The world was running in slow motion now. He had been dragged outside the city. There was a mad crowd around him, hurling insults at him, treading clumsily on his legs pressing them into the sharp cobbles of the road tugging at his skin. His body was covered in spit, an odour of a hundred breaths despising his senses. He was petrified, hanging on to one of his aggressors arms with all his might, trying his hardest to ease the pressure from where they had grabbed the hair on his head. That part all happened so fast, but it seemed to last for ages.

They dragged him for about 30 minutes. Several times he had tried to get away, once he was close but the crowd was just too thick. They relentlessly punished him before their punishment began. By the time they had reached the site where he would be stoned, his body was already bruised and bleeding.

They left him lying there as they formed a u shape around him and a lull descended as they passed uneasy glances at each other. They were sure they wanted to do this, but they were also unsure.

Stoning is not a pleasant way to die. The idea behind it is that you throw stones at someone that are not big enough to inflict serious damage on their own. It’s quantity not quality. I expect it took a good number of minutes for the process to complete, and even then, you wouldn’t necessarily be dead when they stopped. They would stone you until you stopped moving at the very least, if they were merciful they would crush your head.

Hours earlier he had been hurriedly brought before a council to have charges of blasphemy brought against him. He was accused of spreading rumours about tearing demolishing the temple and talking about how the law of Moses was irrelevant. Now this was no small charge.

To go around talking like this in a culture that’s core identity was drawn from it’s religious writings and centralised place of worship was really asking for trouble. He was attacking the very fabric of the social order, their historical journey and trajectory. He was thumbing his nose at God and seeding religious corruption. Moses was their greatest prophet.

It was a group of freed slaves who had seized him and brought him before the council. It is them that brought the charges against him.

Yet this was in spite of the miracles that he performed. We know very little about Stephen except for this little piece in the book of acts chapters 6 and 7. he had been appointed by the church to help distribute the food to the widows in their community. He was selected because he was a man full of faith and the holy spirit. Then we find that he was performing signs and wonders, miracles that pointed to the glory of Jesus, And that’s all we know about him.

So he must’ve been in the synagogue one day, the one where the freed slaves were and he was teaching and they argued with him, but according to Acts, his wisdom was too much for them, they could not win against him. And it really annoyed them. Not because they were pride mind you, that’s an easy assumption to make, but I think they were really genuinely disgusted at this new teaching that Stephen was bringing into their meetings.

As I’ve said before it would be like a Mormon coming in here and teaching us that polygamy was something we should be engaging in. we would not stand for it.

In the end these men had enough and had him arrested. And Stephen didn’t really understand why they would react so strongly—he had healed some of them for crying out loud…surely they could see he was on their side. But something snapped in the men and they had begun a series of events that they would never forget : and many of them would not regret it, well in front of other people that is.

They had grabbed their rocks. No bigger than a fist, you had to still be able to throw it accurately. You only spend time finding a good rock on the first throw. The rest of the throws are quick and fast so you just find whatever you can. The terrain outside the cities was good for finding stones like this so there were plenty to choose from.

As they waited in the lull they would toss their stones in their hands.

After Stephen had been brought before the authorities, the trial began. He stood there and watched—unperturbed by the barrage of lies that were brought against him, the way the authorities jumped unreasonably on the most pathetic stories and twisted them into legal truth. This trial was a sham. There was no justice here. Yet he stood there, peacefully—a stark contrast to the commotion around him. The bible says his face was like the face of an angel. A face that stood resolute in it’s conviction that there is a God who loves and interacts with his creation. A face that demonstrated unwavering loyalty to his God and his lord Jesus.

It must’ve been difficult for the prosecution to keep bringing the lies, seeing this face, this man who wasn’t rattle at all by it. But there he stood. And the trial continued.

When all had been said, the high priest looked at Stephen and asked him very simply, “are all these things so?”

And Stephen ignored the question.

Now let’s get something straight here. Stephen knew that this was a serious situation. Anyone with half a brain that gets caught up in a sham trial knows that the outcome is really not going to be that flash. These people wanted blood and they were going to get it. So Stephen is already preparing himself for this worst. Maybe though he figured he was going to get a flogging and some prison time at worst : like his other mates peter and co. they were sore for a while, but it wasn’t that bad really. I don’t know if Stephen knew he was going to gain the reputation for centuries to come as being the first martyr of the Christian church.

So he ignored the question and launched into an outstanding argument which goes as follows.

A guy called ben witherington makes a stunning outline of the speech that Stephen delivers : I’ve got photocopies of the outline at the front if you’re interested. The speech begins by establishing common ground between Stephen and his accusers. He starts with the ancestral beginnings of Abraham. So far so good, people would’ve been nodding their heads here.

