That should be all for our announcements, so we'll go ahead and go to our third song.
It's going to be a new song for our church, 172, "Love Divine, All Loves Excelling."
172, "Love Divine, All Loves Excelling."
Love, dear, excelling, Joy, God fixes, Thy hosts, He is crowned, Thou pure.
Plates are passed around, turning your Bibles to Acts chapter 7.
Acts chapter 7, we're going to read the entire chapter as is our custom.
Acts chapter 7, follow along silently, starting in verse 1.
Acts chapter 7, the Bible reads there, "Then said the high priest, 'Are these things so?'
And he said, 'Men, brethren, and fathers, hearken!
The God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before
he dwelt in Kaeran, and said unto him, 'Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred,
and come into the land which I shall show thee.'
Then came he out of the land of the Chaldeans, and dwelt in Kaeran, and from thence with
that his father was dead; he removed him into this land wherein ye now dwell.
And he gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on; yet he
promised that he would give it to him for a possession, and to his seed after him, when
as yet he had no child.
And God spake on this wise that his seed should sojourn in a strange land, and that
they should bring them into bondage, and entreat them evil four hundred years.
And the nation to whom they shall be in bondage will I judge, said God; and after that shall
they come forth and serve me in this place.
And he gave him the covenant of circumcision, and so Abraham begat Isaac, and circumcised
him the eighth day.
And Isaac begat Jacob, and Jacob begat the twelve patriarchs.
And the twelve patriarchs, moved with envy, sold Joseph into Egypt; but God was with him,
and delivered him out of all his afflictions, and gave him favor and wisdom in the sight
of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he made him governor over Egypt and all his house.
Now there came a dearth over all the land of Egypt and Canaan, and great affliction,
and our fathers found no sustenance.
But when Jacob heard that there was corn in Egypt, he sent out our fathers first.
And at the second time Joseph was made known to his brethren, and Joseph's kindred was
made known unto Pharaoh.
Then sent Joseph, and called his father Jacob to him, and all his kindred, three score,
and fifteen souls.
So Jacob went down into Egypt, and died, he and our fathers, and were carried over
into Sycambe, and laid in the sepulcher that Abraham bought for a sum of money of the sons
of Amor the father of Sycambe.
But when the time of the promise drew nigh, which God had sworn to Abraham, the people
grew and multiplied in Egypt, till another king arose, which knew not Joseph.
The same dealt subtly with our kindred, and evil, and treated our fathers, so that they
cast out their young children to the end they might not live, in which time Moses was born
and was exceeding fair, and nourished up at his father's house three months.
And when he was cast out, Pharaoh's daughter took him up and nourished him for her own
son.
And Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and
in deeds.
And when he was full forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brethren the children
of Israel, and seeing one of them suffer wrong, he defended him and avenged him that was oppressed
and smoked the Egyptian.
For he supposed his brethren would have understood how that God by his hand would deliver them,
but they understood not.
And the next day he showed himself unto them as they strove, and would have set them at
one again, saying, "Sirs, ye are brethren.
Why do ye wrong one to another?"
But he that did his neighbor wrong thrust him away, saying, "Who made thee a ruler
and a judge over us?
Thou killed me as Thou didst the Egyptian yesterday? Then fled Moses at this saying,
"It was a stranger in the land of Median, where he begat two sons." And when forty years were
expired, there appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai an angel of the Lord and a flame
of fire in a bush. When Moses saw it, he wandered at the site, and as he drew near to behold it,
the voice of the Lord came unto him, saying, "I am the God of thy fathers, the God of Abraham,
and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." Then Moses trembled and durst not behold.
Then said the Lord to him, "Put off thy shoes from thy feet for the place where thou standest
as holy ground. I have seen, I have seen the affliction of my people which is in Egypt,
and I have heard their groaning, and have come down to deliver them. And now come,
I will send thee into Egypt." This Moses, whom they refused, saying, "Who made thee a ruler
and a judge?" The same did God send to be a ruler and a deliverer by the hand of the angel which
appeared to him in the bush. He brought them out, after that he had showed wonders and signs in the
land of Egypt and in the Red Sea, and in the wilderness forty years. This is that Moses which
said unto the children of Israel, "A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your
brethren, like unto me, him shall ye hear." This is he that was in the church, in the wilderness,
with the angel which spake to him in the Mount Sinai, and with our fathers who received the
lively oracles to give unto us, to whom our fathers would not obey, but thrust him from them,
and in their hearts turned back again into Egypt, saying unto Aaron, "Make us gods to go before us,
for as for this Moses which brought us out of the land of Egypt, we want not what is become of him."
And they made him a calf in those days, and offered sacrifice unto the idol, and rejoiced
in the works of their own hands. Then God turned and gave them up to worship the host of heaven,
as it is written in the book of the prophets, "O ye house of Israel, have ye offered to me slain
beasts and sacrifices by the space of forty years in the wilderness? Yea, ye took up the
tabernacle of Moloch, and the star of your god Remphan, figures which ye made to worship them,
and I will carry you all way beyond Babylon." Our fathers had the tabernacle of witness in
the wilderness, as he had appointed, speaking unto Moses that he should make it according to
the fashion that he had seen, which also our fathers that came after brought in with Jesus
into the possession of the Gentiles, whom God drave out before the face of our fathers under
the days of David, who found favor before God, and desired to find a tabernacle for the god of Jacob.
But Solomon built him a house, howbeit the most high dwelleth not in temples made with
hands, as sayeth the prophet, "Heaven is my throne, and earth is my footstool. What house will ye
build me, sayeth the Lord, or what is the place of my rest? Hath not my hand made all these things?
Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost,
as your fathers did, so do ye. Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted,
and they have slain them which showed before the coming of the just one of whom ye have been now,
the betrayers and murderers, who have received the law by the dispossession of angels,
and have not kept it? When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart,
and they gnashed on it with their teeth. But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stead
fastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God, and said,
Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God.
Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord,
and cast him out of the city, and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their clothes at
a young man's feet, whose name was Saul. And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God,
and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. And he kneeled down and cried with a loud voice,
Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep.
Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer. Father God, we thank you for Acts chapter 7, Lord,
and for Stephen, and I just pray that you fill Brother Dylan Oz with your spirit now and give
him clarity of mind to thunder forth the message you've laid on his heart. Help us to pay attention.
Minimize distractions in the room so we can walk out of the service this morning.
More complete Christians. We love you, and in Jesus' name I pray. Amen.
Amen. Well, first I want to thank Pastor Shelley for the opportunity to allow me to fill the pulpit
while he's gone. It's always a great privilege and honor. And thanks, Brother Ben, for that very
long chapter, but that was an epic chapter of the Bible, an epic sermon by this man named Stephen.
I mean, this guy was just completely filled with the Holy Spirit. He's preaching in face of opposition,
and he's basically recapping the entire New Old Testament by memory. I mean, it's just an incredible
sermon. And this morning I want to preach about lessons from the life of Stephen, lessons from
the life of Stephen. And we're going to be pulling things from basically Acts chapter five through
seven. But I wanted him to read Acts chapter number seven because I didn't want to have to
reread this entire sermon for you later. You know what the sermon's about. You know what he was
talking about. But just to give you a little bit of background, Stephen was one of the first deacons
ordained in the New Testament. And a deacon is simply just a servant. It is an official office
of the church. It does have qualifications if you read first Timothy chapter number three.
