Stephen’s Sermon: Seeing Like Stephen

Good morning. Our scripture reading today is

from Acts 6-7 through 760. If you're using one of the

Bibles on the floor, it's on page 860.

If you don't have a Bible of your own, we invite you to take

that one home with you. It's our gift to you.

I mean, let's get started. And the Word of God continued to

increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in

Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to

the faith. And Stephen, full of grace and

power, was doing great wonders and signs among the people.

Then some of those who belong to the synagogue of the freedmen,

as it was called, and of the Cyrenians, and some of the

Alexandrians, and of those from Cilicia and Asia, rose up and

disputed with Stephen. But they could not withstand the

wisdom and the spirit with which he was speaking.

Then they secretly instigated men who said, We have heard him

speak blasphemous words against Moses and God.

And they stirred up the people and the elders and the scribes,

and they came upon him and seized him, and brought him

before the council. And they set up false witnesses,

who said, This man never ceases to speak words against this holy

place and the law. For we have heard him say that

this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place, and will

change the customs that Moses delivered to us.

And gazing at him, all who sat in the council saw that his face

was like the face of an Angel. And the high priest said, Are

these things so? And Stephen said, Brothers and

fathers, hear me. The God of glory appeared to our

father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in

Haran, and said to him, Go out from your land and from your

kindred, and go into the land that I will show you.

Then he went out from the land of the Chaldeans and lived in

the Haran, And after his father died, God removed him from there

into this land in which you are now living.

Yet he gave him no inheritance in it, not even a foot's length,

but promised to give it to him as a possession, and to his

offspring after him, though he had no child.

And God spoke to this effect, that his offspring would be

sojourners in a land belonging to others, who would enslave

them and afflict them. 400 years.

But I will judge the nation that they serve, said God.

And after that they shall come out and worship me in this

place. And he gave them the covenant of

circumcision. And so Abraham became the father

of Isaac, and circumcised him on the 8th day.

And Isaac became the father of Jacob and Jacob of the 12

patriarchs, And the patriarchs, jealous of Joseph, sold him into

Egypt. But God was with him and rescued

him out of all his afflictions, and gave him favor and wisdom

before Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who made him ruler over Egypt

and over all his household. Now there came a famine

throughout all Egypt and Canaan, and great affliction, and our

fathers could find no food. But when Jacob heard that there

was grain in Egypt, he sent out our fathers on their first

visit. And on the second visit Joseph

made himself known to his brothers, and Joseph's family

became known to Pharaoh. And Joseph sent and summoned

Jacob his father, and all his kindred, 75 persons in all.

And Jacob went down into Egypt, and he died, he and our fathers.

And they were carried back to Shechem, and laid in the tomb

that Abraham had bought for a sum of silver from the sons of

Hamar in Shechem. But as the time of the promise

drew near which God had granted to Abraham, the people increased

and multiplied in Egypt, until there arose over Egypt another

king who did not know Joseph. He dealt shrewdly with our race,

and forced our fathers to expose their infants so that they would

not be kept alive. At this time Moses was born, and

he was beautiful in God's sight, and he was brought up for three

months in his father's house. And when he was exposed,

Pharaoh's daughter adopted him and brought him up as her own

son. And Moses was instructed in all

the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was mighty in his words and

deeds. When he was 40 years old, it

came into his heart to visit his brothers, the children of

Israel, and seeing one of them being wrong, he defended the

oppressed man and avenged him by striking down the Egyptian.

He supposed that his brothers would understand that God was

giving them salvation by his hand, but they did not

understand, and on the following day he appeared to them as they

were quarreling and tried to reconcile them, saying, Men, you

are brothers, why do you wrong each other?

But the man who was wronging his neighbor thrust him aside,

saying, Who made you a ruler and judge over us?

Do you want to kill me as you killed the Egyptian yesterday?

At this retort Moses fled and became an exile in the land of

Midian, where he became the father of two sons.

Now when 40 years had passed, an Angel appeared to him in the

wilderness of Mount Sinai in a flame of fire in a Bush.

