Cornerstone Mission Church, Sunday Sermon April 13, 2008
Here is a story about following tradition.
A very poor holy man lived in a remote part of China. Every day before his time of meditation in order to show his devotion, he put a dish of butter up on the window sill as an offering to God, since food was so scarce. One day his cat came in and ate the butter. To remedy this, he began tying the cat to the bedpost each day before the quiet time. This man was so revered for his piety that others joined him as disciples and worshipped as he did. Generations later, long after the holy man was dead, his followers placed an offering of butter on the window sill during their time of prayer and meditation. Furthermore, each one bought a cat and tied it to the bedpost.1
The cat wasn’t a part of this poor holy man’s devotion. But, it became an act of devotion for the followers. This story illustrates what happens when one looses the true meaning behind one’s tradition.
This is sort of what Steven was trying to do with the Jews who charged him for “speaking against this holy place and against the law.” The Jews were so stuck in the tradition of the way things were, they couldn’t see God at work in any other way beyond the boundary of the Promised Land, and the temple wall and the law.
The gospel message of Jesus Christ that Stephen proclaimed was like confronting the practice of tying up a cat to the bedpost. When Jesus entered into the history of salvation, he had done away with the need to worship God within the confines of the land, the temple walls, the tradition. The Jews either accepted or rejected the gospel. For those who accepted the gospel, Jesus was the fulfillment of the temple worship and the law. For those who rejected the gospel of Jesus Christ, they remained blind unable to see what was a plain and simple fact. They charged Stephen of blaspheming God. Blasphemy is the act of cursing, slandering, showing contempt or lack of reverence for God in violation of the 3rd commandment which prohibits misusing the name of the Lord.1
Chapter 7 begins with the high priest’s question to Stephen. “Are these charges true?” The rest of chapter 7 is Stephen’s attempt to clarify and defend himself against this false charge by the Jews and to show them it was not he, but they who were committing blasphemy.
He tried to counteract the false accusation by revisiting the history of the Old Testament. He talked about Abraham, Joseph, Moses, tabernacle and temple and a history of rejecting the Spirit of God in order to prove that he wasn’t against the temple or the law or against God as they accused him. The truth was that the accusers were the guilty ones who rejected God by rejecting Jesus.
1. God isn’t bound by space (v. 2-8)
Somehow the Jews began to believe that God’s activity was confined in the land of Israel. In verse 2, Stephen recounted how God showed up to Abraham. It was not in the Promised Land of Israel, but it was while Abraham was still living in Mesopotamia that is now the modern Iraq that God showed up.
When Joseph, Abraham’s great grandson was sold as a slave by his jealous brothers who betrayed him, verse 9-10 shows how God showed up in Egypt; God was with him… rescued him from all his troubles. In Egypt, God gave Joseph wisdom and established him a ruler over Egypt only second to Pharaoh.
It was there in Egypt God saved the families of Joseph, the descendants of Abraham. The great famine that lasted seven years would have destroyed Joseph’s families in the Promised Land. It was in Egypt in a foreign land God gave saved them from the devastating famine. And, it was in Egypt God multiplied exponentially this families of seventy five as stated in verse 17.
There in Egypt God was with Moses. When he was forty years old, he took matters into his own hand and killed an Egyptian and became a fugitive. And, forty years later, again not in the Promised Land, but in the desolate desert near Mount Sinai God met Moses. The holy ground was where God met Moses (30-34). In it was in Egypt, God demonstrated his miraculous power and delivered them out of Egypt through the Red Sea and through the desert. He led them during the day in a pillar of cloud; by nights he gave them light in a pillar of fire as recorded in Exodus 13:21. And, again there in the desert at Mount Sinai God gave Moses the law to his people (38).
In contrary to what the Jews thought of God as one who was bound by the space, the land of Israel, their own history points to the obvious reality that God wasn’t bound by the space limitation.
2. God isn’t bound by the physical temple.
The Jews who accused Stephen was even more limited in their understanding of God’s presence. To them, it wasn’t just the land, but the temple that limited God’s presence. They believed that God’s presence was bound by the walls of the temple.
As pointed out already, for Moses God’s holy presence was not experienced in the temple. Before there was a temple, before there was a tabernacle, God met Moses at Mount Sinai. And, it was at Mount Sinai where God met Moses that became holy ground.
And, in the wilderness of the desert, God met Moses and his people at the tent of meeting. Exodus 33:7-11 talks about this, God meeting them at the tent of meeting. Before the tabernacle was built, Moses would take a tent and pitch it outside the camp some distance away, calling it the “tent of meeting.” Anyone inquiring of the LORD would go to the tent of meeting outside the camp. And, when Moses entered into the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and stay at the entrance, while the Lord spoke with Moses.
