We're continuing this incredible, this brilliant defense that Stephen makes before the Sanhedrin. I'm going to begin with a story from a ministry that I've had a part in over the last two years, a ministry to a maximum security prison. in Texas and I've had the privilege over the last two falls to preach the Word of God, to preach the gospel to those who are in, many of them with life sentences. And I had the opportunity this past November to have a conversation with one of the inmates there. Usually I don't know their story. I don't seek it out but sometimes they'll come and share their story. This was a a Hispanic man who's 28 years old, who'd been in prison with a life sentence since he was 18. But he had a beautiful and ardent faith in Jesus Christ. And he wanted to tell me his story. And I won't go into the terrible events that led him to be arrested and convicted. But I want to tell how he came to faith in Christ. He had no spiritual background at all. He had no family input at all, nothing of the gospel. He had been arrested for this terrible crime and was held without bail in a prison cell. And there was another man who was put near him, both of those men were Hispanic, and he was able to speak. in a way that he could understand culturally and sympathetically and said, tomorrow they're going to be bringing you some books. You should definitely take them. All right, because he has nothing else to do. He won't be out except for one hour until his trial. So he said, the book cart came around the next day and they brought me two books. One was the most boring book I've ever read in my life about the Lewis and Clark expedition. And so I, and the other was a Bible, a beat up old Bible. As soon as I saw the Bible, I threw it over my shoulder into the corner of the cell, had no interest in it all, at all. But then I tried to read the other book and I had no interest in that. So I went back to the Bible and tried to read that and I had an immediate problem, he said. I just began at the beginning and started reading and it made no sense to me. It made no sense. I didn't get what I was reading. I didn't know how it was relevant to me. And so I threw it back into the same corner. And then I tried that Lewis and Clark book again, and that was doing nothing for me. So I just see, by the way, the beautiful providence of God in all of that. But in the course of time, he flipped to the back of the Bible and found a reading plan that led him ahead into the New Testament. and into the Gospels and things started to make sense and he was led to faith in Christ by simply reading that Bible with no human witness, just reading the scripture and he's been growing in his faith for 10 years. Well his testimony showed me some of the difficulty we face as we come to Acts chapter 7 and that is the problem we all have with the Old Testament. Many of us embark every year on a reading plan and you're gonna do the same thing that this man did, you're going to start in the book of Genesis, and you're going to read. And if you haven't been at it for long, or if you're not even a Christian, or etc., it's easy to read, and you're going to have the same kinds of questions. It's a foreign world. The people are doing things we would never do. They're going through experiences that don't seem relevant to us at all. And then, even worse, there's things that God does in judgment that are difficult to understand, whether a worldwide flood, or Sodom and Gomorrah, or coming in fire on Mount Sinai. And after a while, it's just difficult. It's extremely off-putting for some. have difficulty with it. And throughout the history of the Christian Church there have been some who claim to be Christians who have openly disparaged and denigrated the Old Testament and have spoken against it. For example, in the year 160 there was a false teacher named Marcion who said that basically the Bible presented two gods. There was Yahweh, the God of the Jews of the Old Testament, and then there's Jesus. And they're two different, entirely different gods and present different approaches. Well, that was a heretical view. But many people throughout the ages who have been outside of the church, or even some false teachers within it, have disparaged the Old Testament. Now, we don't disparage the Old Testament, but we do have questions. As we look at it, we try to understand what it's all about. And it's an unfolding story. It's difficult to us. Martin Luther, in his preface to the Old Testament, said, the Old Testament is the cradle and swaddling cloths of Christ. And he urged all Christians to be thoroughly versed in the teachings of the Old Testament. But we have a higher authority than Martin Luther. infinitely so, for Jesus himself clearly taught that the Old Testament predicted him, proclaimed him, his person, his work, his life, his death, his resurrection. It's all right there in the Old Testament. and all the prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the scriptures concerning himself. Later in that same chapter, that same day, he appeared to the apostles in Jerusalem and said, this is what I told you while I was still with you. Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the Psalms. Then he opened their minds so they could understand the scriptures. Jesus had said plainly in the Sermon on the Mount, do not think that I came to abolish the law, the prophets. I did not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen will by any means disappear from the law until everything is accomplished. In John chapter five, Jesus said to his enemies, the Jewish leaders, if you believe Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. The Bible therefore is a glorious unity with Jesus Christ himself as the ultimate purpose of the whole book. He is both the foundation and the crowning stone of the work. He is the Alpha and the Omega, the first and last, the beginning and the end of this story of redemption. Now many Christians do in fact feel very uncomfortable with the Old Testament. Seems an unfamiliar world. And they don't know how to trace out its story in a way that culminates in the person of Jesus Christ. Now in Acts chapter seven we have an amazing example in the brilliant speech of Stephen before the Sanhedrin. He is a role model for us and a tutor teaching us how the history of the Jews is a unity culminating in their rejection of Jesus Christ. It is one of the most thrilling chapters in all the Bible, the words of a true genius, one of the greatest and most underrated heroes in the illustrious history of the Christian church, this man Stephen. Now, over the last few sermons, we've been introduced to Stephen. We met him first in Acts 6. As a man full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, also full of faith, entrusted with the task, along with six others, of overseeing the daily distribution of food, to the Greek-speaking widows in the church in Jerusalem. But his ministry went far beyond that. He did amazing miracles. And he defended ardently and clearly defended the faith, the Christian faith, in a series of Jewish synagogues there in the Jerusalem vicinity. We're told that he had debating opponents who began to argue with Stephen, but they could not stand up against his wisdom or the spirit by whom he spoke. So he won those debates, clearly won them. Unable to defeat Stephen in these debates, they resorted to false witnesses. who secretly, they secretly persuaded some men to say, we have heard Stephen speak words of blasphemy against Moses and against God. So they orchestrated, they wrangled his arrest and had him hauled before the Sanhedrin, the very body, the deliberative religious spiritual leader body that had condemned Jesus to death, these same men now. And now Stephen's in front of them and they said this to the Sanhedrin, this man never stopped speaking against this holy place and against the law. The holy place is the temple, the law is the law of Moses. For we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place, the temple, and change the customs Moses handed down to us. Well his trial before the Sanhedrin begins with this amazing occurrence in verse 15 of chapter six. All who are sitting in the Sanhedrin looked intently at Stephen and they saw that his face was like the face of an angel. And then the high priest asked him, are these charges true? And he begins his defense. Stephen was charged, as I said, with four counts of blasphemy, any one of which would have merited the death penalty in their society. Blasphemy is speaking words of falsehood or words of disrespect. And the blasphemy was against God, against Moses, against the law of Moses, and against the temple. Now last time, as we began walking through this lengthy defense, we saw that Stephen had four goals. First, he wanted to seize and hold their attention. He knew that at some point they would be tempted to kick out and stop listening to him. So he wanted to grab their attention so they could listen to him. Secondly, he wanted to defend himself against their charges of blasphemy. Thirdly, he wanted to convict them of their sins. And fourthly, to proclaim Jesus as the Savior. He wanted to save them. And the only way they would be saved is to repent of their sins, their stubborn unbelief, and come to faith in Christ. Now in Acts 7, we see how Stephen accomplishes these four goals in an ever increasingly powerful presentation. He does seize their attention right away. by narrating their national history, which was a topic very near and dear to their hearts. They loved to talk about their Jewish heritage and their Jewish history, their fathers, their Jewish forefathers. So he seizes their attention. Then he begins to defend himself against these charges of blasphemy. He shows his zeal right away for God, the God of our fathers, the God of glory, he calls him. He has the highest respect for God. He's not a blasphemer. And he also shows his zeal for Moses, his esteem of Moses. We're going to walk through that today. Also the law and the temple. Again, he's no blasphemer. But then, he's going to turn it around and convict them of sin in a pattern that I call a little bit like boiling the frog. Little by little by little, he's starting to stack things up. and a regular pattern starts to emerge, but they didn't see it right away, but we can see it looking back, especially when he reaches the climax of his address. In line with the regular pattern of their fathers, they are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears. So what that means is stiff-necked, they're stubborn, they're rebellious, they won't yield ultimately to Jesus' yoke. They won't submit to him. They won't submit to God. They're stiff-necked and uncircumcised in their hearts and their ears. They don't hear properly. They don't believe and love properly. They're hard-hearted. And they always resist the Holy Spirit of God. Now that array of statements is ultimately my