6. The Book of Acts
June 28th, 2009
Filled with the Spirit
We first meet Stephen in Acts 6. The church has been growing substantially and as it grows so do its needs. Many of these new issues should not be taking up the Apostles’ time. Their time is to be dedicated to prayer and to the ministry of the word of God. So the Apostles call together all the disciples and ask them to select seven men from among them who they can trust to help meet the needs of the church. This is where the first deacons of the church are established. This is where we meet Stephen. He was selected to be a leader in the church because he was known to be full of the Holy Spirit and he was considered to be wise among his peers. Stephen is also the first named person to do miracles who was not an apostle.
Typically when the Bible records a person’s connection with the Holy Spirit they are recorded as being filled. The word used implies that the filling is temporary. The Spirit lives within us. It is not that we do not have the Spirit with us wherever we go because we do. We do not however have the fullness of the Spirit of God when we are by ourselves. When the fullness of the Spirit of God comes upon us it is when we gather together as a church in unity with each other or when God is about to do something incredibly important, like at the day of Pentecost the apostles were filled with the Holy Spirit and through that the church was born. Stephen is a little different. You see the Bible doesn’t say that Stephen was filled with the Holy Spirit it says he was full of the Holy Spirit. The word it uses refers to a state of existence. Stephen was not temporarily filled with the Holy Spirit he existed in the state of being full of the Holy Spirit. His story really begins in Acts 6:8:
Ac 6:8 Now Stephen, a man full of God’s grace and power, did great wonders and miraculous signs among the people. Ac 6:9 Opposition arose, however, from members of the Synagogue of the Freedmen (as it was called)—Jews of Cyrene and Alexandria as well as the provinces of Cilicia and Asia. These men began to argue with Stephen, Ac 6:10 but they could not stand up against his wisdom or the Spirit by whom he spoke. Ac 6:11 Then they secretly persuaded some men to say, “We have heard Stephen speak words of blasphemy against Moses and against God.” Ac 6:12 So they stirred up the people and the elders and the teachers of the law. They seized Stephen and brought him before the Sanhedrin. Ac 6:13 They produced false witnesses, who testified, “This fellow never stops speaking against this holy place and against the law. Ac 6:14 For we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and change the customs Moses handed down to us.” Ac 6:15 All who were sitting in the Sanhedrin looked intently at Stephen, and they saw that his face was like the face of an angel.
Stephen began to preach and teach about Jesus and some of the Jews didn’t like it. They began to argue with him but they could not stand up to his wisdom or the Spirit of God working within him. So they brought up false witnesses to stir up the people so that Stephen would be arrested and brought before the Sanhedrin where he would stand trial. Acts 7 is a record of the trial of Stephen. At first glance Acts chapter seven may seem boring. With what may appear to be nothing more than a history lesson Stephen does something very clever. His sermon in Acts 7 is one of the most brilliant sermons in the entire book of Acts. So much so that you almost don’t notice what Stephen is really doing when he speaks. Stephen was on trial for four forms of blasphemy: Blasphemy against Moses, against God, against the Temple, and against the Law. What Stephen is doing here is using Jewish history to make a legal defense against the charges brought against him while at the same time pointing all of the things he was accused of blaspheming toward Christ. Don’t miss what is happening here. Stephen is on trial. If he was found guilty by the Sanhedrin he could be killed. Facing the possibility of his own death Stephen boldly begins to speak. In one message Stephen does three things: he disproves the accusations brought against him. He displays a masterful knowledge and understanding of Jewish history, and he preaches a sermon at all the same time. Each of the characters he talks about has a trait of Jesus. He was showing how each of the great men in history that the Jews revered actually pointed to Christ. What Stephen shows is that if you look closely at the Old Testament you see Jesus is the fulfillment of Jewish history.
He goes through, point by point and proves that he truly had not broken the law, or blasphemed against God, or Moses. Then in verse 48 he says, well the temple, if you consider that David said in his writings that God would not dwell in the temple then you see I didn’t blaspheme against that I just said what the OT teaches about it. If this had been where he stopped they might have let him go. Normally after a powerful sermon you might expect to have a nice invitation to close out the day. That is not what Stephen does in Acts 7:51 his tone seems to change and he goes from being on the defensive to the offensive.
Ac 7:51 “You stiff-necked people, with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are just like your fathers: You always resist the Holy Spirit! Ac 7:52 Was there ever a prophet your fathers did not persecute? They even killed those who predicted the coming of the Righteous One. And now you have betrayed and murdered him— Ac 7:53 you who have received the law that was put into effect through angels but have not obeyed it.”
