Chapter 7

Verse 1 – “Are these things so?” This is an idiom in the Greek, and the high priest is saying in effect, Do you plead guilty or not guilty? This is a reference to 6:13, 14. Two accusations have been made against Stephen: speaking against the temple, and changing the customs of Moses. The question of the high priest precipitates a real crisis for Stephen. Either Stephen must defend himself or make the issue of the gospel clear, but the indictment is so worded that he cannot do both. It is more important to Stephen to make the issue clear. He is going to do so in a marvellous way and defend himself on the charge that he is changing the customs of Moses. Actually, he will show in his message that Moses spoke about the Lord Jesus Christ and he prophesied the coming of Christ—the first advent. He is also going to demonstrate that Jesus Christ is the God of Israel. This same Jesus Christ has been crucified by the Sanhedrin, by the same personnel who sit on the supreme court; the same people who just a few weeks ago were responsible for the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. Of course, the Sanhedrin will not understand this all at once, but as they gradually become aware of the fact that Stephen is speaking of the “God of glory”—and the God of glory is revealed God, and revealed God is Jesus Christ, and the revealed God to mankind is the one who founded the Jewish race, and He is the one about whom Moses prophesied—eventually they will blow up and do a very undignified thing for a supreme court. They will take him out and stone him to death.

In this chapter we have some most unusual factors with regard to emphasis. Stephen does not attempt to recount the entire history of Israel but he does demonstrate some very important principles which will have fruit later on among certain people who sit on the supreme court. To make the issue clear Stephen must give a resume of certain factors in Jewish history, and in so doing he will demonstrate the fact that he is not speaking against the temple but for the temple, for the temple reveals the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Stephen stands as the accused, but in reality Stephen will judge the Sanhedrin.

Verse 2 – his judgment of them begins. (Verses 2-42, the historical discourse of Stephen) “And he said, Men” – the Greek here means public men, he recognises their authority as the supreme court of the land; “brethren” – they are members of the same race as well as living in the same geographical area; “and fathers” – indicating that they are members of the Sanhedrin and as such they are the ruling body which the Romans have left in the administration of the land. Then the usual vocative, “hearken” –aorist active imperative, “Listen carefully.” He is demanding their attention because he has some very vital facts to give them with regard to this dual accusation. They have crucified Jesus Christ and yet they are now being given another chance to hear the gospel and to be saved. His message is actually going to judge them rather than to defend himself. So rather than saying guilty, or rather than saying not guilty, he simply presents facts on which they can base their opinion. In reality Stephen has selected the principle that he will identify himself with the Lord Jesus Christ who is his saviour. Since he is in union with Christ he must stand or fall, not on the basis of the laws of the land, but on the basis of their attitude toward the Lord Jesus Christ.

His message begins with the Lord Jesus Christ: “The God of glory” – the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the revealed member of the Godhead, the God to whom all glory pertaineth. It is the ministry of the Holy Spirit in this dispensation to glorify Jesus Christ—John 16:14. So all glory belongs to the Lord Jesus Christ, not only because He is saviour but because He is the head of the Church and also the founder of Israel.

“appeared” – the aorist tense indicates the time that Jesus Christ came to Ur of the Chaldees, one of the great cities of the ancient world. There was a person there who had positive volition at the point of God-consciousness—Abram. At this time there were absolutely no Jews on the face of the earth. In saying this Stephen is saying to the Sanhedrin, the Jews who represent the leadership of the land, we are a new race, a new group. There was great pride of race among the Jews but they have failed on one great basis. The only basis for any heritage that was meaningful was their spiritual heritage. The God of glory appeared to Abram when Abram was a Gentile.

“unto our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia” – the Greek says “being in Mesopotamia,” i.e. the Tigris-Euphrates valley. It means the land of the two rivers; “before he dwelt” – the word to dwell here means to dwell according to a norm or standard. It is a compound verb in the Greek, katoikew [kata = the preposition of norm or standard; o)ikew = to dwell]. The norm by which Abram dwelt in Haran was human viewpoint. Haran means the dried up place.

Verse 3 – the command before he dwelt in Haran. “And [Jesus Christ] said unto him, Get thee out of thy country [Ur of the Chaldees], and from thy kindred” – his father, Lot, and so on; “and come into the land which I will show thee.” The land which is designated is across a great desert. To get to Palestine the desert was not crossed. All life existed along the edge of the desert where there was a series of mountains from which were streams, and it was very beautiful all the way around. So Abram went north to Haran, but when he arrived there he became bogged down because he disobeyed the command to get away from his family. Families can be a great hindrance in the spiritual life. Abram always had trouble until his family were removed. He had to separate himself from his father, and later on from Lot.

Verse 4 – “Then came he out of the land of the Chaldeans, and [but] dwelt in Haran.” In other words, he was out of fellowship immediately. Abram’s father dominated his life and therefore he had a dried up life. Stephen’s message is recorded because it is still pertinent to us today. Haran represents the human viewpoint of life, and Abram started out with a colossal failure. He eventually became one of the greatest believers of all time, and the reason he did is because of what God did. And that is true of any believer who becomes great. It’s grace: we never earn it or deserve anything from God. Abram was out of the geographical will of God, he was living in the dried up place.

“when his father died” – 1 John 1:9 is the road to recovery. But sometimes it takes a catastrophe and before Abram could wake up, his father whom he loved dearly, had to be removed from him. And he woke up and moved t the place where he should have been in the first place—Canaan.

Stephen is saying something all the time to the Sanhedrin. It was subtle to the Sanhedrin because “blindness in part has occurred to Israel.” But suddenly the scales were removed from their eyes and they realised that everything that Stephen was saying pertained to them. That’s when they took him out and stoned him. They finally caught on to these things, and they realised suddenly that just as Abram was in Haran [they knew what Haran meant, that it was the dried up place] Stephen was saying that they were dried up, and that there would be no spiritual heritage if God had not intervened and taken Abram’s father out of the world.

“he removed him into this land” – when he said “this land” he was saying, “We have a spiritual heritage.” It began with Abraham’s salvation, with the salvation of Isaac and Jacob. Jesus Christ is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. To dwell means here to dwell permanently, and under spiritual heritage; therefore available spiritual blessing. They were not utilising the available spiritual blessings because they would not accept Christ as their saviour. Stephen is telling them some thing else: You keep this up and you won’t dwell here.

