Acts 7: When Jesus Stood And Stephen Spoke, Everything Changed

When truth collides with tradition, something has to give. We walk through Stephen’s sweeping retelling of Israel’s story, from Abraham’s bare‑knuckled trust to Joseph’s unlikely rise to Moses’ burning‑bush surrender, and ask why people cling to heritage while resisting the very Presence their heritage points to. Stephen honors Scripture, quotes the prophets, and then draws a sharp line: God cannot be boxed into buildings, systems, or safe routines. The result isn’t a tidy debate; it’s a holy confrontation that ends with heaven opening and Jesus standing to receive a faithful witness.

Together we unpack how promise precedes proof, how rejection can be formation, and how holy ground appears wherever God speaks. We explore the cycle Stephen exposes, God sends a deliverer, people resist, God advances anyway, and how it culminates in the Righteous One. When rage rises, Stephen’s final words echo Jesus, planting a seed that will soon bloom in the heart of a young man named Saul. Those garments at Saul’s feet aren’t a throwaway detail; they signal complicity and a mysterious marking. The persecutor will become the apostle, and persecution will scatter the church in a way that multiplies the message far beyond Jerusalem.

If you’re wrestling with complacency, craving courage, or wondering how to follow the Holy Spirit when it disrupts your safe plans, this conversation is your wake‑up call. We talk candidly about choosing Presence over place, truth over self‑preservation, and mission over maintenance, and why a church that refuses comfort often finds power. Listen, share with a friend who needs bold faith, and then tell us: which moment from Acts 7 reshaped your view of God’s story? Subscribe, leave a review, and help more people find the charge they need to move when God speaks.

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- Real Talk. Real Jesus. Real Life. -

Chapters

• 0:00 Prayer And Setup For Acts 7
• 2:10 Charges Against Stephen Recalled
• 3:15 Abraham’s Call And Covenant
• 6:45 Joseph’s Rejection And Rise
• 9:20 Famine, Egypt, And The Family
• 11:45 Pharaoh’s Oppression And Moses’ Birth
• 15:30 Moses’ Training And Misstep
• 18:20 Burning Bush And Holy Ground
• 21:20 Exodus Miracles And Living Oracles
• 24:00 Israel’s Idolatry And Prophetic Warnings
• 27:30 Tabernacle, Temple, And God’s Presence
• 30:00 Stephen Confronts Hard Hearts
• 32:20 Rage, Vision Of Jesus, And Stoning
• 34:30 Saul’s Presence And Stephen’s Forgiveness
• 37:00 Why Stephen’s Sermon Is A Hinge
• 40:00 Tradition Versus The Holy Spirit
• 43:00 Bold Witness Over Self‑Defense
• 46:00 Seeds Of Paul And Global Mission
• 49:00 Scattering, Persecution, And Acceleration

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:00

Hey fam, welcome to the Morning Charge replay. This is your moment to plug in, power up, and get spiritually charged before stepping into everything that God has called you to come through today. Whether that's at work, at home, or at school, or anywhere that He sends you. This is where your day gets aligned with purpose. This is real talk, real Jesus, real life. This is the morning charge.