application for all of us. I'm gonna say this at the end, but I'm gonna say it right now. It is wise for all of us, when we see a very convicting, maybe negative part of scripture, to be humble before it and say, Lord, is this true of me? Am I in any way stiff-necked? And am I uncircumcised in heart and ears? Am I resisting the Holy Spirit? And I know I'm speaking to two categories of people. this morning, I believe I'm speaking to Ducatories, people who walked in here as yet not Christians. Not yet having crossed over from death to life through faith in Jesus Christ. That you would take the warning that Stephen is giving to not be stiff-necked, but to repent and believe in Jesus while there's still time. And then I'm speaking to Christians, mostly to Christians. And in that I can give you two applications. First, thank God that He rescued you from being stiff-necked with uncircumcised hearts and ears resisting the Holy Spirit. That's what all of us were before we were converted. So give God the praise and the glory for saving you from that. But secondly, is it not true that those words are occasionally true of you whenever you sin? that you act like you're stiff-necked with uncircumcised hearts and ears and you're resisting the Holy Spirit, that you would repent of those patterns. So that's basically my point of the whole sermon. The fourth point, he didn't ever get to, and that is to proclaim Jesus as the Son of God, the Savior, in his presentation, so he did it as he was dying. And God gave him a vision of heaven standing open, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. And he said, look, I see the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God, heaven open. And there he is, Jesus is up there. Jesus is the Savior. And they killed him. So, that's the whole message. Last week we got through the first portion of the details. It's important for me that you get the main point, so I've given it up up front, but I think the details are important too. And it's not easy to follow all the details. This is a long, complex story. God and Israel. God and the Jews. And it's not over yet. And so there's a complexity to what God has done with the Jews, but this is a major theme, and that is the Jews always resist what God is doing. They fight him, and they resist him. And we, who are not Jews, Gentiles, we're no better. It's not like our tribe would have done any better. And so this is a problem the world has. So this is a theme. So we began the first portion tracing out God's history with Abraham and then leading to Joseph. And then Joseph was rejected by the 12 patriarchs. The great fathers of the Jewish nation were jealous of Joseph and sold him as a slave. They wanted to kill him. But instead, they got some money out of him and sold him as a slave to Egypt. But he was the very one that God had chosen to be their deliverer from a famine. And so, he's already set up the first Christ-like image or figure. Joseph is a type or pattern of Christ, rejected by the Jews, but ultimately delivered or saved them from famine. So now we're stepping in right in the middle as he continues his developing argument and we zero in on Moses. And he's the next rejected deliverer. So basic point here is Stephen is not a blasphemer against Moses. He has the highest respect for Moses. He speaks reverently of Moses' person and his calling and his role. But the real issue is that Israel rejected Moses, not once, but again and again and again, from the very beginning of their connection with him, and on, again and again rejected Moses. But Moses was a type or a picture of Christ. He was a deliverer, a ruler, a redeemer, ultimately, from bondage in Egypt. Jesus is the true and final deliverer and ruler and redeemer. And Moses also prophesied about Christ. He made actual verbal predictions about Jesus, especially in the animal sacrificial system. So we're gonna walk through that. So the setting is Israel's suffering in Egypt. Look at verses 17 through 19. As the time drew near for God to fulfill his promise to Abraham, the number of our people in Egypt greatly increased. Then another king, who knew nothing about Joseph, became ruler of Egypt. He dealt treacherously with our people and oppressed our forefathers by forcing them to throw out their newborn babies so that they would die. So these were the circumstances which led to the need for Moses as a deliverer. This is the history in Exodus. So the context, the larger context, is God's unfulfilled promise to Abraham. The promise concerning the promised land. That's why it's called the promised land. God had made a prediction that he would have the land. And Abraham, in Genesis 15, asked, how can I know that I'll get it? And so God had said to him in Genesis 15, the very thing that Stephen quoted. Look back at verse six and seven. God spoke to him, Abraham, in this way. Your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, where they will be enslaved and mistreated for 400 years. but I'll punish the nation they serve as slaves, God said, and afterward they'll come out of that country and worship me in this place. So we've already seen that, but now the time has come for that to happen. To fulfill every aspect of that promise. So there was another king that came up in Egypt, another pharaoh. Stephen spoke about how Joseph had been forgotten, and that's not surprising because Israel was in Egypt for 430 years. So it's understandable that the next generation or two or three