Verse 5 – Abraham had to live in the land by the faith-rest technique. Once you get to Canaan everything isn’t perfect. The reason is simple. Canaan has never represented heaven. Canaan always represents the faith-rest life of phase two. The point of this verse is that God gave him promises right at the start—that all of this land would be his, and to his heirs. He didn’t even have any heirs yet. As soon as he got in the land there was a famine, and he went down to Egypt. He failed the test. God promised him the land, so all he had to do was recognise that it was the land that God promised and then stand on faith.

Verse 6 – “And God spake thusly, That his seed should sojourn in a strange land.” Here is the prophecy that in order to really get these people started right and to really occupy the land, two things are going to happen. In the sovereignty of God—first of all the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full. The Amorites are going to live four hundred years more in the land, and the reason the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full is because Abraham has been leading Amorites to Christ—men like Eschol, Aner and Mamre. Because of the impact of Abraham on the Amorites they would go another 400 years before judgment was necessary. Abraham was going to have a bunch of great grandchildren who were all going to be more or less soft. In effect, God said to Abraham that He was going to shape these people up. If they were going to occupy the land and become a missionary base they were going to have to shape up. So they were to go down to Egypt to 400 years of slavery.

Because it is hard to understand the plan of God (because people do not grow up spiritually) He has thrown in a lot of promises. The promises help to declare the plan of God. It says: You don’t understand the overall plan but you need this for right now. You are in a difficult situation, a tight spot, having frustrations and problems, so here’s a promise. Promises are the way you get started. Eventually you begin to see that a promise is a sort of meat or muscle on the bones and that the bone structure is the grace of God, the bone structure is doctrine. One day Abraham realised that behind the promise is the promiser.

“and that they should bring them into bondage” – bondage means maximum adversity. Here is the spiritual heritage link. Abraham actually got to the place where the promises of God were more real to him than people, situations and difficulties. Abraham’s heritage is perpetuated in 400 years of bondage in which people are going to live normal lives under great pressure and adversity. This can only be done under the faith-rest technique.

Verse 7 – “And the nation to whom they will be in bondage I will judge.” Here is the conclusion of the prophecy to Abraham regarding the Egyptian bondage. One of the most important things in orienting to the plan of God is to know prophecy, as well as to understand your own status in time. The nation refers to Egypt. This promise was given to the Jews a long time before they went into bondage.

“and after that shall they come forth, and serve in this place” – so they had a promise that even though they would be in slavery at the proper time they would be delivered.

Verse 8 – Stephen reviews the patriarchs. He gives only such information as is pertinent to a build-up. He demonstrates one thing from the patriarchs, and that is, the grace of God. The patriarchs are twelve brothers. The ten eldest brothers obviously did not earn or deserve anything from God, and yet God provided for them in a wonderful way. He demonstrates that the patriarchs had old sin natures and that they were moved by envy toward Joseph and sought to get rid of him. And the suggestion in only emphasising this particular facet is to indicate that the religious crowd in the Sanhedrin, in their envy of the Lord Jesus Christ sought to remove Him; that their motivation was envy and that as a matter of fact religion is always envious. Religion places great emphasis on money—Matthew 23. Religion shows the mental attitude sinfulness and this is demonstrated in this passage, Acts 7. Mental attitude sins are the worst sins of all, and high on the list of mental attitude sins is envy or jealousy. This was a great motivator as far as the patriarchs were concerned. Even though they became believers they were motivated by jealousy rather than by living a life glorifying to the Lord.

“And he gave him [Abraham] the covenant of circumcision” – the rite whereby the Jews recognised their separation from the other nations and their responsibility to them. Circumcision was practised on the eighth day of physical birth to remind the Jews of their new birth. The Jewish race is the only race which is founded on regeneration. The Jewish race has a marvellous spiritual heritage. A spiritual heritage, however, is no good unless the individual is born again. The members of the Sanhedrin are religious. With the exception of two Pharisees they are unbelievers. They are religious unbelievers which is the worst type of unbeliever. They are antagonistic to anything which concerns the grace of God, and therefore the plan of God. Their antagonism is now compared in a subtle way to the patriarchs. The patriarchs had a covenant of circumcision, a reminder to them that it is the new birth that counts, and that to enter the plan of God you have to be born again. The covenant of circumcision was to remind them that God had separated the Jewish race for a particular reason—a spiritual reason. They were the custodians of the Word of God, they were responsible for the dissemination of the Word to the nations of the world. The concept of circumcision is separation from the flesh, and they had this marvellous heritage whereby they were reminded of their responsibility. But you can have the best of heritage and unless you are born again it becomes a useless factor. This is exactly what Stephen is implying by reviewing only this section of the history of the patriarchs. The verb to “give” here refers to the grace of God: everything is emphasised by the giver.

“he begat Isaac, and circumcised him on the eighth day” – here we have an entire section of Genesis summarised in one phrase, but with emphasis. The emphasis is on regeneration, the responsibility of the one who is born again. By application it is a reminder to us that as believers in Jesus Christ we are in full time Christian service. As long as you live there is a purpose for your life, you are a part of the plan of God, and the realisation of the plan of God depends upon your understanding of the Word of God. The more you understand Bible doctrine the more you can orient to the plan of God for your life.

Every Jew was circumcised, and when the Jew was circumcised on the eighth day it had two concepts. It was a reminder to the Jew all of his life that his spiritual heritage was tied up with his responsibility before God, and that he could only achieve this spiritual heritage through salvation. Circumcision could not save but circumcision was a reminder to the Jew that the only excuse for the existence of the Jewish race was to fulfil a responsibility before the Lord in Old Testament times—custodianship of the Word, perception of the Word, dissemination of the gospel to the other nations. Stephen is addressing himself to unbelievers, and since they have not personally received Christ as saviour circumcision is meaningless because it was simply to remind them of their special function and their spiritual heritage.