SPEAKER_00: 0:23

Father, I just thank you, Lord. I thank you, Father, for your word. I thank you, Lord, for um for what you're showing us through Acts. Lord, I pray right now, Lord, that our hearts are ready to receive what you want to show us today. Father, I pray, Lord, even the scriptures that so many of us have read a million different times, a million different ways, Lord, Lord, that your truth would just shine through, Father, through these words today. That our ears are open, our eyes are open to see and hear all that you have. Holy Spirit, we're not in a hurry. We're going to follow after you today. And we just thank you right now, in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen. All right. So let's take a look at Stephen's sermon. Before I do, though, remember yesterday there was this group of people, and this particular group of people who called themselves Men Set Free. That was kind of their group name, Men Set Free. This was such an evil group, though. They were so rebellious that even the pagan were the ones that the pagan worshipers, the ones worshiping Satan, like they they were they were disturbed by this group of people. This is how evil these people were. And they came with these false accusations when they couldn't stand up to the Holy Spirit on the inside of Stephen that we saw yesterday when Stephen spoke forth the words. The memory was inspired by the Holy Spirit. He spoke by way of the Holy Spirit, stopped them in their tracks. They had nothing left to say. They went and lied on him to the high priest and the council, and so they brought Stephen in and they're confronting him. Yesterday we ended this. Every member of the Supreme Council focused their gaze upon Stephen, and right in front of their eyes, while being falsely accused, his face glowed as though he had the face of an angel. It was like the glory of the Lord shone all about him, and they were looking at him. So now that brings us to chapter seven. The high priest asked in verse one, Are these accusations true? Talking to Stephen, Stephen replied with this. All right, and he's going to take us on a little bit of a journey. He's going to take us way back to the biblical ancestors and bring us to now. He's going to make a point that's not going to end real well for him, but let's dive into it, okay? What's up, Brother Atlan? What's happening, man? I'm going to try to give some time at the end of this before I jump off today. Brother Atlan's been wanting to show us his building and what's been going on over there. And so uh so when we get through this study and we have a little reflection time, I want to come to you for a few moments before I'm out, okay? All right, love you, man. So hang with me. All right. Stephen replies with this, his sermon, okay? My fellow Jews and fathers, listen to me. The God of glory appeared. All right, now, the God of glory appeared to our ancestor Abraham, is what he's about to talk about. But but but the God of glory appeared. I want us to look at something. The entire Hebrew family, and and consequently, the life of believers today. All right, but the entire Hebrew family all began with a divine encounter as the God of glory appeared before Abraham. This is the same glory that calls people to faith in Christ. It's the same glory. And we, much like Abraham, have been captured by the God of glory. Abraham, our father, way back, ancestors, ancestors. On back, back, back, back, back. Same glory, all right, is for us today. But anyway, the God of glory appeared to our ancestor Abraham while he was living in Iraq or Mesopotamia, okay? All right, but Iraq, and you know where Iraq is, we should by now. And before he moved to Haran in Syria, God said to him before Abraham left, he said, Go, leave behind your country and your relatives, begin your journey and come to the land that I will show you. You can see that in Genesis 12 and 1. Okay, Genesis 12 and 1 is where you can find that. So in verse 4, Abraham left southeastern Iraq, Mesopotamia, and began his journey. He settled in Haran and stayed there until his father passed away. Then God had him move to the land of Israel with only a promise. Now, one thing I want you to note about Abraham is we say, go to the land in which I'll show you. All right, and we usually stop there. So Abraham left where he was and he began his journey, leaving Mesopotamia. He settled in Haran and stayed there until his father passed away. So he stayed there for quite some time, and then God had him move again to the land of Israel with only a promise. That's all he had. He had a promise. He didn't have anything else. And there's lots of different messages in today's message. So that's just one I want you to know. Sometimes we wonder why God don't just boop move us right on into the promise, where there's some things we got to encounter along the way before we get there. Verse 5: although God gave him no parcel of land that he could call his own, not even a footprint, as we see in Deuteronomy 2 and 5, yet he promised Abraham that he and his descendants would one day have it all. That was a promise to Abraham. He went there on a promise, and even though he didn't have a parcel of land, not even a small little footprint, God had promised Abraham and his descendants, you're going to have it all. And even though as yet Abraham had no child, God spoke with him and gave him this promise. We see this in Genesis 15 and Exodus 2, and also chapter 12 in Exodus. Verse 7 says, But I will judge the nation that enslaves them, and your descendants will be set free to return to this land to serve and worship me. All right, so what looks kind of bad, it's going to turn out to be kind of good. And the Lord's just the Lord gave him he gave him the promise. I'm going to give you this promise, but I want you to know it's going to be some junk happening along the way. But I will judge that nation. Your descendants are going to be set free and will return to this land to serve and to worship me. Okay. So there's that. And that's Exodus chapter 3, if you want to read that, what I just read. Alright, verse 8. Then God entered into covenant with Abraham, which included the requirement of circumcision. Alright, so when he became the father of Isaac, he circumcised him eight days after his birth. Then Isaac became the father of Jacob, who was the father of our twelve patriarchs. Jacob's son became jealous of their brother Joseph and sold him to be a slave in Egypt. But God's favor and blessing rested upon Joseph, and in time God rescued him from all his oppression and granted him extraordinary favor before Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. We know the story. Pharaoh appointed him as the overseer of this nation and even of his own palace. If you're not sure of that story, you can go to Genesis chapter 41, and there it is. Genesis chapter 41, you can read all about it. Then a devastating famine came all over Egypt and Canaan, bringing great misery to the people, including our ancestors, who couldn't find food. All right, huge famine, no food to be found, really bad times. Verse 12 But when Jacob learned that there was food in Egypt, he sent his sons, our ancestors, on their first trip to purchase grain for their family. On their second trip over to Egypt, Joseph revealed his identity to his brothers, Genesis chapter 45 and 1. And because of that, Pharaoh learned about Joseph's family and where he came from. Joseph sent for his father Jacob and his entire family, a total of 75 people. Jacob and his entire family. Seventy-five folks. Why don't you come and reside here in Egypt? Eventually, Jacob, well, you know, unalived there, along with all of his sons, our forefathers. Now he's talking to the religious council, okay? That's who he's speaking to right now. So Jacob unalived in that place, along with all of his sons, who were our forefathers. Their bones were later carried back to the promised land and buried in Shechem, in the tomb Abraham had purchased for a sum of money from the sons of Hamar. Okay, so there's there's generations. We're going generations back, and now we're and now we're leading into verse 17. The time drew near for God to fulfill the prophetic promise he had made to Abraham.

