Please start with me in your Bibles to Acts chapter 7. Acts chapter 7, and we're going to be looking at verses 1 through 16. It's Acts chapter 7, verses 1 through 16. Hear the word of God. The high priest said, are these things so? And he said, hear me, brethren and fathers. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran, and said to him, leave your country and your relatives and come into the land that I will show you. Then he left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. From there, after his father died, God had him move to this country in which you are now living. But he gave him no inheritance in it, not even a foot of ground. And yet, even when he had no child, he promised that he would give it to him as a possession and to his descendants after him. But God spoke to this effect, that his descendants would be aliens in a foreign land, and that they would be enslaved and mistreated for 400 years. And whatever nation to which they will be in bondage, I myself will judge, said God. And after that, they will come out and serve me in this place. And he gave them the covenant of circumcision. And so Abraham became the father of Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day. And Isaac became the father of Jacob and Jacob of the 12 patriarchs. The patriarchs became jealous of Joseph and sold him into Egypt. Yet God was with him and rescued him from all his afflictions and granted him favor and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. And he made him governor over Egypt and all his household. Now a famine came over all of Egypt and Canaan and great affliction with it. And our fathers could find no food. But when Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt, he sent out He sent our fathers there the first time. On the second visit, Joseph made himself known to his brothers, and Joseph's family was disclosed to Pharaoh. Then Joseph sent word and invited Jacob, his father, and all of his relatives to come to him, 75 persons in all. And Jacob went down to Egypt, and there he and our fathers died. From there they were removed from Shechem and laid in the tomb which Abraham had purchased for some money from the sons of Hamor in Shechem. He who has ears, let him hear the word of God. So our text begins where we last saw Stephen the deacon brought before the Sanhedrin to answer concerning a charge of blasphemy. Now, if you recall, members of the synagogue of the freedmen arose against Stephen to challenge him on his teaching, but they were unable to cope with the wisdom and the power that Stephen possessed. So they secretly stirred men up to have them say that Stephen was speaking blasphemous words against Moses and against God. So Stevens brought before the court of the Sanhedrin, and he's interrogated. And what we find out is that this court of the Sanhedrin was really a kangaroo court. It wasn't a fair trial. It was stacked. And the prosecution there stacked false accusers against Stephen and said of Stephen that this man, this man Stephen, comes into our synagogue and he speaks against the holy place and against the law. Now, beloved, these accusations are very serious. Think about what's being said about Stephen. They're accusing Stephen of attacking God's promise made to Abraham, which included a land promise, and that he's attacking God's giving of the law to Moses, which consisted of all those customs that set Israel apart from all the other nations in the land. You see, beloved, these accusations strike at the very heart of what it meant to be a Jew, to be set apart by God as his chosen people. To deny the Holy Land is to call God a liar or a deceiver, that somehow God did not keep his promise to his people. It's to say that God did not follow through to the Abrahamic promise. To deny the ceremonial law or the dietary laws was to blatantly disobey God. So as we're looking at this text, I've given you an outline there in your bulletin. You have verses 1 through 4, which is the covenant God. Verses 5 through 8 is God's faithfulness foreshadowed. And 9 through 16 is God's faithfulness shown. And listen, what we find out from this sermon, the longest sermon in the book of Acts, not by Peter or Paul or anyone else, Stephen the deacon, what we find out is that Stephen is an excellent covenant theologian. And he rightly points out that the covenant made with Abraham wasn't focused on the promise of an earthly land. Rather, it was on the promise of the righteousness that he received by faith and how Jesus was the fulfillment of all those promises and ordinances given in the Old Testament and now realized in the New Testament with the coming of Jesus. So look there at verses 1 through 2. It says, the high priest said, are these things so? And he said, hear me, brethren and fathers, the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran. So right there, right in verse one, we see that Stephen is given the floor to answer his accusers. The high priest Caiaphas asks Stephen, is this so? These charges of blasphemy against the holy place and against the land. Are you making these blasphemous statements against the promises of God? And you know, Caiaphas has heard these accusations before. Remember, these were the same accusations leveled against Jesus himself. They accused Jesus of these very things. So Stephen begins his reply there in verse two. So he now inclines them to hear. He says, Hear me, brethren, hear me, fathers. And he's going to answer them exactly according to Scripture. First, he's going to answer the accusation about the holy place. And at the outset, I want you to know that the major theme of the first part of Stephen's sermon here is the insistence that the presence of God is not restricted to any single area of land or building made with hands, which is how Stephen applies this at the very end of the sermon. Now, later on in the book of Acts, Paul insists on this very point. Upon entering Athens, Paul perceives of the religious nature of the people gathered at the Areopagus. And he encounters the altar of the 12 gods in Athens, which were altars that were created to house the gods of Athens so that the people could come and the people could worship these gods. These gods were displayed in these altars, and they were worshiped at these altars. And Paul, upon encountering one of these addressed to an unknown God, says that God has made himself known. There is no unknown God. There is the God, and he has made himself known. And this God does not dwell and is not restricted in the altars made by men. You know, beloved, we live in God's world, the world that he created. He does not live in our world. He doesn't live in our holy places. You know, the offense taken by the Sanhedrin here is really predicated on a horrible misunderstanding of the temporary nature of the old dispensation temple and various ceremonial laws, which pointed to the fulfillment in Christ in the new dispensation of the covenant of grace. Now remember, the covenant of grace is not two covenants. It is one covenant. And in the covenant of grace, in the Old Testament, the covenant of grace was administered by promises, prophecies, sacrifices, circumcision, the paschal lamb, and other types and ordinances delivered to the people of the Jews. You know, the men and women who were saved in the Old Testament were justified before God. not having a righteousness of their own, but that which comes by Christ. You see, all these things, these promises, these prophecies, these sacrifices, all these things foreshadowed Christ who was to come. You know, the presence of God was something that was very important to the Jews, and even to us today. The ark of God, the tabernacle, These things represented the presence of God among the people. Remember there in 1 Samuel, the people abused the notion that and equated the presence of God was restricted to the ark of God. So the ark of God comes into their camp, they bring it forth and they see this as a sign of sure victory over the Philistines. God is with us, God is with us because we have this ark of God. And it turns out they were defeated. The Ark of God was captured. Well, think about the tabernacle. You know, the tabernacle where Moses would meet with God in the wilderness. And when Israel finally entered into the promised land, the tabernacle was replaced by a permanent temple built by Solomon, which signified where God would meet with his people. So the presence of God is a serious matter. So you have the high priest asking Stephen here, well are you guilty or are you not? Were you speaking against the holy land or were you not? Look there at verse two. Yeah, verse two. It says, the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran. All right, stop there. Stephen begins his defense by demonstrating that Abraham, who is called the father of the faith, was not found in Israel during the time of God's call to him. Abraham was not in Israel. Abraham was not located in a temple built with gold or a mobile temple in the wilderness. Rather, Abraham lived in Mesopotamia, which is in the land of the Chaldeans, the land of Babylon, which is modern-day Iraq. And while he dwelt there, the God of glory appeared to him. The land of Mesopotamia was not holy ground. What was it? It was hostile ground toward God. At that time, there was no promised land. There was no temple. The father of the faith dwelt in an idolatrous country, and he was an idolatrous man. And it was while he was there, in his idolatry, in his land, that the God of glory came to him. Look there at verses 3 and 4. And this God of glory appeared to him and said, leave your country and your relatives and come into the land that I will show you. Then he left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. From there, after his father died, God had him move to this country in which you are now living. Now, beloved, I want you to place yourselves in Abraham's shoes for a moment. From any perspective that you can look at it, this call of Abraham seems like a fantastical adventure, doesn't it? Think about this. Abraham lived in the land of his father. This is a place where he had dwelt all of his life. He had settled there. His friends, his relatives were there. His whole life was in Mesopotamia. Everything that was important to Abraham was there in that native land. I dare say that it would take an act of God to get him to uproot from his life, from everything that he's known to travel such a distance. That's exactly what happened. It was an act of God. And Stephen says that the God of glory appeared to him, the same God who would and dwell the tabernacle and later the temple, this God called him out of his homeland. Beloved, what we have here is an extraordinary act of grace and mercy on behalf of God to take a pagan man from a pagan land and make him a son of the God of glory. And Abraham didn't do this on his own initiative. Abraham would have been perfectly content being a pagan man, living in a pagan land. But God called him out of it, to lead him to a better place and into a better estate. And as an application here, that's what he does for us. We are pagan men and women. We live in a pagan land. We enjoy being pagans. We enjoy worshiping our false deities, our idols. And it was there that God called us out of our sin and misery and into an estate of salvation by the Redeemer, Jesus Christ. Look there at verses five through seven. It says, but he gave him no inheritance in it, not even a foot of ground. And yet, even when he had no child, he promised that he would give it to him as a possession and to his descendants after him. But God spoke to this effect, that his descendants would be aliens in a foreign land and that they would be enslaved and mistreated for 400 years. And whatever nation to which they will be in bondage, I myself will judge, said God. And after that, they will come out and serve me in this place." So Stephen, in recounting the story of Abraham, reminds the Sanhedrin, those who are gathered to accuse him, that though the promise of land was made to Abraham, and though Abraham made it to the land which God had promised him, he lived there as an alien, as a sojourner. You know, it says there that that he gave him no inheritance in it, not even a foot of ground. You know, Abraham gets to this land. He doesn't have acres upon acres. He doesn't have a little plot of land. He doesn't have a rock. He doesn't have a pebble. He has nothing. He's called out of everything that he knows into this land, he has nothing. And not only that, God promised that his descendants would inherit this land, but he has no descendants. Abraham was a man without a land and without a child. Not only that, God told Abraham that his descendants would toil under the bondage of a foreign enemy for 400 years. Now, again, if you place yourself in Abraham's position, there's not a lot of encouragement to gather here, is there? You're in a foreign place. You have nothing, no land, no descendants. And God's promising all these things. And you look around. Not a pebble belongs to you. You have nothing here. You're in a foreign land. You're surrounded by hostility. What did he have? What did Abraham have in that land? He had the promise of God. That's what he had, and beloved, that was enough. God had promised him land and descendants, and Abraham believed him. Now in the fourth chapter of the book of Romans, the apostle Paul argues that the righteousness that Abraham possessed did not come from works but by faith. that Abraham believed God and it was accounted or credited or reckoned to him as righteousness. Now listen to Romans 4.3. For what did the scripture say? Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. You see, this was a righteousness that Abraham did not possess inherently. Abraham did not possess this righteousness while he was a pagan in the land of Mesopotamia. And he actually didn't possess this righteousness inherently in the land that God brought him to. This was not something that he had within himself. See, this was a righteousness that was extra nos, a righteousness that was outside of himself. You know, the reformers call this a foreign or an alien righteousness. And that is the righteousness of Christ that is credited or imputed to him by faith. You know, that word imputation isn't just a Reformation word. You know, we think of the word imputation, we think of the Reformation. Beloved, imputation is at the heart of the gospel. It's the truth of that imputation of the righteousness of Christ imputed to us that we can ever hope to stand before God. You know, Dr. Sproul rightly said, the whole of salvation from start to finish rests upon imputation. Listen to how Paul describes Abraham after calling him the father of the faith in Romans 4, verses 17 through 22. says, as it is written, a father of many nations have I made you. In the presence of him who had believed, even God, who gives life to the dead and calls into being that which does not exist. In hope, against hope, he believed, so that he might become a father of many nations according to that which has been spoken. So shall your descendants be. Without becoming weak in faith, he contemplated his own body, now as good as dead since he was about 400 years old, and the deadness of Sarah's womb. Yet with respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief, but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully assured that what God had promised him, he was also able to perform. Therefore, it was also credited to him as righteousness. Abraham believed God. This righteousness that God gave to Abraham came before the promises of God were fulfilled to Abraham. This righteousness came before circumcision. This righteousness came before the giving of the law of Moses. before a single Jewish custom was inaugurated. Abraham believed God. Now, by all outward appearances, there was nothing for Abraham to boast in or to take comfort. Romans 4 says that he hoped against hope. Everything that he saw pointed toward this isn't going to happen, and he believed God. And we're told that his body was beginning to break down. His ability to war and to have children was quickly fading. Sarah was getting older, passing the childbearing age. Now, I don't think that Abraham told her that specifically, but it's the truth of the matter. Yet, he believed God. Look there in verse 8. It says, And he gave him the covenant of circumcision. And so Abraham became the father of Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day. And Isaac became the father of Jacob and Jacob of the twelve patriarchs. So after Abraham believed and it was counted to him as righteousness, God gave Abraham this covenant sign to show forth his promise to Abraham and to his descendants. Abraham received this covenant sign after he professed and possessed faith. He was given this sign to point to God's righteousness, which was given to him. And he was to give this sign to all of his children on the eighth day. And this would be a sign, of course, to all of God's, I'm sorry, to all of Abraham's descendants of the promise of God offered to him and to seal to those who by faith received God's promise. Now what was that promise? What did circumcision represent? We're told in Romans 4 verse 11, and he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had while uncircumcised, so that he might be the father of all who believe without being circumcised, that righteousness might be credited to him. You know, this wasn't a sign that He would receive land. It was a sign of the righteousness which he had in Christ. It was a sign of the righteousness of Christ imputed to him. It was a sign to his posterity of Christ's righteousness offered and sealed to them by faith if they would believe. And this is the very same thing that New Testament baptism represents. And when we think about the Abrahamic covenant, remember this. It contains both a physical and a spiritual promise. Physically, God promised Abraham numerous descendants upon the earth and a land where his descendants would dwell as God's people. But there was also a spiritual promise, and that was of Christ, that his true descendant would be the redeemer of all people, of all the elect. And at his coming, Christ fulfilled both the spiritual and the physical promise given to Abraham. Christ was given not just the land in the Middle East, but every nation. The spiritual descendants of Abraham would cover the earth, but also he secured for us salvation and a heavenly home. With these promises made to Abraham by God, the Abrahamic covenant really is the definitive salvific promise from God to man on which every other promise is built. The sacrament of circumcision came after Abraham was credited faith. It came centuries before the acquisition of the Holy Land and centuries before Moses. When there was no holy place, before the temple, before the tabernacle, before the synagogues, all the essential elements of faith were in place. Regeneration, faith and repentance, the word, the Old Testament sacraments, prayer, sanctification, all of it predated the temple and the customs set forth by Moses because Abraham possessed them. And that promise, beloved, was passed down to Abraham's descendants. Well, this shows forth God's faithfulness in keeping his covenant promise to Abraham. Do you remember how the Abrahamic covenant was ratified? Well, normally when a covenant between two people in the Middle East was ratified during the time of Abraham, a formal agreement was made between these two parties, and they would take an animal, and they would split the animal in two, and they would lay the halves of the animals on each side, and both parties would walk through those split animals. as a covenant sign, to say, I will uphold my part of this covenant, or else I will be like these animals. I will be split, I will be worthy of death. So how was the Abrahamic covenant ratified? Remember there in Genesis 15, while Abraham was sleeping, before the covenant sign was given, God himself passed between those halves, thereby swearing by himself that he will show forth the promise of Abraham unto his descendants. God swore by himself. And again, this took place well before there was a holy place, well before there was a temple, well before there was a tabernacle, well before there was a synagogue. Look there at verses nine through 16. So the patriarchs became jealous of Joseph and sold him into Egypt. Yet God was with him and rescued him from all his afflictions and granted him favor and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. And he made him governor over Egypt and all his household. Now a famine came over all of Egypt and Canaan with great affliction with it. And our fathers could find no food. But when Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt, he sent our fathers there the first time. On the second visit, Joseph made himself known to his brothers, and Joseph's family was disclosed to Pharaoh. Then Joseph sent word and invited Jacob, his father, and all his relatives to come to him, 75 persons in all. And Jacob went down to Egypt, and there he and his fathers died. From there they were removed from Shechem and laid in the tomb which Abraham had purchased for a sum of money from the sons of Hamor in Shechem." So now Stephen, after establishing that faith that Abraham possessed prior to the promises being fulfilled, Stephen now places forth Joseph and his brothers. Now we're told here that Joseph's brothers, being moved by jealousy, by envy, wanted to put Joseph to death, wanted to get rid of Joseph. So they devised a wicked plot in order to have it appear that Joseph had died. And then eventually they sold him into slavery to Egypt. Now clearly, his brothers meant this for evil. Yet, in spite of their wickedness, the Lord was with Joseph in his imprisonment. Not only did the Lord protect him in the land of Egypt, the Lord caused him to thrive and elevated him to a place of high rank even in the court of Pharaoh. Notice what it says, that God was with Joseph. Where was Joseph? He was locked up in a cell. Was God in the temple during that time? Was God in the tabernacle during that time? Was God in the synagogue during that time? God was with Joseph in the prison. And so Joseph is raised to this high stature. It caused him to thrive, and he even served in the court of Pharaoh. So when a famine came upon the land, Joseph's family were in dire straits, and they come to Egypt to get food. And it was Joseph himself who was able to provide that for him. You know, it was by the providence of God that the one who was over the food at this time was Joseph. Joseph was not only able to provide for his family, but he brought them into the land of Egypt to settle in the land of Goshen where they would prosper until the time of captivity. And you know who was there with the people of Israel in the land of Goshen? God was with his people. You know, it was this hostility toward Joseph by his brothers That really shows forth what's happening here in the text. You know, Stephen says to them in his closing remarks, which we'll look at when we get there more fully, he says, which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? You know, every prophet that the Lord had sent to his people were persecuted. You know, every prophet that the Lord sent was persecuted for saying, thus says the Lord. You know, these prophets came speaking the word of the Lord to the people of God, and they were all murdered. They were all persecuted. You know, remember Jesus' words to the Pharisees in Matthew 23, 29 through 33. He says, Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, If we had been living in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partners with them in shedding the blood of the prophets. So you testify against yourselves that you were sons of those who murder the prophets. Fill up then the measure of guilt of your fathers, you serpents, you brood of vipers. How will you escape the sentence of hell?" And this is ultimately going to be one of the reasons why Stephen is the first Christian martyr, because he calls them out on their hypocrisy. Well, in closing, I just want to look at a couple things. Why is it when Stephen was accused of blasphemy, he begins this sermon with Abraham? Well, first he wanted to demonstrate the mercy of the God of glory who took this pagan man from a pagan land and grant him faith and repentance. Not for anything done by him, but solely because the God of glory is a gracious, gracious God. Abraham was not chosen already because he was already a godly man who had it all together. He was not a man who by his obedience merited faith and repentance. He was a pagan man in a pagan land. This was a sheer act of mercy and grace showed forth to a sinner deserving of death. And this same mercy and grace is for us today. You know, justification by faith is really shorthand for justification by the righteousness of Christ imputed or reckoned to us. And saving faith, true saving faith is resting and receiving Christ as he is offered to us. We are pagan people living in a pagan world. and the righteousness of Christ is available to us by faith. Next, Stephen shows how men have always persecuted God's prophet by placing forth Joseph as being persecuted by his brothers who sought to do him harm. So Stephen's demonstrating that the men of the synagogue of the freedmen, along with the Sanhedrin, were following in Israel's long tradition of persecuting the Lord's people. And finally, Stephen demonstrates that God does not dwell in temples made with hands. God is with his people. The kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ encompasses all things and all places. Abraham, the father of the faith, was declared righteous and he worshiped God long before the land promise was fulfilled. when he didn't have a rock to stand on that he could call his own. The Sanhedrin failed to realize that temporary nature of the tabernacle. You know, when Jesus was asked in John 4 by the woman at the well, our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you people say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. You see, she knew that she was supposed to worship in Jerusalem. What did Jesus say to her? Woman, believe me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. In times past, the temple in Jerusalem is where God and man would meet, but now we worship God in every city, every place, because we are indwelt by his Holy Spirit. Well, listen in closing to John 1. You know, it wasn't the physical tabernacle that was important. Yes, God had specific instructions on how to build it, but it wasn't because it was a place that was worthy to contain the presence of God, but rather it showed forth his glory. Listen, John 1, far more important is this. And the word became flesh. and dwelt among us, and we saw his glory. Glory is the only son from the Father, full of grace and truth. Now that word there translated dwell means tabernacled. So you could read this as the word became flesh and tabernacled among us, and we saw his glory. You know, beloved, if we are to meet with the living God, Jesus himself is the place where we must go. Jesus is the true tabernacle. So where do we worship now? Do we need a temple? Is God confined to a single place of land on earth? God is with his people wherever they're gathered. Wherever the people of God are gathered, the Lord is present. For us, it's here in the sanctuary, where we come quorum deo, before the face of God. It's here that we give glory and praise to God, that we sing his majesty, that we partake of his ordinances, and we love his people. So where God's people are present, he is present. Let's pray. Our Father and our God, we thank you for justification by faith alone. We thank you that the righteousness of Christ is freely given to us, not by anything that we could possibly do, but by your grace, by receiving and resting upon the Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you for Stephen and this account of his boldness, to proclaim your word. We pray that you would give us all this same boldness as well. Help us to be true worshipers. Help us to worship you in all times and wherever we are, giving glory to you. In Christ's name we pray.