My thoughts this evening, as
the Lord will enable, are particularly to be found in the last few verses
of this extensive chapter, and particularly verse 51, where
Stephen says to these men, ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised
in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost, as your
fathers did, so do ye." This was really a tremendous witness
that this man Stephen brought before these men. He had given
an account, as it were, of the history of the Jews. He went through the way in which
God had systematically intervened in the history of this people,
this people blessed in so many ways. with the revelation of
God to them. And yet, for all of their blessings,
a people who relentlessly opposed the things that God showed them. He showed them that wherever
God had acted, there had been an antagonism and an oppression
of those whom God had sent. Wherever the Lord works, we find
that an opposition rises against Him. It has always been the case
in the history of Israel. It was always the case in the
time of our Lord. and it has proved to be so ever
since. Our Lord Jesus Christ, in this
passage that Stephen accounts and relates to us, is called
the Just One. And it is this title, this beautiful
phrase that is used to describe the Lord, in which Stephen says
in verse 52, Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? And they have slain them which
showed before of the coming of the just one, of whom ye have
been now the betrayers and murderers. Stephens premise, his argument
if you like, was that just in the same way as the prophets
and those who revealed God's will in past times had been systematically
opposed and thwarted and oppressed and slain. So, nothing had changed
and these very men who were now trying Stephen had been personally
guilty and were culpable before God of the slaying, of the betraying
and the murder of the Lord Jesus Christ. Stephen here calls him
the Just One. This title that is given by Stephen,
I think in the context is significant. It is a very suitable title for
the Lord Jesus Christ. It speaks of one who is uniquely
holy. It speaks of one who is in his
very nature righteous and perfect, one who before God is regarded
in all innocency and he as the just one is the one who is uniquely
able amongst men to supply that righteousness without which no
man shall see the Lord. And so here we are directed to
look to the Just One. This is the culmination, this
is where is the climax of Stephen's narrative. He began early, right
back at the time of Abraham. He built his argument up through
the history of Moses. He showed how Jesus or Joshua
in the Old Testament had brought that tabernacle into the land
of Israel. How ultimately David came to
the throne and how the temple was raised but then he cuts all
of that away and he says this Moses he spoke of one who was
to come not one who would be housed in a temple made of stone
not one who would be blessed and praised by the labours and
the works of the hands of men. We've proved that in the past.
You made your golden calf. It was an idolatrous thing. And
here is that same idolatry being perpetuated in these days. You're no different from the
wicked forefathers who went before you. And you have killed the
just one. Now, these men, I am absolutely
certain, knew exactly what Stephen was saying here. This reference
that was being made to the Just One, this reference which speaks
of the Lord Jesus Christ, was a phrase that they would be familiar
with. In Isaiah 26, there is a phrase
there in the seventh verse which says, the way of the just is
uprightness. The Old Testament is littered
with phrases that speak about the way in which the just one,
the holy one, the righteous one would be revealed. In Deuteronomy,
we are told, he is the rock. His work is perfect, for all
His ways are judgment. A God of truth and without iniquity,
just and right is He. Now, when Stephen identified
the Lord Jesus Christ as the Just One, he was alluding, in
his own knowledge of the Old Testament Scriptures, and in
the certain knowledge that these priests would have of these Scriptures,
to the fact that Jesus Christ is the One who was here spoken
of in the Old Testament. In Ecclesiastes chapter 7 we're
told there is a just man that perisheth in his righteousness. In Lamentations 4, verse 13,
for the sins of her prophets and the iniquities of her priests
that have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her. This was exactly the argument
that Stephen is bringing. You have had, as the prophets
and the priests, you have had the just one in your midst. and you slew him, you murdered
him. The people in the days of the
Lord's entrance into Jerusalem, they fulfilled the prophecy of
Zechariah so exactly that it must have caused these priests
to quake. They were so familiar with these