But a deacon is not someone, you know, that's like running a church or in charge or anything
like that. A deacon is just someone that is a servant. And that's what Stephen was. And the
reason why they needed a servant at this time, why they needed a deacon at this time, is because
the apostles were accomplishing a lot of work. Let's look at Acts chapter number five really
quickly and look at verse 42. It says, "And daily in the temple and in every house they cease not
to teach and preach Jesus Christ." You know, these apostles, they're not like how a lot of
pastors are today where they sit in their ivory tower and read Charles Spurgeon books all day
from their office. They're actually going house to house every single day going to the temple
preaching the gospel, getting people saved, doing the work of an evangelist, right? So these
apostles that are doing great works for God, it would make sense that they need help, that they
need helpers. What doesn't make sense is why a lot of these pastors you see today have a staff of
20 or 30 people when they're not preaching the gospel. Why do you need a staff? Why do you need
deacons? You're not even doing what the apostles were doing here preaching the gospel. It doesn't
make any sense. But the apostles, they did need help. Let's look at Acts chapter number six verse
one. It says, "And in those days when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a
murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews because their widows were neglected in the daily
ministration." So because the apostles were going preaching the gospel so much, it caused the number
of the disciples to be multiplied, which increases the workload, which increases the things that the
apostles are possibly neglecting, right? And because of that, one of those things that are
kind of being neglected is the care of the widows, which is something 1st Timothy 5 talks about if
you want to read more on that. And so this is a problem. Look at verse number two. It says,
"Then the twelve called the multitude of the disciples unto them and said, 'It is not reason
that we should leave the word of God and serve tables.'" So the disciples and the apostles here,
they're saying, "Okay, we recognize that this is a problem. Yeah, this problem needs to be fixed,
but it doesn't make sense for us to leave the word of God and to serve tables, right? It doesn't
make sense for the men that are the only men that could do the things that they're doing to stop
doing what they're doing to serve tables, to help with the administration, to help with the widows.
And I don't think the apostles are saying, "I'm above serving the widow," or, "I'm above doing
some sort of administrative task." I don't think they're being prideful here. They're just recognizing
that, hey, they have their role. Other people have other roles. You know, there's some things
that only you can do. There's some things that only our pastor can do. We all have different gifts and
talents and places in life that God has put us. And, hey, to be an apostle, you had to literally
have seen the risen Lord Jesus Christ, right? I mean, there's not very many of those people going
around. So they can only do what they can do, but lots of people can help serve widows and serve
tables and do administrative tasks. And so that's where they're at in this situation. Look at Acts
chapter number six verse three. It says, "Wherefore, brethren, look ye out among you, seven men," and I
want you to notice the qualifications that these men had, "of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost
and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business. But we will give ourselves continually to prayer
and to the ministry of the Word, in the saying, 'Please the whole multitude.' And they chose
Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost, and Philip, and Procurus, and Nicanor,
and Timon, and Parmenes, and Nicholas, a proselyte of Antioch. So what are their instructions?
Hey, I want you to look from among you seven men of honest report, men that are full of
the Holy Ghost, full of wisdom, to do what? To do the administrative tasks, to take care
of the widows, to take care of the more, you know, seemingly smaller tasks in the ministry.
But they still had really high qualifications for these men. They weren't just saying,
okay, go find the derelick on the side of the road that doesn't have a job and make
him start serving the widows. Go find the bum that's holding a sign on the side of
the road and have him start taking care of the administrative tasks. No, they want to
find men that are skilled, men that are full of the Holy Ghost, men that are full of wisdom
to take care of the seemingly small tasks of the work of God. And what does this teach
us? The first lesson from the life of Stephen is that the work of God should be taken very
seriously. The work of God should be taken very seriously. And it doesn't matter what
that entails, just anything you do for God should be taken very seriously. You know,
some people could argue, well, you know, the apostles, they're laying their hands on people,
they're healing people, they're doing miracles, they're preaching the Word of God. That's
very important. And absolutely that is very important. That's extremely important. But
you know what? In God's eyes, you know what else is also important? Taking care of the
widows. Taking care of the administrative tasks. Because God would not have had a high
qualification for this seemingly not important job if it wasn't important to him. And that's
the thing. What may be less or more important in the eyes of man is not always what's more
important in the eyes of God. God wants every single work done for him, every single good
work done for the kingdom of God, to be taken seriously and to be done by skilled people.
He doesn't want just a bunch of bozos running the church and taking care of the things
of church, right? No, he wants skilled people. He wants people that are full of the Holy
Ghost, that take his word seriously, that take the kingdom of God seriously. And you
got to think, you know, think about people in the secular world in history that have
been close to kings, right? Like cup bearers or security, or even now we have like, you
know, the Secret Service or cooks at the White House, right? Why is it that these people
are important? Is it because their job is necessarily important? No, it's really because
of who they're in proximity to, right? I mean, if you're a cup bearer for a homeless
guy, that's not as cool as being the cup bearer for the king, right? To be the cup bearer
for the king, you have to be vetted. You have to, you know, be someone that's really trusted.
And you think about it, who are we serving? The king of kings, the creator of the entire
universe. So it does not matter what task you're doing, no matter how small it may
seem to you, that is a big deal because of who you're serving, right? I mean, it'd be
such an honor and such a privilege to be the cup bearer for the king of a nation. But how
much more of an honor and privilege would it be to serve the widows for the Lord Jesus
Christ? How much more of an honor and privilege would it be to be a doorkeeper in the house
of God serving the Lord Jesus Christ, right? No matter what you do, sweeping the floors,
cleaning something, praying for someone, you know, folding the bulletins, whatever you're
doing, hey, you're doing that for the king of kings, right? And that should be something
that you take seriously because realize that God takes it seriously and that God wants
men that are wise and full of the Holy Ghost to be people that serve Him because the work
of God is always to be taken seriously. I'll read for you. If you want to go to Exodus
18, I'll read for you Ecclesiastes 9-10. The Bible says, "Whatsoever thy hand findeth
to do, do it with thy might, for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom
in the grave whither thou goest." And you know, part of the reason why I think Stephen
was chosen is because God knew that no matter what Stephen was doing, he's gonna do it
with his might, right? Hey, if he's serving the widows, he's gonna do that with all of
his might. And if he's preaching a red-hot sermon against the Jews, he's gonna do that
with all of his might, right? He's not just a one-trick pony. He's actually someone that
can fill many roles, right? He's someone that can be trusted with a lot of tasks. We see
a similar concept in Moses' day. You're in Exodus 18, 21. Look at Exodus 18, 21. And
And basically to give you some context, Moses is just overwhelmed with work, he's trying
to judge the whole nation by himself, he's trying to have everyone bring every matter
to him.