Verses 9-14, one of the patriarchs is selected. The reason is because he brought out the worst in the rest of them. Not only is Joseph one of the great believers of all time, in the New Testament his death is emphasised—Hebrews 11. Joseph did something in dying that was greater than anything he did while living: he gave the Jews a Bible for 400 years, before Moses came into the scene. He gave them doctrine, the plan of salvation, in his death. So in Hebrews 11:22 when the Holy Spirit summarises the life of Joseph, his life is omitted. Joseph is mentioned for two reasons by Stephen. First, he is the one who perpetuated the spiritual heritage, he provided the basis for doctrine during the Egyptian bondage. It was his coffin which was not buried and which became the basis of declaring the promises of God to Israel during their slavery. Secondly, Joseph is one of those people who brings out the worst in everyone else. He always aroused the jealousy, the envy, the bitterness, the antagonism and hostility of those around him. This was true as far as his brothers were concerned. Joseph could irritate his brothers without even trying, and bring out the worst in them. That is why he is mentioned here, because he brought out the worst in the patriarchs and because Stephen is comparing the ten patriarchs to the Sanhedrin. He wants them to get the point. Obviously he can’t talk about the wonderful life of Joseph, he must talk about what the patriarchs did to get rid of Joseph and what was behind it all.

Verse 9 – “And the patriarchs [the ten older brothers], moved with envy.” Here is one of the greatest of all sins. Mental attitude sinfulness characterised the self-righteous and moral Sanhedrin. Stephen is now pointing out to them their extreme sinfulness. In Matthew 23 Jesus castigated them for their pride and mental attitude sins. Envy or jealousy is a terrible sin and one that makes the individual miserable. It also makes its object miserable as well.

“sold Joseph into Egypt” – Egypt is always associated with the slavery of the Jews. It hadn’t occurred yet, but remember that Stephen is speaking from the standpoint of retrospective exposition and he is looking back. The Jews in the day of the Sanhedrin, when they think of Egypt, they think of slavery. The interesting this is that the Sanhedrin in their jealousy were in slavery or bondage. Very subtly Stephen is saying to the members of the Sanhedrin that they were slaves. The Sanhedrin was the supreme court, and as such they had a marvellous function in the judiciary system of the Jews. But because of their envy, jealousy and prejudice they failed to operate as a supreme court—as illustrated by the death of Christ and the martyrdom of Stephen. The Sanhedrin was in slavery to religion, to mental attitude sins, and instead of functioning as a true supreme court they had failed to use justice. Eventually Stephen is going to tell them how they will be judged by God. In fact, Stephen is the accuser of the Sanhedrin.

“but God was with him” – you can’t destroy the plan of God by persecuting or destroying the believer. The defection of the Sanhedrin and the apostasy of the Jewish nation will not destroy the plan of God, it will actually further the plan of God for God uses the wrath of man to praise Him.

Verse 10 – “And delivered him out of all his afflictions.” If you are in the plan of God, God’s plan is greater than your problems, sufferings, sins, or failures. We should underline the word “all.” There is no problem too great for God’s plan.

“he gave him favour [grace]” – the word “grace” here in the Greek means Joseph didn’t earn or deserve it, and this illustrates our relationship to God. There was nothing in the background or the life of Joseph whereby Pharaoh would look at Joseph and “hire” him, make him prime minister. Joseph was more prepared than anyone else, not because of his experience but because of his relationship with the Lord. His relationship was grace: everything depended on who and what the Lord was. And his relationship to Pharaoh was grace because when Joseph came into the picture he didn’t have anything to recommend him. This section reminds us of two things: our relationship to God is grace; the power of our lives, relationship to others, is grace.

“and gave him favour and wisdom” – wisdom is the application of doctrine to experience. Here it is something else—the application of general knowledge to experience. Joseph was given by God the Holy Spirit general knowledge of administration. As a result he applied these things and became the number one man in the Egyptian empire. God really promoted him.

Verse 14 – “and all his kindred, threescore and fifteen souls.” This last phrase probably tells us more about the importance of the faith-rest technique and the value of doctrine in our lives than anything else in the passage. When Jacob came down from Egypt to be under the protection of Joseph and the Egyptian empire the family numbered seventy-five people. Four hundred years later that same group of seventy-five will number two million adults. For 75 people to multiply into 2-million adults after 400 years of slavery requires something that is fantastic. Usually when a nation goes into slavery it declines in numbers. One thing is quite clear, and that is that people do not live normal lives in slavery. They live lives of pressure and tragedy and difficulty. And yet here, in 400 years there are not only many more people than the original 75 but there are people who have become very strong and have developed certain characteristics which are not developed in slavery. They are not only very strong but they are hard-headed, very independent, and the most difficult people in the history of the human race to lead. These people lived normal lives under abnormal conditions by the use of the Word of God, by doctrine as they had it in their day. The written Word did not exist until after their slavery, but God gave them doctrine and promises and tremendous information. Some of this information is found in the 15^th chapter of Genesis and similar passages. With this information and their own faith-rest they lived perfectly normal lives under abnormal conditions.

Verse 15 – “So Jacob went down to Egypt, and died, he, and our fathers.”

Verse 16 – “And were carried over into Shechem.” [“Sychem” is Greek; “Shechem” is Hebrew] When the patriarchs died their bodies were taken to Shechem, with one exception, and that was Joseph. Joseph didn’t arrive there until after the days of Joshua, and Joseph’s bones of Hebrews 11:22 form a part of the doctrine which kept these people going and caused them to multiply and to live normal lives.

“and laid in the sepulchre that Abraham bought for a sum of money.” Even though God told Abraham that this land belonged to him, Abraham didn’t make noises like a dictator and walk in on the Canaanites and say, “God says this is my land. Get out!” He waited on the Lord to handle that and he purchased this land.

Verse 17 – “But when the time of the promise drew nigh.” This is skipping over the 400 years, and refers to the time of the promise of deliverance; “the people grew and multiplied in Egypt”—the living of the normal life and a population explosion which can only be explained on the basis of the use of the Word of God.

Verse 18 – a person develops through pressure.

Verse 19 – “The same dealt subtly with our kindred.” In other words, they were taken into slavery under a ruse: “and evil entreated our fathers,” which means to put them into slavery.

“with the result that they cast out their young children that they might not live” – this speaks of how the Pharaoh became concerned with this population explosion under slavery. They decided to cut it off by passing a law that all male children born to the Jews in slavery were to be slain.