of Egypt's royal family wouldn't know anything about some Jewish individual that did something 100 years ago or 75 years ago or something. They didn't remember him. They didn't know him. To make matters worse, Israel flourished reproductively. They just exploded in population. In those 430 years, the nation would grow from the 75 people that Stephen talks about that came at the time of Joseph to some experts think the number may have been as high as five million. based on the census of military age men, and then extrapolating out to older and younger males, and then women, you know, babies, all of that. It might be as many as five million people. Incredible. Well, the king who ruled over Egypt at that time was nervous about that. Very nervous about the increasing population of Jews. So he decided to take stern measures. He reduced them to slavery, bondage, So they're building the great buildings of Egypt. And a modified form of genocide by forcing the Jews to expose or kill their boy babies. So Moses appears at that time. Look at verse 20. At this time Moses was born. And he says, Stephen says, he was beautiful in God's sight. He was a very handsome-looking boy. So you can see Stephen is very complimentary. He doesn't need to say that. What a good-looking baby he was. Every parent thinks their kid is beautiful, all right? But he was unusually attractive. He was unusually handsome, all right? Why does he do that? He's saying, look, I'm very favorably disposed toward Moses. negative on him. And then he speaks more significantly about his upbringing in verse 21. And when he was exposed, Pharaoh's daughter adopted him and brought him up as her own son. So like all the other Jewish boy babies at that time, he was in fact exposed. He was in fact cast out into the Nile, but in a basket made of reeds. And amazing providence led to his rescue by Pharaoh's daughter and a dual culture, dual language upbringing. Stephen only mentions that Moses was brought up in Pharaoh's household as the son of Pharaoh's daughter, but we also know from the Exodus text that he was nursed and reared from infancy by his own Jewish mother, Jochebed. So he was bilingual and bicultural. This was amazing providence. Moses was specifically being groomed for the role as Israel's deliverer. Now Stephen focuses on his training within Pharaoh's household. Highly cultured, look at verse 22. Moses was educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians. So he knew their culture, he knew their education, he knew how they did things in the court. He was familiar with the court, comfortable with it, knew what was going on. And it says, he was powerful in speech and action. So he's positioned to be a great leader of men. By the way, this is an interesting little moment here. Powerful in speech. Do you remember when God called Moses out of the flames of the burning bush? Remember what he said? He said, you know, I have a speech impediment. Remember this whole thing? It's like, who are you kidding? You don't have a speech impediment. I've seen this for years. People are like, oh, Moses stuttered. He had a speech problem. It's like, no, he didn't want to go, he didn't want to do the mission. Remember how at one point he says to the angel who speaks from out of the burning bush, please send the one you choose, means send someone else. But God said to him, who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the Lord? I'm bigger than any speech problem you have, but the fact is you have been prepared and groomed for this. You're ready, powerful in speech and action. Well, when he was 40 years old, he tries to save Israel in a clumsy sort of awkward way the first time. Look at verse 23, 24. When Moses was 40 years old, he decided to visit his fellow Israelites. So realize, this is a long time now. 40 years into his life, he, at that point, casts his lot with Israel. So he'd been living in luxury, he'd been living in the halls of power, but he's decided he's going with the Jews. So he decided to visit his fellow Israelites. He saw one of them being mistreated by an Egyptian, so he went to his defense and avenged him by killing the Egyptian. Remember how he looked this way and that and buried him in the sand? So he casts his lots with Israel. This was a massive decision as the author of Hebrews tells us. In Hebrews 11, 24 through 26, listen to what the author of Hebrews says in that hall of faith. By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh's daughter. He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a short time. He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ. as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking forward to his reward. Hebrews 11, 24 through 26. Moses, we're told by the author of Hebrews there, does it all for Christ. He does it all for Jesus, who hadn't even been born yet. It says in the next verse in Hebrews 11, 27, by faith he left Egypt, not fearing the king's anger, he persevered because he saw him who is invisible. Who's the him? Previous verse, Christ. He saw the invisible Christ by faith. That's what the author of Hebrews is doing. It's by faith. Is that not the same for us? We've never seen Jesus. We look back at an invisible Christ and believe in him. He looked ahead by the prophetic word to the invisible Christ and trusted him. Old Testament saints saved the same way we are. And so he persevered to seeing him who is invisible. Now by faith, Moses could see ahead to the days of