And his father-in-law Jethro gives him some advice, look at Exodus 18-21, "Moreover thou
shall provide out of all the people," notice these qualifications again, "able men such
as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness, and place such over them to be rulers of thousands
and rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties and rulers of tens, and let them judge the
people at all seasons. And it shall be that every great matter they shall bring unto thee,"
notice these words, "but every small matter they shall judge. So shall it be easier for
thyself and they shall bear the burden with thee." You say, oh, well who cares what the
judge is like if all he's doing is judging the small matters, right? I mean, if a judge
is only taking care of like menial tasks and just menial judgments, it shouldn't really
matter what his qualifications are, right? Wrong. Look, he's saying, "Find able men
that fear God, men of truth, that hate covetousness, so they could judge the small matters." Right?
That shows you that God, because obviously God worked this out for this to happen and
God approved of this, you know, God wants to have skilled, high quality people serving
him, even for the smaller tasks, even for the menial items, even for judging the small
matters and of course we still have Moses, right, and he's going to judge the great
matters.
Hey, we still have a pastor that's going to be the leader.
We still have the apostles that are going to be laying their hands on people and leading
the charge of Christianity, but guess what?
Stephen matters too, the lesser judges matter too, and every single person in the kingdom
of God doing any work for God, God wants you to take that job seriously and God wants
you to do it with all your might.
He wants you, when you come to church, when you're singing the hymns, to sing it with
your might, to praise Him with your might, not to just be mumbling, "Do God be the great
things He hath done?"
No, that's not how God wants you to sing.
He wants you to praise Him from your heart and sing out with your might, right?
Hey, when you're out soul winning, He wants you to go and talk to people with your might,
not just be like, "Yeah, we're from a church, yeah, you want to get saved?"
No, okay, bye.
Like, that's not how God wants us to be, right?
God wants us to be persuasive and full of the Holy Ghost and full of wisdom and actually
look like we believe what we're saying and actually look like we're excited to be a Christian
and excited to be saved and show up to church and do all the tasks of the church with all
of your might, everything.
The audio video guys that we have help with our church, hey, do that with your might.
The ushers, do it with your might.
The security guys, do it with your might.
When you're preaching, preach with all your might, right?
Reading the Bible, hey, pay attention with all your might.
Look in the scriptures when we're preaching with all your might, right?
Not just scrolling Facebook, not just playing games on your phone.
You know, I've been in church before since, you know, I'm not usually back here.
I'm usually over there.
And I've seen this in many churches.
You walk by and, oh, someone's on Craigslist, oh, someone's scrolling eBay.
It's like, what are you doing?
We're here to serve the king of kings right now.
Do it with your might.
That's the type of person God's looking for.
And that's the type of person that Stephen was.
You know, I bet you that Stephen, when he read his Bible, read it with all his might.
I bet you he wasn't just kind of having his audio Bible on in the background and kind
of half listening for one chapter a day and calling that good.
I'm pretty sure he knew his Bible because I'm pretty sure he preached the whole sermon
basically quoting the Old Testament, rebuking the Jews, right?
You know the Bible says in Psalm 1, "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel
of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
And his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night."
I guarantee you that was Stephen.
I guarantee you.
Oh, he's only a servant.
Yeah, so what?
He still loved the Lord as God.
He still meditated on the Scriptures day and night.
He still, you know, believed in the Word of God and it was a treasure to him, even as
if he's just a servant.
He still was a good preacher, even though he's just a servant.
Hey, he still was literally a martyr for Christ as being just a servant.
And what does that teach us?
It tells us that every single task for God, you should take it seriously.
You should realize that it's important to him.
And when you're praying for your brothers and sisters in Christ, hey, take that seriously.
That's important to God.
You know, you, fellowshipping with visitors and being nice to people that are new in the
faith and discipling someone and getting people to grow in the Lord, look, God takes that
seriously and he wants us to take it seriously as well.
Not just have this apathetic attitude where you don't care about anything, where you don't
care about anything about the church.
Let's go to Colossians chapter number 3, Colossians chapter number 3.
If you struggle with this, I think this verse can help change your perspective, to change
your heart, to just cause you to care more.
Colossians 3 verse 23 says, "And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily as to the Lord and
not unto men, knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance, for
ye serve the Lord Christ."
I already talked about how you're supposed to do everything with your might, right?
You're supposed to go to work with your might, you're supposed to serve God with your might.
You should do everything with your might, but you say, "Well, you know, I don't like
my boss at work."
Well, do it unto Christ.
Forget about your boss.
You say, "Oh, well, I have a hard time being a submissive wife and following what the Bible
says because you don't understand I have a bad husband."
Well, do it unto the Lord.
Follow God's commandments because of Christ, not because of your husband.
You say, "Well, I have a hard, I have a problem forgiving my wife and I always want to stay
bitter against her."
Hey, forgive her for Christ.
Forgive her for the Lord, right?
Do what you do instead of for man, do it for God.
Because when you're doing it for God, then you won't care about the recognition, then
you won't care if you're just a servant, right?
Because you realize that God takes every single task in the kingdom of God very seriously.
What about soul winning?
Go to Matthew chapter number 9, Matthew chapter number 9, Matthew 9, look at verse 35, "And
Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and preaching
the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.
But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted
and were scattered abroad as sheep having no shepherd.
Then saith he unto the disciples, The harvest truly is plenious, but the laborers are few.
Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth laborers into his
harvest."
You know, you look out into our world today, even in our own community here, with 8 million
people living in this metro, that's a lot of people for this church to reach with the
gospel, right?
You know, it just makes me think, like, man, I just wish people would care.
I just wish people would realize how important the work of God is to the Lord, and how important
you are to that work, how God looks down at the people without a shepherd, he has compassion
on them, and he says, "Hey, the harvest is plenious."
I mean, there's 8 million people here, but you know what the problem is?
The laborers are few, and it's because people do not take seriously the work of God.
People do not take seriously the commandment to go out and preach the gospel to every creature.
Otherwise, they'd be doing it.
And look, I want to encourage you, if you don't go soul-winning or if it's been a while,
you need to get back out soul-winning.
You need to get back out soul-winning.
It's the reason why we're on this earth.
And look, no one's going to make you feel bad for it.
We try to make it easy for you to go soul-winning at this church.
If you're a lady and you want to go with the ladies, we have a ladies-only soul-winning
time that you can show up to in the middle of the week on Tuesday morning.
You know, "Hey, people," you say, "Well, I have kids."
They all have kids.
Have your kids together, right?
I mean, go to the doors with all your kids together.
People are going to be nicer to you anyways.
You know, you ladies don't realize that two men going to the door, we get a lot more slack
from people than when you're a lady or when you have kids with you, right?
I mean, soul-winning with my wife, people are always nice.
So I always like that when it's two dudes, okay, especially where I'm from, okay?
Texas is a little bit better.
But look, we make it easy for you.
There's times almost every day of the week.
We've got soul-winning captains.
We've got other mentors of this church that would be happy to teach you how to preach
the gospel.
You say, "Well, you know, I'm kind of embarrassed because I used to preach the gospel, but I
don't do it anymore."
Hey, who cares?
You're going to be in heaven for all of eternity.
Would you rather just regret your made-up phantom of embarrassment that no one's even
going to care about anyways and just regret that for all of eternity or just get over
yourself and show up soul-winning and earn some rewards in heaven and do something great
for God?
