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The Prophet Stephen, aka Martyr

Stephen, above all others in the New Testament Church, even the apostles, understood the timing issue. See Acts chapters 6 and 7.

What was the faithful Israelite’s attitude at the time of the coming of Christ? He believed the law of Moses, the prophets, the histories, and the Psalms of David. He had a view of Israel as the premier nation, the nation God had chosen for a special purpose. I like to imagine that the 12 were that type; with all their failings, they were hoping for God’s promises of a kingdom to come true and to be a part of it.

Stephen was not one of the 12. We don’t know, but he might have been a follower in the crowds around Jesus, or he might have been someone who while visiting during the Feast of Pentecost, was such an Israelite like the Apostles. He caught the vision of the Kingdom, but Stephen was amazing. He had a better understanding of where Christ wanted His Kingdom heading than the apostles had when Jesus ascended to heaven. He understood the bringing in of the Gentiles, he understood grace but not just the grace of salvation/forgiveness but grace as it continued and was enhanced after Christ’s death. He understood there was a new high priest who had radically changed not just Israel, but the world. And he understood that Jerusalem was doomed, and the gospel would expand into the entire world.

Acts 6:3-5 “Wherefore, brethren, look ye out among you seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business. . . . And the saying pleased the whole multitude: and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost,”

Acts 6:8 “And Stephen, full of faith and power, did great wonders and miracles among the people.” My pastor called him gifted like an elder, not just a deacon. However, these words indicate giftings like an apostle. What wonders and miracles? Did the sun turn dark at noonday? Did the moon turn to blood at night? Were cripples jumping up at his word or touch? Luke doesn’t tell us, but these words are unique and indicate something beyond the normal ministry of healing even.

Notice that he didn’t go looking for controversy. He wasn’t going out and debating his opponents; he was doing Christ’s ministry, and they came after him. But like Jesus, he could handle a good debate. Remember how Jesus would embarrass those who tried to trick him? Think also of the movie Braveheart. I remember when I first watched it, I listened as character after character would give him sound, reasonable advice. I would listen and think, “That sounds like pretty good advice,” and then William Wallace, as portrayed by Mel Gibson, would respond with unassailable strength and conviction for his country and for freedom and for courage. He was a man on a mission. So was Stephen. But what mission.

Lev. 18:1-4: “And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, I am the LORD your God. After the doings of the land of Egypt, wherein ye dwelt, shall ye not do: and after the doings of the land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall ye not do: neither shall ye walk in their ordinances. Ye shall do my judgments, and keep mine ordinances, to walk therein: I am the LORD your God.”

I believe Stephen and the apostles believed in the mission of the Kingdom of God and that Israel was supposed to fulfill that mission. But what did it look like? Was it the nations flooding into a physical temple? Was it a David becoming King and taking over from Caesar the control of the known world? Stephen tells us what it looked like, partly through the eyes of his enemies.

Why did the apostles pick him? An honest man, full of faith and the Holy Spirit, a man committed to this new way of advancing the Kingdom – thru Christ not the priesthood of old, through Christ as King in heaven and over the earth, not by an earthly king; through preaching and wonders not through military power. Imagine Stephen in a prayer or worship meeting with a fellow Jew who was wavering in his faith, who maybe wondered whether it was true that God had chosen a new way through this crucified Christ instead of a powerful king, like King David of old? How would Stephen have spoken to him? A man full of faith! He would have warned and exhorted and encouraged:

“Don’t go back. This is God’s way now. He’s chosen our King, a King who cannot be destroyed, who conquered death. And He will conquer our enemies now! See these people who claim to be God’s people, who claim to rule in God’s name? They are hypocrites who reject God’s chosen King. Those who rejected King David were destroyed for rejecting the anointed one. His progeny went on to rule, and so will we. We are following in the footsteps of Christ the King, and we and our children and our grandchildren will not fail. Even if Jerusalem is destroyed, His Kingdom will go on throughout the whole world! We are a part of that, and we will not back down from the God of all grace who upholds His faithful. We have been chosen for this purpose, don’t you know.”

He would have stood head and shoulders above all in his faith in this new way, and the apostles would have seen it. That’s why they picked him to be a deacon to wait on tables.