Old Testament prophecies regarding the Messiah. They were living
these Old Testament prophecies as far as the coming Messiah
was concerned. They were constantly looking
for him. Listen to what the ninth chapter
of Zechariah says. Rejoice greatly, O daughter of
Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, thy King cometh unto
thee. He is just, and having salvation,
lowly and riding upon an ass, and upon a coat, the foal of
Annas, the people lauded the Lord Jesus Christ with these
very words as he entered into Jerusalem. He was riding upon
the coat of an ass. This was most certainly the fulfilment
of this messianic prophecy from the book of Zechariah. The Lord
Jesus Christ was that just one and undoubtedly that is the force
of Stephen's testimony before these men. And it's wonderful
when we reflect at the way in which the Lord God, the Father,
was pleased to manifest this title, the Just One, upon the
witnesses to the work and the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was called the Just One. Do you know who called him the
Just One? Pilate and Pilate's wife both
testified to the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ was the just
one. And we see that all of those
around about the cross, around about the work of the Lord Jesus
Christ testified to his holiness and his perfection and his innocency. In Matthew chapter 27, verse
19, we read these words. When he was set down on the judgment
seat, his wife, that is Pilate's wife, sent unto him, saying,
Have thou nothing to do with that just man? For I have suffered many things
this day in a dream because of him. Very interesting, I wonder,
and I reflected upon this sometime, I wonder how much of the Old
Testament scriptures Pilate's wife knew. She says, I have suffered
much in a dream concerning this man. Have thou nothing to do
with that just man? Could perhaps she have been familiar
with some of the ministry of the Lord Jesus? Was this a divine
revelation that was given to her? Was the Holy Spirit impressing
upon her mind here in this dream that there was something special,
something awesome about this man? Why did she use this phrase
concerning him? The Old Testament gives us some
indication that there may well have been a spiritual dimension
to this revelation that she received. She said she had suffered much
in a dream this day concerning this just man. In Job chapter
seven, that old witness to the glory of God writes,
When I say, my bed shall comfort me, my couch shall ease my complaint,
then thou scarest me with dreams. Thou terrifiest me through visions,
so that my soul chooseth strangling and death rather than my life. There is witness in the Old Testament
of fearsome dreams and visions being laid upon men and women
in order for God to reveal something of His person. Nebuchadnezzar
in Daniel chapter 4 could say something similar, I saw a dream
which made me afraid and the thoughts upon my bed and the
visions of my head troubled me. And this was the end, this was
the reason for that troubling dream that came upon Nebuchadnezzar. And I think it's interesting
also in the context of Pilate's judgment of Christ. I saw a dream
which made me afraid and the thoughts upon my bed and the
visions of my head troubled me, said Nebuchadnezzar, to the intent
that the living may know that the Most High ruleth in the kingdom
of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will, and setteth up over
it the basest of men." Here we see that this woman had a troubled
night, a dream in which she understood something of the nature of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Pilate was about to sit on judgment. This woman knew that Pilate was
sitting upon judgment of a just and innocent man, and she warned
him off. She said, have nothing to do
with this man. I've suffered many things. Here
we see that God, it appears, ordained that a testimony should
be borne to the holiness and the uprightness of the Lord Jesus
Christ by the very people who were involved in his false judgment
and in his execution. Pilate said in the 24th verse
of Matthew 27, I am innocent of the blood of this just person. This name, again, coming to the
fore in the identification of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was
betrayed, but his priestly accusers were forced to employ false witnesses,
and they knew that these witnesses were false. Pilate, his judge,
acknowledged his justness. His wife did. And even Judas,
that betrayed him to the Jews, went out and hanged himself because
of the conscience that he had This name appears to have been
used purposefully by the apostles and by Stephen, as we have seen
on this occasion, later by Paul and by Ananias, in order to convey
to us something of the nature and the work of the Lord Jesus
Christ. And interestingly, whenever we
see it used of the Lord in the New Testament, it is in connection