Christ, though only dimly. Now for Stephen's argument though, the issue was that Moses was taking the role with Israel of savior and defender. And they rejected him from that role. That's Stephen's point here. Look at verses 25 through 28 in chapter seven. Moses thought that his own people would realize that God was using him to rescue them, but they did not. The next day Moses came upon two Israelites who were fighting. He tried to reconcile them by saying, men, you're brothers. Why do you want to hurt each other? But the man who was mistreating the other pushed Moses aside and said, who made you ruler and judge over us? Do you want to kill me as you killed that Egyptian yesterday? So Moses had reached the point at age 40 where he said, I'm going with the Jews. I'm casting my lot with them. And he thought, Stephen tells us, that the Jews would realize what a boon and an advantage that would be. I mean, you realize I'm coming from Pharaoh's household to help you. But they didn't see it that way. and they did not welcome him, and they pushed him aside. So this is another step in Stephen's progression here, his argument. And that is this, the Jews always reject the ones that God sends. They always do. They reject the prophets, they reject the redeemers, they reject the judges, they reject them. And now they've rejected Christ, that's his point, but little by little. They don't see it yet, but that's where he's headed. They were so proud of their Jewish forefathers. They're so zealous for Moses that they're accusing Stephen of blaspheming Moses, but the shoe is actually on the other foot. Their forebears, the Jews, rejected Moses saying, who made you ruler and judge over us? They rejected him. Stephen's gonna return to that statement in a moment. Now, God calls Moses to be the deliverer. Look at verses 30 through 34. As he went over to look more closely, he heard the Lord's voice. I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Moses trembled with fear and did not dare to look. Then the Lord said to him, take off your sandals. The place where you're standing is holy ground. I have indeed seen the oppression of my people in Egypt. I have heard their groaning and have come down to set them free. Now come, I will send you back to Egypt. Stephen's point is in verse 35-36, this is the same Moses whom they had rejected with the words, who made you ruler and judge? He was sent to be their ruler and deliverer by God himself through the angel who appeared to him in the bush. He led them out of Egypt and did wonders and miraculous signs in Egypt at the Red Sea and for 40 years in the desert. So there it is. Israel forefathers rejected Moses as ruler and judge and deliverer, but God chose him for that role. Actually, we know from the story, they rejected Moses again and again, not just once, again and again. They were ready to stone Moses when there was no water in the desert. Stephen's gonna show this repeated pattern of rejection a little later in his part about the law when he said they refused to obey him. There is the plain evidence. They consistently rejected Moses from being their savior and deliverer. But Moses also predicted the coming Messiah. Look at verse 37, and he's just rubbing it in now. This is that same Moses, all right? You know the one they rejected? That same Moses who told the Israelites, God will send you a prophet like me from among your own people. Now this is a well-known prophecy, the prediction of the coming of the prophet, like capital P, prophet. Some people wondered if John the Baptist was the prophet. You can read about it in John chapter one. They're waiting for the prophet. It was recorded in Deuteronomy 18, this clear thing, God will send you a prophet like me. Peter had already alluded to this very same prediction. This is a very important prediction. In Acts 3.23, anyone who does not listen to that prophet that God raises up from among your own people will be cut off from his people. You've got to listen to the one who comes or you'll be cut off. So Moses predicted the coming of the Messiah and warned them that if they rejected him, they would be completely cut off. So summing up this phase of Stephen's presentation, Stephen makes it plain that the Jewish nation consistently rejected Moses from being their leader despite their supposed fierce loyalty to him centuries later. Next, Israel's rejected law. Stephen now turns to the next aspect of their charges against him, blasphemy against the law. that he would change the customs Moses handed down to them. So Stephen introduces the law, verse 38. He was in the assembly in the desert with the angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai and with our fathers and he received living words, living oracles to pass on to us. It is beautiful the respect that Stephen has for the word of God. Living oracles. I can't help but think about Hebrews 4.12. The word of God is living and active, right? Sharper than any double-edged sword. It penetrates to the dividing of soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and attitude of the heart. Well, you look at Hebrews 4, Hebrews 3 and 4 is an extended meditation on Psalm 95. Today, if you hear his voice, don't harden your hearts. And that was about Israel's hardness of heart in the desert. David wrote that Psalm 500 years later. And the author of Hebrews works it, today if you hear his voice, don't harden your heart, and then steps back and says, isn't the word of God amazing? It