When Moses saw it, he was amazed at the sight.

And as he drew near to look, there came the voice of the

Lord. I am the God of your father's,

the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob.

And Moses trembled, and did not dare look to, did not dare to

look. Then the Lord said to him, Take

off the sandals from your feet, for the place where you were

standing is holy ground. I have surely seen the

affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their

groaning, and I have come down to deliver them.

And now come, I will send you to Egypt.

This Moses whom they rejected, saying, Who made you a ruler and

a judge. This man God sent as both ruler

and Redeemer by the hand of the Angel who appeared to him in the

Bush. This man LED, LED them out

performing wonders and signs in Egypt and at the Red Sea and in

the wilderness for 40 years. This is the Moses who said to

the Israelites, God will raise you, raise up for you a prophet

like me from your brothers. This is the one who was in the

congregation in the wilderness with the Angel who spoke to him

at Mount Sinai and with our fathers.

He received living oracles to give us.

Our fathers refused to obey him, but thrust him aside.

And in their hearts they turned to Egypt, saying to Aaron, Make

for us gods who will go before us.

And for this Moses, who led us out from the land of Egypt, we

do not know what has become of him.

And they made a calf in those days and offered a sacrifice to

the idol, and we're rejoicing in the works of their hands.

But God turned away and gave them over to worship the host of

heaven as it is written in the book of the prophets.

Did you bring to me slain beasts and sacrifices during the 40

years in the wilderness? Oh House of Israel, you took up

the tent of Moloch and the star of your God ref in the images

that you made to worship, and I will send you into exile beyond

Babylon. Our fathers had the tent of

witness in the wilderness, just as he who spoke to Moses

directed him to make it according to the pattern that he

had seen. Our fathers in turn brought it

in with with Joshua when they dispossessed the nations that

God drove out before our fathers.

So it was until the days of David who found favor in the

sight of God and asked to find a dwelling place for the God of

Jacob. But it was Solomon who built a

house for him. Yet the Most High does not dwell

in houses made by hands. As the prophet says, Heaven is

my throne and the earth is my footstool.

What kind of house will you build for me, says the Lord, Or

what is the place of my rest? Did not my hand make all these

things? You stiff necked people,

uncircumcised in heart and ears? You always resist the Holy

Spirit as your Father's did, so do you.

Which of the prophets did your Father's not persecute?

And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming

of the righteous one whom you have now betrayed and murdered.

You who received the law as delivered by angels, and did not

keep it. Now when they heard these

things, they were enraged, and they ground their teeth at him.

But he, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven, and saw the

glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.

And he said, Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of

Man standing at the right hand of God.

But they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears,

and rushed together at him. Then they cast him out of the

city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down

their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul.

And as they were stoning Stephen, he called out, Lord

Jesus, receive my spirit. And falling to his knees, he

cried out with a loud voice. Lord, do not hold this sin

against them. And when he had said this, he

fell asleep. This is God's true word.

What's going on? Port City family and friends.

Good to be with you. My name is Tanner.

I'm the lead pastor here and I don't know about you but as that

was read I just get hyped up. Y'all get really hyped as we get

started this Act series. I hope you do.

I hope that when we read the book of Acts, we see what God

wants to do in our cities. We see who God is, we see who we

can become. We see what only God can do and

we see that we were made for this and nothing less than this.

We were made to be a part of an adventure like this.

So if you've ever felt like you were made for more than Netflix

and chill, you are correct. And I'm all for the appropriate

setting of Netflix and chill. OK, And y'all, what we're not

going to do in this series, we ain't going to whine about the

American church. What we're going to do is we're

going to study the early church and we're just going to beg God

to make us like it. We're going to beg God to fill

us with the Spirit. We're going to beg God to do

what he's always done and we're going to repent what we need to.

We're just going to we're going to pray.

We're going to say, God, let's do it.

I don't want to settle like in a spirit filled way.

I just want to say let's go, like let's go.