Why?
Because the work of God is important to him.
In the second lesson we can learn, go to Acts chapter number 6 verse 5, the second lesson
we can learn from Stephen's life is that there's a prepared place for a prepared person.
And we've heard this phrase a lot but it's true and it's important to dwell on.
There's a prepared place for a prepared person.
Look at Acts chapter 6 verse 5, "And the saying pleased the whole multitude, and they
chose Stephen," notice what he's like, "He's a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost
and Philip and Procurus and Nicanor and Tymon and Parmenas and Nicholas the proselyte of
Antioch." So it wasn't just Stephen, it was also these men. But notice what their characteristics
were. They're men full of faith. They're men of the Holy Ghost, right? These people were not just
not taking the Word of God seriously, just coasting through life, just derelicts. No,
there are people who have been serving God already before they got this opportunity.
It wasn't like God looked down and said, "Well, I know Stephen's not a hard worker now. I know
Stephen doesn't care about the Word of God now. I know that Stephen isn't going to be able to stand
against persecution now, but when I give him a position, when I give him an opportunity,
then Stephen will start to work hard. Then Stephen will care about the things of God."
That's not how it works in anything in life, in anything in life. You're not going to get hired
because the boss hopes that someday you'll know how to do the job and someday you'll be a good
worker. No, he's going to look at a pool of candidates and say, "Who is a prepared person?"
And guess what? There's a prepared place for you, right? This goes for anything in life.
I'll read for you, yeah, let's go to a couple examples in the Old Testament. Think about
King Saul. This was a man that was a prepared person and there was a prepared place for him.
Look at 1 Samuel chapter number 9, 1 Samuel 9 verse 1. "Now there was a man of Benjamin whose
name was Kish, the son of Abiel, the son of Zeror, the son of Bekorath, the son of Afiah,
a Benjamite, a mighty man of power. And he had a son whose name was Saul, a choice young man and
a goodly. And there was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than he. From his
shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people. And the asses of Kish, Saul's father,
were lost. And Kish said to Saul his son, "Take now one of the servants with thee, and arise,
go seek the asses." So before King Saul is ever king, you know what he is? He's a servant. He's
a servant to his father, right? He's out working. His father's giving him tasks. Hey, go seek these
asses, right? Kind of a picture of being a shepherd, right? And it's foreshadowing the
future of King Saul that he's going to be the king of the nation. He's going to be looking out
for the nation, right? But before he was ever king, before he was ever glorified, he was working.
And the way he even ran into Samuel was they were starting to get worried that they couldn't find
his father's asses. And so they're like, "Hey, well, let's go inquire at the man of God to see
if he can help us find my father's asses." And that's when Samuel anointed him and said, "Hey,
I'm anointing you captain over Israel." So before he was ever anointed captain, what was he doing?
Working hard. Saul wasn't just lazy and just thought, "Oh, someday I'm going to be the king
somehow." No, he was a prepared person and there was a prepared place for him. How about King David?
Go to 1 Samuel 16, flip the page a couple times, 1 Samuel 16. Over and over we're going to see
that God uses men that are already working. He doesn't just pick lazy people and then assume
they're going to change. He finds people that are already hard workers, then gives them an opportunity.
Look at 1 Samuel 16, 11 and Samuel said unto Jesse, "Are here all thy children?" So this is where Samuel
is coming to anoint who's going to be the next leader of Israel. And he said, "There remaineth
yet the youngest, and behold," notice this, "he keepeth the sheep." So while Samuel's looking to
anoint someone, what is David doing? Working. You don't see David coming up to Samuel and saying,
"I'd like to apply for the position to be king." We've had people literally email our church saying,
"Hey, are you guys hiring any full-time soul winners?" No! Are you out of your mind? Who are
you? What work are you doing? We should know about you, right? You don't just contact the church and
be like, "Hey, you want to hire me as a full-time soul winner?" Oh, do you think we're hiring
full-time prayer warriors too? Do we need to hire full-time Bible readers? This is ridiculous,
right? No, if God wants to use you, he should just see you already working and you should be called
into it, right? Not you got some bright light in your room. I mean like literally called, like,
"Hey, do you want to come work here?" Right? That's like how it should be. That's how it is
when you look at these men of God. Where was I? Verse number 11, second part of verse 11, it says,
"And Samuel said unto Jesse, 'Send and fetch him, for we will not sit down till he come hither.'
And he sent and brought him in. Now he was ready and with all the beautiful countenance and goodly
to look to. And the Lord said, 'Arise, anoint him, for this is he.' Then Samuel took the horn of oil
and anointed him in the midst of his brethren. The spirit of the Lord came upon David from that
day forward. So Samuel rose up and went to Ramah." And of course we see all throughout David's life
that he's a hard-working person, that he's keeping the sheep, he's fighting the lion, he's fighting
the bear, he's fighting Goliath, he's fighting the Philistines, right? He was a man of action,
he was a man that was prepared for the job and that's why God chose him. Here's another example
I'll just read for you, the man of God Amos. Amos 714 says, "Then answered Amos and said to Amaziah,
'I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's son, but I was in herdmen a gatherer of sycamore fruit.'"
Right, he's just a worker, he's just a laborer. He wasn't, you know, in some sort of spiritual
lineage of priests or pastors or preachers, he was just a hard-working person and God saw from heaven,
hey, this man's a hard worker, he's got a good heart, let's make him the man of God. And that's
the same thing with Stephen. You know, it's not like we get some sort of lineage from Stephen that
makes him special. You know, that's what I like a lot about the pastors in our movement is it's not
like they have this super long lineage of Baptist pastors. Like, you know, Pastor Shelley's dad was
a Baptist pastor and his grandpa was a pastor. It doesn't work like that. It's like our pastor was
a software developer. He's a hard worker and God saw that he was a man fit for the job and chose
him for the job. You know, Pastor Anderson was an electrician and God saw that he had a good heart,
that he cared about things of God, that he took it seriously and made him the man of God, right?
And I give you example after example like that. It's not like these men were just, you know, raised
in some sort of pastor's family, which there's nothing wrong with being raised in a pastor's
family, okay? I'm just saying that it's not always those type of people that God chooses.
It's the people that work hard. You know, you don't want to wait for an opportunity to start
working hard. You want to start working hard and then the opportunity will meet you, right?
It's like, you know, these single guys, it's like instead of worrying so much about how bad other
women are and how there's no good women, why don't you just focus on being a good man? Why
don't you just focus on being a man that's worth marrying and focus about yourself and start working
hard inwardly rather than just pointing the finger at everyone else? Hey, you don't think that God
has a prepared woman for a prepared man? You don't think God can give a godly man a good wife? Why
wouldn't he do that? You know, a prudent wife, the Bible says, is of the Lord. Why would God not
give you that, right? You know, some of these guys, they need to stop pointing the finger outward and
pointing at themselves and just accept the hard pill of reality and just start working on it,
getting better. Same thing, you know, you want to be a good wife. You want to be a good spouse,
right? Don't point the finger at everyone else. Just start working hard. Just start working hard.
