Martyr

Paul said he would become all things to all people so that he might reach some for the sake of Jesus. Stephen fulfilled Paul’s words long before he wrote them, as the first martyr of the church, stoned to death with the coats of his executioners ironically laid at Paul’s feet…

8 Stephen, a man full of God’s grace and power, performed amazing miracles and signs among the people. 9 But one day some men from the Synagogue of Freed Slaves, as it was called, started to debate with him. They were Jews from Cyrene, Alexandria, Cilicia, and the province of Asia. 10 None of them could stand against the wisdom and the Spirit with which Stephen spoke.

11 So they persuaded some men to lie about Stephen, saying, “We heard him blaspheme Moses, and even God.” 12 This roused the people, the elders, and the teachers of religious law. So they arrested Stephen and brought him before the high council.

13 The lying witnesses said, “This man is always speaking against the holy Temple and against the law of Moses. 14 We have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy the Temple and change the customs Moses handed down to us.”

15 At this point everyone in the high council stared at Stephen, because his face became as bright as an angel’s.
Acts 6:8-15 NLT

Stephen, who had been named one of the deacons earlier in chapter 6, was not just a good service leader. He was a person full of God’s grace and power. It was evident through the way God worked in him and through him, that the Spirit was strong within Stephen.

The thought around this debate was that the freed slaves and the Jews that had come back from these other regions were conservative of mind and not open to the message of Jesus. We can see in their false accusations what they believe: “We have heard him say that this Jesus… will… change the customs Moses handed down to us.” It’s a false accusation, but it belies their true concern.

Incidentally, this went both ways in the New Testament. In some cases, the apostles taught that Jewish Christian converts should continue following their customs, while Gentile Christian converts were not obligated to follow Jewish customs. In one situation (Acts 16), Paul arranges for Timothy, who had a Greek father, to be circumcised. In Peter’s own case, he was told by God is a vision that everything was clean for him to eat (Acts 10).

What I find true for the most part in the New Testament is that the instruction was based on what was best for the furtherance of the gospel. It wasn’t about the person, but rather was about the kingdom. Paul summarized this well in 1Corinthians 9 as becoming all things to all people so that he might reach some for the sake of Jesus.

Stephen was about to live Paul’s words in the story of the kingdom. The amazing irony is that in the next chapter people will lay their coats at the feet of Paul (known then as Saul) as they stone Stephen to death. His face became bright as an angel here in verse 15 because he was full of the Holy Spirit as he wound up to deliver his last speech about the kingdom of God.

As Stephen was willing to become all things to all people in service to Jesus, he became on this day the focal point of persecution. On this day, Stephen became the first martyr…

Amen.

Marc Kinna