Transcription
Right? On Monday, as Sarah and I were sitting waiting for Barb to go to school, and Sarah broke out her phone and started looking at the lectionary passages, it was the first one she read, and she goes, ugh, the stoning of Stephen. And I took a second, and I said, yeah, but that’ll preach. And she looked at me and said, yeah.
But bear with me, because I think the message here in what happens to Stephen is most applicable for us in the world and the days we have now. Because when we look at this moment, there’s a lot of baggage which we see. And we might need to unpack this.
The church is in a and preach and teach in the community, but they aren’t exactly happy together. There’s internal conflict. There’s accusations of neglecting widows.
And remember, widows and orphans were a special group that needed to be cared for, especially by the original First Church. And all of that brings us to this moment where Stephen is preaching in the temple. When Stephen is filled and full of grace and power, and there comes a plot to silence him.
Stephen is accused of blasphemy. High crimes and misdemeanors it is. But really, what Stephen has done is nothing but tell the truth.
Stephen stands in front of this crowd, and in a lot of ways, it’s like a principal trying to talk to a student from a school that the principal is not the principal of. It’s the high priest wielding power over Stephen, but Stephen is not part of his particular religious community. So, convicting Stephen of blasphemy is a bit like me trying to tell a church down the road that their minister has committed blasphemy when they’re not a part of the RCA and all of that.
So, there’s issues, to say the least. But he stands in front of the high priest, stands on trial, not that dissimilar to the trial that Jesus went through. Trumped up charges, guided all towards a predetermined verdict that Stephen must die.
But what Stephen really does that seals everything is he tells the truth of Israel’s waywardness over, well, its existence, period. He relates about Aaron and the golden calf, the attacks on Abraham, and the faithlessness of moments and people throughout the story of Israel. The various times that they forgot to follow God and refused outright to listen to the prophets, to listen to Moses.
Stephen does nothing but tell the truth. But often when the truth gets really tough to listen to, that’s when problems come. When you are confronted with the waywardness of your ancestors, when you are confronted with the fact that your ancestors continually forget God and have to continually be called to a newfound obedience to God, and you think your ancestors, well, they were the ones who walked on water and not Jesus.
That is a hard truth to swallow. And that’s what causes Stephen’s death. Stephen is maybe not reading the anger in the room over him tearing down this lie, this story about how great the ancestors of Israel were.
But he’s innocent of anything other than telling the truth. But sometimes when you tell the truth, you got a problem. I remember once being asked by a friend who was about to take a job, so Bill, what do you think about this? What are your thoughts? In my head, there’s this voice of, you know, they don’t want to hear the truth.
You know, they won’t want to hear the truth. And what did I tell them? I told them the truth. I don’t think this is a great fit for you.
I think it’s a bit of a feel-good decision post-college. I don’t know if it’s the right thing you should be doing, trying to tell the truth to a friend. And guess what? That friend was very upset with me.
I didn’t say anything wrong, but I told the truth. And here Stephen has said nothing, nothing that is wrong, but he told the truth. And so he goes and he is dragged to his death.
He is dragged to be stoned. But all of this builds up to this moment, because what really happens here that is filled with wonder and amazement is not that he is being killed for telling the truth. It is what he lives out and what he does in what I would say is the absolute worst moment in his life.
He is being stoned to death. Rocks are being thrown at him with the goal of killing him, stone after stone after stone. And instead of doing what we would expect him to do, take the occasional stone and throw it back at the crowd, yell out in defiance about his innocence and how they’re trying to silence his truth.
What does he do? He prays for his assailants. He prays for those who are in the act of killing him. Lord, do not hold this against them.
Do not hold this sin against them. Do not hold this murder against them. He doesn’t taunt them.
He doesn’t say, oh yeah, throw a little bit harder next time. He doesn’t go down fighting in that way. He doesn’t protest his innocence or throw rocks back at them as I said earlier.
There isn’t a John Wick, Jason Statham moment where all of a sudden he stands up and he’s going to escape and you see him running down the road away from these guys. He accepts what is happening and he prays for those who are killing him. As I read the news this week, I couldn’t escape Stephen.
As I read articles about this political party going after that political party going after that one, every time I heard Stephen’s prayer. Every time I heard about people tearing themselves and all of us apart with their anger, with their frustrations, with their bitterness, I thought of Stephen. I thought of a man who is being stoned to death and yet is praying for those who are killing him.
Many years ago when I was in school, the popular thing you wore around your wrist was this little rubber plastic band that said WWJD or you had a t-shirt that had it on it. It was the hottest commodity for a period of time right up there with the yellow Livestrong bands and we’re not talking about those bands. And people always seem to be asking that question and if you ever really want to ask that question of what would Jesus do, look at the cross.
When he is on his worst moment, when he is hanging there suffering and he prays, not for vengeance, not for anger, not for death on those who have done this to him, but he prays for the people who have hurt him. When Stephen is sitting there being pelted by stones, by rocks, and is dying, he embodies that. He embodies what Christ not only taught but lived out.
He prays for his killers. If we ever want to answer that question of what would Jesus do and model how Stephen lives and yes dies, think about Matthew 5 44 when Jesus says, but I say to you love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you so that you may be children of your father in heaven. And in Luke’s telling also of the Sermon on the Mount, he writes, but I say to you love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.
So that you may be children of your father in heaven. Oh no, that was Matthew. And if you want, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, and pray for those who abuse you.
And again, if you want to know what would Jesus do, look at what he does when he is on the cross with the nails in his hands and feet and how he prays for those who are persecuting him in that moment. On his worst day, Stephen isn’t filled with anger and hatred, he is filled with God’s glory and grace. Is a moment like this easy? No, grace is not easy, forgiveness is not easy in the moment.
For Pete’s sake, Stephen is being pelted with rocks and praying for forgiveness for those who are throwing the rocks. That’s not an easy moment, but it means that we have sacrificed of ourselves, sacrificed our basis responses to a moment, sacrificed what we want to do for what God desires us to be and to do. That is the radical sacrificial grace that God calls us to live, to tell of, and to live out.
Brothers and sisters, may we embrace in this world the actions and teachings of Christ and how Stephen lives them out. May we pray for those who hurt us, pray for those who hate us, and pray above all else to have grace for those around us. Amen.
And now let us respond to our gifts. Mighty and gracious God, we thank you for the many blessings you have given us, for all the ways you watch over us and keep us. Be with us, O Lord, as we seek to serve your people in this world.
Guide us in the use of our gifts so that we might build up your kingdom here on earth as it is in heaven. Amen.