Just start focusing on yourself. You want to be a business owner someday. Well, be a good employee,
right? This goes for anything in life. I'll read for you 1 Corinthians 3.5 says, "Who then is Paul,
and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom he believed?" And I love this phrase, "Even as the
Lord gave to every man." You know, the most important thing when it comes to there being
a prepared place for a prepared person is that God has prepared people in this world for you to
preach the gospel to. That's the most important thing that God has prepared for you. God has
prepared for you souls that need to be saved that you need to reach with the gospel. Because the
Bible says here, "Hey, there's ministers even as the Lord gave to every man." You know, God has
given to every man in this world a minister to preach the gospel. But if you're not prepared for
that job, then that fruit is going to die, right? They're not going to hear the gospel. They're not
going to be saved. They're not going to go to heaven if you refuse to do your job, if you refuse
to be a prepared person. And, you know, there's no excuse, right? We have the soul-winning seminar.
We give you a handout. We teach you how to preach the gospel. There's no excuse not to be a soul
winner in this church, and God wants you to do it. God wants you to be a prepared person, and He has
a prepared place for you. Go back to Acts chapter number six. Acts chapter number six. The third
lesson from his life is that you could earn great rewards in heaven no matter your position. No
matter your position. Because some people would look at a guy like Stephen and say, "Well, he's
just a servant. He's just, you know, dealing with the widows. He's just dealing with the administrative
tasks. How can this guy be great in heaven?" And also, you know, maybe sometimes moms and stay-at-home
wives would look at themselves and say, "Well, how can I be greatly rewarded in heaven? Isn't it
always going to be the guy behind the pulpit and the guys running the show?" No, it's not always
going to be like that. And God doesn't reward you based on the position that you're in, okay? We'll
get to that in a second, but Acts chapter number 6, look at verse 7. It says, "This is the result of
what Stephen did. And the word of God increased, and the number of the disciples multiplied in
Jerusalem greatly, and a great company of the priests were obedient to the faith." Think about
this. If you are helping the kingdom of God, no matter what role that's in, whether that's the
pastor, whether that's a servant of the church, whether that's someone that comes and goes
soul-winning, whether that's someone that volunteers with the tasks around church or
prays for other people, in whatever capacity you're supporting and lifting up the kingdom of God.
Hey, if the kingdom of God is increasing, you're a part of that work, and you're going to be
rewarded for that work, right? Think about in warfare. It's not just infantrymen, riflemen,
that win wars, right? I mean, you have engineers, you have cooks, you have medical personnel,
you have commanders, you have officers, you have an air force, you have a navy.
It's all of this coming together for the same cause, right? Well, the kingdom of God is not
just nothing but apostles. It's not just nothing but pastors, nothing but deacons, nothing but
evangelists. No, it's the entire kingdom of God fulfilling each individual's role together.
That's what causes the work of God to increase. And notice what happened. It says that the Word of God
increased. Also, you know, if you just see that results are happening, hey, you know that you're
going to be rewarded for that work. And I think Steadfast Baptist Church is like, you just look
at the results, even in face of adversity, even in face of all the challenges we've had. It's like,
hey, people are growing here. Praise God. People are getting baptized here. People are getting saved.
Our attendance just continues to increase, right? So that shows me that there's hardworking people
in this church that care about the work of God. And hey, we need to make sure it always stays that
way. We don't want to just get complacent and say, oh, well, we're a great church today. Yeah,
we want to make sure we're still a great church next month, and still a great church in the coming
years, and still a great church to pass on to our children someday. That should be every church's
goal, right? And think about this also, because the point is that you could be greatly rewarded in
heaven no matter what your position is, right? The greatest thing that you could possibly be as a
Christian anyways is a servant. Do you know that? You look, "Oh, well, this person is just a servant.
How is this person going to be rewarded? I'm just a mother. I'm just serving my kids. I'm just serving
my husband. You're this employee. Oh, I'm just serving my employer." The greatest thing you could
ever be is a servant, and I'm going to prove that to you. Go to Luke chapter number 22, Luke chapter
number 22. Jesus' disciples here, they start arguing amongst themselves. Look at Luke 22,
verse 24. "There was also a strife among them. Which of them should be accounted the greatest?"
So, picture this. This is kind of funny. Human nature here, pride, right? The disciples, they're
arguing about who's going to be better. It's like, "Well, you know, I revived more people from the
dead, and no, I did more miracles. I cleaned more lepers. I helped more deaf people here." They're
arguing, "Well, I'm going to be the best in heaven," right? And this is how human nature is. It's
embarrassing, but we're all humans. We've all done it, 25. And he said unto them, "The kings of the
Gentiles," so like the people of the world, "exercise lordship over them, and they that exercise
authority upon them are called benefactors. But ye shall not be so. But he that is greatest among
you, let him be as the younger, and he that is chief as he that doth serve. For whether is greater,
he that sitteth at meat, or he that serveth, is not he that sitteth at meat, but I am among you
as he that serveth. You think about the greatest person that's ever lived, ever will live, is the
lord Jesus Christ. And what was he? A servant. He didn't come to this earth to have people fan him
and feed him grapes and carry him up on a chair and walk him around everywhere he goes. He came
to be a beast of burden, to be a servant to us, even though he's God. Even though he's perfect, high,
holy, lifted up, sinless, and we are just complete dirty rotten sinners, undeserving of salvation,
he came here to serve us. Talk about humility. And you got these disciples arguing about who's
going to be the greatest. And Jesus is saying, "Well, let me tell you something. I'm the greatest,
and you know what I am? A servant." So the best thing that you and I can ever be in our lives is
a servant. And that doesn't matter if you have a position of authority or not. It doesn't matter
if you're husband or wife, a boss, or an employee, a pastor, or a church member. In whatever position
you're in, if you want to be great in that position, just serve. Just make it all about serving other
people. And when you do that, you will be greatly rewarded in heaven because that's what Jesus is
saying. That's the best thing you could ever be. Go to Philippians chapter number two. Philippians
chapter number two. It's our human nature that always wants to see the outward appearance and
always wants to see the CEO of the company as the greatest person right and always wants to see the
commander in chief except for America as the greatest person right. No one takes our commander
in chief seriously obviously right but hey you always want to see the person you know that's
leading the charge as like the greatest they're just always going to be the best but look it's
not always that way. It can be a humble mother in a church. I'm sure there's been many churches
throughout history where the person rewarded by God the most has been a mother. I guarantee it and
I guarantee you in other churches it's been a guy that just works a blue collar job that just goes
to work really hard during the week and spends his extra time for free going soul winning and
volunteering with the church. That's a great work. You say well I'm not doing much. Yeah but you're
giving a lot of what you have to give. God sees that. Philippians chapter 2 verse 5 says let this
mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus who being in the form of God thought it not robbery to
be equal with God but made himself of no reputation. You know Jesus wasn't going around making a bunch
of TikTok videos trying to become famous. He wasn't you know ordaining himself and and doing
a bunch of weird stuff. He wasn't trying to get a reputation. He wasn't trying to be well known
and look he says and took upon him the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men and
being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself and became obedient unto death even the death of
the cross wherefore god also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name
that at the name of jesus every knee should bow of things in heaven and things in earth and things
under the earth and that every tongue should confess that jesus christ is lord to the glory of
god the father hey you want to be great you want to be used greatly by god sir because the man who
didn't even try to build a reputation for himself the man that wasn't trying to lift himself up
he was trying to serve other people is going to be the most exalted person in the history of the
world and every single person that's ever spoken against christ and all the people that hate them
will bow on their knees and give him glory someday wow that's incredible coming from a servant