And man, we got one life to live.

It'll soon be passed. Only what's done with Christ

will last and just be you. Have fun, be full of the Spirit

and get in some good gospel trouble this fall.

That's what I want, if you will, as we're going to see in today's

text. OK, so let me pray for our act

series as we just get going and we'll dive into this sermon on a

sermon. Our Father, we love you.

Thank you, God, thank you, thank you.

Thank you that this happened. Thank you that it's real.

God, there's just so many layers, so many sermons could be

preached on the sermon. But God, we ask you, God, don't

just do these things in the nation's, don't just do them in

other parts of the world. God we want, we want to see it

in the States. God, we want to see it in

Norfolk. God, we want to see a movement

and God we know when movement is happening, there is opposition

as a part of that. So God strengthen us for this

task, fill us with the Spirit, give us the kind of lives that

that amount to this not just one off things, but the the type of

life where we are as Stephen was and God, may we understand the

roots of the gospel that make this so offensive.

God and would you save people? We pray in Christ's name, Amen.

All right, y'all. So this is a sermon on a sermon,

a really long sermon. And really what it comes down to

is 2 things. So I want to go ahead and give

you those two. OK?

One is going to be the response of the people to the sermon.

That's going to be part of the the, the conversation that comes

down to we're going to talk about the word later.

Stiff neck. Somebody say stiff neck.

Stiff neck is the idea that your neck is turned in One Direction

and you're not going to turn it. Like I want you to imagine a 2

year old toddler. OK, this toddler thinks there's

candy to the right. So the toddler starts going

right. You know the candy's to the

left. You want them to have the candy,

but they think it's right. So they're walking you.

You try to grab their hand, they smack it.

They just, I mean, they're just, they don't, they think they're

so much smarter than you. It's hilarious.

They hit you. They're they're just, they keep

going and you're like, baby, baby, the candy.

They're hitting you. They're not listening.

They will not turn. Even you pick them up.

They're kicking and screaming. That's the image of stiff neck.

You will not turn. OK, so that's the first thing

we're going to see is just this response of stiff neckedness in

the heart of the hearers. And the second is we need to

focus on the person of Steven. And there's something about who

he was, what he did, and, and just in the even the way he

died, just everything the author of Acts is trying to get us to

see with Steven. That is a key to our life with

Christ if we want to see this type of movement in our time.

So we're going to look at the stiff neck response and we're

going to look at the look of Steven.

OK, so I got four kind of turns we're going to take.

We got the situation, the sermon, the response, and the

man, if you are ready, let me hear you say I'm ready.

OK #1 the situation. It kind of explains to us what

was happening. I know we're picking up on a

series in chapter 6. In previous years we did the the

first chapters, but basically in chapter 6, the church had

reached this pivotal moment in its development where an issue

popped up and the apostles were like you, this is a really

important thing, but we need to preach the word and praise.

We need to raise up others. That's the first installment of

deacons and servants and Stephen is one of those people chosen,

set aside prayed over here you go OK and it tells us in verse 7

the word of God continued to increase and the number of

disciples multiply greatly in Jerusalem and a great many of

the priests became obedient to the faith.

The idea was the Lord honored this moment where the church was

starting to struggle having some multi ethnic racial tension.

That's what's happening at the beginning of Chapter 6 where

certain widows were being neglected of a certain language.

So it was race and language based preference, if you will.

And so Steven was brought up to help lead in that moment and he

does and the Lord honors it. And the church is growing well.

This Steven is just becoming a leader.

He's he's given, he's teaching and he's teaching in the temple,

which is where a lot of the, the early church action was going

down before some persecution breaks out as we'll talk about

next week. And then what happens is

Stephen's doing miracles. He's doing all kinds of stuff.

And it tells us in verse 11 that as happened with Jesus, starts

happening with Stephen. They ain't like that.

And in the temple, there's one name you got to bring up if you

want to cause a problem. Watch what they do.

