We Are Church | Human Flourishing - Acts 6 & 7 | April 13

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1928 through 44, no, excuse me, 40.

When he had said these things he went on ahead going up to

jerusalem as he approached bethphage and bethany at

the place called the mount of olives he sent two of the disciples and said

go into the village ahead of you as you enter it you will find a colt tied there

on which no one has ever sat untie it and bring it if anyone asks you why are

you untying it say this the lord needs it so those who were sent left and found

found it just as he had told them As they were untying the colt,

its owner said to them, Why are you untying the colt?

The Lord needs it, they said. Then they brought it to Jesus,

and after throwing their clothes on the colt, they helped Jesus get on it.

And as he was going along, they were spreading their clothes on the road.

Now he came near the path down the Mount of Olives, and the whole crowd of the

disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the miracles they had seen.

Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord. Peace in heaven and glory in the highest heaven.

Some of the Pharisees from the crowd told him, Teacher, rebuke your disciples.

And he answered, I tell you, if they were to keep silent, the stones would cry out.

Thank you, Julie. Good morning, family. Today is Palm Sunday. I have Crocs on, sorry.

I apologize for the terrible shoes that are Crocs. Today is Palm Sunday.

Today marks the, as I mentioned earlier, today marks the Holy Week.

We call it the Holy Week. It is the last week of Jesus's life.

It is the crucifixion, the tomb, and then ultimately leads us to the joys of

the resurrection. So this is the Holy Week, which leads us to these things.

And I know we just heard a reading of the triumphal entry.

This is when Jesus rides into Jerusalem on a donkey. The crowds are cheering.

They're waving their palm branches, which is why we call it Palm Sunday.

They're laying their coats down on the road before him. I'm not sure what that's about.

They are celebrating the king coming in to bring peace.

This is what the triumphal entry is all about. And I know what you're thinking.

You're thinking, aren't we still in Acts?

Yes, we are still in Acts. Today is actually Acts chapter six and seven,

which explains why Julie didn't read that because it's like 75 verses,

which, you know, Marlene did read a lot earlier.

So I guess we learned our lesson when we gave somebody too many verses to read.

But I thank you both for your faithfulness, by the way.

These are full chapters. They're full of life.

It's the life and the ministry or the life and character of Stephen.

He is a faithful servant, a bold preacher. He ends up being the first martyr

of the church in chapter seven.

This is Acts chapter six and seven. And then we have the triumphal entry.

So the question is, what does Stephen have to do with it? Now,

at first glance, perhaps not much.

They seem to be very different and disparate stories. But the more you dig in, the more you realize,

if you're not too quick to separate them in your mind, that these two events,

yes, separated, removed by time and space, that they have a deep theological connection.

So Stephen's life, even though for us it only spans two chapters,

Stephen's life is something that reflects the larger story of Jesus and his

ministry, only it happens in a much more compressed timeframe,

a much more compressed format.

And the more that you look, the more you realize that Stephen is meant to mirror Jesus.

He mirrors his life, he mirrors his death and ultimately the results of that

death, but he mirrors Jesus.

Stephen is a mirror of Jesus, the suffering servant.

Stephen, like Jesus, is accused of blasphemy, of speaking against God and the church.

The lying witnesses said that this man is always speaking against the holy temple

and against the law of Moses.

We have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy the temple and

change the customs Moses handed down to us.

And of course, in the gospels, Jesus is accused of just that,

of saying that he would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days.

They're both brought before the Sanhedrin to stand trial.

Stephen, like Jesus, prays for his persecutors saying, Lord,

don't charge them with this sin, which of course mirrors Jesus's prayer on the cross.

Father, forgive them for they do not know what they're doing.

In that same breath of Jesus, of Stephen's final, final words,

he prayed, Lord, receive my spirit, which again, echoes Jesus's words on the cross.

Father, I entrust my spirit into your hands. And with these words, he breathed his last.

And again, well, I'm getting ahead of myself, I guess, but there are so many

ways in which Stephen is presented as an imitation of Christ in his life and his death.

And ultimately in the powerful witness that comes out, that flows out of that death.

We talked last week about what it means to follow Jesus, what it looks like to follow Jesus.

And now we get through Stephen, a demonstration of that.