with God's covenant purpose. That clearly was the intention
of Stephen. He gave a whole account of the
way in which God had faithfully revealed himself down through
the ages. And again, we see elsewhere,
that when it is used, it is used in the context of an emphasis
upon the covenant relationship which God has with his people. That there is a Messiah, that
the Christ, the promised one, the God-man would come and that
he would have laid upon him all the sins of his people, that
he would carry all the obligations of his people, and that he and
he alone would be answerable to God for their salvation and
their deliverance and their peace. Let me just give you a couple
of examples. In Acts chapter 3 in verse 13, we read this concerning
the Lord. It's Peter that's speaking. Peter
and John, as they went up to the temple, to the beautiful
gate, and they were called to give an account. And in the 13th
verse of chapter 3, this is what Peter says. And remember, this
idea of the covenant God is picked up whenever God is shown to have
been faithful to the people of his choice. And here it is immediately in
the beginning of these verses. The God of Abraham and of Isaac
and of Jacob, the God of our fathers. That tells us immediately
that we're speaking about the covenant God. He hath glorified
his Son Jesus, whom ye delivered up and denied him in the presence
of Pilate, when he was determined to let him go. But ye denied
the Holy One and the just. That was the name that was given
by Peter on that occasion to the Lord Jesus Christ. And desired
a murderer to be granted unto you, and killed the prince of
life, whom God hath raised up from the dead, whereof we are
witnesses. A little later in Acts chapter
22, verse 13, Ananias is speaking. And again, we see this covenant
purpose revealed. Paul is speaking, I'm sorry,
but he's telling what Ananias had said. Ananias says, Paul
came unto me and stood and said unto me, Brother Saul, receive
thy sight. And the same hour I looked up
upon him. And he said, The God of our fathers
hath chosen thee that thou shouldst know his will, and see that just
one, and shouldst hear the voice of his mouth, for thou shalt
be his witness unto all men of what thou hast seen and heard. And sure, that when Saul of Tarsus
heard Ananias' words, that here the God of our fathers hath chosen
thee, that thou shouldst know his will, and see that just one,
and shouldst hear the voice of his mouth, he would have remembered
immediately, standing there in the presence of these judges,
and hearing Stephen say exactly the same words, and using exactly
the same term to describe the Lord Jesus. that Stephen identifies
Jesus, the just one, who has come from God to save his people
in fulfilment of all that the Jews had previously been told
and taught by the prophets and the revelation of God. Yet, just
as the prophets were rejected and killed by the Jews in the
past, the Just One now was rejected and killed by the Jews of the
present. That's exactly what the apostle
meant. The Jews, they knew who this
just one was, from Zechariah and from elsewhere, and Stephen
was emphatic in laying this charge to their account. This Holy One,
this Just One, was the Messiah, was Jesus Christ, was King over
His people, was the Saviour that was spoken of in Zechariah 9. Yet He was meek, humble and riding
upon an ass. It is clear from the account
of Jesus entering into Jerusalem that the common people clearly
understood, Luke chapter 19, that this Jesus was the one who
had been spoken of in Zechariah 9. and undoubtedly the Jews would
have understood that too. And Stephen's whole testimony
is based upon this great fact, that Jesus Christ is the way
of salvation. Jesus Christ is the one sent
by God in order to deliver his people to bring in peace, to
establish that relationship with God that had been broken through
the fall and to bring that chosen, that covenant people back to
God. This testimony that Stephen bore
was clearly going to be his last testament. His sermon was going
to cost him dearly and so it proved. Acts chapter 7 is an
exquisite rendering of the whole of Jewish history, a simple summary,
but it was a condemning critique upon these Jews, and they knew
it. The theme was often returned
to by the Lord Himself and by the disciples. A revelation was
given and rejected. Direction was provided and ignored. In Matthew 23, the Lord says,
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because ye build
the tombs of the prophets and garnish the sepulchres of the
righteous. And say, if we had been in the
days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with
them in the blood of the prophets. whereof ye be witnesses unto
yourselves, that ye are the children of them that killed the prophets. And what was true then is just
as true today. God has spoken by the Lord Jesus
Christ. The covenant God has revealed