coming from someone that made himself low what does that tell you the greatest thing you could
ever be is a servant and you can be greatly rewarded by god no matter what position you have
no matter what title you have no matter where you went to college no matter what country you're born
in no matter what your skin color is just be a servant and you'll be used greatly by god you
know this man steven just a servant right preached an awesome sermon stood in the face of persecution
it was martyred for christ just a servant right you don't think he's gonna be rewarded greatly
for that absolutely will fourth lesson we can get from his life this obvious one is that godly
christians will be persecuted godly christians will be persecuted let's look at verse number nine
of acts chapter six act six nine says then there arose certain of the synagogue which is called
the synagogue of the libertines and sirenians and alexandrians and of them of silicia and of asia
disputing with steven and they were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he
spake and they suburned men which said we have heard him speak blasphemous words against moses
and against god so you see so far here steven has all this opposition out of nowhere right
all these jews all these synagogue of satan christ-hating jews just come out of nowhere to
speak against steven and just and they suburn men unto him for what what has he done so far
he's just godly he's just a godly servant he's done absolutely nothing but yet he has this
persecution and this opposition against him for no reason other than him being godly now notice
this word subborn says then they suborned men which said we have heard him speak blasphemous
words against moses moses and against god i looked up the definition of this word it says
to bribe or induce someone unlawfully or secretly to perform some misdeed or to commit a crime
or to induce a person to give false testimony or to obtain false testimony from a witness so
you know since it's 9 11 here's your conspiracy plug all right here conspiracies exist conspiracies
are real conspiracies are all through your bible what is a conspiracy it's one or more people
conspiring planning to do something bad to do something evil to do something illegal look i
know that the media wants to like make you feel bad for believing in conspiracies but conspiracies
exist throughout humanity it's it's part of human nature right you see it right here in the bible
they're suborning men which said we have heard him speak blasphemous words against moses and
against god now is that true no it's a complete lie it's a complete false accusation but these
jews came together they conspired they suborned people so they bribed or induced someone to give
a false testimony against steven and guess what it's the same exact thing today it was the same
thing on 9/11 2001 it's the same thing that's happening in every country all throughout human
history read psalms chapter two you know the kings and the rulers of this earth set themselves
against the lord and against his anointed saying let us break their bands of thunder let us cast
their cords from us right so obviously the kings the princes of this world the people in leadership
they conspire against god they conspire against christianity and if you've been a part of this
church you realize that that is more true than sometimes we'd like to admit i'll read for you
second timothy 312 yay and all that will live godly in christ jesus shall suffer persecution hey
just like how it doesn't matter what your position is you could still earn great rewards in heaven
well here's a little bit of a more negative one it doesn't matter what your position is you could
still earn great persecution it doesn't matter that steven wasn't the apostle it doesn't matter
that steven wasn't the man in charge it doesn't matter that steven was just the servant he still
was persecuted to the point of martyrdom right and so you know you need to count the cost and
this goes back to point one of taking the work of god seriously taking christianity seriously and
realize that yeah you might be a layman you might be just a servant like steven was but guess what
you also can receive great persecution and there's coming a time during the great tribulation that
jesus warns us about where there will be great persecution of pastors no of all christians of
all christians and you need to get that reality settled deep into your heart today before it
comes so it's not just a total shock to you so it's not just a total surprise to you to wear
your moves so you could remain steadfast and realize yeah i may not be in any position of
leadership or anything that i might be a state home mom i might be a blue collar dad but hey you
could still receive great persecution no matter your position because the bible says hey all that
will live godly in christ jesus it doesn't say all that have a position it's all that will live
godly and now obviously when you read this story i mean it's just screaming to you that this is
very closely parallel to the story of christ right i mean the jews are subverting men just
have false accusations against him let's go over some of the similarities between jesus and steven
here so the first one obviously is that they're both servants right we already talked about that
jesus came to be a servant he didn't come to be served same thing with steven he's a servant
both shut the mouths of their adversaries both spoke with such wisdom that they shut the mouths
of their adversaries look at axe chapter 6 verse 10 it says and they were not able to resist the
wisdom and the spirit by which he spake i mean when steven's speaking when steven's preaching
the word of god it's so sound doctrine and so full of the holy ghost that hey these people they
can't say anything against it they can't disprove what he's saying right same thing with jesus go
to matthew chapter number 22 matthew chapter number 22 verse 41 and to give you some context
you know the saddest he's here trying to ask jesus this convoluted question about the resurrection
and a wife and a husband that were married and the husband died and she had like six other husbands
they all died and who's who's gonna be in the resurrection how are they gonna be married or
whatever and it's just this foolish question of course jesus answers makes them look dumb you know
same thing they try to tempt him by asking what the greatest commandment is he answers that makes
them look dumb but notice this in verse 41 it says while the Pharisees were gathered together
jesus asked them so now he's gonna ask them a question saying what think ye of christ
whose son is he they say unto him the son of david he saith unto them how then doth david in spirit
call him lord saying the lord said unto my lord sit thou on my right hand till i make thine enemies
thy footstool if david then call him lord how is he his son boom just drop in these questions on
them and and do they do they know how to answer it says no man was able to answer him a word
neither does any man from that day forth ask him any more questions jesus rose to these people so
hard he just destroyed them in this intellectual battle where they're like i'm just never gonna
ask jesus a question ever again just because he's too he's too wise he's too skilled he has too much
knowledge and you know what same thing with steven when he spoke they weren't able to resist the
things that he was saying you know the game sayers weren't able to resist him he had sound speech
that could not be condemned as titus talks about right here's another similarity go to at uh mark
14 and axe chapter 6 mark 14 and axe chapter 6 they're both brought before council they're both
brought before the judge in a sense right and had false testimony against them axe chapter 6 look
at verse 11 when they suburned men which said we have heard him speak blasphemous words against moses
and against god and they stirred up the people that sounds familiar and the elders and the scribes
and came upon him and caught him and brought him to the council and set up false witnesses which
said this man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place and the law for we
have heard him say that this jesus of nazareth shall destroy this place and shall change the
customs which moses delivered us and all that sat in the council looking steadfastly on him
saw his face as it had been face of an angel so these jews are of course lying about stephen saying
he hasn't ceased from speaking blasphemous words like not only has he blasphemed he just won't
stop blaspheming and he's saying that jesus is going to come destroy this place and change the
customs it's just all lies none of it's true you know and it goes to show that you know sometimes
you could have a bad day in court and still be right you know you could still be convicted of
something and still be right i mean how many men of god in the bible were thrown in jail for
preaching gospel does that make them bad does it make them wrong no i feel like sometimes people
are like don't want to touch people that have been to jail or whatever but you don't realize
that a lot of times people go to jail for stupid reasons a lot of times people lose in court as it
were for stupid reasons because you know they didn't follow what exodus talked about about
having judges that love truth and hate covetousness you know they just want to follow a political
agenda that's why you have so much bad judgment in our country but the same thing happened to
christ right i told you to mark 1455 and the chief priests and all the council sought for witness
against jesus to put him to death and found none so they couldn't find any evidence against christ