has converting and convicting power. And so Stephen does the same thing, he received living words. I think it also refers to Deuteronomy 32, 47, where God said about the law of Moses, these are not just idle words for you, they are your life. Well, that's even more true of us now that Christ has come and we have the gospel. These are not just idle words for us. This is our life. Our eternal life is found in this book, in the words of the scripture, living words. Stephen is no blasphemer against the living words of God. He had the highest honor and respect for the word of God. Note that Stephen also mentions the angel who spoke with him. In verse 38, he was in the assembly in the desert with the angel who spoke to him. This is undoubtedly, I believe, the angel of the Lord. It was the angel of the Lord who spoke out of the flames of the burning bush, whom Stephen says the Lord spoke to him. The angel of the Lord is the pre-incarnate Christ. And God spoke of the angel of the Lord in Exodus 23. He said, behold, I'm sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared. Pay attention to him. And listen to what he says. Do not rebel against him. He, my angel, he will not forgive your rebellion since my name is in him. Do you realize what that's saying? He would never, God Almighty would never say that about an angel, just an ordinary angel. This is definitely the pre-incarnate Christ. And you better obey him because he's not gonna forgive your rebellion against him. Word angel means messenger, and Jesus was that. He was the ultimate, final messenger to God. In the past, God spoke to our forefathers, to the prophets, at many times and in various ways, but in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son. Jesus is the final word, says in Exodus 23, 22, of Christ. If you listen carefully to what he says, and do all that I say, I will be an enemy to your enemies and oppose those who oppose you. I'll save you from all of your enemies if you'll follow him. Well, Jesus Christ received the living words of God and committed them to Israel. Now, later in Stephen's speech, he's gonna mention other angels, plural. So I believe that the angels had a role in delivering the word of God to the prophets. It's really interesting. Book of Revelation talks about this. The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him, Jesus, to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant, John. So it's God to Jesus, to an angel, to John, to us. like a relay race of truth. So it seems in the Old Testament, the Old Testament articles were mediated through angels. And Stephen's gonna mention that at the end. Well, Stephen's point though is, yes, you got the law, you got the words, but you never obeyed it. You never obeyed it. You got living words from God and you didn't keep them. The day they came, you violated them. God spoke out of fire and a cloud on the top of Mount Sinai, the Ten Commandments. And that same day, they made a golden calf. Look at verse 39 through 41. Our fathers refused to obey him. Instead, they rejected him and their hearts turned back to Egypt. So Moses is up on the mountain. Remember, he went up to get the rest of the law from God. And he was gone, up there in the cloud and the fire. They rejected him and in their hearts they turned back to Egypt. They told Aaron, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who led us out of Egypt, we don't know what's happened to him. This was the time they made the idol in a form of a calf. They brought sacrifices to it and held a celebration in honor of what their hands had made. They were wicked idolaters in Egypt before the Exodus. I didn't know that, brothers and sisters, but read about it in Ezekiel 20. God warned them before the Exodus to give up their idols. While they were still in Egypt, they wouldn't do it. Ezekiel 20 is one of the most heartbreaking chapters there is and fits right in line with what Stephen's saying. You always, always, always reject me and your idolaters. There are wicked idolaters in Egypt, there are wicked idolaters in Mount Sinai, there are wicked idolaters for 40 years in the desert until God killed that whole generation off. And they continue to be wicked idolaters after the end of the promised land. Wasn't long before they forgot all of that and were going after the gods of the Canaanites. And Stephen makes this plain, look at verse 42, 43. But God turned away and gave them over to the worship of the heavenly bodies. This agrees with what is written in the book of the prophets. Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings 40 years in the desert house of Israel? You lifted up the shrine of Molech and the star of your God, Rephan, the idols you made to worship. Therefore, I will send you into exile beyond Babylon. Now, he told them he was gonna do that before they even entered the promised land. Read about it in Deuteronomy 34 with the song of Moses. God said, I wanna teach, or Moses said, I'm gonna teach you a song before any of your history happens to tell you what you're gonna do. You're gonna go into the promised land, you're gonna eat crops you didn't plant, and live in houses you didn't build. You're gonna get fat and comfortable, and you're gonna kick against me, and you're gonna go after idols, and I'm gonna have to discipline you by Gentile armies, and they'll exile you, and you'll lose the promised land. So just memorize that song and sing it until it happens. Whoa, that's the song of