the way of salvation. He has brought that great and
precious work to the attention of this world. He has declared
what is the way of salvation, that all the promises of God
are to be found in Christ, that they are fulfilled in Him, that
He is the Ye and Amen, and it is a done work and it is complete. And yet that revelation is consistently
and persistently denied and the direction which the Word of God
gives to look unto Jesus, that just one, is systematically ignored. The allegations made against
Stephen were the same allegations that were being made against
the whole of the church. And it was no accident that Saul
stood by and that the clothes of Stephen's persecutors were
laid at his feet. It was his mandate to destroy
the church. It was his purpose to bring to
naught the work of Jesus Christ. And in the name of religion,
whether it be the religion of the Old Testament Jews, Whether
it be the religion of the Pharisees, whether it be the religion of
Saul of Tarsus, whether it be the religion of these Pharisees
that stood up in the synagogues and contended with Stephen, or
if it be the religion of our day, it is always the purpose
of religion to gainsay the person and the work of the Lord Jesus
Christ. That is why we can have no confidence
in the structures of religion in our own day, just as there
never has been any confidence in the structures of religion. It is inward conformity to Christ
and not outward conformity to ritual that reveals the truth
and the living spirit in the life of an individual. God had
been good, faithfully, over the years, over the centuries, sending
prophets, sending leaders, sending lively oracles, revealing himself,
and he was consistently misunderstood, misapplied, and generally missed
altogether. What was true of the patriarchs
and of the fathers was true of the priests. They treasured their
law. They valued their temple. They thought their rites and
their ceremonies and their customs were of the essence. and they
missed the just one. They missed the Lord Jesus Christ. They were trapped by their traditions
and they were blind to the presence of God amongst them. And that
was their hypocrisy. Today, people treasure their
churches, they treasure their denominations, they treasure
their connections, they treasure their reputations, and they imagine
that in some way they are going to find God in these temples. The Lord God does not live in
temples. The Most High dwelleth not in
the temples made with hands. Heaven is my throne, and the
earth is my footstool. What house will ye build me? Stephen goes on to say to these
men, ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always
resist the Holy Ghost. And that's exactly where religion
is today. It must be, it always is. Uncircumcised in heart. This was the condition of these
men. They proudly went around with
this reputation of being circumcised in the flesh. They held that
circumcision to be the mark of their history and their heritage. This was their tradition and
this was their hope. but it was merely an outward
cutting of the flesh. They were uncircumcised in heart. There had never been the conviction
of their spirit. There had never been the opening
of their heart. Do you know what that opening
of your heart means? Do you know when people say,
when they're giving these calls to unbelievers. Open your heart
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Have you ever seen an open heart?
If you open somebody's heart, they're dead. That's what it
is. If you have a broken heart, if
you have a burst heart, if you have a cut heart, you're dead. And that's why it is impossible
to open your heart to the Lord Jesus Christ, because it requires
that you are slain and that you are brought back to life again. And that's what God does with
his people. When he quickens them, he slays
them, and he brings out of that death the newness of life, which
is the new creation in the Lord Jesus Christ. These men were
uncircumcised of heart. They claimed to be Abraham's
children, but they were not the children of faith. They did not
have the mark of the true children of God. They were uncircumcised
of heart and they were uncircumcised of ear. They had a slavish attendance
to the law and the energies of the individual in fulfilling
and accomplishing that law. They thought it was all about
free will. They thought it was about dedicating
themselves to the service of their own good works, that they
would serve God by the things that they did, that they would
honour him by the labours of their hand. But they did not
hear the still small voice. They did not hear the promptings
of the Holy Spirit. They attended to the hearing
of the law. They attended to the ministry
of their old religion. But they could not hear the good
news in the gospel of salvation. They resisted. They contradicted. They persecuted the prophets.