verse 56 for many bear false witness against him but their witness agreed not together and there
arose certain and bare false witness against him saying we heard him say i will destroy this temple
that is made with hands and within three days i will build another made without hands but neither
so did their witness agree together hey so you know if you've ever been lied about you ever have
people conspiring to come after you you're in good company because the same thing happened to the
lord jesus christ who had no sin and the same thing happened to steven who did nothing wrong here
right so just because these things are happening to you doesn't mean there's something wrong with
you it could be because there's something right with you honestly here's another similarity both
were martyred of course we know the lord jesus christ allowed himself to be crucified you know
they mocked him they spit on him they put a crown of thorns on his head they beat him made fun of
him put the nails through his hands and through his feet pierced his side they murdered him on the
cross he was martyred right well here's what happened to steven let's read a little bit of
acts chapter number seven verse 51 you know and of course we read act seven at the beginning of
the sermon and he's basically like i said just this whole sermon is basically a rebuke of the
jews let's start reading in verse number 51 it says ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart
and ears ye do always resist the holy ghost as your fathers did so do ye by the way this is hard
preaching not when you're preaching to a whole crowd that agrees with you when you're preaching
to people that want to kill you to people that hate you honestly the the smallest taste that
i've ever had of hard preaching was the city council and that was nothing near what what
steven was going through but that was probably the hardest i've ever spoke because everyone in
that room hates you everyone disagrees with you i mean when pastor shelley speaking they're like
it's like the demons are like coming out of them it's like what's going on here like that's actually
real hard preaching in opposition right and he's doing this in in the face of people that want to
kill them verse 52 which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted and and they have slain
them with which showed before of the coming of the just one of whom ye have been now the betrayers
and murderers he's calling these jews the murderers that they are who have received the law by the
disposition of angels and have not kept it when they heard these things they were cut to the heart
and they gnashed on him with their teeth that sounds familiar right but he being full of the
holy ghost looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of god and jesus standing on the
right hand of god and said behold i see the heavens open and the son of man standing on the
right hand of god you know i believe that god allowed stephen to see this vision to kind of
put his stamp of approval on stephen saying hey i'm with you i agree with what you just preached
i'm for you right now and he let him see heaven open and see the lord jesus christ sitting on the
right hand of the father and look at verse 57 then they cried out with a loud voice my jesus
doesn't preach your hate 911 kids run right that's what they're that's what these jews are yelling
a bunch of idiots a bunch of demon possessed morons they cried with a loud voice and stopped their ears
and ran upon him with one accord cast him out of the city and stoned him and the witnesses laid
down their clothes at a young man's feet whose name was Saul they stoned steven calling upon
god and saying lord jesus receive my spirit and he kneeled down and cried with a loud voice lord
lay not this sin to their charge and when he had said this he fell asleep you see because
steven was a man of god that was full of the holy spirit and what was it they couldn't speak
against the words that he said they couldn't gain say the words that he said so they couldn't beat
what he was saying they didn't have better ideas they didn't have truth on their side so instead
they wanted him to shut up and when they couldn't shut him up you know what they did next they killed
him and this is this is always the plan against christianity fight against it fight against it
lose because you don't have the truth and we do then try to shut us up try to silence us and you
know what comes next try to kill us it's happened all throughout history it's what will happen again
it's what jesus warned us about in the all of it discourse we know it's coming this is the plan
this is the conspiracy of the wicked is to kill christians and it was this conspiracy against
steven why because all that we will have godly in christ jesus shall suffer persecution period
oh yeah he's just a servant yeah he suffered persecution as just a servant yeah he's just
helping the widows yeah he was just doing the administrative task but when he spoke the word
of god it doesn't matter who you are when you're speaking the word of god people are going to hate
you because they hate christ it's not you that they really hate jesus said me they hate jesus said
right it's not really pastor shelly that they hate it's not really the other pastors of our
movement that they hate it's not really you and i that they hate when we walk into this church
it's the lord jesus christ because any other church that believes what we do also is hated by the
wicked and any other person like steven who preached the word of god to the jews you know
that's the adversary at that time they hated him too they wanted to kill him too and jesus warned
us about this this should be no surprise to us go to matthew chapter number 10 matthew chapter number
10 matthew 10 22 and he shall be hated of all men for my name's sake but he that endured to the end
shall be saved but when they persecute you in this city flee into another for verily i say unto you
you shall not have gone over the cities of israel till the son of man become the disciple is not
above his master nor the servant above his lord it is enough for the disciple to be as his master
and the servant as his lord they have called the master of the house beelzebub how much more shall
they call them of his household and you know if the world if if the wicked aspects of this world
never treat you like they treated jesus you know it makes me wonder are you even jesus's disciple
because what they did to jesus was they lied about him what they did to jesus was they railed
against him they mocked him they conspired against him they had a false trial against him
and they killed him they called him a blasphemer that's what the world did to the lord jesus
christ so if the entire world loves you it loves everything that you say makes me realize you're
not a disciple of christ you're not a disciple of christ these churches that preach the positive
only sermons they never get anyone upset they never make the news they never get any protesters
hey it's because you're not the disciple of christ verse 26 fear them not therefore there's
nothing covered that shall not be revealed and hid that shall not be known what i tell you in
darkness that speak ye in light and what you hear in the ear that preach ye upon the housetops
and fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul but rather fear him which
is able to destroy both soul and body in hell you know eternity settled the score between the
jews and steven here right eternity settled the score between the lord jesus christ and the jews
in the bible why because one went to heaven and one went to hell right steven went to heaven and
these jews that don't believe in christ go straight to hell so don't be afraid of him that could kill
the body rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell right and so we
shouldn't fear persecution we shouldn't back down when persecution comes our way rather we should
just keep preaching on the housetops what jesus told us in the ear right we could should just keep
saying exactly what the bible says no matter who anyone thinks about it because eternity will
settle the score it doesn't matter even if they win in this life they won't in the next we win
forever and there's nothing they can do to ever stop that that is how it is verse 29
or not two sparrows sold for a farthing one of them shall not fall to the ground without your
father but the very hairs of your head are all numbered fear ye not therefore you're of more
value than many sparrows whosoever therefore shall confess me before men him will i confess also
before my father which is in heaven but whosoever shall deny me before men here's the people that
won't preach the full counsel of god him will i also deny before my father which is in heaven
think not that i am come to send peace on earth i came not to send peace but a sword this is just
the reality this is just the way it is christianity is not all about sunshine and rainbows and just
having peace all the time no there's battles no there's oppositions get over it it is how it is
if you want to go to a church where there's always peace and no problems you could find just about
any other church in america just about any other church in this area hey you can go over to the
nazarene church over there and join pastor vanilla soybean latte and have him go serve some subway
sandwiches to pedophiles yeah you can go to that church and yeah there'll be peace you can be weak
you could do nothing for god you could be the enemy of god if you want to do that but actually
if you want to be on the right side if you want to be on steven's side hey that's just how it is
division persecution this is just the reality it's not fun it's not pleasant but it's just reality