unknown: 10:01

Whew.

SPEAKER_00: 10:01

How many of you feel like, man, I've just been on the journey and I'm waiting on the promise? Well, I mean, think about Abraham. He went through an awful lot. Our Jewish people had increased greatly in number, multiplying many times over while in Egypt. Verse 18 now, another king who had forgotten how Joseph had made their nation great arose to rule over Egypt. That's in Exodus chapter one. He was an abusive king who exploited our people with his smooth talk. With cruelty, he forced our ancestors to give up their little boys as he committed infanticide. All right, and that is another term for oh, well, uh the best way to put it, another term for unaliving a child before it's born. There you go. And today that's that's the term that we would know it as. Then Moses came on the scene. A child of divine beauty is what Moses was described as. Now that the Aramaic here is oh, let me go. Oh, yeah, yeah. The Aramaic here calls him beautiful, well-pleasing in the eyes of God. All right, he was loved by God. Ancient Hebrew scholars believe that Moses may have had a shining of glory on his countenance when he was born. All right, the glory of the Lord shone around him. And that distinguished him as a special servant of the Lord. They say the glory of the Lord. He was radiating, almost like we saw Stephen earlier radiating. Moses was a type or a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. No one was fairer than he, but no one was more extraordinary than the Lord. We learn in Exodus 6 and verse 20 that Moses' father was Amram, and his mother was Joshabed. Amram means family of the lofty one. Joshbed means Yah makes great. And the name Moses means rescued out of the water. All right, which is exactly kind of his story. But then Moses comes on the scene, okay? His parents hid him from Pharaoh as long as they could to spare his life. As we see in Hebrews, you can go to Hebrews chapter 11, verse 23. After three months, they could conceal him no longer, so they had to abandon him to his fate. We don't know what's going to happen. We're going to put him in a basket, we're going to send him downstream, we're going to hope for the best. But God arranged that Pharaoh's daughter would find him, take him home, and raise him as her own son. So Moses was fully trained in the royal courts and educated in the highest wisdom Egypt had to offer until he arose as a powerful prince and an eloquent orator. What in the world is that? Elocant or okay, Jewish, let's look at Jewish tradition. All right, let's look at this for a minute. So Jewish tradition is that Pharaoh's daughter had no child of her own, and she herself was an only child. All right, Moses stood in line to receive the throne of Egypt, the great world power. God was going to prepare a servant who would do his pleasure. All the education and culture of this world dynasty, with its unlimited resources, was placed before Moses. The most elite of education was all placed right there before Moses. When Moses turned 40, his heart was stirred for his people, the Israelites. One day he saw one of our people being violently mistreated, so he came to his rescue. And with his own hands, Moses unalived the abusive Egyptian. Moses hoped that when the people realized how he had rescued one of their own, they would recognize him as their deliverer. Boy, was he wrong. And that's the next thing. How wrong was he? The next day, verse 26, he came, he came upon two of our people engaged in a fist fight, and he tried to break it up by saying, Men, you are brothers. Why would you want to hurt each other? But the perpetrator pushed Moses aside and said, Who do you think you are? Who appointed you to be our ruler and judge? Are you going to unalive me like you did the Egyptian yesterday? Verse 29, shaken by this, Moses fled Egypt. He's on his way. Still in you can go to Hebrews chapter 11, get the whole details. But Moses fled Egypt here and lived as an exile in the land of Midian, where he became the father of two sons. After forty years had passed, while he was in the desert near Mount Sinai, the messenger of Yahweh appeared to him in the midst of a flaming thorn bush. Exodus 3 and 2, by the way. Moses was astonished and stunned by what he was seeing, so he drew closer to observe this marvel. And then the Lord Yahweh spoke to him out of the flames, saying, I am the living God, the God of your ancestors, I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Trembling in God's presence and overwhelmed with awe, Moses didn't even dare to look into the fire. Out of the flames the Lord Yahweh said to him, Take the sandals off of your feet. Now that's pretty huge. Because this then, removing one's shoes indicated the highest reverence for something. All right, it was very symbolic of removing earthly matters from our minds and our hearts and readiness to accept spiritual realities from the Lord. When you kicked off your shoes, you were removing things, and you're saying, Lord, here I am. But the Lord said, Take the sandals off your feet, for you're standing in the realm of holiness, or you're standing upon holy ground. I have watched and seen how my people have been mistreated in Egypt, or I have seen their torment. I have heard their painful groaning, and now I have come down to set them free. So come to me, Moses, for I am sending you to