They showed that this revelation of the Messiah was of no importance
to them. Indeed, when the Just One came,
they betrayed Him. They murdered Him. Stephen says,
ye do always resist the Holy Ghost. The work of the Holy Ghost
is to reveal the Lord Jesus Christ. and powerfully and efficaciously
he reveals the Lord Jesus Christ to those to whom he is sent by
God the Father in the covenant purposes of grace. The Holy Spirit
cannot be resisted in the matter of the elect's salvation. Here he was resisted because
these men were reprobate It speaks to us of the distinctiveness
and the particularity of the work of salvation and the covenant
of grace to God's elect people. The Lord's people are called
to trust in the just one. Do not miss this. That's exactly
the implication of Zechariah's prophecy. The call went out in
the day of that prophet, rejoice greatly O daughter of Zion. Who is this daughter of Zion?
It is the people of God's choice. It is the elect of God. This
is the holy Jerusalem that comes down out of heaven. This is the
people who are the beneficiaries of the love and the grace of
God. These are the people who have
been chosen in Him. Rejoice greatly, O daughter of
Zion. Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem. Behold, thy King cometh unto
thee. He is just and having salvation. The just one is holy. The just one is righteous and
is innocent. He is the Saviour. He comes and
becomes sin for His people. He takes the curse that is upon
their shoulders. He takes the guilt. He takes
the condemnation and He dies in their place. And as King,
raised again from the dead, placed over the church as his people
and given all authority by his Father. He comes in power with
the behest of the Holy Spirit to gather his people. Therefore
this call is to his church, rejoice greatly. His people are united
to Him. His people see in Him, Jesus
the just, Jesus the sinless One who became sin for them, that
they might become the righteousness of God in Him. Now believing
this and understanding this is not simply knowing the history,
the history that Stephen spoke of the Old Testament revelation,
nor indeed that which is revealed of the Lord Jesus Christ himself.
but it is seeing him with the eye of faith. It is knowing him
who supplies holiness. It is trusting in him who has
provided for every need, who is the sufficiency for all our
need, and who is alone the saviour of his people, who satisfies
divine justice. Stephen applied that lesson to
his hearers And the implication that they had slain the Messiah
was clear to these men. And the reaction? Well, we see
it in these concluding verses. They hated him. They hated him
for pointing out their self-righteous works religion. And they, we're
told, gnashed upon him with their teeth. I may have remarked about
this before, but I don't know how literally we can take that
statement. But if we take it literally,
these men bit him with their teeth. Such was the ayah, such
was the anger, such was the detestation of this message, that these men
literally bit him. Well, they gnashed on him with
their teeth. In the 37th Psalm and verse 12,
we read these words. The wicked plotteth against the
just and gnasheth upon him with his teeth. The wicked plotteth
against the just and gnasheth upon him with his teeth. And here's our lesson. This is
what we're told. that the psalmist says the wicked
would gnash upon the just with their teeth. Certainly the Lord
Jesus Christ was the just one. Certainly he was persecuted Certainly
He was crucified. Certainly He was betrayed and
murdered by these self-righteous hypocrites, these stiff-necked
and uncircumcised in heart and ears who always resist the Holy
Ghost. Certainly the Lord Jesus Christ
was the object of their hatred and He bore the sins of His people
on the cross of their crucifixion. But the lovely thing is also
here, that Stephen was just. That as Christ was the just one,
so Stephen was just also. They gnashed on him with their
teeth. This man who only spoke the truth,
this man who only declared what he had seen and heard of the
Lord Jesus Christ, this man who brought the message directly
to their ears and their hearts and laid it clearly before them
and accused them to their faces of being the perpetrators of
this horrendous crime. Those who are in the Just One
are as just as He is. They are holy. righteous, pure
and innocent in the sight of God because they are in him,
the just one. That's the great testimony of
the gospel. We don't have to keep running.
