The Trial of Stephen, Part 3
Acts 7:17–29 NKJV
“But when the time of the promise drew near which God had sworn to Abraham, the people grew and multiplied in Egypt till another king arose who did not know Joseph. This man dealt treacherously with our people, and oppressed our forefathers, making them expose their babies, so that they might not live. At this time Moses was born and was well pleasing to God; and he was brought up in his father’s house for three months. But when he was set out, Pharaoh’s daughter took him away and brought him up as her own son. And Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was mighty in words and deeds.
“Now when he was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brethren, the children of Israel. And seeing one of them suffer wrong, he defended and avenged him who was oppressed and struck down the Egyptian. For he supposed that his brethren would have understood that God would deliver them by his hand, but they did not understand. And the next day he appeared to two of them as they were fighting, and tried to reconcile them, saying, ‘Men, you are brethren; why do you wrong one another?’ But he who did his neighbor wrong pushed him away, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and a judge over us? Do you want to kill me as you did the Egyptian yesterday?’ Then, at this saying, Moses fled and became a dweller in the land of Midian, where he had two sons.
We continue this morning with our study of the defense which Stephen brings at his trial before the Sanhedrin, We have already seen how he uses Abraham and Joseph. today, we will look at Moses, a great leader whom the LORD raised up to deliver His people, Israel, from Egyptian captivity.
We need to be reminded that Stephen is on trial for his life. This is no mere history lecture on the life of Israel. He did indeed have the attention of all the hearers, something which rarely happens at a lecture, As such, Stephen is not saying anything new. He is recounting Scripture, something which the Jewish hearers were quite familiar. What we need to zero in on is how Stephen uses Scripture in his defense of the gospel. What seems novel is how the life of Moses in Scripture looks in the light of the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ. We should also remember that Stephen does not defend himself in the way most people in danger of condemnation do. There is no apology for his stirring up trouble against the Temple or the Jewish establishment. In fact, Stephen's presentation here will lead directly to His death by stoning.
We have already learned from Stephen’s account of Abraham that God had made a promise to Abraham. He also reminds us that the promise He had made that Abraham’s descendants would inherit the land of Israel. But there was also some difficult aspects of the promise. Abraham was told that his descendants would end up in slavery in a foreign land. He was also told that this promise would be delayed for four hundred years. We have also seen how God had used Joseph to prepare the way for Israel to survive the famine by coming into the land. We are reminded that this same Joseph was himself sold into slavery by his brothers. The very same Joseph whom the brothers of Joseph had rejected would be the one God had chosen to deliver them.
So, we come to the words in verse 17 of the text we read this morning. “When the time of the promise drew near.” We have to remember that this was 400 years later. To us mortal beings, this seems like an eternity. We remember that it was 400 years ago that the Pilgrims came to America to be soon followed by Puritans coming to what they considered to be the New Canaan after 1630. Many generations have come and gone since them. They came looking for a land of promise. But today, we have to seriously reconsider whether their dreams for America still have any meaning, The institutions than men make, even those based upon “Christian” values have a time stamp upon them. But this is not so with God. God’s promises are sure and steadfast. What God says will happen will certainly happen. I can only wonder in the hard bondage of Israel for several generations whether the promise given to Abraham had lost its meaning. Was the promise swallowed up by times of intense despair. We all want God to work in out time and in our lives. We have troubles with promises which are distant. So, we can only assume that many of the enslaved Israelites had lost hope. But, there were certainly some who looked hopefully to the fulfillment of the promise. Those familiar with the promise given to Abraham and believed it could count that it had been four hundred years. This seems to have been the case with Moses’ family. Regardless of how much these Israelites knew, the important thing is that God can count. The time had come.
Stephen takes some time to rehearse the conditions of the time. Israel had vastly grown in population. This, by the way, was also a part of the promise given to Abraham. He reminds the hearers that the time of favor at the time of Joseph had passed, and that the tide had turned against Israel. The Egyptians who were afraid to the alarming increase of their slave Israeli population instituted drastic measures to control it. they tried to get the midwives to kill the male Israelites at birth. And when that failed due to the faithfulness of the midwives to Yahweh, they attempted to drown all the male babies.
