Transcript

The year, 1934. Americans John and Betty Stam were serving as missionaries in China. One morning Betty was bathing her three-month-old daughter Helen Priscilla Stam when the city’s Magistrate appeared.

Communist forces were near, he warned, and urged the Stams to flee. So John Stam went out to investigate the situation for himself. He received conflicting reports.

Taking no chances, he arranged for Betty and the baby to be escorted away to safety if need be. But before the Stams could make their break, the Communists were inside the city. And soon the enemy beat on the Stams’ own gate [and they were taken captive].

That night John was allowed to write a letter to mission authorities. “My wife, baby and myself are today in the hands of the Communists in the city of Tsingteh. Their demand is twenty thousand dollars for our release….The Lord bless and guide you. As for us, may God be glorified, whether by life or by death.”

Their captors led the Stams toward a city, twelve miles distant. John carried little Helen, but Betty, who was not physically strong, was allowed to ride a horse part of the way.

Under guard, the foreign family was hustled into a postmaster’s shop. The postmaster, who recognized them from their previous visits to his town, asked John “Where are you going?” “We do not know where they are going, but we are going to heaven,” answered John.

The next morning the young couple were led through town without the baby. Their daughter Helen Priscilla was left wrapped in a sleeping bag in the deserted house they had occupied the night before.

John and Betty’s hands were tightly bound, and they were stripped of their outer garments as if they were common criminals. John walked barefoot. He had given his socks to Betty. The soldiers jeered and called the town’s folk to come see the execution.

The terrified people obeyed. On the way to the execution, a medicine-seller, considered a lukewarm Christian at best, stepped from the crowd and pleaded for the lives of the two foreigners. The communists angrily ordered him back.

The man would not be stilled. His house was searched, a Bible and hymnbook found, and he, too was dragged away to die as a hated Christian.

John pleaded for the man’s life. It was then that the communist leader sharply ordered John to kneel. As John was speaking softly, the leader swung his sword through the missionary’s throat so that his head was severed from his body.

Betty did not scream. She quivered and fell bound beside her husband’s body. As she knelt there, the same sword ended her life with a single blow.

Two days later, Helen Priscilla was found in the deserted house and carried out to safety. Inside the sleeping bag, Betty had put a change of clothes and diapers, and she had pinned two $5 bills to her sleeping bag.

John Stam was the brother of the founder of the Berean Bible Society, Pastor Cornelius R. Stam. John and Betty’s martyrdom resulted in a surge of new missionaries who went around the world to share the gospel and resulted in the salvation of many souls.

John wrote of his hope and prayer that God would be glorified whether by their life or their death, and this did happen through the work of the Church and salvation of souls.

In Acts 7, we learn of the martyrdom of Stephen. Like John and Betty, Stephen died as a result of his faith in Christ. And God was glorified through Stephen’s death as well.

Stephen’s martyrdom sparked a great persecution of believers and it also resulted in a change in God’s dealings with mankind as we’ll see.

Acts 7:1-8: “Then said the high priest, Are these things so? And he said, Men, brethren, and fathers, hearken; The God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran,

And said unto him, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and come into the land which I shall shew thee. Then came he out of the land of the Chaldaeans, and dwelt in Charran: and from thence, when his father was dead, he removed him into this land, wherein ye now dwell.”

“And he gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on: yet he promised that he would give it to him for a possession, and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no child.

“And God spake on this wise, That his seed should sojourn in a strange land; and that they should bring them into bondage, and entreat them evil four hundred years.

“And the nation to whom they shall be in bondage will I judge, said God: and after that shall they come forth, and serve me in this place. And he gave him the covenant of circumcision: and so Abraham begat Isaac, and circumcised him the eighth day; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat the twelve patriarchs.”

Acts 6:5 records how Stephen was a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit. By the Holy Spirit, he performed miracles and wonders and he spoke with great wisdom.

When people from a synagogue attempted to dispute with Stephen, Acts 6:10 records that “they were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he spake.”

In this account in Acts 7, we see the great faith and wisdom of Stephen.

The leaders of this synagogue, frustrated by their inability to resist his wisdom, then begin falsely accusing Stephen of speaking “blasphemous words against Moses, and against God” (6:11). They then brought Stephen before “the council” or the Sanhedrin.