Egypt to represent me. Verse thirty-five. So God sent back to Egypt the man. Our people rejected and refused to recognize by saying, Who appointed you to be our ruler and judge? God sent this man back to be their ruler and their deliverer, commissioned with the power of the messenger who appeared to him in the flaming thornbush. Verse 36. This man brought the people out of their Egyptian bondage with many astonishing wonders and miracle signs, miracles in Egypt, miracles at the Red Sea, miracles during their forty year journey through the wilderness. This is the same Moses who said to our ancestors, The Lord God will raise up one from among you who will be a prophet to you, like I have been. Listen to everything that he will say. Moses led the congregation to the wilderness, or Moses is the one who was in the assembly in the wilderness. And he spoke face to face with the angel who spoke with him on the top of Mount Sinai. Along with our ancestors, he received the living oracles of God that were passed down to us. I know this is long, y'all, but we're we're we're we're going somewhere. We're going to break this down. But our forefathers refused to obey, verse 39. They pushed him away. Their hearts longed to return to Egypt. We just want to return. Things were better there. We're not getting anywhere. In verse 40, while Moses was on the mountain, our forefathers said to Aaron, make us gods to lead us, because we don't know what has become of this Moses who brought us out of Egypt. We we gotta we gotta we gotta do something, because this ain't working, and we ain't quite sure about this Moses, dude. The Aramaic says, We don't know who this Moses is. We truly don't know him. So they made a god, an idol in the form of a bull calf. They offered sacrifices to it and celebrated with delight what their own hands had made. When God saw what they had done, he turned away from them and handed them over to the worship of the stars of heaven, as recorded in the prophetic writings, as seen in Amos chapter five, verse twenty-five. People of Israel, you failed to worship me when you offered animal sacrifices for forty years in the wilderness. Instead, you worshiped the god Moloch, that was the Canaanite god of the sun in the sky, and you carried his tabernacle, not mine. You worshiped your star god Rephan. You made idols with your hands and worshiped them instead of me. So now I will cast cast you into exile beyond Babylon. God gave Moses the revelation of the pattern of the tabernacle of the testimony. By God's command he made it exactly according to the specifications given to him for our ancestors in the wilderness. The next generation received possession of it, and under Joshua's leadership, thanks, Joshua, they took possession of the land of the nations, which God drove out in front of them. The tabernacle was carried about until David found loving favor with God and prayed for a dwelling place for God of Jacob. But it was Solomon who built him a house. Verse 48. However, the Most High God does not live in temples made by human hands, as the prophet said. He's really going based off of these these prophets in their words. So what we're going to see now is the prophet said in Isaiah 66, verses 1 and 2 Heaven is my throne room, and the earth is but a footstool for my feet. How could you possibly build a house that could contain me, says the Lord Yahweh? And where could you find a place where I could live? Don't you know that it is my hands that have built my house, not yours? Isn't it my hand that's built all of these things? Not yours. Why would you be so stubborn as to close your hearts and your ears to me? Now Stephen's really hitting home. He's going back to the past and he said, The prophets have been saying, the prophets have been saying, but our people have been, they've been pushing this away, they haven't been listening. All of these things have been said, and now he gets to the point where he says, Why would you be so stubborn as to close your hearts and your ears to me? And you're believing these guys and these false accusations that are coming against me, but you haven't believed these prophets and what they've said, even though all of this has come to pass. And especially the point here where he's saying the most high God does not live in temples made by human hands. And you can sit here on your high priestliness and all of your counsel and all of your things, but I want you to know that the Most High God does not live in these temples. And now you've been stubborn and closed your hearts and your ears to me. Stephen goes on to say, you're always opposing the Holy Spirit just like your forefathers. What a huge there's that son, Sherry. What a, what a what a huge I mean, Stephen's not, he ain't trying to like he ain't holding back at this point. He does not care. He is full of the Holy Spirit, and he is going to speak forth the truth, and he is beginning to tear down the religious system, whether they want to believe this or not. You're always opposing the Holy Spirit, just like your forefathers did. Verse 52 Which prophet was not persecuted or unalived by your ancestors? Tell me, name just one, because they unalived them all, even the ones who prophesied long ago of the coming of the righteous one, who was just here, by the way, and left his Holy Spirit for us. Stephen goes on to say, Now you follow