"While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, 'Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.'"
Stephen had been telling the Jews before him that what had occurred in their generation was a fulfillment of what their Scriptures had foretold from the beginning, aka, "In the beginning...." He rebuked them for not believing/obeying the Word of God. He laid out before them what has kept the Covenant People of God going from the beginning, the absolute, total Faithfulness of, "The Word of God," Jesus, the Face of the Blessed Trinity, and the One Who appeared many times over the last thousands of years, "to all who have loved His appearing." (2 Tim 4:8c)
If you read the Bible you discover that everything happening in the world around us has been foretold. The serious (is there really any other kind?) disciple of Jesus is a person whose life is governed by the Words of God, his life style, his political beliefs, his interpersonal relationships, his business dealings. Now we should not be surprised when people want to "stone" us for such a life; they have been doing this since Cain.
It grieves the heart of a person in whom Jesus lives when they react to us as the unbelievers did to Stephen. But we have a great example for us as we consider how Stephen reacted to such, "When the members of the Sanhedrin heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God....'Look,' he said, 'I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God'....While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed"------ the best reaction to the worst of human behavior. "Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, 'Lord, do not charge them with this sin.'" Who knows; there just may be a Saul of Tarsus somewhere in our lives also. Paul never forgot, to the day he died, what he saw that day.
Father, in Jesus' Name, may I live as Stephen did. Amen.
Stephen had been telling the Jews before him that what had occurred in their generation was a fulfillment of what their Scriptures had foretold from the beginning, aka, "In the beginning...." He rebuked them for not believing/obeying the Word of God. He laid out before them what has kept the Covenant People of God going from the beginning, the absolute, total Faithfulness of, "The Word of God," Jesus, the Face of the Blessed Trinity, and the One Who appeared many times over the last thousands of years, "to all who have loved His appearing." (2 Tim 4:8c)
If you read the Bible you discover that everything happening in the world around us has been foretold. The serious (is there really any other kind?) disciple of Jesus is a person whose life is governed by the Words of God, his life style, his political beliefs, his interpersonal relationships, his business dealings. Now we should not be surprised when people want to "stone" us for such a life; they have been doing this since Cain.
It grieves the heart of a person in whom Jesus lives when they react to us as the unbelievers did to Stephen. But we have a great example for us as we consider how Stephen reacted to such, "When the members of the Sanhedrin heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God....'Look,' he said, 'I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God'....While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed"------ the best reaction to the worst of human behavior. "Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, 'Lord, do not charge them with this sin.'" Who knows; there just may be a Saul of Tarsus somewhere in our lives also. Paul never forgot, to the day he died, what he saw that day.
Father, in Jesus' Name, may I live as Stephen did. Amen.
When Peter, an 18 year old Norwegian, "heard the call to evangelize China, on that day he not only emptied his wallet into the collection plate, but included a small note with the words, 'and my life.'"
"Looking unto Jesus"
Hebrews 12:2
"Looking unto Jesus"
Hebrews 12:2