The Sanhedrin was a ruling body of Jewish leaders in Israel, which claimed jurisdiction in the matters of religion. They were like Israel’s Supreme Court.

Breaking the ninth commandment under the law, the men from the synagogue “set up false witnesses” against Stephen, Acts 6:13 says.

And their accusation against Stephen before the Sanhedrin was that “This man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place, and the law: For we have heard him say, that this Jesus of Nazareth shall destroy this place, and shall change the customs which Moses delivered us” (Acts 6:13-14).

Thus, verse one of chapter 7 says, “Then said the high priest, Are these things so?” In other words, Caiaphas, the high priest, says, “You have heard the charges Stephen. Are they correct? Are you speaking blasphemous things about the temple and the law?”

Stephen’s defense and reply are a broad lesson on their shared history in Israel. His address was not focused on trying to secure his own acquittal by the Sanhedrin. It was a message to reach Israel’s leaders, that they would repent and believe in Christ.

Standing before the Sanhedrin, he did not look at this as an opportunity to save his own life, but as an opportunity to tell them what they needed to hear.

The address is a review of Israel’s national sins in her history and it closes with Stephen confronting the sins of the men in front of him on the Sanhedrin.

He built his review around prominent men in Israel’s history: Abraham (vv. 2-8), Joseph (vv. 9-17), Moses (vv. 18-44), Joshua (v. 45), and David and Solomon (vv. 46-50).

Stephen’s purpose was also to show that the Lord Jesus Christ experienced the same things Joseph and Moses had experienced as God’s anointed servants.

The Sanhedrin recognized them as profoundly key men in their history whom God had chosen and used for the blessing of Israel and His purposes, and Stephen uses these men to point out that they should likewise recognize and believe in Christ and Who He is.

And in both cases with Joseph and Moses, Israel had rejected these men the first time, but the second time they accepted them. This was the point of Stephen’s address: Christ was rejected the first time, now it was time to accept Him.

As he begins, he addresses these religious leaders as “Men, brethren, and fathers.” They were his “brethren” and fellow-Jews. He called them “fathers, showing respect for them as leaders of the Jewish people.

And then he tells them to “hearken” to his words. His address opens with a reference to “the God of glory” (v. 2), and it closes with mention of “the glory of God” (v. 55).

The God of glory initiated the relationship with Israel when He chose Abraham. And the God of glory initiated her redemption by personally coming to Israel to save her from her sins so that He might have an eternal relationship with Israel.

The God of glory had appeared unto Abraham, and the God of glory had appeared to them in the Person of Jesus Christ.

Abraham was the father of the Jews and the father of faith. And faith is what Stephen is calling these group of men to do with Jesus Christ.

The God of glory appeared to Abraham and called him to get out of his country and to leave his family to go to a land that He would show him.

And the father of the Jews, Abraham, responded by faith and departed from where he was, in order to follow God into unknown territory.

Obeying God’s call, Abraham left Mesopotamia, or Ur of the Chaldees. But he initially traveled 500 miles northwest as far as Haran and settled temporarily there.

Abraham’s father Terah and his nephew Lot were with him in Haran. Abraham remained there until his father died. Then Abraham made it to Canaan, the land of promise, “wherein ye now dwell,” Stephen tells the Sanhedrin.

These Jewish leaders were not willing to depart from where they were in their thinking and beliefs about Jesus Christ. Stephen, by the Holy Spirit, is urging them to follow Abraham’s example of faith and courage, to go from where one was to someplace else based on the Word of God.

This is how transformation takes place in our lives as well. By faith in Christ and trusting and obeying God’s Word, God takes us from where we are in our lives to someplace else and someplace better. He changes and renews our thinking and lives. And there is only blessing in following God’s call to do this.

Stephen next points out that it did not seem at first that God’s Word to Abraham could be true. As to the promised land, God “gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on,” though He had “promised that He would give it to him for a possession, and to his seed after him.”

And as to “his seed,” God had promised that the land of Canaan would go to Abraham’s seed, “when as yet he had no child.”