Verse 20 – “In which time Moses was born.” In other words, Moses should have been slain because he was born because he was a male child. Moses’ name is not a Jewish name, it is an Egyptian name and it means “half of a king.” The dynasty was the Thutmose dynasty—notice the “mos” suffix. Thutmose I came to the throne and started the new dynasty. He had a son (whom he called Thutmose II) whose wife was Hatshepsut. She only had a daughter, and there had to be a man to inherit the throne. Thutmose II had a son by a concubine who would be known as Thutmose III. Hatshepsut didn’t care for young Thutmose. She adopted the baby Moses to make him the heir of the throne. Moses means “came from the water.” Moses was born under the edict of destroying the male children. Principle: God’s plan is greater than man’s devices. It was man’s plan to eliminate the male children but it was God’s plan to overrule.

“and nourished up in his father’s house three months” – he was fed by his mother, but everything he learned about Jesus Christ and about doctrine he learned in the Egyptian palace. Christ was clearly presented in that palace and only Moses responded. The girl with whom he grew up, Hatshepsut’s daughter, did not respond as far as we know. Neither did Thutmose III who became the greatest ruler of all Egyptian history. But he wasn’t even going top get to the throne originally. It was Moses who was the genius; it was Moses who was the crown prince. And it was Moses who made the decision to turn down the Egyptian throne.

Verse 21 – “her own son.” The word “own” means she adopted him. He became the heir.

Verse 23 – “And when he was full forty years old” is literally “When the forty years was fulfilled.” The life of Moses if divided into forties. In the first 40 years he was a success in Egypt. In the second 40 years he was in obscurity and training in the Arabian desert. In the third 40 years he led the Jews out of Egypt, and he led them during their time of great discipline right up to the Jordan.

“it came into his heart” – his mind, the mentality of his soul. He is a believer with Bible doctrine; “to visit his brethren, the children of Israel.” He knew of his birth and background.

Verse 25 – at this point he made his decision that he was going to go with his own people, the Jews, rather than to be the ruler of Egypt. “For he supposed” – he kept on assuming; “that his brethren would have understood how that God by his hand would deliver them: but they understood not.” Why was Moses in the desert for forty years? All of the time that he spent in those forty years in the desert some Jews had to die. There are two sections of discipline: the 40 years of discipline of the exodus, but there were 40 years of discipline before the exodus because of one thing—there were a group of Jews who “understood not.” In other words, they were stupid when it came to doctrine. They rejected doctrine. Those people had to die in slavery. The worst thing that can happen to a believer is to “understand not” the Word. The stupid ones with regard to doctrine had to be eliminated before the plan of God could move forward. The greatest hindrance to the plan of God among believers is stupidity, and the cover for stupidity is sincerity. So when you get to a point where you will not learn the Word of God, then as far as God’s plan for your life is concerned it comes to a screeching halt. Consequently there is only one way you can go out of this world and that is through the sin unto death—for ignorance. God cannot use believers who are not cognisant of Bible doctrine.

Verse 26 – “as they strove,” present linear aktionsart, “as they kept on bickering among themselves.

Verse 27 – “But he that did his neighbour wrong [the Jewish bully boy] thrust him away, saying, Who made thee a ruler and a judge over us?” In other words, “I am chief bully in this territory, so get out.” He was trying to get control. Yesterday he was a cowering slave, but today his old sin nature flares up. If you don’t have doctrine you can’t stand power. That is the principle.

Stephen is saying to the Sanhedrin, “Look who is bullying the Jews.” The Sanhedrin. In other words, the Sanhedrin want to rule. Stephen is standing before the supreme court and saying, “You killed the Lord of glory.” Because they wanted to rule—power lust. The one who is being judged is doing the judging.

Verse 29 – Moses got out of there. Moses could not take control of the people at that time and the reason was quite obvious. The Jewish bully was stupid, ignorant of doctrine. Bullies are always stupid, they think that all they have to do is throw their weight around, and that is exactly what was going on with the Sanhedrin—bullying. They were using law to bully the people and Stephen stood up to them. It was not Stephen who was blaspheming Moses, it was the Sanhedrin. There was a forty year delay in the exodus because the people did not understand doctrine, and the plan of God cannot use ignorance at any point.

Verses 30-35, the preparation of Moses. Moses’ preparation took place in the last two or three months before he went to Egypt.

Verse 30 – “And when the forty years were expired.” God gave Moses forty years of private life. Once he went back to Egypt there was nothing private about his life ever again.

“there appeared to him in the wilderness of mount Sina an angel of the Lord” – the word “an” doesn’t occur. In other words there is no definite article and the absence of the definite article calls attention to the person. Therefore sometimes the absence of the definite article has more stress in the Greek than the use of the article. “An angel of the Lord” is the Lord Jesus Christ. It was Jesus Christ who after a forty-year vacation tapped Moses on the shoulder.

“in a flame of fire in a bush” – to get Moses’ attention.

Verse 31 – “When Moses saw it, he wondered at the sight.” The word “wondered” in the Greek means that he was totally amazed, and it is in the imperfect tense which means he kept on being amazed. This tells us that he was a long way ff when he first saw it and he was constantly amazed, he kept looking at it.

“and as he drew near to behold it, the voice of the Lord came unto him” – this event occurred out in the desert of Arabia. He was not standing on Mount Zion in Jerusalem. To the Jews the hill on which the temple was located was holy. The buildings of the temple were holy But Jesus Christ appeared to Moses, not in the environs of Jerusalem where the Sanhedrin was now seated in judgment of Stephen, but out in the Arabic peninsula. And that spot was just as holy, if not more so, as the temple would be or could be. This is the point that Stephen is making and why he is emphasising it. They accused him of blaspheming Moses and later on the temple, but he is pointing out to them that Jesus Christ doesn’t make one spot better than another spot. Any spot is holy where the Lord Jesus Christ is located.

Verse 32 – “Saying, I am the God of thy fathers, the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” This explains Romans chapter nine, verses 6-13. Abraham was born again and had a personal relationship with the Lord—Genesis 15:6. He was a Gentile but he became a Jew by regeneration.