Then they secretly instigated men who said, We have heard him

speak blasphemous words against somebody, say Moses, Moses, and

God. And they stirred up the people

and the elders and scribes, and they came upon him and seized

him and brought him before the council.

And they set up false witnesses who said, This man never ceases

to speak words against this holy place in law.

For we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will

destroy this place. It's referring to the temple,

and will change the customs that Moses delivered to us.

And gazing at him, all who sat in the council saw that his face

was like the face of an Angel. Y'all so many sermons could be

preached on even what I just said.

OK, Just the imagery of his face looking like an Angel.

Like if in a Jewish mind when Moses came down after receiving

the 10 commandments, he was shining kind of like an Angel.

So they should, they're ironically saying he's not the

Moses guy, but he is shining like Moses.

Jesus was shining on the mount of Transfiguration.

So like, there's this, we can all see who's with Jesus here,

like who's on Yahweh's side here, but they're opposing him

in the name of Moses. OK.

And so there's just so much irony in the text and it's, it's

literally filled with just imagery of what Jesus himself

went through, right? Like they, they would throw

false charges and Jesus just sat there silent where Jesus sat

silent. Steve is grabbing the mic.

He's like, let me explain to you something.

OK, so that's the situation. They get a stir going and here

comes point #2 the sermon and y'all, they just picked the

wrong guy to mess with. They just picked the wrong guy.

Like there's certain guys, certain times, certain people,

you press the buttons, they walk away and maybe even the Lord

saying, let's back down, this ain't the moment.

But the spirit decided this man going fry y'all, and I'm going

to have my man Luke write it down so that it's there forever.

And basically a lot of Pauline theology, a lot of the rest of

the New Testament theology of explaining how Judaism gives

birth to Christianity. They're not in opposition, but

true the, the the roots of Christ are.

I mean, they're they're sprouting from a Davidic tree

House of Abraham. All of it flows together.

It is all in this sermon. And Paul spends a lot of time

breaking it down. And the basic idea, if you don't

know your Bibles that well, that is OK, OK.

But the basic idea is he is methodically going to fry them.

It's a really a three piece combo.

He brings up Abraham, he brings up Temple and he brings up

Moses. I can't do all of them.

As you probably could tell, Moses is the highlight.

That's where we're going to hang out.

OK. But though that that three piece

right there is everything that it means to be Jewish, OK, from

an ethnic standpoint. Now God had an intention through

the ethnicity and through the lineage of faith shared with

Abraham. And what Steven is trying to get

them to see is they missed it from the jump.

That's what he's trying to say. If you are anti Jesus, you were

never with Yahweh. That's what he's saying.

If you were not with Jesus now, you missed it from the jump.

So he goes back to Mesopotamia in the call of Abraham to point

out this hasn't changed. Stay with me.

And he methodically brings them to their guy Moses through their

own history and then fries them on Moses.

Does that make sense? So I want to I want to take you

just to the Moses thing. But what he's trying to say is

he is not knocking the the setup of Judaism that God constructed.

He's knocking their manipulation of it from the beginning to the

point that they kill the man who is blazing with glory in front

of them like Moses once did in the name of Moses, like just

the, the irony is so thick. OK, so I want to show you kind

of the the crux of what he's saying.

So look with me at verse 35. He gets to Moses.

He brings up Moses's early stuff and just pay attention to this

one word. It starts with an R.

You'll hear it here in a minute. This Moses whom they rejected

saying, who made you a ruler and a judge.

This man God sent as both a ruler and Redeemer by the hand

of the Angel who appeared to him in the Bush.

Then verse 39 our fathers, he's meaning like in the flesh like

our our our ancestors refused to obey him, but thrust him that's

Moses aside and in their hearts they turned to Egypt saying to

Aaron make for us gods who will go before us.

As for this Moses who led us from the land of Egypt.

We do not know what has becoming him and they made a calf in

those days and offered a sacrifice to the idol and

rejoicing of the work of their hands again.

If you don't know Bible immediately after the giving of

the 10 commandments as that's going on.