Stephen’s hearers would clearly recall the details of that story, for Abraham was nearly one hundred years old and Sarah nearly ninety when they were still expected to believe that God would give them the promised seed.

This part of Stephen’s address was meant to cause these Jewish leaders to think about the claims of Christ. The Jews had expected the Messiah to be a victorious leader who would free them from their enemies and establish His kingdom of peace and righteousness.

And they refused to believe the possibility that Jesus Christ was the Son of God and Israel’s Messiah.

But at first what seemed an impossibility that Abraham should ever be the father of any great nation, and that his seed would ever possess the land when he had no seed at the age of 100 and his wife at the age of 90, all happened exactly as God had said.

And beyond that in verse 6, the promise of possessing the land again seemed hopeless to Abraham’s seed when the chosen people were in bondage in Egypt for 400 years.

But in Genesis 15, way before it ever took place, God prophesied and promised Abraham, that his seed would be there for 400 years but God would judge that nation that held them in bondage, and they would return and serve God in the land He had promised.

There is a subtle warning of the Holy Spirit through Stephen here that God judges those that hold His people in bondage. And these leaders were holding the people of Israel in spiritual bondage, when God wanted to set His people free in Christ.

Stephen shows how in the end, God’s Word was shown to be true, and God was faithful. Thus, while it seemed an impossibility to these leaders that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah and God’s Son, they needed to open their minds to its possibility based on God’s Word and the prophecies concerning Him.

Because often what appears to be impossible and unbelievable was in fact the truth.

Thus, even in his and Sarah’s old age, verse 8 says, “Abraham begat Isaac, and circumcised him the eighth day; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat the twelve patriarchs.”

Acts 7:9-16: “And the patriarchs, moved with envy, sold Joseph into Egypt: but God was with him, And delivered him out of all his afflictions, and gave him favour and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh king of Egypt; and he made him governor over Egypt and all his house.

“Now there came a dearth over all the land of Egypt and Chanaan, and great affliction: and our fathers found no sustenance. But when Jacob heard that there was corn in Egypt, he sent out our fathers first.

“And at the second time Joseph was made known to his brethren; and Joseph’s kindred was made known unto Pharaoh. Then sent Joseph, and called his father Jacob to him, and all his kindred, threescore and fifteen souls.

“So Jacob went down into Egypt, and died, he, and our fathers, And were carried over into Sychem, and laid in the sepulchre that Abraham bought for a sum of money of the sons of Emmor the father of Sychem.”

Like Christ, Joseph was beloved of his father, but was hated and rejected by his brethren. As John 1:11 says of Christ “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not.”

Ten of the sons of Jacob, the fathers of the nation, moved with envy against Joseph and they conspired against him for how to get rid of him.

Stephen’s point in bringing this up is to show how these “fathers” and leaders on the Sanhedrin were guilty of the same thing with Jesus Christ, they had moved with envy against Him and conspired for how to get rid of Him.

When the Lord was before Pilate, Mark 15:9-10 reads, “But Pilate answered them, saying, Will ye that I release unto you the King of the Jews? For he knew that the chief priests had delivered him for ENVY.”

Joseph was sold by his brothers into Egypt, the hands of the Gentiles, for pieces of silver. Likewise, Christ was betrayed for 30 pieces of silver, into the hands of the Romans.

“But God was with him” in his affliction. God was with Joseph and the Father was always with His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

In Acts 10:38, Peter told Cornelius, “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; FOR GOD WAS WITH HIM.”

Nicodemus, one of the Sanhedrin, had even told the Lord, “Rabbi, we know that Thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that Thou doest, except GOD BE WITH HIM” (John 3:2).

God delivered Joseph out of all his affliction and he became an exalted ruler, as Pharaoh “made him governor over Egypt and all his house.”

This, too, pictures the Lord Jesus Christ, Who having endured the afflictions and rejection of His earthly ministry, died on the Cross and rose again, ascended, and was exalted to God’s right hand. And in the Kingdom, He will be its Exalted Ruler, ruling as King over all.

As a result of Joseph’s interpretation of Pharaoh’s dream and how Joseph wisely and skillfully had Egypt store up food during the years of plenty leading up to the famine, during the great famine in Joseph’s day, Egypt had food to share with the world.