“Then Moses trembled, and durst not behold” – he became terrified. Stephen uses this phrase for one reason: to contrast the attitude of Moses toward Christ and the attitude of the Sanhedrin. The Sanhedrin was filled with hatred and envy whereas Stephen loved the Lord Jesus Christ. The Sanhedrin used Moses as their front man and yet they were inconsistent with the attitude of Moses; Moses became terrified. The word “tremble” means to become terrified. When the bush spoke that was too much even for Moses. The words “durst not behold” means he did not dare to observe.

Verse 33 – “Then said the Lord to him, Take off your shoes from your feet: for the place where thou standest is holy ground.” The principle involved here is obvious. The Sanhedrin is the supreme court of the land. They are the judges. The judges are now being judged but they don’t know it yet. Once they understand they are being judged they are going to do the only thing they can; they are going to kill Stephen. This is the only court in the land that stands for law and order and yet because they are religious, and because they are so filled with hypocrisy and legalism, and because they have rejected Jesus Christ as saviour, they are going to get rid of him. They don’t quite understand it yet, but all of a sudden everything will come into place. The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob: that is the Lord Jesus Christ. The founder of Israel: that is the Lord Jesus Christ. Moses attitude toward the Lord Jesus Christ was one of, first of all faith, then one of respect and love, and he recognised the grace of God. All of these things are totally foreign to the Sanhedrin. But when they understand they will express their attitude by stoning Stephen to death. Again, the temple was a sacred building to the Jews and the Sanhedrin was sitting in the temple at this time. To them this was holy ground and they said that Stephen was blaspheming the temple. The temple actually spoke of the Lord Jesus Christ, but when you reject Christ as saviour you have ritual without reality and therefore the temple is meaningless unless you are believer. In the Sinaiatic peninsula a bush burns, which is the Lord Jesus Christ the saviour of Moses, and when Moses comes to the burning bush He calls this holy ground. This is something that begins to bother the Sanhedrin immediately because they say the only holy ground is the gr0ound on which the temple is located. Stephen reminds them very quickly that there is holy ground any place the Lord Jesus Christ happens to be. The priests were famous for taking off their sandals before they entered the temple because the temple was holy ground, and yet right out in the desert Moses took off his sandals right then and there because the holy ground is any ground where the Lord Jesus Christ is. This is a slap in the face to the Sanhedrin and they begin to get the drift of what Stephen is saying. They have accused Stephen but Stephen is actually judging them.

Verse 34 – the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. “I have seen, I have seen.” The verb is repeated for this reason: Jesus Christ saw the need of the Jews forty years before, and when Moses went to deliver them and he slew the Egyptian, that was the first time “I have seen.” But forty years later the situation is now ready, there is now knowledge of doctrine among the Jews, and once again the Lord says, “I have seen.” The repetition of the verb is for that reason. God was ready to take the Jews out forty years before but their ignorance of doctrine hindered that. The first “I have seen” is an aorist active participle. The second is an aorist active indicative. The action of the aorist participle precedes the action of the main verb. The main verb is the second “I have seen.” The aorist participle is the first “I have seen.” Forty years before then God had seen but the Jews were not ready because of ignorance of doctrine. Forty years later, again we have the indicative mood instead of the participle to indicate this is the main verb and to indicate this is the time, and to indicate furthermore that the vacation of Moses is now concluded. This little piece of syntax clears up the whole principle and tells us once again that God would have delivered the Jews forty years earlier were it not for the greatest evil that occurs among believers—ignorance of Bible doctrine. Ignorance of Bible doctrine hindered a whole generation of people. Where there is ignorance of Bible doctrine there is legalism, spiritual bullying, oppression. There is a principle here: You have to have knowledge of doctrine to appreciate freedom.

“I have heard their groaning” – this can mean one of two things. The groanings can refer to their prayers under great pressure, or it can simply mean an expression of their pressure.

“and am come down to deliver them” – when Christ says He has come down to deliver them He is going to do the work, but Moses is His leader, His human instrument. Moses’ vacation is over: “And now come, I will send thee to Egypt.” He doesn’t say “I will send” because “I will send” is an aorist active subjunctive, and the subjunctive mood is exactly the same as the imperative with one exception. The subjunctive mood in the Greek is a command but it is not the same command as an imperative because it is a command that takes cognisance of human volition. In other words, “I will send you but you will have to go from your own positive volition.” Obviously Moses cannot do the job for the next forty years unless he is willing to do the Lord’s will. The aorist tense indicates he has to go now.

Verse 35 – Stephen makes a command that really causes the Sanhedrin to realise that they were being judged. “This Moses whom they refused” – cf. Acts 6:11 where they said Stephen was blaspheming Moses. He is saying that the Jews forty years before Moses was sent actually refused him, and he is comparing the Sanhedrin to that group who “understood not”—ignorant of doctrine. When there is rejection of Christ this sets up a vacuum into which comes religion. Religion rejects all doctrinal viewpoint, and that was the Sanhedrin. The Sanhedrin suddenly discover that instead of Stephen being guilty of blasphemy against Moses that he is saying that they are; that they are exactly the same as that generation which refused Moses. “They refused” is an aorist tense to show that he is lining them up with them. The middle voice: they did it on their own volition. The indicative mood is the reality. Stephen draws a parallel between the rejection of Moses and the Sanhedrin group. Notice that the Sanhedrin has rejected the leadership of Christ just as that previous generation had rejected the leadership of Moses.

“Who made thee a ruler and a judge?” The Sanhedrin said to Jesus Christ, “Who made thee our ruler?”

“The same [Moses] did God send to be a ruler and a deliverer” – God’s plan goes on in spite of ignorance of doctrine, in spite of the negative volition of believers. Stephen is saying to the Sanhedrin that God’s plan goes on in spite of the crucifixion. Jesus Christ will come back, He will rule Israel, but in the meantime God’s plan will go on because you Jews will be under the fifth cycle of discipline and God will raise up a new kingdom, the Church, the kingdom of regenerate.

“by the hand of the angel” – “God” is God the Father, the author of the plan; “the angel” is the Lord Jesus Christ, the angel which appeared to him in the bush. It isn’t Stephen who has rejected the God of Israel, it is the Sanhedrin. Jesus Christ as the God of Israel appointed Moses, and since He did, Jewish rejection of Jesus was Jewish rejection of Moses. When the Sanhedrin rejected Jesus Christ they blasphemed Moses rather than Stephen.

Verse 36-44, the Exodus generation.