And, when more permanent tabernacle was built, Exodus 40:38 says that the cloud of the Lord was over the tabernacle by day, and fire was in the cloud by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel during all their travels.
During this time, God met the Israelites wherever he led them. And, wherever God met them became the holy place. It was God’s presence in meeting his people that made any specific location holy.
If this wasn’t enough to prove that God wasn’t bound by the temple, Stephen went on talking about the temple specifically in v.47-50. Solomon built the house for God. But, it was very clear from the beginning that the Most High does not live in houses made by men. The logic doesn’t work, for God who calls heaven his throne and the earth his footstool be confined by the walls of the temple. It just doesn’t work. Yet, this is what the Jews believed.
Apply…
Do you think it is possible that we too are guilty of believing that God is bound by space, by the church building? Can you think of how this might be the case? When we leave this worship space, the church building, and this two hours of service, how much of our thoughts, our actions, our decisions, our existence would be immersed in the knowledge God who is not bound by time and space? When we come back next week to Sunday service, would this knowledge of God who is not bound by space and time make any impact in the way do our life?
Think of sound effect. Have you ever visited Abt store, an electronic store located in Glenview? I took my girls there when I needed to get a stereo headphone. There is this room with leather couches and a huge HD TV screen with huge speakers all around. When we were there, HD TV showed this surreal and animated musical concert. Wow, I am not much of an audiophile, but goodness, the sound effect was so way too cool. I felt as though I was at a concert listening to the live performance. I don’t know how many sound channels they had going in that room, but I could tell you this much. It wasn’t coming from a mono speaker.
The way God wants us to experience him is not through an old, static prone, mono speaker that doesn’t seem to work most of the time. He wants us to experience him through ultra high fidelity system. He wants us to be immersed in him not just these two hours, but every moment. That’s what God who is not bound by time and space wants to do with us.
3. God’s isn’t bound by the rejection (v. 51-53)
Stephen turned things around from verse 51. He likened the accusers to their forefathers who displayed the propensity to reject God’s messengers.
It was through Joseph God delivered the seventy of his people out of the certain death under the severe famine. Yet, before this deliverance could take place, Joseph had to be rejected, betrayed and sold as a slave by his own brothers (7:9).
Moses was the great messenger, God’s ambassador to bring the Israelites out of the slavery under Egypt. But, when Moses tried to intervene on behalf of his people, they rejected him as ruler and judge (7:35). They refused to obey him Moses spoke directly with God. They rejected him and in their hearts turned back to Egypt.
And, while he was receiving the law from God at Mount Sinai, they made an idol in the form of a calf. And, when you read through the history of Israel in the Old Testament, you begin to understand what Stephen was saying. Time after time, when God sent his messengers, the prophets to turn from the idols to the true God, the Jews rejected them, killed them.
It was Moses who prophesized, “God will send you a prophet like me from your own people.” It wasn’t Stephen who rejected this prophet, but they did. So, was Stephen’s indictment in Acts 7:51-53, “You stiff-necked people, with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are just like your fathers: You always resist the Holy Spirit! Was there ever a prophet your fathers did not persecute? They even killed those who predicted the coming of the Righteous One [that is Jesus Christ]. And now you have betrayed and murdered him- you who have received the law that was put into effect through angels but have not obeyed it.”
Apply…
However, God’s plan has never been thwarted by human rejection. Yes, Joseph’s brothers betrayed and rejected him, but it was through Joseph, the rejected one that God deliver his family. Yes, it was Moses who was rejected by the people, but it was this rejected Moses that God sent back to the people who rejected him for the exodus. Yes, it was Jesus who was rejected by the people he came to save, but again it was Jesus who suffered, died and raised from the dead to save those who reject him. Case in point, consider apostle Paul’s life. He was the persecutor; he went after Christians most vigorously and zealously to destroy them, to prove them they were dead wrong. He rejected Christianity completely. Yet, God chose this person, the persecutor of the name of Jesus to become the persecuted for the name of Jesus.
As we serve God who isn’t bound by rejection of mankind, we too are called to be not bound by human rejection. We see this in Stephen. He was not a man who feared the Jews and their false accusations. He only feared God who is not bound by time and space; he only loved God who sent his One and only Son to rescue him from his sins.
Let us pray that this will be true of us as well.
1Youngblood, R. F., Bruce, F. F., Harrison, R. K., & Thomas Nelson Publishers. (1995). Nelson's new illustrated Bible dictionary. Rev. ed. of: Nelson's illustrated Bible dictionary.
1 http://www.bible.org/illus.php?topic_id=1581
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