Dy Twenty-Seven

If you have 5 minutes!

Read Acts 6:8-11

8 Now Stephen, a man full of God’s grace and power, performed great wonders and signs among the people. 9 Opposition arose, however, from members of the Synagogue of the Freedmen (as it was called)—Jews of Cyrene and Alexandria as well as the provinces of Cilicia and Asia—who began to argue with Stephen. 10 But they could not stand up against the wisdom the Spirit gave him as he spoke. 11 Then they secretly persuaded some men to say, “We have heard Stephen speak blasphemous words against Moses and against God.” 12 So they stirred up the people and the elders and the teachers of the law. They seized Stephen and brought him before the Sanhedrin. 13 They produced false witnesses, who testified, “This fellow never stops speaking against this holy place and against the law. 14 For we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and change the customs Moses handed down to us.” 15 All who were sitting in the Sanhedrin looked intently at Stephen, and they saw that his face was like the face of an angel.

One of my most vivid childhood memories is of going to watch my younger sister in her school’s production of Joseph. My sister played the part of Potiphar’s wife. Her and Potiphar appeared for probably a maximum of 5 minutes in a play lasting over an hour yet, from my completely unbiased perspective of course, they stole the show! He was wearing a classic fake glasses, nose and moustache combo and put on a Monty Python-esque funny walk; my sister was scarily convincing as the would-be adulteress literally chasing Joseph around the stage. In that play, as in many others, the smaller characters had an impact far beyond what you would expect from their relatively minor role.

So too in Acts, Stephen appears for the first time at the start of this chapter and is dead by the end of the next. However, his impact is huge! His death not only appears to be a significant part of Saul’s later conversion (7:58) but, through his speech in particular, he in many ways lays the foundation for the vast explosion of the church out amongst the Gentiles – the journey to which Luke starts charting in the chapter following Stephen’s death. 

Thus, Stephen becomes one in a huge line of people whose relatively walk-on parts resonate into history with an impact far beyond what could possibly have been conceived at the time (see also, for example, the women listed in Jesus’ genealogy in Matthew; the widow in Luke 21 who innocuously makes her offering and, in doing so, becomes Jesus’ example par excellence of what it means to give… and so on!).

• Can you think of more recent examples of everyday people whose lives/actions/words have turned out to have an impact far beyond what anyone could have expected at the time?
• Does the fact that God works in this way affect your view of him at all? In what ways might it make you reassess the potential significance of your life and what God might do through you?

Stephen has already been described as a man of full of wisdom, full of faith and full of the Spirit; Luke now adds that he was also full of God’s grace and power. We are perhaps so familiar with these words being used together to speak of God – and by his Spirit those who serve him – that the slightly incongruous nature of their pairing easily passes us by. But how often in the world do we see this incredible combination in practice? Perhaps it is something we can pray we’d see more of! It is, however, fitting that it is this description of Stephen that precedes Luke’s account of the “great wonders and signs” that he did among the people; it is because God is powerful and gracious that he is both able and willing to intervene in people’s lives for their good. 

• Maybe choose one person you know of who is in a position of power and ask God to help them also have grace.

If you have a bit longer  :-)

Whilst writing on this section, Tom Wright laments the vehemence with which he, and other Christian writers and speakers, are often attacked if they dare to suggest anything new! Conversely, he notes, those on the more radical end of the spectrum can become similarly obtuse if he affirms any aspect of tradition. He concludes: “as in several previous generations, people today find real debate about actual topics difficult, and much prefer the parody of debate which consists of giving a dog a bad name and then beating him for it, and then lashing out, too, at anyone who associates with the dog you happen to be beating at the time.”[1]

In line with this, whilst at Bible college, I was shocked by how easily my whole view of a particular theologian could become tainted by just one comment. I would find myself in a quandary as to whether I should even bother to find out what else they might think because I was so put out by one thing they had written about x, y or z. I was surprised by the amount of effort required to remind myself that just because I disagreed with them on some things it did not mean they would not be a useful source of help!!! This is in part reflective of an unhelpful leaning that I have towards black and white/all or nothing thinking. However it is, I think, also indicative of a wider problem within our modern day society, which is that we’re perhaps not that good at disagreeing! Thus, for example (and to be a bit provocative!), one could argue that the meaning of the word tolerance has made a subtle shift from “agreeing to disagree” to just “agreeing” or, if not, staying quiet.

• How do you respond when hearing or reading something that you disagree with?
• We haven’t had a scale for a while so where would you place yourself on the following:

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[1] Tom Wright, “Acts,” pg. 103.