Verse 36 – God did the work. “He [God] brought them out, after that he [God] had showed wonders and signs in the land of Egypt, and in the Red Sea, and in the wilderness forty years.” This is the principle of grace, and this is the plan of God. God is the one who delivered them; He is the one who provided for them for the entire forty years.

Verse 37 – the source of grace is emphasised. “This is that Moses, which said unto the children of Israel.” Moses told them the source of all their blessing. He constantly told that generation for forty years about Jesus Christ. And there is one quotation given to demonstrate that Moses was telling them about Christ, a quotation from Deuteronomy 18:18. This is a Messianic passage, and it indicates that for 40 years Moses kept telling the people about Christ. “A prophet [Jesus Christ] shall the Lord your God [God the Father] raise up [bring on the scene] unto you of your brethren, like unto me.” The words “him shall ye hear” is not found in the original. The Sanhedrin rejected the one sent by the Father, and when they rejected Jesus Christ who called Moses they were obviously rejecting Moses.

Verse 38 – Stephen talks about Moses and Jesus so that they will understand. “This is he, that was in the church.” The word “church” is not church, the Greek word is e)kklhsia and it means here “assembly.”

“who received living oracles to give unto us” – living oracles refers to the doctrine of the Old Testament. The word “oracle” refers to doctrine; the word “living” means vital. Doctrine is real, living, the life of any believer.

Verse 39 – the attitude toward doctrine. “To whom our fathers would not obey” – they [the original generation] knew doctrine but they would not obey doctrine; “but thrust him from them, and in their hearts turned back again into Egypt” – they had doctrine, but you can have doctrine on the outside and human viewpoint on the inside, in which case you’ve had it. Negative volition resists the doctrine. So the exodus generation was a generation under discipline because they constantly disobeyed doctrine, they refused to hear doctrine. They didn’t go back to Egypt physically but they carried Egypt in their minds.

Verse 40 – “Saying unto Aaron, Make us Gods to go before us: for as for this Moses.” “As for this Moses” is a phrase to indicate their disdain. They rejected Moses. Moses went up Mount Sinai to get the law and while he was up there getting it they rejected him; “we wot not what is become of him” – literally, “we do not know what has become of him.” In other words, they just assumed that he was dead. Why? Because they thought he was dead? No. Because they had Egypt in their minds. They created Egypt right in front of them, they made the golden calf which was one of the gods of Egypt. They went back to Egypt mentally and manufactured for themselves idols. This was the beginning of a principle which leads to the fifth cycle of discipline. Why do people have idols? Because they have minds, and in their minds they create a false image of God. They create a false image of God because they have rejected the Word. They say no to the Word and say yes to their thinking. Thinking is a part of the human good process. People who reject Christ as saviour depend upon their own good works and their own thinking.

Verse 41 – “And they made a calf in those days, and offered a sacrifice unto the idol, and rejoiced in the works of their own hands.” The word “rejoice” here doesn’t mean rejoice in the sense of inner happiness, it means they lived it up in the sense of the religious feasts of heathenism at that time.

Verse 42 – “Then God turned, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven.” In other words, in the last 39 years the reason why all of these people died the sin unto death was because of idolatry. Stephen is explaining something that isn’t always obvious when you go through the Old Testament. Hebrews chapters three and four summarise for us the failure of the first year of the exodus—they were minus the faith-rest technique. But remember that this generation lived 39 more years, and in those years minus faith-rest they had the doctrine but did not use it. Idolatry merely expresses the fact that human viewpoint has the centre of the mind. They expressed what they had in their minds. Idolatry is primarily a mental attitude. The host of heaven means the gods of the Gentiles, the heathen. This same thing is the reason why the Jews later went into the fifth cycle of discipline in the Babylonian captivity. Stephen jumps from the exodus generation and he quotes from Amos 5:25-27 to show that whenever the Jews were guilty of idolatry, that idolatry simply reflected what they had in their minds. Human viewpoint expresses itself in idolatry whereas divine viewpoint expresses itself in faith-rest and great peace, power and impact.

Verse 43 – “Yea, ye took up the temple of Moloch.” Moloch is the god of the Canaanites in which the Amorites offered their children—an ox-headed statue with two paws which extended out. Under these paws was a furnace and the children were put on the two paws and burned to death. The children screamed, and so they had a drum that they would beat to drown out the screams of the children. The Hebrew word for that drum is toph. So one of the Hebrew words for hell is tophet—hell with the emphasis on the screams of the unbelievers forever.

“and the star of your god Remphan” – the worship of the planet Saturn. The point is, idolatry.

“and I will carry you away beyond Babylon” – the fifth cycle of discipline was administered the first time because of idolatry, idolatry based upon human viewpoint in the mentality of the soul.

Verse 44 – “Our fathers had the tabernacle of witness. The whole point of the tabernacle was to declare Jesus Christ.

“speaking unto Moses, that he should make it according to the fashion that he had seen” – the whole thing was scaled in a certain way because Bible doctrine in any form must be absolutely accurate.

Verses 45-47, that generation failed because of disorientation to grace.

Verse 45 – “Which also our fathers that came after brought in with Joshua.” They brought all of these things into the land with Joshua, everything which spoke of Christ; “into the possession of the Gentiles, whom God drove out [grace: God did the driving out] before the face of our fathers, unto the days of David.” David, probably more than any other outside of the apostle Paul, discovered something.

Verse 46 – “Who found favour before God.” Anachronism here obscures the whole principle involved. The Greek says, “who discovered grace.” So the phrase in the Greek says, David who discovered grace.” David is the writer of Psalms, and basically the psalms are the discovery of grace. The lyrics are how he discovered the grace of God.