If you want to know what the good life is, look at Stephen. If you want to know

what it means to follow Jesus, we look at Stephen.

We want to know what is human flourishing. It may not be what you expect,

but I can tell you where to look. we look at Stephen.

So let's connect some dots, okay?

Acts 6 begins with a moment of crisis. As the believers rapidly multiplied,

there were rumblings of discontent.

Discontent, by the way, is a major threat to the church.

Persecution doesn't destroy the church, but more churches have been destroyed

through grumbling and complaining than anything else. So this is a big problem.

The Greek-speaking believers complained about the Hebrew-speaking saying that

their widows were being discriminated against in the daily distribution of food.

So the 12 called a meeting of all the believers and they said,

we apostles should spend our time teaching the word of God, not running a food program.

And so brothers select seven men who are well-respected, are full of the spirit

and wisdom, and we will give them this responsibility.

And then we apostles can spend our time in prayer and teaching the word.

So the crisis, the Greek widows are being overlooked. And okay, slow down.

We're not meant to see the apostles as ignoring the needy for the sake of preaching.

That's not what we're meant to do.

Because who do you think was taking care of all the widows before this?

Probably the apostles. They were probably in charge of the distribution of food

and then it just became too much.

More and more, it said that a multitude were added to them, right?

That believers were rapidly multiplied. So it was just too much for them to handle.

We're not supposed to see them as neglecting.

What we're supposed to see is that the spirit led the church into justice,

Not to respond with silence or nationalism, but to respond with justice and compassion.

And this might be pretty nerdy for some of you, but the seven men that are selected

into this, these first deacons or servants, as the word means,

they're all Greek names.

So what it's saying is not only are the widows who are Greek speaking Hellenist

Jews being overlooked and so they're trying to solve this problem,

that they also appoint to an official position of authority the same people

out of the same Greek speaking Hellenistic Jews who were traditionally marginalized

by the Hebrew speaking Jews until Jesus came along and he tore down all these socioeconomic walls.

So he appoints, they're appointed the same people, the same Greek speaking Jews

to these offices of authority.

So Stephen is chosen to serve.

The story starts off by taking care of widows and through it,

it paints a picture of human flourishing as God's children serve one another.

We flourish together as we learn to serve.

Today, we're going to talk a little

bit about what it means to flourish as people, for human flourishing.

And what that means first and foremost is that we flourish together as we serve one another.

And so what Stephen was doing in his character here is reflecting the same thing

that he learned from his savior, laying down his life, that human flourishing

begins with service, with servanthood, with embracing God's heart for the vulnerable,

for the overlooked, for racial reconciliation for the nation,

if we look at how God answers our prayers to give us today our daily bread,

to provide for our needs, all that we need today, if we look at how God answers

those prayers, it's through the church, it's through each other as we serve one another.

The Village Church in Dallas, Texas begins every year in January,

as we all do, but they begin every year in January with the same series called The Creator's Heart,

which is a yearly rhythm that grounds them in God's design for human flourishing.

And every year they look at the same three topics, and it might be spread out

over more than just three sermons, but they look at the same three things.

It's the value of every human life, the beauty of ethnic harmony,

and God's desire for the nation.

This is to refocus and recenter them. And at the heart of this series is this

idea about service, about laying down your life for one another,

about lifting each other.

It's about choosing love over self, about choosing justice over comfort,

humility over pride, that the core of human flourishing is serving one another. Service.

And this is a defining character of Jesus's life as well, as we all know,

that the King of Kings didn't come to be served, but to give his life as a ransom for many.

That Jesus, this isn't just a metaphor. This is how he actually lived.

Jesus, we see constantly takes the lowest position.

He is touching lepers. He's eating with sinners.

He's washing the disciples' feet, even the feet of the disciple who would betray him.

Jesus is serving in his life.

He came in riding on a donkey in full submission of the father,

not to gain power, not to take power, but to give it up on the cross.

When his followers argued over who was the greatest and the kingdom,

Jesus didn't rebuke their ambition, but what he did is redefined it.

Right? He said, among you, it will be different.

Those who are the greatest among you should take the lowest rank and the leaders

should be like servants.

And this is the paradox of the kingdom, the upside down kingdom,

that the, those who serve one another are those who shine brightest that those who.