in their steps and have become his betrayers and his unalivers. You have been given the law by the visitation of angels or by angelic decrees, but you have not obeyed it. Now, verse 54. When they heard these things, they were overtaken with violent rage, filling their souls, and they gnashed their teeth at him. They were beyond angry. They were extremely mad. But Stephen, overtaken with great faith, as we see here, was full of the Holy Spirit. He fixed his gaze into heaven. Oh, I'm sorry, he fixed his gaze into the heavenly realm, it says, JD, good morning. Thanks for those, bro. Good to see you. Trash man, you too, man. And as he looked, he saw the glory and the splendor of God and Jesus, who stood up at the right hand of God. This is significant. Paul, good morning, man. Jesus, who stood up at the right hand of God. Look, Stephen said, I can see the heavens opening and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God to welcome me home. Jesus sits at the right hand of God. But when he saw Stephen giving his last breath for the gospel, Jesus stood up, is what the word says. And I believe that was to welcome the martyr home. The man that seats sits at the right hand stood. Do we do we pick up on these things? Verse 57, his accusers covered their ears with their hands, and they screamed at the top of their lungs to drown out his voice. They were done hearing Stephen at this point. They couldn't take or hear any more. Then they pounced on him and they threw him outside the city walls to stone him. His accusers, one by one, placed their outer garments at the feet of a young man named Saul of Tarsus. Who is Saul? Who is this guy? Saul, who is eventually going to be converted, and will become Paul the Apostle. Romans, Corinthians, hello. What I see here is Stephen's graduation was Paul's initiation. There was a passing of a mantle here in the midst of what looked like a tragic situation. Stephen was good. He was ready to go. He knew he had to stand up and say what he had to say. And what happens next is monumental. Saul eventually is going to become Paul. Verse 59, as they hurled stone after stone at him, Stephen prayed as he was being stoned. Our Lord Jesus, accept my spirit into your presence. He crumpled to his knees and he shouted in a loud voice, Our Lord, don't hold this sin against them. And then he unalived. He was gone. Stephen, around for a short time, stood up. Remember, he was one of the ones that they that they they prayed. They prayed him in and set him into place. He was serving and he was preaching the gospel. Miracles, signs, and wonders were happening. And then he had a group that just did not like him, totally against him, the most evil of the evil. The pagan people didn't like these people. They stayed away from them. They knew they were the most evil of the evil. Let's look at some things. I know it was kind of long. We went down quite the path. Acts 7 is the it is the longest sermon in Acts, by the way, for those that want to know. But Stephen had to make a point. You know, and Stephen, he really wasn't, I mean, it's not like he was really on trial here if you really look into the situation, but Israel's history was on trial this day. Stephen stands up and he walks them through their own sacred history. I gotta stand here and remind you guys of something. He started with who? Abraham. He started with the promise. He moved to Joseph, who was the rejected deliverer. Why is it unaloved? He was, yes, I know. GMA Shelley, TikTok does not allow us to say certain words. So that's why that. That's correct. And I just I don't want to. I'm spreading the gospel and I'm not wanting to make it to where I'm not able to spread the gospel. If you're new to TikTok and you hear me say weird words, it's that those words are in here, what you just said, but I cannot say those out loud. So there you go. Uh I hope that works. But he started with Abraham the promise, went to Joseph, the rejected deliverer. We moved into Moses, who was the rejected redeemer, the law, the temple. He moved into many different things. Stephen is speaking to religious leaders who what? Let's remind ourselves of who these religious leaders were. They were those that prided themselves on what? On their heritage. They were huge in their traditions. They they really were ones that trusted their lineage more than the newness of whatever this is that's going on with this man named Jesus. They're upholding more of their traditions than anything. They believe God was confined to their systems and their land and their buildings and all the things. You know what I'm saying? He proved he knew Scripture better than their accusers. He's like, if you really want to go there, we're gonna go there. I I I want to stand here and approve that I I know I know history. I I know I know your customs and I know your traditions and I know your things, but I want to remind you of all of everything. I have the authority to speak by way of the Holy Spirit. So let's go through this together. Over and over again, over and over again, all throughout the scriptures, which Stephen was preaching in his sermon, as we call it. We see where God sends a deliverer. The people reject the deliverer, but God still continues to advance his kingdom here on the earth. Here comes a deliverer of the message, rejected. Here comes another deliverer of the