“and desired to find a tabernacle for the God of Jacob” – the word “tabernacle” here actually refers to a temple. He wanted to build a permanent building. He was saying in effect that the tabernacle has been discarded. The tabernacle was in the city of Nod during David’s life until Nod was destroyed, and people weren’t paying much attention to the tabernacle. So what David wanted to do after he conquered Jerusalem was to put up a permanent type tabernacle in Jerusalem so that everyone could know about Jesus Christ. So David was unique in his generation because while he discovered grace the results of his tremendous doctrinal ministry would come in the next generation, and it was actually his son Solomon who built the temple. This was because an appreciation of the true meaning of the temple was not possible in David’s day. There were not enough believers who had discovered grace to make the operation worthwhile. In other words, Stephen is saying: If David had contrary to the Word of God gone ahead with the temple, then the situation in that temple in David’s day would be just exactly like the temple in the day of Stephen and the Sanhedrin. Stephen recognised as he stood there before the Sanhedrin in the temple (which declared the person and the work of Christ) which was meaningless to these people. They had rejected Jesus Christ and the salvation provided on the cross. They were indicting Stephen because he was a believer in Jesus Christ. Since they have rejected Him Stephen is making it quite obvious: “You have lost the meaning of the temple. This building is not sacred. You have declared the building sacred. It is Christ who is represented by this building that is sacred. The sacredness is in the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Verse 47 – “But Solomon built him an house.” Not because there was anything special about Solomon but because in Solomon’s day the doctrine which David taught finally took root. The Psalms had their impact. The teaching of Christ in the Psalms caused an object lesson to be constructed. So Solomon’s temple was simply an illustration, a training aid, to Christ in the Psalms. But now the very Christ of the Psalms had come and the Sanhedrin had rejected that Christ, and therefore the building in which they were seated was to be destroyed because there is no such thing as a sacred building, it is the person and the work of Christ that counts. These men had profaned the temple by rejecting the Lord of glory.

Verses 48-53, Stephen accuses them of everything of which they accused him in Acts 6:11, 12.

Verse 48 – the temple, and before it the tabernacle, were training aids. They were designed to depict the work of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross, as well as the uniqueness of His person. The very articles of construction were so designed to make this presentation of the uniqueness of Christ. For example the ark of the covenant was constructed of acacia wood and gold. The wood speaks of His humanity, the gold of His deity. Above the ark was the mercy seat iHis deity.His

which spoke of the work of Christ. So everything in the holy of holies spoke of the person and the work of Christ on the cross. In the holy place was the table of shewbread: Christ is the bread of life: the candlestick: Christ is the light of the world. The white linen spoke of the righteousness of Christ, the various colours that went over the walls and over the roof—both material and colours speak of the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Out in front of the tabernacle was the brazen altar which speaks of the cross, and the brazen laver which speaks of rebound. Therefore the Jews had a complete doctrine with regard to salvation and their responsibility in their operation phase two. All of these things were very clear to them because these training aids were constantly before them. They had them in the tabernacle and they had them in the temple. In order that these training aids might become a reality in the teaching of doctrine certain rituals were designed around them. These rituals, once again. Taught of the person and the work of Christ. They could see these rituals in action and understand what they meant doctrinally.

But then there comes a generation of unbelievers. They keep up the ritual, they still have the temple, but the Lord Jesus Christ is not their saviour and is not real to them, and ritual without reality is meaningless. Consequently there was such a generation when our Lord was on earth. Everything in the temple was fulfilled by the ministry of Christ on earth, beginning with His incarnation and ending with the cross. Even though they had the rituals which portrayed this they were unbelievers. Now they are faced with one of the spokesmen for the Lord Jesus Christ who was very clear about the fact that they had rejected the very one who was revealed by the law of Moses and the tabernacle.

“Howbeit the most High [the Lord Jesus Christ] dwelleth not in temples made with hands; as saith the prophet.” In other words, these all portrayed the Lord Jesus Christ but having the temple does not mean that they have Christ as saviour.

Verse 49 – he quotes from Isaiah 66:1, 2. “Heaven is my throne, and earth is my footstool: what house will ye build me?” In other words, the Lord Jesus Christ created everything, and as revealed in Romans 1:18-20 everything is designed to portray Christ. Nature itself reveals the existence of God. The building of a temple is no substitute of accepting Christ as saviour. They have built the temple which portrays Christ but they have rejected the very person who is portrayed. Building a temple, worshipping in a temple, is meaningless unless you are born again. On the very day on which Christ died fulfilling the Passover these very people of the Sanhedrin partook of the Passover. But they were unbelievers, they refused to believe in Christ, and so ritual without reality is meaningless.

“what is the place of my rest?” – in the Church Age the place of His rest is the body of the individual believer. 1 Corinthians 3:16 tells us that the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. 1 Corinthians 6:19 confirms that principle. The temple of God today is every born-again believer. Now the significance of Isaiah 66 becomes greater than it ever was before because inside of every believer, including Stephen standing before the Sanhedrin, is God the Holy Spirit. The Sanhedrin was actually facing a temple in the temple. They were facing a Spirit-filled person, and here was a person who represented the new age—a born-again believer filled with the Spirit, fearlessly proclaiming doctrine to the Sanhedrin. In fact, he is about to indict them.

Verse 50 – “Hath not my hands made all these things?” Jesus Christ is the creator—Hebrews 1:10; Colossians 1:16; John 1:3. The very hand that created the universe is the hand that was nailed to Calvary’s cross. The One who brought all of these things into being is the One who actually died fore their sins.

Verse 51 – having made his point Stephen comes up with his counter accusation. “Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears” – they have had negative volition at the point of God-consciousness. Then comes the principle that they have resisted the Holy Spirit and are therefore said to be uncircumcised of heart. Circumcision was the ritual on which they based salvation, and while they had physical circumcision they did not have spiritual circumcision in this sense” uncircumcised of heart means that when they came to gospel hearing they again went on negative signals. So these two vocatives actually summarise their whole rejection of the Lord Jesus Christ and of His Word.

“ye do always resist the Holy Spirit: as your fathers did, so do ye” – Stephen now compares the Sanhedrin with the exodus generation. They refused to believer the Word; this generation refused to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Resisting the Holy Spirit—John 16:8ff, the special ministry of God the Holy Spirit at the point of gospel hearing. The compound word here for “resist” is a)ntipiptw [a)nti = against; piptw = generally to fall, but sometimes to push], which means to push against. So they have pushed against the Holy Spirit and therefore have opposed or resisted Him. In other words, they have heard the gospel from the Lord of glory Himself, have heard Jesus Christ not only utter the gospel but portray it in many ways. They have seen the signs of His uniqueness, the signs of His Messiahship in the miracles which He performed, and yet they resist the ministry of the Holy Spirit.