Then he goes on to talk about Joseph and how Joseph, God’s chosen one of the twelve sons, was sold into slavery, he was rejected. But this didn’t alter God’s sovereign will to have joseph be a major player in the history of his people. when famine struck Israel they went to Egypt where Joseph had been raised up as basically 2IC of the kingdom. He was able to distribute food to those who needed it, including his family who then stayed in Egypt.

As time wore on, the Israelites were enslaved by Egypt by a pharaoh who did not know who Joseph was. Enter into the story, moses.

Now already in his speech Stephen is making a point without isolating himself. He starts of with the common ground and starts to seed the main thrust of his offensive into the flow. He talks about how moses was rejected by Israel after he had killed a slave driver that was being oppressed. God called moses, in no uncertain terms, the people of Israel struggled to accept this at first, and then they crossed saw the plagues, the signs and wonders and believed…as you would if you walked through massive columns of water like when Moses parted the red sea. You don’t forget that type of miracle very quickly do you…nor do you forget easily how God provided food for them in the wilderness.

So Stephen is talking about this and people are nodding their heads in agreement. So far so good. Stephen then makes the observation that what happened a little later was that at the very moment when God was solidifying the identity of this brand new nation, setting it in stone if you will with the ten commandments being etched into the two tablets, Israel was beginning to want to worship a God like the other gods around them. Make us a golden calf, they said. “Make us a god who will lead us.” Even here they rejected God. But God still stuck with them in spite of this rejection. And still instructed them to build a place where they could worship him, a huge tent that was called the tabernacle, where God would symbolically dwell with his people. And when they took the land they were to inhabit, God let Solomon build a house for him. Well so it seems…as even Solomon rejected God. And they were still nodding.

There’s a constant theme here. A story of God working with his people, and them constantly rejecting him. So Stephen cleverly weaves accurate history and commentary together to create this very strong alignment between himself and his accusers. They were left wondering then, how much different is he from us then? Why is he so upsetting? What is it that makes him stand out as being against us? So far everything works…we’re on the same page…”

Part of me wonders if Stephen had stopped there whether or not he might’ve just got flogged. But his point was still to be made and he made it good.

Time moves slowly when your eye catches sight of a projectile heading straight for it. The first stone had been thrown, and silence enveloped stephen’s perception of the world. He was looking around at the looks on the men’s faces. They didn’t care about justice, this was about something else. Somehow they had tapped into the ugly part of the human consciousness that would want to slow down at an accident just to see if there was any blood, that wants to see movies that are violent and gory, that wants the villains to suffer incredibly bloody deaths, that is able to build massive arenas so people can watch people be torn limb from limb by wild beasts.

The ugly in us that wants to hurt people to make ourselves feel more powerful and in control. That will push people down with put downs and shameful remarks, gossip and injury just so we can feel a little more righteous, better than them. We treasure disappointment because it can make us superior to others. And we deal with people in such a way that makes the subordinate to our own ends.

At the end of his argument Stephen said this:

“you arrogant people, you are so full of your own self importance that you just don’t get it. You were blessed to be a blessing, but instead you try to do things on your own strength—just like your ancestors did. Do you not get it? You are as bad as all those who rejected God in the past. What suffering our nation has gone under because of people dissing God and missing the point. You might have all the external signs of being his chosen people, but your hearts are unrighteous and set in opposition to the holy spirit. You are a continuation of all that is bad in our history.

“tell me, which of the prophets did your ancestors not persecute? That’s right, they killed all ones who told of the coming of the messiah, who is Jesus of Nazareth, who you killed and hung on a tree to die. You are betrayers and murderers. You are as culpable for God removing his blessing from our nation as your predecessors were. You keep the law in word, but you have not kept the law in spirit.”

Now understandably, they were really quite angry at this sudden turn in his speech. Luke says in Acts that they ground their teeth. It’s the kind of rage you feel when you are at your wits end, when you just cannot believe what you are hearing and are ready to just throw someone against the wall. The grinding is some kind of stop gap, some kind of intermediate vent for our anger and unless something happens quick then you’re likely to do something you regret. So as they were biding time, trying to have self control from just strangling him right then and there…Stephen just takes it to another level.

It’s not his fault he had a vision.

He saw Jesus sitting in heaven at the right hand of God. The privileged position. It gave him huge hope and wonder, a pool of respite, but it simply angered his aggressors even more.

“Stone him” the righteous people said, “Stone him!” said the really good people. “burn them alive” said the really good Christians who were trying to keep doctrine safe. That’s right, let’s not think this is that far removed from us Christians. We are not that far removed from this.

There are many Christians who are ready to throw very big rocks at the men who molest children, at those who live homoerotic lifestyles, those who don’t show purity in the same way they think it should be shown. “Stone him!” They cried a little too enthusiastically.