This is not a nice thing to say. To call a Jew uncircumcised would be like bringing a plate of veal to a vegan convention, it is not going to go over well. Circumcision was the physical evidence of Judaism. This was the official seal of their covenant with God. The Jews were very proud of this. To say that someone had uncircumcised hearts and ears is to say: you may be circumcised but it hasn’t changed who you are. You do not hear and your heart does not understand things the way someone who was part of the people of God should. Essentially what he is saying, it that while you may be Jewish in body your heart does not belong to God. Stephen has just given this history of the Jews and here he shows how the Jews persecuted the chosen people of God. Stephen says: of course you are persecuting me because I am righteous. You always resist the Holy Spirit and you always persecute those who bring a message from God. This is sadly very true. While the Jews did not persecuted all of their prophets they managed to get most of them. Stephen tells them that they have not learned anything from their past mistakes. Just as their forefathers killed the prophets God sent so they killed Jesus. Stephen really lets the Sanhedrin have it. He says, “Look, all these great men, many of whom you persecuted, they all point to the Messiah. Then when the Savior you had been waiting for came you betrayed and murdered Him. You killed the Son of God. Here they are again rather than learning their lesson. Rather than changing their hearts they are responding by persecuting the ones that God sends to them.
Ac 7:54 When they heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. Ac 7:55 But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. Ac 7:56 “Look,” he said, “I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.” Ac 7:57 At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, Ac 7:58 dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul. Ac 7:59 While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Ac 7:60 Then he fell on his knees and cried out, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” When he had said this, he fell asleep.
They are furious with him. The cover their ears and gnash their teeth at him. Can you picture it? A bunch of wise political and religious leaders going, “Blah, blah, blah, I can’t hear you!! Nah, nah, nah, I’m not listening!!” The religious leaders are acting like children throwing a temper tantrum. I would love to have seen that. So the crowd takes Stephen out and they stone him. But we have gotten ahead of ourselves. Stephen looks up to see heaven opening and Jesus standing at the right hand of the throne of God. Something is strange about this picture. Do you realize the significance of verse 55? One word here makes a huge difference. Stephen looks up to heaven and he sees Jesus. What is Jesus doing? He is standing. This is a very unique picture. The only other time Jesus is seen standing after He has ascended into heaven is in Revelation 1 in John’s vision. Every other time we see Jesus in the New Testament He is sitting. When court is in session the judge sits. So every other time we see Jesus He is sitting at the right hand of God advocating on our behalf as they judge the actions of the world. The only other time we see Jesus standing is when He is about to return.
You see the kingdom of God is not democracy it is a theocracy and the God who sits on the judgment seat is the king. Do you know what happens in a court room when the king stands up? It’s the same thing that happens when the mother of the bride stands up at wedding. When the king stands everyone stands with Him.
Stephen sees Jesus standing for he is the first Christian martyr. The king of kings and the Lord of Lords stands to welcome Stephen home. Stephen enters heaven like a beloved hero. Can you imagine? Can you picture entering heaven to see all the courts of saints and angels standing and cheering as they welcome you home. What a reception. What an honor this would be.
Stephen’s death marked the beginning of the persecution of the church. Sometimes we are afraid of death or persecution. But we shouldn’t be. As Christians there is no place in our lives for this kind of fear. Paul rejoices when he is persecuted for Christ. We should too we should not fear the kids in our school, being made fun of, being picked on, or being laughed at by co-workers or family. For persecution brings you closer to God. Here we brag about church size and success. In the rest of the world that doesn’t matter, once you have been beaten for Christ, everything else doesn’t matter. Suffering for God brings you closer to Him, makes you more like Christ. Stephen was a type of Christ. Look at their lives. Jesus and Stephen both were brought to trial under false accusations, both were killed though they were innocent, and just look at their last words, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.”
We do not need bigger churches. We need churches with people who are filled with the Spirit of God. We need people who can stand up with their life on the line and boldly preach the Gospel to a hostile audience. As the world moves further and further from God what we need is a church that draws closer and closer to Him. We need men and women who are filled with the Spirit who stand regardless of the cost. Who can look at this world and at the very people who are causing them pain and sincerely pray: Father forgive them for they know not what they do.
I had a friend at Ozark, a wise and incredibly Godly man, and his dream was to be a martyr for Christ. He longed for nothing more than to go the mission field to preach the gospel and be killed for it. I loved his passion. There is no greater death than death for Christ, but I think more important than dying for Christ is how you live for Him. For the Christian life is not about running off and getting yourself killed, it is about dying to yourself every moment of every day. For in order to live for Christ we must die to ourselves and in order to die to ourselves we must live for Him.
When we live for God the world may hate us. In fact they probably should hate us. There are two great threats to the church. The first is persecution. The church has typically done very well during persecution. The second great threat is social seduction. This threat is devastating to the church. You see the truth seems to be either we will love so boldly for Christ that the world beats and kills us to shut us up or we blend into society so effectively that we begin to look and act like they do. We forget that though we are in the world we are not of the world and what Acts 6-7 show us is until we are ready to live for Christ we will never be ready to die for Him. If the cost is your life are you willing to pay it?