Notice the accusation his enemies made against him: “Then they suborned men, which said, We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses, and [against] God. . . . And set up false witnesses, which said, This man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place, and the law: For we have heard him say, that this Jesus of Nazareth shall destroy this place, and shall change the customs which Moses delivered us.” As a former prosecutor in the Air Force, we had charges we brought against criminals. If we made a mistake, some of the charges may be correct, some not. In the case of Stephen, even the false accusers, I believe, got it right . . . in part. Even a false accusation should have some truth in fact. In Stephen’s case, he’s accused of serious crimes for that day – blasphemy against Moses, the law, this holy place (the temple), and even God. They were untrue and incorrect (there was no Mosaic law condemning saying the temple would be destroyed), as shown in his defense. However, the factual accusation that he said “that this Jesus of Nazareth shall destroy this place, and shall change the customs which Moses delivered us” was correct. Let me show you why.

Jesus in Mt. 24:2 said the temple would be destroyed within the period of the generation to which he was talking – “See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.” Jesus did change the customs Moses passed down. Heb. 7:11-2 speaks of Jesus fulfilling the Melchizedek priesthood instead of the Levitical: “For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law.”

Stephen was more committed to God’s Kingdom than he was to the priesthood he and dozens of generations grew up with, the temple built by Solomon, even his own people and nation. Are you more loyal to God’s Kingdom than to the good ole US of A? Isn’t it ironic that Stephen was honored by God with the shining face of an angel in the same way Moses was, the one his accusers said he blasphemed!?

In his masterful defense in chap. 7, he spends 50 verses summarizing the history of Israel. During his speech, every head in the room was nodding in agreement, none of those Israelite enemies ever heard a more orthodox exposition of their history. He spoke of Abraham and the patriarchs and the promises, of the going to Egypt and the deliverance by Moses, the Israelites’ opposition to Joseph and later to Moses, their turning from God to a golden calf, King David and Solomon and the building of the temple, how the temple cannot contain the God of heavens and earth, the giving of the law, and the building of the temple. Some of his enemies were probably thinking, “Hey, this guy isn’t so bad after all.” He explained the appropriate view of the temple, even the view Solomon, the builder, held: “Howbeit the most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands; as saith the prophet, Heaven is my throne, and earth is my footstool: what house will ye build me? saith the Lord: or what is the place of my rest? Hath not my hand made all these things?”

Then he might have escaped if he had stopped there, but the indicted turned and leveled the indictment on his accusers: “Ye stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye. Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? and they have slain them which shewed before of the coming of the Just One; of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers: Who have received the law by the disposition of angels, and have not kept it.”

Following in the footsteps of the disobedient, the unfaithful, the killers of the prophets, they receive his accusation. And he accuses them of not keeping the law. He knew that Israel and the temple were not the end game for God and His goal of the Kingdom. He knew that they had hypocritically put their hope in a building, which was built for the King of the Universe and was intended to be temporary, while denying the very King who created all things. He held a high view of the law, just as Jesus did, and he knew that in denying and killing the Messiah, they had committed the greatest sin of history. Which, of course, would result in the greatest judgment of history – the massacre of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the destruction of the temple, yet at the same time, the escape of the Jewish Christians from Jerusalem. The destruction of Jerusalem for Stephen, a loyal Jew, was not a disaster; it was the sign of the greatest change in history, the breaking down of the wall between Jew and Gentile, the opening of the kingdom of God to the Gentiles and the Jews, the undoing of the restriction of man from God’s holy of holies.

So he was awarded with the vision of the Son of God at the right hand of God. Like Joseph speaking of his dreams, he was not afraid or ashamed to speak of what he saw. He knew the timing – it was now time for the kingdom, incubated in Israel’s time from Moses to Christ, to move on – to the whole world, the footstool of God. Jerusalem, the rejector of Christ, was doomed, and so was the temporary temple that had been stationed there. Now those who worship God would worship Him in spirit and in truth from anywhere in the world and based on faith in Christ not physical descent from Abraham. Compared to Stephen, even Peter was slow in his understanding of God’s purpose in and for the New Covenant.