Kneel before other humans stand tallest in God's eyes, if we take a lower position,

so those who lay down our lives are the ones who truly live,

are the ones who truly find our life.

It's the paradox of the kingdom.

Every day, this is how I've begun to apply this a little bit in my life.

Every day at work, I make coffee for my coworkers.

Now, because I like coffee. As most of you know, and some of you are grinning, I hate coffee.

It's gross. I don't even like the smell of it.

Michelle made the first cup of coffee recently. Yeah, she made the first cup

of coffee recently that didn't immediately elicit a just involuntary reaction of disgust on my face.

And that's the best that I have for coffee, y'all.

I don't do it because I like it. I don't do it because it's something that I

need in the morning to give me energy.

I just do it to serve them. I get

to the office early I usually get to the office before everybody else

every day and so while it's still quiet I make the coffee and you know what

most people don't even notice that somebody made them coffee most people don't

even notice who made it for them but that's not why I do it anyway it's not

about getting credit it's about showing love in a consistent way.

It's about showing up and showing love in a consistent way. A way I probably

need to apply this more often in my marriage is probably to wash the dishes

so that Jenny doesn't have to wash it.

This is me thinking out loud, processing this information. But that's what service

looks like. It's not glamorous.

It's not convenient.

It's not often noticed.

But it reflects Jesus. And so Stephen, he didn't serve the widows because he

had nothing better to do.

He didn't serve the widows because that was like his thing.

We all serve out of our skills and our passions, but we also serve where there's a need.

So Stephen served where there was a need. And we, Jesus uses the word slave,

right? We make ourselves a slave.

This is the position that we take, which is all fine and good until people start

treating us like slaves.

But then Jesus still tells us, serve one another.

So as we move into Easter, there is going to be several people,

perhaps a multitude of people, depending on how we define the word multitude,

who enter into our gathering without a relationship with Jesus.

They're going to be coming seeking. They're going to be coming and they're hurt.

They're going to be coming skeptical. They're going to be coming,

some of them just curious, some of them just because that's what you do on Easter

in America is you find a place to go to church.

And here's the thing, the way you interact with them, the way that you love

them next week will determine,

and I suppose the better way to say this is, it will preach louder to them than

anything else that will happen that day.

Because most people decide within seven minutes whether they're going to come back.

That's before music, especially if we get started late, which we tend to do.

That's before I get up and say a single word. Most people have made up in their

minds if they're going to come back.

That's based on the way that you love them, the way that you serve them.

If someone made eye contact with them, if someone talked to them,

if someone welcomed them, if someone smiled and noticed them,

made space for them, they're going to make that decision based off of all of

that before we even start service.

And for someone, this could be a life-changing, defining moment.

So we can't miss this opportunity to serve.

The core of human flourishing, at its core, human flourishing is service.

It's serving one another. So let me ask you, what are ways that you can implement this?

You can step into this idea that you can contribute to human flourishing in

your own life, in your day-to-day rhythms, in your workplace,

in your family, in your neighborhood. What are ways that you can serve one another?

I've heard this before. I can't tell you where, but.

For me, it all comes down to the kind of this question, wherever you go.

So even when you enter into these doors this morning, the question is,

one, there's a statement, I'm here to serve.

And two, the question is, how can I serve?

So wherever you go, we're asking those two questions. And that's how we contribute

to human flourishing as we serve one another.

Because here's the twist. The moment I use the word flourishing,

most of us have already come up with a picture in our mind of what that looks

like, of what human flourishing looks like.

And usually it looks something like comfort and safety and success.

We imagine that human flourishing means a good life without any trouble.

Let's just name the lie, right? Let's name the lie that we believe human flourishing

is comfort, success, and safety.

We have certain expectations, But what if that's not the kind of flourishing that God has in mind?

What if that's not the picture of human flourishing God has painted?

When Jesus rode into Jerusalem, the crowds had expectations. They had an idea.

They had an imagination of what the good life looked like, what they were looking

for. It looked like victory.

It looked like national pride. It looked like political freedom.

It looked like a king who would come in, restore Israel.

But Jesus didn't give them that. Jesus didn't give them those things.

He brought a kingdom, but it was of a different kind of kingdom.