God's like, hey, Moses, Aaron down there making a cow, they're

worshipping a cow. Moses, let's just start over

right now. Me and you come on.

And Moses like no Lord like. But the point is he's saying

y'all bit y'all, y'all don't claim Moses.

Moses, you really want to talk Moses?

Let's talk Moses like y'all rejected him.

Y'all didn't listen to him. You wanted to go back to you'd

rather be slaves in Egypt with steak than in the wilderness

with God with what God wants to give you bread from heaven.

Verse 53 That's what he says he he says of them you who received

the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it.

What he's trying to say he's coming for the jugular.

He's like look you're you're claiming that I'm anti law anti

Moses but y'all don't keep the law.

But that's kind of the crux of where they disagree.

Even so, they disagree on what it means to be pro Moses and pro

law. But what he's trying to say is,

hey guys, the law was never about the external.

And in the sermon you can go back and look at the covenant is

given after he meets Abraham. Just the way the sermon is

constructed is so wise is to point out that all of these

symbols within the system were to point to our need, were to

point to what we lack. The law is a mirror.

It shows you what you lack. It shows you what you don't

have. It shows you who you are not

shows your need for sacrifice, which yes, happens in the

temple, but it was never an end. It was a means to showing your

need for grace. And this Moses that you worship

in verse 37. Look at that one with me, y'all?

This is a famous verse if your Bible doesn't have one of those

things called somebody help me footnotes, cross references.

Thank you Deuteronomy 1815 is a big one.

OK, Moses said this. This is the Moses who said to

the Israelites, God will raise up for you a prophet like me

from your brothers the. Idea.

All of Moses's ministry was pointing to an eventual greater

Moses and Moses said another Moses is coming.

Does that make sense? So he's saying y'all about to

kill me like he's he's not saying that in the sermon.

But think about it. They're about to kill the guy

talking about Moses, quoting Moses, saying there will be

another Moses while gazing like Moses and blazing like Moses and

y'all gonna kill me in the name of Moses.

Just like you killed. Jesus in the name of Moses.

So he's just laying it on thick and what he's trying to say,

y'all? Jeremiah 31, Ezekiel 36, all of

the the the new covenant promise was that God would put onto his

people's heart the Law. The goal always was for God to

have a people who actually wanted him, who actually were

indwelt by him, who actually loved Him.

The Law can't make you love him. And that doesn't.

Make the law bad. Part of what the law is doing is

taking you to him by making you aware you're captive to it.

So the law is good, OK. It's like a it's like the cage

to the prisoner. You already a prisoner is just

making you aware of your imprisonment and showing you

your need for a Redeemer. And so and there's other pieces

in here. Just two little Nuggets.

One of the things he does at the very beginning.

I can't I can't walk through the the temple theme and the the

stuff with Abraham as much. But look at how he starts in

verse two. Look at this and Steven said

brothers and fathers, hear me the God of glory appear to our

father. You know what I think he's

trying to say? I think Stephen is.

Trying to say from the beginning Abraham knew a person.

Y'all know a system like God was always a glorious Redeemer?

Who called? Abraham and Abraham received it

by grace. Abraham believed God.

He counted it as righteousness. Then with the temple.

Stuff because again, they worship the temple, not the God

of the temple. They worship the temple and

verse 50 he. Does this.

It's a quote. To the prophets that said did

not my hand make all these things referring to the Lord

being like if you go back and read, you can write down first

Kings 8. If you're if you're going home

and just kind of rereading this sermon and the one of the

longest prayers in the Old Testament.

Solomon prays as they commissioned the temple and

Solomon says God, you don't dwell in what we build.

Solomon said that when they built it so that's not like the

New Testament just making up that God doesn't dwell in

building. Solomon said it when they built

the first one. So he's saying y'all worship

temple. But even the dude who built the

temple, Solomon said this ain't it.

Like he looked at it how amazing it was.

He's like God you more amazing than this building.

So from the. Beginning their worship ended

where God was not at. Does that make sense?