accept reality or quit that's your options last point here i'll make it quick is that god can
use your tribulation for good god can use your tribulation for good and i didn't say god will
use your tribulation for good i said god can use your tribulation for good and i think that
god using your tribulation for good depends on your response to your persecution and your
response to your tribulation because think about how stephen responded to his persecution well
first we see that he just continues steadfast he just keeps preaching the word of god in the
face of these people that want to kill him in the face of these people that are lying about him
he didn't change his message i'll read for you second timothy four two says preach the word
the incident in season out of season reprove rebuke exhort with all long suffering and doctrine you
know steven didn't just say well you know you're right i changed my mind if you go back to the greek
uh the jews didn't kill jesus if you go back to the greek you know the prophets of god in the
past never made anyone mad if you go back to the greek you don't always resist the holy ghost you
actually always accept the holy ghost you guys are great people wonderful people right no that's not
how his attitude was he stuck with what the bible says even though it was an ugly truth for these
people to hear he didn't quit preaching the word of god and lastly what's another way that he
accepted his persecution was that he finished his life with a charitable heart with a loving heart
look at acts chapter number seven verse 55 let's read this again but he being full of the holy
ghost looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of god and jesus standing on the right
hand of god and said behold i see the heavens open and the son of man standing on the right hand of
god then they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and ran upon him with one accord
and cast him out of the city and stoned him and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young
man's feet whose name was Saul and they stoned Stephen calling upon god and saying lord jesus
receive my spirit and he kneeled down and cried with a loud voice notice this lord lay not this
sin to their charge when he had said this he fell asleep and this also is another similarity between
the lord jesus christ and Stephen when lord jesus christ died he said father forgive them
for they know not what they do right and Stephen is just saying basically the same thing hey lord
lay not this sin to their charge you know our desire should always be for people to be safe
our desire should always be for people to be forgiven by god and even in the midst of
reprobates which i guarantee you there were some reprobates cruising the lord jesus christ
and even in the midst of reprobates and i guarantee you there were some reprobates
in the midst of the people stoning steven sometimes there's people that are just dragged along for
the ride sometimes sometimes people bring their kids to a protest preaching protesting against
a church they're young children you think these young children know what they're doing absolutely
not and you know our desire for people that are caught in the balances should always be lord
forgive them for they know not what they do lord lay not this sin to their chart that should always
be our heart for people now of course there's other parts of the bible we know that once a
person's reprobate they're rejected by god there's no more hope of salvation and we're not supposed
to hope for good for those people but realize that there's a lot of people that you may think is a
reprobate that may not be and you should always try if possible to get people to benefit the doubt
and love people even if they're your enemies love your enemies the bible says right now not love
god's enemies but love your enemies pray for them and something and it's okay sometimes to pray and
if prayer lord if this person has any hope if this person's not a reprobate will you please
soften their heart will you please allow them to hear the gospel will you please allow them
to hear the truth lord please lay not this into their charge and if they are a reprobate lord
please judge them it's okay to pray like that right that way you continue to have a charitable
heart but not a bleeding heart have the heart that the lord jesus christ had had the heart that
steven had but don't try to have a heart that's more loving than god or less we should try to
love the way god loves we should try to love the way steven loved and how did and and realize that
you know because getting back getting back to the point about god working out your tribulation for
good i told you how steven responded to his tribulation that's he did those two things he
kept preaching and he finished with a charitable heart that's why i think god used his tribulation
for good but just realize that not everything that's bad that happens to you is actually bad
right you know the blind man in john chapter 9 you know the question was asked why was this man born
blind was it his sin or was it his parents sin and jesus said you know this guy didn't sin
either did his parents sin but it was for the glory of god right so that jesus can be glorified
so we could have a story in the word of god of jesus healing a man that's why he was born blind
he was born blind so that jesus can heal him right and realize that not every bad thing happens to
you is always bad because something really amazing came out of the death of steven because you could
look things through a one-dimensional lens and just say steven was killed that is bad okay is
steven being killed bad yeah that sucks right no one wants to be martyred no one wants to be
murdered but there was an amazing good that came from it look at acts chapter number seven let's
read verse 58 and cast him out of the city and stoned him and the witnesses laid down their
clothes at a young man's feet whose name was Saul you want to know who was a witness to the martyrdom
of Stephen who was a witness to the murder of Stephen the man who would someday become the
apostle Paul the man who would someday change the world just turn the world upside down with the
gospel of Christ getting the gospel to the entire eastern world leading the charge starting churches
getting Christianity off the ground he witnessed the stoning of Stephen you don't think that left
an impact on the apostle Paul you don't think that made a deep impact on his heart when he realized
that he was on the wrong side of things the things that he allowed happen the the preaching
that he heard Stephen preach and he allowed that to happen you don't think that motivated him to
serve Christ better and where would we be today without the apostle Paul right all from who a
servant all from a lowly servant who decided to care about the word of God who decided to take
it seriously who decided to be a prepared person who decided to keep preaching in face of persecution
and to handle it the right way because of his example we have Christianity that we have today
that's incredible that's an incredible uh just testimony of a servant and of a Christian in
general and it just goes to show that God can use your tribulation for good and you don't always
know what that looks like you don't always know how God is going to use it for good but hey just
make sure just focus on responding the correct way and let God figure out how he's going to use it
for good hey you just keep preaching no matter what you just keep having a charitable heart you
just keep loving people no matter what and God will make sure to work it out for good I'll close
with this Romans 8 28 says and we know that all things work together for good to them that love
God to them who are the called according to his purpose you know I can't think of a more fitting
verse for the life of Stephen you know if you're just only looking things through the carnal lens
you would say man this is a rough life he's just a servant that gets persecuted that gets stoned
hey but God's able to work this thing out for good and I guarantee you that Stephen
has an incredible amount of reward in heaven just an absolutely incredible amount of reward in heaven
and realize that there's nothing stopping you from also being greatly rewarded by God you don't have
to become an apostle that's not even possible anyways nowadays you don't have to become a
pastor though we need pastors and it'd be great if people became pastors you don't need to become
a deacon or evangelist though it's great to do those things you can do great things for God as
the person that you are right now just as a recap number one the work of God should be taken very
seriously number two is a prepared place for a prepared person number three you can earn great
rewards in heaven no matter your position number four godly Christians will be persecuted and
number five God can use your tribulation for good let's have a word of prayer Lord thank you so much
for this day and thank you for the word of God thank you for the story of Stephen and just thank
you that he was truly a steadfast Christian that he's able to be a great example for us i pray that
you help us to follow in his footsteps just to take the word of God seriously to be prepared
to continue in face of persecution and I pray that any persecution that steadfast Baptist church
has received and will receive in the future Lord I pray that you would work it out
for good for your honor and for your glory in Jesus name we pray amen can I get that mic please
go to our fourth song my faith has found a resting place 150 150 my faith has found a resting place
song 150 my faith has found a resting place has found a resting place
trust the ever once for me shall miss