He brought a throne that wasn't in the physical world, so to say,

but it was over the world. It was over time and space.

He's not interested. Jesus isn't interested in playing by our rules of power and authority.

He's not interested in condescending to what we believe he should be.

He redefines what flourishing looks like and he does it by laying down his life.

When we look at, at Stephen, just remember Stephen is an imitation of Christ.

Stephen, Stephen is a mirror of Jesus in a compressed timeline.

Flourishing looks a little bit differently. It looks like faithfulness and obscurity

before Acts chapter six.

None of us have even heard the name Stephen before.

We've never encountered him. He's not one of the 12.

He's just a normal, regular guy. He's kind of like us. We're for the most part,

pretty normal. I think he's just a regular average guy.

He doesn't, he doesn't make a scene or come onto the scene and make a name for himself.

He's just faithful in the quiet things. He served, he's serving tables.

He's taking care of, of widows.

He's, he's doing the unseen, unglamorous works of love.

He's being a faithful servant. And then when he finally kind of steps into the

spotlight in chapter seven, it's not because he's chasing recognition because

he is filled with the spirit.

It says that he's full of God's grace and power.

He performed amazing miracles and signs among the people. And then when men

showed up to debate, it says in verse 10, that none of them could stand against

the wisdom and the spirit with which Stephen spoke.

The result of Stephen's life was that many Jewish priests became Christians. They converted.

And this is what brought him to the eyes of his accusers is that all of these

Jewish priests are becoming believers and they're freaking out like what's going on.

And they find out that it's Stephen who is full of the spirit,

full of wisdom, full of truth.

It was the faithfulness, his faithfulness that changed things,

that brought his life to the attention of these accusers.

Quiet faithfulness and obscurity. This is something else that he picked up from

his savior. Something else that he learned from Jesus.

Because when the world says, what the world says that flourishing is,

is often money and attention being flashy.

That's what it looks like to flourish, to not have a care in the world.

That throughout his life, Jesus was relentlessly faithful, but he was rarely flashy.

Most of the time you see him going around telling his followers and telling

those who he healed to not tell others about the miracle, what we call the synoptic problem.

Why is Jesus, if he's so concerned about the salvation of the world,

also so reticent for people to know about him?

He often mourns people to not tell anything about him, to not tell who he is

because he's not chasing the crowds. He's not chasing attention.

He's not looking after all of these things that the world decides flourishing is.

Jesus never traveled far from the region that he was raised.

Jesus never held a political office. He never led an army. He didn't write a

book. Well, he kind of did, but you know what I mean?

Jesus didn't do all of these things to attract a crowd.

Even by the end of his ministry, the end of his life, most of his followers left.

We see that moment in John 6, where he turns to his disciples and says,

are you going to leave me too?

At the end of the time, most of his followers had walked away,

but none of that was the goal.

His eyes were on the cross. His gaze was fixed on fulfilling the will of the father.

He was locked in onto his mission. His purpose was redemption.

And this is what the heart of faithfulness and obscurity is all about.

Faithfulness, obscurity is all about living fully into God's call,

even when no one notices.

And perhaps even especially when nobody notices, it's living faithfully into God's call on our life.

And Stephen flourishing looked like truth and love.

You know that passage in Ephesians chapter four, it says, instead,

we will speak the truth and love growing in every way more and more like Christ,

who is head of the body, the church.

I don't know about you, but I get the truth part really well,

but perhaps not the speaking in love part.

But Stephen is kind and many were brought into the family.

But when he is given the opportunity, he doesn't shy away from speaking boldly,

from proclaiming a bold witness, even though it costs him everything.

Stephen preaches, he preaches the longest sermon in the New Testament.

So if some of y'all thought that I talked for a long time, Stephen has the longest

sermon in all of the New Testament.

And it's primarily about two things. It's about one that Israelites never received the prophets.

They always rejected the prophets. And it's two about the fact that the law

can't save them because they could never keep the law anyway.

And it doesn't give them a new heart, which they so desperately need.

Those are the two things that he preaches in the sermon. He says in verse 51,

chapter seven, you stiff necked people, your hearts and ears are still uncircumcised.

You were just like your ancestors.

You always resist the Holy Spirit. Was there ever a prophet your ancestors did not persecute?