They ended at the thing and not the person behind the thing.

And I told you that this is basically what Paul spends many

letters trying to break down in different ways depending on what

they're struggling with. He says it's so emphatically in

Romans 228 and 29. This is how he says it.

Again, you don't have to know the whole Bible to get this, but

the more you see it, as you read the Word over and over and over

over the years, it just becomes more and more beautiful to you.

That's what he says. Romans 2. 2829 For no one is a

Jew who is merely 1 outwardly. Nor is.

Circumcision outward and physical, but a Jew is 1

inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart by the

Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man, but

from God. Yo.

This is what the New Testament teaches.

If you trust in Christ, you are in Abraham's family.

You are. You are.

In the lineage of Abraham, all of the blessings of Abraham are

yours. In Christ, you are in.

That's wow. That's what the New Testament

teaches, and that's what Steven told them in a lot of different

ways. So let's see how they respond.

To that. OK, let's talk about the.

Response. The response is pretty simple.

They kill him. OK, this whole point just

kidding, they do kill him they go wild.

But I I want y'all to think about the moment where the

sermon went from like. I don't like this dude to.

Like, let's kill him. OK, Here's the moment.

Look with me at verses 51 through 54.

He makes so. Plain what I just tried to

explain to you, but these verses are just cutting.

You stiff. Necked people, uncircumcised in

heart and ears, You always resist the Holy Spirit as your

Father's did, now not our fathers as your Father's did.

So do you. Which of the prophets?

Did your Father's not persecute, and they killed those who

announced beforehand the coming of the righteous One, whom you

have now betrayed and murdered? You who received the laws

delivered by angels and did not keep it?

I imagine them in the crowd be like, what do you say?

Me so he gives a little 3. Piece here underline them if you

got your Bible stiff neck. Uncircumcised in.

Heart and ears so we got a neck heart ears neck heart ears y'all

see those you see them there we're going to talk about them

those those are the images we need to grab heart ears.

Next, let's start with heart. Somebody say heart.

You know the Bible teaches that every single thing we do flows

from the heart. Everything How?

The overflow. The heart.

The mouth speaks. Guard your heart from everything

you do flows from it. Everything.

What you want dictates what you do.

What you want dictates what you say.

I remember growing up. It's.

Crazy the stuff I. Did all gossip about people, all

kinds of stuff and just be like my bad, I ain't mean that.

That it just wasn't. True, like we, we, we said that

kind of stuff. But somewhere you thought it for

you said it premeditated, you know, And yeah, you, you might,

you might be able to hold it in when you've had your coffee, but

when you haven't, you annoyed and your kids bothering you and

this is happening that you let it RIP.

But it doesn't mean it wasn't real.

The overflow of the heart is everything we do and our hearts

are the problem then, right? And so This is why external

religion makes no sense like a, a fixing what's on the surface

doesn't deal with the roots of the problem, right?

Like our heart is the problem. And so he calls them

uncircumcised in heart. First off, if you call an ethnic

Jew uncircumcised anything, they're like, what are you

trying to say man? What are you trying to say?

But he says you're uncircumcised in heart.

So think. About.

This, what circumcision is, is a killing off of the flesh for the

purposes of something new coming to life.

Old gone, new comes, old gone, new comes so.

The. Physical image of circumcision

was supposed to point to the need for heart circumcision.

Cut off old new comes. Cut off old new comes.

OK, so you can cut your body, you can't cut your heart.

Does that make sense? The idea is you need your heart

cut by the heart cutter. You need the scalpel of the Lord

to cut your heart. You need to be given the new

heart. You need to be heart of stone

removed, heart of flesh planted. The idea that the Bible presents

is that God wants to give you a new heart.

That's what it teaches we. Can't do.

That so to call them uncircumcised in heart means you

did all you think you run the system, but your actions are

evidence that you don't have a new heart.

Spirit does not indwell you and that's the most condemning thing

he could call them is uncircumcised in heart.