Here is an account of a stoning from a book called Hugalas Web (pp 64-65), it’s fiction but it ’s based on modern day stoning in Iraq :

Her mind swooped in closer to the woman buried to her waist. Terror ripped through her mind. She saw herself as that woman. Kat wanted to help her, to shield her but all she could do was helplessly view this horrific scene. She saw the crowd push a man who was stumbling and pleading into circle. She heard the taunting shrieks of the crowd yelling at him to cast the first stone. Her eyes filled with terror as she recognized this man as her husband, Ira. She was locked in her nightmare and could not hide from its horror. She saw herself pleading for mercy. But her pleas, just excited the boisterous leering crowd even more, and their frenzy of yelling became louder, and completely drowned out her voice. Her eyes were full of terror and tears streaked from them.

The men and women were yelling at her “Fornicator”, “Whore”, and “Adulterer”. A prophet appeared and faced the crowd announcing that no stone should be thrown that should kill with a first or second blow, or so small as a pebble as to do no injury to the condemned. He smiled, blessed the crowd and moved back towards the circle’s edge.

Reaching it, he turned towards Kat and his face suddenly mutated grotesquely into the face of Sorat. For a long moment, he stood there smiling smugly at Kat, and then his booming voice rang out and commanded his dominions to commence the stoning. Like humans void of soul or mind, they jeered and yelled as they went about selecting their most jagged stones. Kat’s husband faded from her view. Then suddenly the first stone smashed into her, splitting open the skin on her left breast. She heard herself shriek in pain. As the stones mutilated her, her screams and the crowd’s jeers were drowned out by the hideous sounds of Sorat laughing uncontrollably and his booming voice yelling “God is great.” Another stone smashed into her head from the back, as the crowd grew bolder and louder with yells and shouts. Men rushed to the edge of the circle and spat at her as they heaved their stones at her face. A fist size rock smashed into the back of her head spraying blood across the ground and exciting the crowd even more. The blood made them bolder and their yells and shouts intensified. Now her face was pulverized from the stoning. The blood soaked her hair and splattered on the ground all around her. A spray of blood and spit now accompanied her cries of pain. Both her eyes had been ruptured and her teeth smashed. Thick dark blood oozed from her broken jaw. Her left breast was totally stripped of its flesh, and its nipple hung solely from a piece of skin. Blood streamed down her chest making glistening red spots on the ground. The gore pleased Sorat, and he gleefully watched the proceedings to ensure that no one used a stone of the wrong size. In Kat’s dream, she saw a vision of herself raising her head and pleading for mercy from the thunderous crowd around her. A large woman, with a string of spittle flying from her mouth screeched, “God is great,” as an answer to Kat’s plea. Then the woman followed her chant, with a large stone violently hurled at Kat’s fractured skull. The impact jerked her head backward and this woman who looked like Kat fell silent. Her agony had finally ceased. She had found her peace. The crowd was still in frenzy and continued to stone and spit at her, until Sorat transformed himself back into the image of a holy prophet and told them to stop. He blessed them and thanked them for doing Allah’s bidding and they all shouted, “God is great.”

So Stephen was looking in slow motion at the hate in their eyes as they began to throw their stones at him. He saw that he wasn’t being punished, he was being used. He was a piece of crowd driven art, taking the fall for all of their disappointment, a vent of their anger at this world, their despair at injustice, their desire to be part of God’s will…they were being obedient on one level, yet on another level totally disobedient. Crack on the side of his head, caught him by surprise as it hit him before the one he was watching.

Dull thuds on his back and his thighs. He shrieked in pain as he watched several wounds open up on his body. He prayed. A simple prayer to himself as he resigned himself to his fate. “lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” More stones, coming thick and fast. Now is arm was fractured, hanging strangely halfway down his forearm. Crack. Thud.

And then he knelt as best he could and shouted in a loud voice, “Lord! Don’t hold this sin against them!” and he meant it.

Then he died.

It’s a true story. This actually happened to someone. This actually does happen to Christians around the world and as the story of acts progresses we will hear more and more about this.

But I’m left feeling cold as to how to respond to this. So I want you to break into groups and tease out your response here. What does this mean to you?

How many of us are affected by this story in a practical level…what does it say about our faith? How do we get to this point? I wish I had an easy answer for you. I wish I could say and now here is the sign and wonder that will point you to Christ. But at the end of the day, that’s not what we wait for I suppose. It’s actually not up to me. It’s up to you to make a step of faith.

If you want to really begin your walk with Jesus, not just head knowledge, but a walk that moves you and makes you stand firm, assists you in a conscience driven life to love God and love other people, then stay behind after I say this closing prayer and someone will come and talk with you about it. It would be a real honour for you to let us do that with you.

Let’s pray.