They even killed those who predicted the coming of the righteous one.

And now you have betrayed and murdered him.

You who have received a law that was given through the angels, but have not obeyed it.

He doesn't hold back. He's on the same train as Peter, just constantly reminding

people that they're the ones who killed Jesus.

He's just proclaiming truth.

He doesn't hold back. And we as Christians are to live in this contradictory way,

that we would be a contradiction to the world because we are supposed to hold

grace and truth in the same breath, truth and love.

This is so hard, especially because the world usually demands one over the other.

And we have words for them.

Fundamentalism is what shouts for truth and neglects love.

And then sentimentality is what beckons for love, but rejects truth.

And so the world calls us to an extreme, but Christians are meant to hold this

contradiction because Jesus embodies both.

Jesus is the one who looks over the city of Jerusalem, the city that would reject

him, the city that would betray him, the city that would crucify him.

Jesus looks over this city and he weeps.

He weeps because they didn't see it. They don't realize what's in front of them.

They don't understand who he is.

So he weeps. He doesn't ride into Jerusalem with judgment in his eyes.

He's not on a war campaign, but he rides in with these tears on his face because he loves.

He's full of grace and truth.

Jesus spoke boldly. He challenged the temple systems. He advocated and confronted injustice.

He advocated for justice and confronted injustice, but never without love,

never without compassion.

And if we want to be faithful witnesses, if we want to show the world a true

picture of what flourishing looks like, then we have to have this same spirit,

the spirit that says the hard things with a soft heart,

the spirit that calls sin what it is, and yet still weeps over our city.

We have to be this contradiction because the world is never going to give you

approval if you follow Jesus.

Didn't give Stephen approval. It didn't give Jesus approval.

The same crowds, Jesus wasn't popular for very long. The same crowds that shouted

Hosanna on these streets are the same crowds that five days later shout, crucify him.

And it's because he didn't fit into their category.

He was too bold for the religious.

He was too gracious for the powerful. He was too compassionate. He was too truthful.

He didn't fit their categories. And if you follow Jesus, really follow him,

then you're going to confuse people as well. You're going to frustrate some people.

You're going to comfort others in ways beyond what they've ever experienced

because it's his grace and it's truth. It's love and it's truth held together.

That's the flourishing life. Stephen isn't just bold.

He's radiant. It's funny that in Acts 6, when the council looked at him,

it says his face was like the face of an angel. He was literally glowing in some ways.

Stephen's flourishing. It looks like failure to the world. He was arrested.

He was falsely accused, he was killed.

But Acts shows him shining bright in the spirit of God with a spirit,

with wisdom, with truth.

With grace. He is the image of someone who is fully alive in God's presence.

And because of this, he's glowing because the reality is that what it looks

like, this is what it looks like when someone is so filled with a spirit that

not even the weight of death can dim Jesus shining through them,

can even dim the light of Jesus shining through them,

to be in line, fully in line with the spirit.

And there's this verse that I'm reminded of from Stephen's life.

It's something that Paul will write years later.

And Paul was there, by the way, Paul was standing there.

It says that when the people drag Stephen outside the city, pick up their stones,

it said that his accusers took off their coats and laid them at the feet of a young man named Saul.

So this is before he became known as the apostle, formerly known as Saul as

the people pile up their coats and they pick up their stones,

Paul is standing there nodding in approval.

And I wonder if Paul thought of Stephen's face when he wrote this to the Philippian church.

He wrote, do all things without grumbling or disputing that you may be blameless

and innocent children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted

generation among whom you will shine as lights in the world.

I wonder if Paul ever thought of Stephen's face after his conversion,

if he ever reflected on what he saw that day.

Because what he saw was not just a man dying.

It was a man who looked up and saw glory. It was a man that was radiating the

presence of Christ in his life.

A man who prayed for his enemies, even Paul, who was there. A man who was full of grace and truth.

And this is Stephen's life. What Paul would later come to recognize as the true

picture of human flourishing. not success by the world standards,

but flourishing in the presence of a Christ, a presence of Christ, even in suffering.

Because flourishing isn't just about comfort. It's not about success,

not about having it all together.

It's about being faithful to God, being faithful to God's calling in your life.

It's about radiating love and truth, even when it costs. and that Stephen's

death didn't signify failure.

It gave the world a picture of a life fully devoted to God.

Life that shines like a light in the darkness. And that's the kind of flourishing

that Jesus invites us into.

This is the human flourishing that we are invited into.

And sometimes God's will for our lives involves suffering. Sometimes it involves martyrdom.

And we're not ever given the promise that we will fully understand why Stephen's

story ended in his death, but I can give you two really powerful outcomes of

what happened as a result of his faithful witness.

One, we're going to take a closer look at in several weeks as we look at Paul's conversion.

And so we're going to spend some time there, but it's hard to imagine that Stephen's

death didn't play some role as Paul encountered the living Jesus on the road

to Damascus, that this event didn't mark some important step in his life.

But two, there's another result.

The church didn't die with Stephen, but it exploded.

As the disciples are persecuted and scattered as a result, they fill the globe

with the message of Jesus.

The gospel spreads from Jerusalem and it reaches faraway places.

It goes to India and China, just as it's traveling to Rome in the West.

As Paul is bearing witness in Rome, as we read about in Acts,

The apostle Thomas, doubting Thomas, is planting churches in India.

Isn't that crazy to think about?

That's part of church history that we don't often, aren't often shown.

But the gospel spreads east just as far, if not farther, than it spreads west.

It reminds me of Tertullian, a church father.

He has these famous words that the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.

Like a grain of wheat falling to the ground, it seems to die,

but it multiplies bearing fruit far beyond what we can see.

So the church explodes following Stephen's death and it goes everywhere.

The sermons you preach in your life as you live through suffering speak way

more volumes than those that you share in your blessing.

Here's the crazy part about Stephen. Stephen didn't die with his eyes on the pain and the injustice.

Stephen died with his eyes on Jesus. In the middle of the chaos,

Stephen looked up and saw Jesus standing at the right hand of God.

And it says, Stephen gazed steadily into heaven.

He saw the glory of God and saw Jesus standing in the place of honor at God's right hand.

And he told them, look, I see the heavens opened and the son of man standing

in the place of honor at God's right hand.

Stephen sees glory. Stephen sees welcome. This is the only place.

Everywhere else in the New Testament, Jesus is described as sitting at God's right hand.

And Mark 16, Hebrews 1, Hebrews chapter 10, he sat down at the right hand of

Hebrews 10 · chapter mention

God, waiting from that time until his enemy should be made a footstool for his feet.

And this is the only place in the New Testament where Jesus is depicted as standing

at the right hand of God, which is significant.

Jesus sits on the throne as a judge.

Jesus stands to receive Stephen. He stands almost as a lawyer arguing for Stephen's

case, advocating for him.

In Psalm 119, it says, argue my case. This is a prayer from David.

Argue my case, take my side, protect my life as you promised.

We see Jesus standing, arguing Stephen's case.

As Jesus himself said in Matthew 10, Whoever acknowledges me before others,

I will also acknowledge before my father in heaven.

You see Jesus acknowledging the faithfulness of Stephen before his father.

On Palm Sunday, the crowds welcomed Jesus as king.

But here we see the king of kings standing and welcoming his good and faithful servant, Stephen.

Is not a fleeting moment of praise from the crowds. This is an eternity of welcome from the king.

This is the type of flourishing that we are called to, an eternity of welcome

from our king. So let me ask you this question.

Where is your gaze? What are you looking at?

What kind of flourishing are you chasing?

Is it the kind that the crowds cheered for as Jesus came to Jerusalem for comfort,

for security, for power, control, popularity?

Or is it the kind that Stephen shows us?

Faithfulness, truth, love, even when it costs everything.

Where we are looking shapes our reality. What we stare at shapes who are we going to become.

So do we look for comfort? Do we look for control? Do we look for power?

Or do we look to the one who welcomes us into true life?

What kind of human flourishing are you after? Where is your gaze?

We need eyes that see the welcoming of the king.

Because Stephen's story isn't a tragic footnote. It is a window into the kingdom

that Jesus was already always trying to bring.

It was a window into the type of kingdom Jesus was ushering into this world,

not a kingdom of worldly flourishing, but a kingdom full of love,

full of the spirit, full of service, full of glory.

Music.