Sermon Acts 7:55-60 Stephen

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard

New Covenant Church

Sermon  Acts 7:55-60 Stephen

March 14, 2017

I would like to begin this morning by recognizing the mothers in the congregation.  Thank you for raising children to believe in Jesus Christ.  Also thank you to all the children who have joined their mothers in worship today.  I hope that what you see and hear in worship today will bring you closer and closer to God.

I would also like to remember my mother, who raised me and ensure that I was in Sunday school and church every day.  And I remember my grandmother who got down on her knees to pray for me every day.   Neither one would like to see me as a pastor, but I think they may be looking down today.   

Today I will be preaching the fourth in my series of sermons on the first church that the Holy Spirit assembled on the Day of Pentecost, just 50 days after the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  We have already heard the first Christian sermon, preached by Peter, which resulted in the repentance and baptism of 3000 people.  Peter proclaimed with great joy that Jesus’ resurrection from the dead had been foreseen by the prophets of old.  And the new church exhibited great compassion by caring for each other.

Today we will see that first church experienced some growing pains.  Conflicts came into the church through differences in culture that threaten the church’s survival.  Violence erupted among God’s own people.  And an important leader of the church, Stephen, was stoned to death.

It is sad that the church of Jesus Christ would experience conflicts to this degree.  Jesus had always tried to minimize conflict teaching that when someone strikes our cheek we should turn the other one and if a soldier tells us to walk a mile we should walk two.  But somehow conflict in the first church got out of hand.  We will take a closer look at this, but first let’s pray.

“Grant unto us, O Lord, to be occupied in the mysteries of thy heavenly wisdom, with true progress in piety, to thy glory and our own edification. Amen.” (John Calvin)

Stephen’s ministry began in conflict.  The church, in an effort to help widows in the community, was distributing food.  But some of the Greek speaking widows complained that they were being overlooked in favor of the  Aramaic speaking widows.  Here is what happened.

Acts 6:1-5 In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews[a] among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. 2 So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. 3 Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them, 4 and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.”

5 This proposal pleased the whole group. They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit

This shows us that there were cultural conflicts within the church.  Some of the new Christians had adopted Greek culture.  They spoke, dressed and acted like Greeks.  Others tried to hold onto their old Hebrew culture.  They spoke Aramaic and dressed and acted like their ancestors.  These two groups often came into conflict.  So it is not surprising that they would bring this conflict into the church.  Stephen was appointed as a deacon to deal with this problem.  The Apostles had come out of Hebraic culture.  So Stephen and other six other Hellenists were appointed to make sure that the Greek speaking widows were properly treated.

But conflict continued in Stephen’s ministry.  The Holy Spirit gave Stephen extraordinary power to heal and cast out demons.  This helped the church grow, but it also attracted opposition from various groups would would argue with him.  

Acts 6:8-10  8 Now Stephen, a man full of God’s grace and power, performed great wonders and signs among the people.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—who began to argue with Stephen. 10 But they could not stand up against the wisdom the Spirit gave him as he spoke.

Stephen, with the help of the Holy Spirit, usually prevailed in these arguments, but his opponents were successful in driving up opposition throughout Jerusalem.  The evil one was doing whatever he could to kill the church before it had a chance to multiply into new churches and spread the gospel throughout the world.

We see this sort of conflict today.  Many Christians are comfortable working in the gifts of the Holy Spirit.  Other Christians are more skeptical about these gifts.  Many Christians do not accept miracles today and doubt the validity of so called works of the Spirit.  But many others experience the work of the Holy Spirit and see miracle in own lives.   What we need in the church is discernment, to know what is of the Holy Spirit and what is not.  With discernment conflict can be minimized.

We these conflict happening in Jerusalem, Stephen was brought in to speak with the Sanhedrin.  They suspected that Stephen was preaching against the God of Israel and Moses, and if so he had to be stopped.  Stephen then connected Jesus to the whole sweep of Israel’s history.  (For more information on this talk with one of our Bethel teachers.)  His point in doing this was to show how God’s people had persecuted God prophets throughout history.  And his conclusion was that just as prophets were persecuted long ago, so too was Jesus crucified by the very people he was talking to.   As you might imagine this made them very angry too.

So here was Stephen, a Hellenistic Jew, who had performed signs and wonders, and had accused the religious authorities of killing a prophet of God.  This made the Jewish leaders very angry.  But this wasn’t enough for them to stone Stephen to death.  What happen next did.

Acts 7:15,55-60 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.

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.  56“ Look,” he said, “   I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.”

57 At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, 58 dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul.  

59 While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, “  Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.”

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.

Stephen’s face was shining with God’s glory just as Moses’ face lit up after approaching God on Mount Sinai.  Stephen obviously had seen God face to face.  As this occurred Stephen saw a vision of the risen Jesus Christ standing at the right hand of God.  This vision has guided the church for 2000 years.  The implication was clear.  By seeing Jesus standing at the right hand of God, he had seen God, and Stephen’s face glowed having come into God’s presence.   This was too much for the religious leaders to handle.  Stephen was saying the Jesus was God.  From the religious leaders perspective this was blasphemy.  But Stephen, filled with the Holy Spirit, knew that his vision was true.  Jesus is God.  

This first proclamation of the foundation of our faith resulted in Stephen’s death.  He was martyred so that the whole world would know who Jesus really is.  Jesus is God.

As a result of all of this official persecution of the church began, led by an angry pharisee named Saul of Tarsus.  The church fled Jerusalem and was scattered.  But faith in Jesus Christ would not die.  New churches were started.  More and more people repented and were baptized.  Even Saul of Tarsus, the great persecutor of the church, encountered Jesus and received the gift of faith.  The first church, founded by the Holy Spirit, flourished as it brought the good news from Jerusalem into all of Judea and Samaria, just as Jesus had commanded them.

And we, 2000 years later, are still part of this spread of this gospel.  We are called, like the first church, to proclaim that Jesus Christ is our Lord and he was resurrected from the dead.  We take this message to new cultures and new lands.  We do this by talking to our neighbors about our faith here in Middleton and by supporting missionaries around the world.

But we must always remember the church will face opposition.  Like the first church the evil one will try to stop us.  There are those in our culture today who would like to see us disappear.  Christians are being persecuted today in various countries and need our prayers.  But the Lord we follow has given the evil one a fatal blow from the cross.  Death has been defeated.   We no longer have anything to fear.  And so with boldness we go into the world proclaiming that Jesus is Lord.  Let’s pray.

Lord Jesus we thank you for looking down upon us from heaven where you sit at God’s right hand.  We thank you for hearing our prayers and interceding for us with your Father.  Bless us with your Spirit so that our faces will glow.  And especially, bless our mothers on this Mother’s Day.  Amen.