message, rejected. Your people continue, our people, as Stephen said, our people. He's like, hey, I converted over to this because it's the truth. And we can see in the patterns where this continued to get rejected and rejected, rejected. Hey, in our day, it still gets rejected and rejected and rejected. You've always done this, is what Stephen's saying. When are you gonna stop this? When are you gonna realize that this is the truth? He was the Messiah. God appeared in Mesopotamia, in Egypt, in the wilderness. He's appeared everywhere, not just here in the temple, mind you, which is why he brought back those words. God was not confined to your little building. It wasn't little, but you're the one that's confined to your building and to your traditions and to your systems. Your broken systems, mind you. Stephen was trying to make a point here. You honor God's past, but you're resisting his present and what he has just done. And what he's still done. And that's right, Sherry. He still isn't confined to all that. That's why I say we gotta be careful what we build with these. Is it what God wanted us to build? Was it his kingdom come, his will be done on earth as it is in heaven? Does he need another building? Does he need another thing? Does he what is Stephen's letting him know? Hey, look at this. This is this is all of this, and all of that you have in here. You need to take a look at this. You're resisting the Holy Spirit. You ones that you love the law, but you're rejecting the very one that the law pointed to. He came to fulfill all of this, but you want to continue to live in your systems and your things. He's trying to let them know. You're idolizing the temple. You completely have, you've missed the Messiah. You claim to keep the law. We're gonna keep the law, we're upholding the the law. And you are the ones that unalived, sorry, the very righteous one, our savior, our savior. This was not this was not a very this was not a very mild. Stephen, Stephen could have just come in and he could have just said, that wasn't me. I didn't say those words, and stopped. That what they're saying is false. I didn't I didn't say any of that. No, he's making a point. He's making a point. And to be quite honest, do you remember? Let's go back for a second. I've already marked eight from Monday or Tuesday, but let's go back for a minute. Y'all give me a second. Y'all know how I am. The men set free agitated the crowd and the elders. Before that, they said the men set free conspired in secret to find those who would falsely accuse Stephen and lie about him, saying, We heard this man speak blasphemy against Moses and God. That was the thing. So we got to go back. All right, that was the whole thing from yesterday, chapter six. We heard this man speak blasphemy against Moses and God. But he went and he set the story straight. But he didn't just defend himself, he really set the story straight. He really did. He had a nice little confrontation with them. While we're here, let's set the story straight about this. See, Stephen didn't just defend himself and just call out the lies to them because self-defense here for him, I feel, he would have missed the assignment. He would have missed the moment. And he knew the moment would not end well with what he felt by way of the Holy Spirit to say. But here's what I want you to know about these guys. These guys were built different. Can we stand here today and say we're built different that we would say anything, even if it meant like gone, we're done after our next statement? Are we willing to say that? Are we really willing to say that our life is not our own? Are we? I got to look in the mirror with this too. If we were confronted in such a way, would I really stand up and say, well, let's just get honest with things today? See, Stephen wasn't here to save his life. He wasn't, whatever I got to do so I can stay alive. I just, I can't know. He was here to tell the truth. He was here to tell the truth. Are we here to tell the truth? Are we here to tell to tell the truth of the matter? Jesus, I want you to know something about this because Jesus didn't defend himself before Pilate either. Stephen is following in the footsteps of Jesus. So should you and I follow in the same footsteps, steps of Jesus. English today. When God really wants to shift something, when he really wants to get something done, he doesn't send in negotiators. Stephen wasn't a real negotiator. You know, Jesus wasn't a negotiator. Let's let's reach some common ground here. Let's compromise. No, no, no. He sends witnesses in to tell the truth just like it is. Stephen was so full of the Holy Spirit, he was radiating, he was glowing in this moment. So we know he was speaking the truth by way of the Holy Spirit. And even the Jewish, the leaders, the high priest in the land, they knew. They knew, but it made them angry. You are not going to come against our traditions. You're not going to come against it. And can I tell you today, in some semblance or another, there's still persecution even in our own churches, our Western world churches. If you were to stand up and say something, depending on where you were, I'm not talking about every church, may not be talking about your church, okay? So no, no offense, spirit of offense, in the name of Jesus. What I'm saying is, Big C, especially us Western world folks over in