Listen to Glisten: Stephen's Story

Listen to Glisten: Stephen’s Story

How to craft a sermon: Let the passage itself dictate

If it’s a passionate passage, be passionate

If it’s a narrative, be narrative

If it’s theology, like this one, then time to bust out the theology!

What you read in small groups today is just filled with theology...

Acts 6:8-7:4; 7:51-8:3

Ajith Fernando: Great summary!

1. God’s Activity is not Confined to a Land

2. Worship Acceptable to God is not confined to the Jerusalem temple

3. The Jews have constantly rejected God’s Representatives

Mark’s Paraphrase (Heather has recommended I pass these by her first before I record myself and post them on the inter web for the world to see… Hopefully not too cheesy)

God’s Gone Global

God’s Gone Mobile

Rejecting God’s Nobel

God’s Gone Global

Accusation:

v. 11: “We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God.”

vv.13-14: “This man never ceases to speak words against this holy place and the law, for we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and will change the customs that Moses delivered to us.”

So Stephen addresses these charges by using theology!

Stephen shows not how Jesus will destroy this place and change the customs of Jesus…

Stephen proves to them that the Old Testament has pointed to Jesus fulfilling the role of ‘this place and the customs of Jesus.’

THIS PLACE MAY NOT BE AS IMPORTANT AS YOU THINK!

Examples:

7:2-3: God spoke to Abraham in Mesopotamia

7:4: Haran

7:9-16: Blessed Joseph in Egypt

7:30-34: Moses in the desert

7:36: Performed Signs and wonders in Egypt, Red Sea and desert

7:38: Law given at Mount Sinai

None of these places were in the Promised Land! God was active outside the borders of Israel centuries before the Land was conquered by Joshua!

God’s always been global!

He works beyond border and sometimes works in the most unusual places!

He works in that missionary working North Korea.

He’s working in Palestinian Christians seeking to be the presence of God.

He’s working in the exploding underground church in China.

The Economist: An odd resource...

China: 38 million Christians in China

Larger than the population of Canada!

More Christians in China than France and Germany Combined

Fastest growing: (https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/09/15/protestant-christianity-is-booming-in-china).

The Houston Chronicle writes that by 2030, there may be more Christians in China than any other country in the world!!

Isn’t that just awesome!!

In the past, I have spend a lot of time talking about our society and the declining Christian numbers around here. I’ve done the research and it just looks depressing, but when we look globally, I want to encourage you! We can celebrate that God is still on the move in little house churches in North Korea, or Pakistan. He is giving courage to Christians in places with ‘no-conversion laws.

As God worked through famous missionaries like Hudson Tailer, William Cary, Amy Carmichael, David Livingstone, Elizabeth Elliot, God continues to work. He works through young Christian women in Palestine, Nicaraguan Missionaries, evangelicals in Russia, and faithful believers in Nepal.

God is Working Globally and he invites us to continue to join him in this missionary work right here and now.

2. God’s Gone Mobile

Charge: Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and will change the customs that Moses delivered to us

Stephen: God’s Gone Mobile so don’t keep God in a BOX

7:5: Abraham wasn’t even given a foot of the land! It was only promised to him

7:33: Holy Ground by the Burning Bush: Holy Ground where? Mount Horeb in modern day Egypt

7:38: Mount Sinai: Probably the same place as the Burning bush

7:44-46: Tabernacle: God’s Mobile Home: Moved all over the place!

Temple: God’s not limited to it!

v.49: “ ‘Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool.”

God is not confined to a holy spot like the Temple:

Why do you think people were accusing Stephen of talking about destroying the Temple?

Partly because he was a good student

John 2:19-21: 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” 20 The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” 21 But he was speaking about the temple of his body.

Your small group is legit!!

Just as legit if we were to be meeting in the most beautiful Cathedral!

And I’ll be honest with you: The next few months are going to be very interesting with regards to worship space… Even once things really start opening up, I’m not sure how this is all going to work and it’s frustrating for me as the pastor to have so many unknowns.

But I need to theologically check myself here as well!

The point here is that your worship is 100% legit!! If you’re in a living room or office, that’s holy space!

Just as holy as the burning bush!

How is that possible?

Skizo: Split apart: Schizophrenia

Mark 1:10 And when he came up out of the water, immediately he saw the heavens being torn open: Skizo

Mark 15:38: And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom.

Stephen, teaching good theology

3. Rejecting God’s Nobels

Nobels=God’s representatives

7:9: Joseph was rejected

7:26-29: “And the patriarchs, jealous of Joseph, sold him into Egypt; but God was with him

Moses was rejected when he tried to intervene in a quarrel.

7:39-43: Moses was rejected and the people build at golden calf .

7:51-53: “Our fathers refused to obey [Moses], but thrust him aside, and in their hearts they turned to Egypt

Israel’s history is one of rejecting the ones they should have been listening to!

“That you rejected Jesus should be proof that you were wrong!!”

Important theology:

God’s gone Global

God’s Gone Mobile

Rejecting God’s Noble

Stephen is Teaching us something called Fulfillment Theology:

The Church, therefore, replaced Israel. We have talked about that before.

Acts 1: NOT 11 DISCIPLES!

Why is this important?

Gentile Church vs. Jewish Church: There is no difference! Even today

Hebrew Roots Movement…

Jesus did away with all this!!

Stott: “What Jesus taught, then, was that the temple and the law would be superseded, meaning not that they had never been divine gifts in the first place, but that they would find their God-intended fulfilment in him, the Messiah. Jesus was and is himself the replacement of the temple and the fulfilment of the law. Moreover, to affirm that both temple and law pointed forward to him and are now fulfilled in him is to magnify their importance, not to denigrate it.”

In other words, to say that the land and the temple shadows of Jesus was to make them even more important than how they were understood.

Make Stephen mad!!

A Man Filled with Grace and Power:

v.52: “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit...”

7:53: “You who received the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it...”

Was he interrupted mid-sentence?

“You think I’M not keeping the law… Well, let me tell you! YOU haven’t kept it because you don’t see it through the lens of Jesus!”

And we all know how the story ends...

Stephen is kill for his theology.

In fact, Luke makes two really powerful connections to the death of Jesus:

Dying Like Jesus:

Acts 7:59 and Luke 23:46 (Stephen: “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!”)

Acts 7:60; Luke 23:34 (do not hold this sin against the killers)

“Not only has Jesus come close to Stephen, Stephen has, in the process, become like Jesus.” NIVAC

Is this theology worth dying over??