We don't have to keep laboring. There is rest to be Labouring,
working, seeking to serve God in order to please Him is a direct
contradiction of the innocence, perfection and holiness that
the Just One has secured and provided for His people. Our
rest is because Jesus is the Just One and we are in Him. We know, says Paul in Romans
chapter 8 verse 28, we know that all things work together for
good to them that love God, to them who are the called according
to his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he
also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his son, the
just one. that he might be the firstborn
among many brethren. Moreover, whom he did predestinate,
them he also called, and whom he called, them he also justified,
made just in him, and whom he justified, them he also glorified. What shall we say then to these
things? If God be for us, who can be
against us? He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also
freely give us all things? Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. It is God that makes us just. who is he that condemneth, it
is Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even
at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for
us. There's a lovely couple of verses
at the end of Isaiah chapter 45. Just turn with me, please,
to Isaiah chapter 45. We're told here at the end of
these chapters, chapter seven of Acts, that Stephen looked
up and he saw the Lord Jesus at the right hand of God, standing,
waiting to welcome him home to glory. It is such a beautiful
picture. Here is this man taken out by
his enemies. brought to that place of execution
and there he kneels down in the dirt and they pick up their stones
and one by one they begin to throw them at him. They hit his
back, they hit his shoulders, they hit his legs, they hit his
head and soon life starts to ebb from this man. But as he
dies As he goes to sleep, as we read last week, he looks up
and he sees the Saviour there standing at the right hand of
God. What a lovely sight. Standing,
mind you. That one who is seated at the
right hand of the Majesty on high is standing, waiting to
welcome his child home. On the 21st 22nd verse of Isaiah chapter
45. Look unto me and be ye saved,
all the ends of the earth, for I am God and there is none else. I have sworn by myself, the word
has gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and shall not return, that unto
me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear. Surely, shall
one say, in the Lord have I righteousness and strength. Even to him shall
men come, and all that are incensed against him shall be ashamed. In the Lord shall all the seed
of Israel be justified and shall glory. May the Lord bless these
thoughts to us and remind us of the great privilege that we
have of being numbered together in the covenant of grace with
the just one and the holy. Amen. Almighty God, we thank Thee for
Thy faithfulness down through the ages of Thy Church in revealing
the Messiah, Jesus Christ, the Just One and Holy, to Thy people. We thank Thee for those in days
gone by who in the time of the Patriarchs and the Prophets,
in the time of Abraham and Moses and of David and of Solomon,
saw and understood the significance of the work of Jesus Christ.
We thank Thee for those in the days of Thy life here upon earth,
precious Saviour, who saw and knew Thee as the Messiah, the
Son of God, that taketh away the sins of the world. We thank
thee for those who in the days of the Church, like Stephen,
could understand that thou art the Just One and Holy. and we bless thee that thou hast
continued to reveal as the great covenant God thy way of salvation
to one and another throughout the ages of thy church as thou
hast sent thy Holy Spirit to gather in, to quicken, and to
bestow the gift of faith. We pray that this evening thou
wilt be merciful to us in this place, that thou wilt give us
a sense of our union with thee, that thou wilt give us that gift
of faith, that eye of understanding, that ear to hear, that thou wilt
open hearts and that thou wilt be pleased to quicken even the
dead and bring to life those who have yet to know Thee as
Lord and Saviour. And we pray that for those of
us who have entered into that experience of Thy grace, Thou
wilt keep us ever mindful that our standing before the Holy
God is entirely based upon the just one and holy of thy purpose,
that he is the source and ground of our acceptance with thee,
and all has been accomplished and all has been delivered, and
that we are blessed in him. We look unto him this evening,
the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We thank thee for him and all
that he has accomplished. We pray that thou wilt increase
our awareness and our understanding of the work that he has accomplished,
that we may grow in grace and in a knowledge of the truth.
Thy word is truth. He is the truth. We pray that
our knowledge of him will increase as the days of our pilgrimage
pass. For Jesus' sake, amen.