America, we have the same type of persecution, not to unalivingness, but we have the same persecutions. Today we call it like cancel, cancel culture or whatever you want to call it. You don't see eye to eye with me, I'm done with you. Oh, you don't know. You can go on somewhere. If Stephen had really, and this is just me, this is just me taking notes. Okay, as I'm looking at Stephen, as I'm hearing him talk, if if Stephen had really defended himself, it would have centered the story on Stephen at this point, because he would have been defending himself and his life and what he had going on, and we would not have had this exposure that God intended to have in that moment. For when Stephen said what he had to say and knew what was coming, he looked up into heaven and what? Jesus stood up at the right hand, stretched out, and welcomed the martyr home. He said, I can see the Son of Man, the Son of God stood up. Stephen knew that he was well pleased, and that's all that mattered. Because eternity was greater for him than trying to stay here. He accomplished the mission. He accomplished the mission. If the truth had been I believe that if the truth hadn't been given in that moment, it would have changed the landscape of things. Because we're gonna we're gonna see something else here in a moment. And and I even think, and this is just me, I I even think back to what if what if the apostles had chosen somebody else instead of Stephen? All right, because this, I mean, if they they found him, they they used by way of the Holy Spirit to pick who they were going to have come alongside and to help. Would it have gone differently? Would the right person, see, if if the right person isn't put into the right place, it's gonna affect the outcomes of things. But this is why, this is why the Holy Spirit chose Stephen to step into this place. Stephen was what? He was full of faith. They said he was full of faith, and he was full of the spirit. They knew he was the right guy because of those two requirements. He was full of faith, he knew God was gonna do what God said he was gonna do, and he was full of the spirit. He was full of the Holy Spirit. He was bold, he was uncompromising, he wouldn't compromise, all right, and he was willing to unalive without softening the truth. Another person could have stood there and tried to defend themselves, maybe. They could have tried to do whatever they needed to do to survive. But see, one that's truly living, full of faith, and one that's truly living full of the Holy Spirit, took care of business in a way that needed to be taken care of. He truly didn't mind that he was gonna be a martyr. God needed that, he needed the seed in that moment to be planted because now you're gonna see another shift happen in Acts. There's a transitional moment that's taken place here. All right, Stephen was not chosen on accident. Man plans his ways, God orders their steps. Stephen was not chosen by accident. He knew he was the one that could follow through with the assignment, but it took those to be obedient to hear the Holy Spirit to say that guy is one that needs to come alongside and come in. Once again, decisions should always be made in the secret place. Decisions should always be Holy Spirit led, because I sit here and think, what if somebody other than Stephen had been chosen in that moment? And the Lord is like, but they were ones that got on their faces before the Lord daily and multiple times daily, and they followed the Holy Spirit and all their decisions and all their things. Stephen was chosen for the assignment. And then there at the end, we see these religious leaders and people. They were laying their garments at Saul's feet. Where did this guy come from? Where's the this guy? But this turns out to be a massive, a massive, massive part of the entire story of what's going forth. Delivering Jesus to the nations. This is huge. In this particular culture, I want us to understand something. And I'm going slow this morning because I don't want to miss something. Laying the garments at someone's feet was a really big move because you're like, that's just to us, see, if we're not careful, we can just read through things. As they hurled stone after stone, they prayed, blah, blah. Oh, before that. Oh, his accusers one by one placed their outer garments at the feet of a young man named Saul of Tarsus. And it just keeps moving. It mentions that and it moves on. All right. They understand, they understood what this carried then. Us, we just read this and we're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. If you're not careful, you just kind of read scripture down. You're like, okay, that was great. I read scripture and I'm like, why? Why did you take this, that one sentence? Why is that there? They threw him out the door, threw stones at him, and then they threw clothes at this guy. Who what why did you mention this? Okay. Laying garments at someone's feet gave them authorization of some kind. Saul wasn't just watching, though. Saul was participating. This young man wasn't just watching this man get stoned. I want you to realize he was participating. He was approving of Stephen being stoned to unaliving this. He was in on this thing. Stevens, that is the first recorded martyrdom, by the way, of the church. This is the first account where we've seen somebody actually and go. And