son on the wall of his city. When the people of Israel saw the sacrifice of the king’s own son, they departed from him and returned to their own land (2Ki_3:27). They lost the will to fight when they saw the sacrifice the king made. So, too, when we see the sacrifice of our King’s Son, when we see clearly the price that was paid, we lose the will to fight. And, like Stephen, we’re at peace even when the enemy throws stones.