Jesu Juva
Acts 6-7
March 18, 2026
Midweek Lent 4
Witness with Stephen
Dear saints of our Savior~
It’s easy to romanticize and fantasize about life in the early church—especially about the good ol’ days of the church’s infancy, immediately following our Lord’s Ascension and the Day of Pentecost. Everything was so new, so pure, so fresh. The church was growing by leaps and bounds. There were signs and wonders and miracles happening left and right. The power of preaching and the Holy Spirit seemed unstoppable.
But tonight we learn that those first days of the faith were actually filled with problems and troubles. The reality of the early church was quite different from what we might imagine or dream it to be. It’s all laid out for us in the early chapters of the book of Acts. And even those early pages are stained a crimson color. From those pages there can be seen an unmistakable trickle of blood.
That blood belonged to Stephen, who was an unlikely martyr. He made for an unlikely martyr because he wasn’t an apostle. He was a deacon. He wasn’t on the front lines; he worked behind the scenes. He went to work for the church precisely because the church (even in her infancy) had problems and conflicts.
The apostles were delighted to hand over their headaches to Stephen and six others. These deacons, led by Stephen, were problem-solvers and peacemakers. They were full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom.
Already there was griping and grumbling in those post-Pentecost days. Certain widows were being neglected in the daily distribution of food. Stephen was sent to solve that problem and fix those logistics. Lesser men might have been overwhelmed with despair and frustration. Lesser men might have lost heart. But Stephen went to work for the church precisely because there were problems and conflicts. And Stephen wanted to be part of the solution.
What about you and your life in the church? Do you want to be part of the solution? For the church is still beset with challenges, problems, troubles, and crosses. It’s so easy to say, “That’s not my problem. That’s not my job.” It’s so easy to point out the problems. It’s so easy to complain and grumble about what doesn’t work right. Against that chorus of complaint came Stephen, singing a different tune, full of grace and the Holy Spirit: problem-solver, logistics expert, peacemaker.
Jerusalem’s Jewish Council quickly began to view Stephen as a threat—a threat that needed to be neutralized. They arrested him and charged him with speaking against the Temple. And this charge had just enough truth to make it stick. For Stephen wasn’t just running a meals-on-wheels program. As he fed those widows and took care of the poor, he was apparently always telling the good news about Jesus. Stephen declared that the temple in Jerusalem was no longer God’s dwelling place on earth—that since the Word became flesh—since God’s Son, Jesus, became man and dwelt among us—God’s presence was no longer confined to a place, but to a person: Jesus, the Christ.
It was this point that got Stephen into trouble—his claim that God’s presence was found in Jesus, and no longer in the temple. Jesus, too, had spoken of His own body as a temple that would be destroyed and raised again in three days. Stephen was confessing that the real temple was now wherever Jesus gives Himself to us—and for us. Jesus once mourned over Jerusalem and laid bare the desire of His heart to gather her people together as beneath the wings of a mother hen. “But you were not willing,” He said. “See, your house is left to you desolate.” And, without Christ, the temple/house of the Jews was indeed desolate.
This beautiful truth about the presence of Jesus was rejected by the Sanhedrin. They resisted the Holy Spirit and sought to kill Stephen for the truth he spoke. Our own sinful natures also work against this truth about the presence of Jesus in our lives. Your Old Adam works overtime against the Holy Spirit, seeking to substitute other things in place of Jesus: Human relationships, human pleasures, human pride, human wisdom. The devil can and does use all of these things to get us to grind our teeth and stiffen our necks to the truth of God’s Word and the gift of His real presence here in His church.
Stephen lived and died believing and trusting that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life—that where two or three are gathered together in His name, Jesus is among them. For Stephen, this meant that, at the moment of His death, he was welcomed into the presence of Jesus for all eternity. The angry lies were told for only a brief time. The outrageous accusations were heard for an even shorter time. The bruising stones rained down on him for just a matter of minutes. But for Stephen, the presence of Jesus was to be enjoyed forever and ever.
God sent His Son to live and die and rise again so that you, too, might enjoy the presence of Jesus forever—so that this very day in this very temple Jesus Himself can absolve you of your sin, place His promises in your ears and heart, and feed you with heavenly food. That’s what it meant when Jesus breathed His last on the cross, and the curtain in the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. It meant that the dividing wall of your sin was done away with by the death of Jesus in your place. Now there is no division between you and Him. No separation. No condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
Jesus Christ has opened the gates of heaven for you, just as they were opened for Stephen. Through faith in Jesus you can know for certain that, as your eyes close for the final time, you will see it. You will see what Stephen saw—the Son of Man in human flesh standing at the right hand of God. Even stone-throwing, teeth-gnashing, stiff-necked sinners like us—cleansed by the blood of the Lamb—even we will see what Stephen saw.
God grant us daily to unstop our ears for this reason. God grant us to confess our faith for this reason. God grant us to forgive our enemies for this reason. God grant us to fall asleep in Jesus with this confidence. By His life, death, and resurrection, Jesus Christ has opened heaven for you.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment