Who are we? We do many things that if they were broadcast on a big screen at the Bank Atlantic Center we may never come out of our houses again. Even now we find ourselves doing that which we despise and not doing that good which we desire. Interestingly enough students have such a strange perception of Theology teachers, they think temptation doesn't bark at us and sin is something we don't partake in. They consider us saints, professional wrestlers who have all the demoniacs pinned to the ground. I have decimated the 10 commandments and if grace is an ocean I could say I am flat on my back at the depths of it. What I deserve is death- but in Christ we don't get what we deserve - Through all these things however I cant say that I ever gave the nod to have another man brutally murdered. Now don't get me wrong, I understand the Sermon on the Mount, I understand that I have murdered in my depraved heart through my hatred and gossip. This is not to compare myself to Saul of Tarsus and come out as more righteous, but for the sake of illustration, I never gave the nod to have someone's son brutally murdered.
The first Christian martyr Stephen's sermon is the longest in the book of Acts (Acts 6)- his passion poured out similar to the pouring out of Paul the apostles life for the sake of Christ and his gospel. His sermon is loaded with scripture and evangelistic zeal drafting an entire outline of Israel's history. Stephen was a man who was loaded with the gifts of the spirit. Nevertheless Acts 7 presses up against Acts 6 each time we close our Bibles to pray and it will be there pressed against Acts 6 echoing through all of eternity. It is a horrible chapter and yet a chapter filled with evidence that man could never have written the scriptures without the Holy spirits intervention. Stephen is attacked by men who are grinding their teeth at his offensive gospel message and large stones are hurled at him tearing his flesh from the bone ending his life as he prays for the forgiveness of his enemies - one of which was the man who gave the nod to execute him - that mans name is Saul of Tarsus - soon to be the apostle Paul. Saul was literally standing there watching Stephen's murder, he watched the blood pour out of him and he witnessed his last breath and his open eyes with no soul left behind them. God answered Stephen's prayer offering forgiveness to Saul - the one who gave the nod to murder the son of a precious mother. A mother who carried and nurtured Stephen in her blessed womb for 9 months, a women who raised a man of God who's name will forever be recorded in the Word of the living God. And this dirtbag named Saul gave the ok to have him murdered brutally in the dirt blown streets of Israel.
But God does not leave us with a story of the first dead Christian and a ferocious murderer. He gives us Acts 9. The apostle Paul's conversion.
Heres the point - Paul more than likely ministered to the families of the very ones he had killed as he traveled throughout the Mediterranean planting churches with the gospel of Christ. Perhaps Stephen's mother was a member of the churches of Corinth, Galatia or Colossi or maybe she encountered him at Antioch or near the temple in Jerusalem. Perhaps Paul when he said I forget that which is behind was referring to the countless bodies he left dead for their faith in Christ? Grace reaches so deep that millions of Christians through the ages have come to faith through a man named Paul who wrote the majority of the New Testament while inspired by the living God after he gave the nod to kill someone's blessed son. Perhaps he looked in the face of Stephen's mother and the forgiveness of Christ surrounded them like the dark oceans surround the Alvin submersible? Saul gave the nod, but God got a hold of him.
You will not find anything like this in the Koran, in the Apocrypha or in the Bhagavad Gida. You will not find grace like this in the book of Mormon or in the New World Translation carried by a Jehovah's Witness. This is real grace. Think about it, would you want to hear the epistles of Paul read in your 1st century church if he had given the nod to kill your child? What if he showed up at the entrance to your church, an exterminator of Christians. Only the grace of Christ could give you the ability to forgive a man like this. Only the grace of Christ can give you the ability to forgive yourself. I don't care where you have been - We can never out sin the grace of God. If you are a Christian who looks down your nose at others, you have not yet drank the depths of his Amazing grace. You are who you are because of his mercy, not because you woke up one morning and decided to make a decision that can be recanted a few years later or to be a morally better person. God comes and gets us, just like he did Paul - When God captures us he consumes us and he changes us permanently. Although we remember giving the ok to sin and murder God gives us the ok to charity, forgiveness and life and creates a desire in us to extend this to others. Saul was a taker of life - Paul was a giver of life - life through the preaching of the precious gospel.
We have both been standing in the sand blown streets of Israel giving the nod to evil and to death, but Christ gave his life in those same streets, offering his life unto death so that we can be forgiven. Just as Stephen's mother had to do, extend that forgiveness to others because we have no idea, some day that enemy may be another Paul. One mans life was taken in sin, but the life of Christ was given for redemption -Think about it Stephen didn't know Saul would be Paul but I can assure you, they know it now- pray for your enemies and forgive those who persecute you. Your past does not define you - press on towards Christ.
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