Starving people from “all countries” came by droves to Egypt to buy food. Joseph in his exalted position opened the storehouses and released the contents to anyone who needed food. In essence, Joseph became a savior of the world.

The nations of the world came to Joseph that they might not die, but find bread and live, that they might find deliverance and be saved through Joseph’s kindness and generosity. And not only did the nations come, Joseph’s brethren came: “But when Jacob heard that there was corn in Egypt, he sent out our fathers first” (v. 12).

And Joseph became the savior of his brethren. God used the evil intentions of Joseph’s brothers to fulfill His own plan for the world and to save his brethren.

That’s exactly what happened with the Cross of Christ. Christ was the Savior of His brethren. God used the evil intentions of Christ’s brethren to fulfill His plan for the world and to deliver Israel from her sins and give eternal life to those who believe.
In Joseph, we see the turning of the brothers’ wicked plot to the salvation of many, even of the brothers themselves.

We see Joseph elevated from the place of suffering to a powerful throne, saving his people from death; and we see the victory of love. And all that is true of Jesus Christ.

Remember that Stephen was a man full of the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit’s ministry is about pointing people to Jesus Christ.

John 15:26: “But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, He shall testify of Me.”

Thus, this message by Stephen who is full of the Holy Spirit, is all about Jesus Christ and is pointing the Sanhedrin to Him.

The first time Joseph’s brothers came to Egypt for food, they did not recognize him. The second time they came, Joseph told them who He was and they knew Him.

When the Lord healed a blind man in Bethsaida, He did it in two steps. He spat on his eyes and put His hands on him and asked him what he saw. The man said “I see men as trees, walking” (Mark 8:24). Then He put His hands on his eyes again, and had him look up and the man saw everything clearly.

Following this miracle, the Lord asked His disciples, “Whom do men say that I am? And they answered, John the Baptist: but some say, Elias; and others, One of the prophets. And He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? And Peter answereth and saith unto Him, Thou art the Christ” (Mark 8:27-29).

Most of Christ’s brethren, the Jews, did not recognize Him during His first coming. It was like the man who said he saw men as trees walking. They couldn’t see clearly, it was hazy, and there was uncertainty and confusion over His identity. Some thought He was John the Baptist, others said Elijah, some said one of the prophets.

Peter gave the right answer, however, Jesus was the Christ, or the Messiah, and the Son of the living God. Peter saw Him and knew Him.

Joseph not being recognized by his brothers, is Stephen pointing out how these Jewish leaders, the Sanhedrin, did not recognize their Messiah.

Like the blind man who saw clearly the second time, however, when Christ comes again at His second coming for His brothers, and reveals Himself to the house of Israel, and they see Him, everything will be crystal clear, they will recognize the One whom they betrayed and rejected, and they will be utterly stunned and shocked and speechless.

In the future, Israel will recognize Jesus Christ as her Messiah. Revelation 1:7 reads, “Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of Him. Even so, Amen.”

Pastor C. R. Stam gives this insightful thought too. Stephen was saying, “Do not be too sure that you have disposed of Christ by nailing Him to a tree.

“Joseph’s brothers also thought they had disposed of him when they threw him into the pit. But they were wrong, and after a time they were made to face him whom they had rejected.”

These Jewish leaders were being shown by Stephen that they shouldn’t be so sure that they would never have to face Christ again because they had Him crucified. Christ rose again. He has ascended and is exalted. He is coming again.

And they will have to face Him whom they had rejected one day. But Stephen wanted them to accept Him in faith and repent for what they had done.

The first time Joseph was with his brothers, they rejected him. The second time after meeting him in Egypt and moving their families there, they accepted him.

Stephen was attempting to drive home the point, that the first time they had rejected their Messiah, now was the time to accept Him.

Sharp arrows of conviction were being shot into their souls by the Holy Spirit as they heard Stephen review the steps of Joseph’s life and then remembered what they had done to Jesus of Nazareth.

But as we continue to investigate Stephen’s death, these arrows did not bring them to faith in Christ as God desired, instead they hardened their hearts against the truth and silenced the messenger from the Lord.