Moses, Deuteronomy 34, before they ever enter the promised land. It's heartbreaking. But that fulfillment came after centuries of warnings by the prophets, right? Centuries of warnings. Elijah and Elisha and one prophet after another came and said, you've got to turn from your wicked ways. God gave them over to the worship of idols and eventually punished them by the exile to Babylon. So who is it, Stephen would ask, who is it that's the blasphemer against the law? Is it me? That's not me. It's your forefathers. And frankly, it's you. The real blasphemers are you, he would say to the Sanhedrin. Next we have the Israel's idolatrous temple. Stephen addresses the charge that he blasphemed against the temple. Now what he's saying is the Jews' real idolatry was the temple itself. They thought their religion could save them. So he traces out the history of the tabernacle, then the temple. Look at verses 44 through 50. having received the tabernacle, our fathers under Joshua brought it with them when they took the land from the nations God drove out before them. It remained in the land until the time of David, who enjoyed God's favor, and asked that he might provide a dwelling place for the God of Jacob. But it was Solomon who built the house for him. However, the Most High does not live in houses made by men. As the prophet says, heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me, says the Lord? Or where will my resting place be? Has not my hand made all of these things? So the secret of the tabernacle, God showed Moses a vision of heaven, a heavenly tabernacle. And there was a pattern given to Moses, which then became the tabernacle. And the tabernacle was a type and a shadow and a picture of that heavenly reality. That's what the tabernacle was. The author to Hebrews tells us this, that this pattern was a type and a shadow of a true tabernacle in heaven. The type and shadow was never meant to replace the reality, the heavenly reality. It was just a symbol. an earthly picture of it. Now, in the course of time, David decided the time had come for an upgrade. Here I am, David said, dwelling in a palace of cedar and God's in a tent. I think I'll make him a house. Remember this whole thing? I think I'll make him a house of cedar. So, following Stephen's history, after the tabernacle was made, the Jews carried it with them through the desert. They brought it with them into the promised land under Joshua. It was around with them that whole time as they're conquering in the promised land, cleared the land of the pagan tribes of Canaan, and then centuries later, David had this idea for the upgrade. He wanted to make basically a palace of cedar for God. God sent him a prophet, Nathan, to speak to him. First he said, hey, that's a great idea. So then the word of the Lord came to Nathan and said, on second thought, go back and say something to David. And this is what he said to him, to David. This is God speaking to David. Are you the one to build a house for me? I have not dwelled in a house from the day I brought the Israelites up out of Egypt to this day. I've been moving from place to place in a tent, where the tent is my dwelling. Instead, God says, I'm gonna build a house for you. When your days are over and you rest with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. There's no doubt who that is, the son of David, that's Jesus. and he builds the eternal dwelling place. He said in John 14, I go to prepare a place for you. And we find out in 1 Peter, we're the living stones, we are the place. And through salvation, he is building this beautiful, heavenly structure where God and man will dwell in intimate fellowship forever. But the point of the tabernacle and of the temple was, we're not there yet. You're not welcome. You're excluded. This far you may come and no farther. And it doesn't matter if the wall that blocks you is cloth or gold-covered wood, you're not allowed to come. The way had not yet been disclosed as long as that structure was still standing, the author of Hebrews tells us. But instead, the Jews, and by the way, at the time of the dedication, Stephen mentions this, at the time of the dedication, Solomon understood this. God gave Solomon wisdom and perspective to see what was really going on here. So at the dedication of the temple, that gold box made of, I guess, acacia wood covered with gold leaf. He's dedicating it and he's praying to God. And he said this, 1 Kings 8, 27, but will God really dwell on earth? Heaven, even the highest heavens cannot contain you, how much less this temple I have built. You can't make a box for God. The universe isn't big enough for him. There's no container for the infinite God. Certainly not this gold box that I've made here in the city of Jerusalem. But the Jews idolized the temple. They made an idol of it. They looked on the temple, similar to the Ark of the Covenant itself, like a good luck charm. You remember the story with Eli when they were fighting against the Philistines and they got beaten by the Philistines in day one of a battle? So he said, I have an idea. Someone said, let's get the Ark of the Covenant, get it on the battlefield, we'll win. Remember this? And Eli was very worried about the Ark, remember? And so they bring the Ark the next day and they lose and the Ark gets captured by the Philistines, which as you know from the story, did the Philistines no favors. God can take care of himself, Eli. He doesn't need your protection. But the