Verse 52 – the same prophets who preached the gospel rejected. Christ Himself was rejected when He preached the gospel of Himself, but even before that the prophets of old were rejected.

“Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted?” These are the prophets who were true to the Word, the prophets who proclaimed Christ.

“and they have slain them which shewed before the coming of the Just One” – the coming of the Just One is not the Second Advent, it refers to Christ coming the first time—the incarnation. The incarnation was the subject of the gospel teaching of the prophets and it was rejected.

“of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers” – so the Just One was betrayed and murdered by them. They have rejected Christ even as the prophets who proclaimed Christ in the past were rejected by them.

Verse 53 – the rejection of the law. Remember that in 6:11 they accused Stephen of rejecting Moses or the law. He now accuses them of having rejected the law because the purpose of the law is to reveal Christ, that He might be received, and they have rejected Christ. “Who have received the law by the disposition of angels, and have not kept it.” The disposition of angels means that when Moses first received the law he had angels for his teachers. So in the receiving of the law in the past angels actually taught the law and made it real. We know this from Psalm 68:17; Galatians 3:19. But even though the law has one purpose—to reveal Christ and to make the gospel clear—they have rejected it, even when it was taught by angels. Therefore they are the ones who are guilty, not Stephen.

Verse 54 – the reaction of the Sanhedrin. “When they had heard these things [the indictment of themselves], they were cut to the heart” – reference to the thinking part of the mind. What was said cut them up. The Greek word for “cut” is diapriw [dia = through; priw = to cut] which eventually meant to open up something and understand what is inside of it. So what it actually means here is that they have now analysed the speech of Stephen and they see what he is saying. They understood all of the implications of Stephen’s message, and having understood them they now react in a very violent way.

“and they gnashed on him with their teeth” – just before they got up and came to get him they began to grind their teeth and show their teeth.

Verse 55-56, the person of Stephen.

Verse 55 – “But he [Stephen], being full of the Holy Spirit.” The word “being” here is not the ordinary status quo verb, it means to exist or subsist—u(parxw. In other words, Stephen has been filled with the Spirit during this entire time. This is a verb for constant existence. The verb is present linear aktionsart, he kept on being this way, existing or subsisting in the filling of the Spirit.

“looked up stedfastly into he, and saw the glory of God” – Stephen’s dying grace. One of the characteristics of dying grace is apparently occupation with the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. The “glory of God” is the glamour of Jesus Christ. “Glory of God” is a title of Christ, and so we should translate: “and he saw [aorist tense, in a point of time when they were rushing him] the glory of God, even Jesus standing.”

“on the right hand of God [the Father]” – He was standing to applaud one of the great messages of all time given to the Jews. This was a message that actually received a standing ovation from heaven. Notice that when Stephen gave his message to the Sanhedrin their wasn’t a single believer in his audience, outside possibly Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathaea—a supreme court of 70 men, and they were unbelievers. Their attitude toward Stephen was one of great negative activity, but now we see what heaven thought of this speech, it received a standing ovation.

Verse 56 – when Stephen looks around and sees this negative reaction from the Sanhedrin he describes what he has seen as a part of dying grace. “And he said, Behold I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God.” In other words, he told them that while they were negative in their attitude that heaven itself gave him a standing ovation.

Verses 57-60, the dying of Stephen.

Verse 57 – “Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord.” They were all agreed about one thing and that was to kill him. “Stopped their ears” simply means they held their hands over their ears, they didn’t want to hear any more of this. They couldn’t stand it. They “ran upon him” means to rush at him impetuously. In other words, they stopped thinking. They turned off their minds and became animals. Whenever man is without God he lowers himself to the level of animals, sooner or later. They did it “with one accord,” they were all in agreement.

Verse 58 – “And cast him out of the city.” They grabbed him and violently took him out. Then when they were outside of the city limits, where it was legal, “they stoned him.”

“and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man’s feet, whose name was Saul.” The witnesses are the ones that actually throw the stones. If you witnessed against someone under Jewish law and an indictment is brought in, then the witnesses had to perform the execution. This introduces the most evil man in the human race—Saul of Tarsus. Before he was saved he was the worst sinner who ever lived because he was the most religious man who ever lived.

Verse 59 – “And they stoned Stephen.” The imperfect linear aktionsart means they kept on stoning him. Stephen was under dying grace, he was “calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.”

Verse 60 – “And he kneeled down, and he cried with a loud voice [so they could hear], Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.” Do not destroy them now, in other words, give them a chance to be saved. There were some people present who would be saved and Stephen’s very prayer made it possible for some of the people in that crowd, who were either consenting to his death or actually throwing the stones, to be saved later on. In other words, this prayer is, Don’t kill them for what they are doing now. Saul of Tarsus was saved because of this prayer.

“And when he had said this he fell asleep.” Sleep is used to describe Christian death. The body sleeps in anticipation of resurrection. Cf. 1 Corinthians 11:30; 1 Thessalonians 4:14; Daniel 12:2; 1 Corinthians 15:51. Stephen was a vapour trail. The impact of his life and the impact of his death were fantastic.

1. With the unbeliever life is a conflict, including the conflict with death—how to postpone it, how to evade it, how to face it.

2. Fear of death is a demonstration that man has no hope beyond death. Fear is a by-product of rejection of Bible doctrine.

3. The materialist among unbelievers says, Eat drink and be merry, i.e. have fun today, postpone tomorrow.

4. But salvation changes this. Once a person believes in Christ he should have no fear of death, as illustrated by Stephen.

5. Stephen proves the point, The Sanhedrin destroyed his body by stoning but the soul and the spirit went into the presence of the Lord. He was not frightened.

6. Stephen’s death is a witness to the validity of Philippians 1:21. “For me to live is Christ” – he proclaimed Christ to the Sanhedrin; “to die is gain” – by his death he gained. The Sanhedrin couldn’t hurt him; they could only promote him.

7. In the face of death Stephen had no fear in his mind. He kept on thinking. A sign of no fear under pressure is the ability to think.

8. Stephen died relaxed and happy, even though his death was painful.

9. When a believer dies thinking doctrine his life counts, and his death counts even more for Christ. Stephen died filled with the Spirit, hence he died glorifying God. He died under the principle of dying grace, and as a result this was the first step in bringing Saul of Tarsus into the picture.