Stephen now summarizes the birth and early life of Moses. The Jews knew the story well. Moses’ mother hid Moses from the authorities, and when she could no longer, placed him in an ark and placed him in the river to be found by Pharaoh’s daughter. He was raised up in Pharaoh’s house and learned all the wisdom of the Egyptians. Moses was fair in appearance and became great in his speech and deeds. Stephen does not recount all of the details, just the one’s needed to make his case. The Jews would have known that Moses was spared by the will of Yahweh who made it possible for Moses to both survive and to attain an education in Pharaoh’s house. It is interesting to see the parallel in the life of Jesus who was miraculously saved from Herod, and when He came to Nazareth was noted to have grown in stature, in wisdom, and favor with those who knew Him. See Luke 2:40 and Luke 2:52. In-between these accounts we learn that he amazed the teachers in the Temple with His knowledge when He was only twelve years old. As Jesus’ early years were in relatively quiet preparation for His public ministry. Moses was placed in position to where he could access the court of Pharaoh.
Stephen then tells of the account of slaying the harsh Egyptian taskmaster who was beating a Hebrew slave and slew him. Moses thought he was doing it in secret, but he was seen by at least one other Israelite. The next day he tried to break up and argument between two fellow Israelites. The one at fault asked if he would kill him like he did the Egyptian yesterday. Moses was forced to flee for His life, where for forty more years, he was prepared for God’s ministry through him. this is the main point of Stephen’s defense. God raised up Abraham and faithfully gave Him a promise that His descendants the land of Canaan. When Israel was about to be endangered through famine, God prepared Joseph and gave him extraordinary gifts which his brothers resented. In other words, Israel’s response to the providence of God was to reject the one God had chosen to deliver them. They tried to kill him. Yet the faithful God still raised up Joseph in favor with Pharaoh and became the means of Israel’s deliverance. This is why the detail of the fact that there was a time in which there arose a Pharaoh who knew not Joseph. We now see that Israel did the same with Moses. Yet it would be through Moses that Yahweh delivered Israel from Egyptian bondage. we can see that Stephen’s argument is leading to Jesus, who would likewise be rejected by the ones he came to save. And as Israel’s disobedience could not thwart the will of God, and the ones He had raised up would become the very means of deliverance. God is faithful, even when we are not.
So what does this message teach us? Besides learning of the history of the early church and what it teaches us how the early followers of Jesus lived and how they continued in the ministry of what Jesus had begun to do and teach, it has a message to teach us today as well. We live in a world which in many places has rejected Christ and Christianity. Some churches have become as apostate as many of the Jewish nation had become in the days of Stephen. There are those who are called “Christians” who are most offended at the message of the gospel and ridicule those who follow the teachings of Christ taught in the Bible. These feel there is a different gospel to teach and use the name of Christ to give authority to a message which is explicitly anti-Christian. We also see a rejection among those outside the Church in was once the realm of Christendom which are replacing it with atheism or neo-paganism. These actively try to destroy all vestiges of Christianity, even in its most compromised forms. Ridicule is giving way to outside persecution. To some, praying peacefully outside an abortion clinic is a greater crime than murder. In many cases,they don’t even consider murder a crime. Yahweh has been replaced by Baal again except that it is an anti-fertility death cult rather than a fertility.
We are being called to account for our beliefs. Christians are being arrested for their beliefs. Like Stephen, we may be called to account before the law. How shall we answer? We have seen, Stephen put the defense and proclamation of the Gospel ahead of his own defense. His life or death in this life was not important. what was important was that the Gospel be proclaimed in the hope that others would repent and believe. Will we do likewise?
Stephen recounts the rejection of those the LORD had set up as the leaders of Israel. We have learned of Joseph and Aaron. We see what happened to Stephen whom the LORD had chosen to be His witness. WE can learn from the trials of Bishop Athanasius who was five times deposed as bishop defending the church against error. We think of Luther’s bold stance before the Diet of Worms in which he risked almost certain death standing up for liberty of religious conscience before the Holy Roman Emperor. In this case, the Lord delivered Luther from death. But many of his fellows did not and paid with their lives. these are but a few examples of those who made bold witness to the truth.
We face many challenges today, both within the church and before the world. Will we have the courage to stand? Will we support those whom God has raised up to bear this truth. All things are possible by the power of the Holy Spirit. Stephen stood because he was full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom. He did not have this strength within himself. Likewise, the Lord is able to help us stand.
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