point was, there in Shiloh, God was willing to give his ark over to the Gentile enemies because of the wickedness of Israel. And the fact that they looked on the ark as a good luck charm. Well, years later they would do the same, only this time it was the Babylonians coming, not the Philistines. And they said, God will never let The Babylonians in here because we have the temple of the Lord. And Jeremiah the prophet said, don't you believe it. Do not trust, Jeremiah 7, 4, do not trust deceptive words and say, this is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord. Go now to the place in Shiloh where I first made a dwelling for my name and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of my people Israel. Do not think for a moment I'm not gonna do it again. And he did do it. The Babylonians came in with axes and chopped the temple of Solomon to bits, took the gold, burned the rest. So Stephen's concluding point, verse 48 through 50, however, the Most High does not live in houses made by men. As the prophet says, heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. Where is the house you will build for me? What kind of house will you build for me, says the Lord? Or where will my resting place be? Has not my hand made all these things? So the true blasphemy, of the temple is not Stephen or Jesus. It's these Jews that trusted in it like a spiritual good luck charm and forgot that the whole point was to point out their own wickedness and sin and the need for an atoning sacrifice and that they're excluded from a holy God. The true dwelling place would come later and Jesus is the one who would build it. Now he's come to his conclusion. You stiff-necked people with uncircumcised hearts and ears. You're 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 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. Stephen's been building to this point. Now we see what he's about. We see it. He makes clear what his whole agenda has been. God sent Joseph. Your fathers rejected him and wanted to kill him. He later saved Israel. God sent Moses. Your fathers rejected him, wanted to kill him. He later saved Israel. God gave the law of Moses. Your fathers rejected it and disobeyed it in every generation, but it points to a salvation later to come. God gave the temple. Your fathers idolized it and missed the whole point of it. God doesn't dwell in houses made by men. It points to a salvation yet to come, and that is Jesus. Well, I've already given you the application. I gave it to you at the beginning. If you came in here not yet a Christian, I hope today for you is the day of salvation. How could any sinner stand before God, a holy God who knows everything you've ever said or done, all of your thoughts, with any hope that your righteousness is enough? It isn't. Turn away from your righteousness, trust in Christ, and he will forgive you. His blood shed on the cross is the atonement, the only atonement that God has given. All we have to do is believe in it, like the thief on the cross. Trust in him and your sins will be forgiven. For the rest of us, I've already said, thank God He rescued you from being stiff-necked with uncircumcised hearts and ears resisting the Holy Spirit. Thank God, give Him the credit that He took out your heart of stone and gave you a heart of flesh. Thank God for that. But then ask God to deliver you from the remnants of that, because we still show it, don't we? We're still stubborn, we're still fleshly, we're still selfish. May God deliver us. I also want you to marvel at God's wisdom in the Old Testament. Isn't this incredible? What an incredible story. And this is just one little theme through it. There's so many other things that God has done. I delight in the fact that God's gonna win the story with Israel. Isn't that awesome? Romans 11 says, all Israel will be saved. That doesn't mean every single Jew that's ever lived, no, but that final generation, God's gonna redeem them, and they're gonna look to Christ, and they're gonna believe in him. In the meantime, they're breaking his heart. As he says in Romans 10 verse 21, all day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and obstinate people. And then we look at ourselves and say, Lord, make me different. Finally, Stephen was bold. We have an opportunity this week. Maybe we don't have Stephen's gifts and we don't have Stephen's opportunities, but we have our own gifts and we have our own opportunities. Let's be bold this week. Let's tell people about Jesus. I would again invite you to come and pray with us on Wednesday morning. This is what we're praying for, that we would have boldness and opportunity to share and then that God would bless it. Close with me in prayer. Father, thank you for the depth, the complexity, the clarity that comes from studying your word and from Stephen's amazing insights. Lord, I pray that you would take these lessons and press them home to our hearts. I pray that no one would leave this place under the wrath of God unsaved, that they would know today is the day of salvation and repent and believe in Jesus and find full forgiveness and release for all time from their sins. And Lord, help us, who have already done that, to live holy lives, to put sin to death by the Spirit, and to be bold in witnessing as Stephen was. In Jesus' name, amen. Stay motivated to grow to spiritual maturity by accessing free biblical content at twojourneys.org. 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