standing there is Saul for the first martyr of the Lord. The man, the very man who is going to carry the gospel to the Gentiles. Glory to God. We better be thankful for this guy. First, he consented to unalive a messenger for Jesus, the first one. The first one on account. This tells me Saul was even being put into place, even in the midst of his rebellion and his darkness, all right, because he was not living a life for the Lord, okay? He was just heathen. But in this moment, God was marking him. Can we wrap our brains around that? We want to point the finger at this person and that person. They did wrong, they did wrong, they did. God is a God, he can totally restore somebody. He can totally turn somebody's lives around. And many of us have radical testimonies of how he turned our lives around. And there was Saul participating. And one day God is going to get a hold of him. Stephen's would become a part of Saul's transformation later on that wonderful road to Damascus. The blood of Stephen that was shed that day went into the, I believe, went into the ground as a seed for Paul. Come on, follow me. Follow me, somebody. He's my cornerstone. What's up, brother? Good to see you this morning, man. Anyone else I've missed? Hello. Welcome into the morning charge. We're glad to have you here. I'm going over just a couple of this is almost like Josh's thoughts. These are my notes. What I see chapter seven is, it's kind of what I call, like if you had a door and you have hinges that swing the door. Chapter seven is what I call kind of a hinge chapter. It begins to turn something, it begins to shift something, something begins to change. Everything before it built us up to this point, because now we have our first martyr. Everything after is everything's going to begin to flow from this point. This that happened to Stephen changed things drastically. We've seen the firefall in what chapter two. We saw power and boldness happening in chapters three and four. We saw purity and obedience happening in five. There was order that was set by the apostles. There were new leaders that came forth in chapter six. And now chapter seven come with a cost. The gospel was fully rejected by the religious system in this chapter. Completely. And now here comes this Stephen guy. It's showing us the scattering of believers. We're going to see some things coming up. All right. In chapters 8. We're going to see the gospel going out beyond Jerusalem. We're going to see Saul begin to rise. He's going to have his moment. We're going to see the Gentiles begin to come to Jesus. Lots of things changing. But Stephen stood up and changed the landscape of things. Even though he would not physically be here anymore, he changed things. He knew the mission. He knew what he had to do. If Stephen had not done what he did, the church might have stayed right where it was. And who knows? They could have gotten to that point where they those people and people scattered and no, but the message of Jesus had to continue and continue and to grow and to grow and to grow. We've grown so complacent. When you really start picking this stuff apart and what they would stand for and that they would really stand up, we have we have gotten I mean I'm not talking about any one person, okay, but but us, big C church as a whole, we have gotten comfortable. We have gotten complacent. We're okay doing our little Sunday school and hearing our little message and singing our few little songs and going about our daily lives. Busy with all kinds of busy. We are busy, busy, busy bees. If he can't get you to sin, then he'll keep you busy. That's what the enemy does. And then Jesus stood. Uh-oh. I heard Annalise back there. She said, uh-oh. Ah, we can learn a lot from that. Uh-oh, baby. That's right. I don't know if y'all can hear and hear. I hear just as plain as they. Yeah, church. You heard that from the mouth of a one-year-old. Uh-oh. That's where we are. We need to wake up. We need to fully wake up and be the burning ones. That when people see us, they see what they saw in Stephen. They see what they saw in Peter and John. And we've got to know that the Holy Spirit has our lives and he will open doors. Even to the point where you get thrown in falsely accused, open the doors to Peter and John to go out and preach once again. I thought they were in there. Now they're the power of the Lord. And then at the very, very end, I'm kind of ending here. I'm landing the plane. Don't worry. Stephen forgave like Jesus forgave. He said, Lord, do not charge them with this sin. Do not bring this against them. The first martyr at this point, sounding just like the Savior. They don't know what they're doing, Lord. Lord, we pray they're going to get it one day, but they don't know what they're doing right now. So don't bring this charge against them. And from this moment forward, we see where the church stops being centralized, so to speak. Persecution is going to come to the land and believers are going to scatter, but but they're going to be preaching everywhere at this point. That only drove the gospel out even further beyond its bounds. What looked like was lost in that moment and all was gone and hope was lost is actually bringing acceleration to bringing the gospel around the world. Stephen finished well. He finished very well.

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