But he doesn't stop there. He says uncircumcised hearts and

ears. Somebody say ears.

So why the ear? You're on the Bible, The pathway

to the heart is through the ear. See that the?

Path to the heart is through the ear.

The idea is we we hear and it hits the heart and then we

change. OK so to be uncircumcised in ear

is to close off the path to what would change the heart, right?

So to say you're uncircumcised and hears means you ain't

listening. Romans 10/17 says faith comes

through hearing and hearing through the word of Christ.

You don't hear, heart don't get cut.

That's kind of the idea. So he's saying y'all don't.

Hear you need you have uncircumcised hearts, you have

uncircumcised ears. So you've they probably had

entire portions of this book memorized and he says you have

uncircumcised ears. So you sent through school all

them years, you had your ears closed the whole time.

You can memorize 1,000,000 verses and have the ears closed.

Did you know that you have uncircumcised ears and then he

calls them stiff necked? Somebody say stiff neck you so.

Stiff neck. I think our vernacular is

stubborn, but stiff neck that I might start, I might start using

that one. Y'all don't be stiff neck now,

though I might sign off text. Don't be stiff neck, y'all just

just your neck is strong. I mean, you can just you ever go

to, every once in a while you go to the gym and those dudes put

on them things on their head and they're like.

You've reached levels. In the gym game, when you're

doing the head belt with the 45 on and you're just, I'm not

there, I'm not there. But y'all, your neck is strong

even if you don't do that. And the idea is the neck, the

reason I love that image. I think we need all three.

OK, here's kind of the point. God's got to cut your heart.

You have some volition over your ears, but when you hear neck,

that's you. You choose what you turn to.

That makes sense. So there's this great tension in

Scripture. God wants to give you a new

heart. You got to turn your neck.

Lest we begin. To blame God that he didn't gift

us the heart. You didn't turn your neck.

Does that make sense? So I can't cut my heart, but

God's calling me to turn my neck.

He wants to circumcise. Your heart, but you won't open

your ears and turn your neck. That's what he's saying, lest we

turn this on God. And y'all, I just want to.

I just want us to hear this. If we are not in.

Christ, we are uncircumcised in heart and ears and we got stiff

necks. And one of the.

Signs that God is drawing you to himself is if he's turning your

neck if what he says begins to go from intolerable vomit

repulsive shut my ears ignore it avoid it avoid that person avoid

those places go through the motions when your heart awakens

when you feel like you're coming alive something is happening

where the spirit it again it's us.

It's the Spirit is turning us and I just want to say turn your

neck like I'm pleading with you if you don't know Jesus.

Yo what he wants. To give you is a new heart.

He wants to make. You, the you he made you to be.

He wants to give you. Victory over sin practically in

power and in penalty. Like we just focus on the I, I

don't want to be in trouble part, but the power part.

God wants to give you victory. He wants to give you new life.

He wants to give you resurrection.

He wants to give you all the energy you wasted on lust and

gossip and hating people and annoyed and just resentment.

Like you ever just get annoyed How much of your energy goes to

that stuff? It's almost like.

What if a power from on high could invade you and make you a

different kind of person with different taste buds who

actually wants what you were designed to want?

What if that were possible? Well, it is.

I'm pleading with you. To become who you were designed

to be, you can't do it. In the path.

Is through the ear, it's through the word of Christ.

As Christ crucified, He died on a cross.

Not to motivate you. He died on a cross.

To cut your heart, He died on a cross.

To give you a heart of flesh. He died on the cross for the

Spirit to indwell you. But this isn't a.

This isn't a a a a a. You get a little bit, he gets.

A little bit. This is a a, a surrender, A

submitting, A bowing and acknowledging that you killed

him. He says you killed him, you

delivered him over. And for every person who is a

true Christ follower, what they've all acknowledged to and

bowed to is to say I killed Jesus Messiah.

I did that. You're agreeing with God that

you were uncircumcised in heart and ears and stiff neck, and I'm

pleading with you to do that. Don't try harder.

That's not how you start to be right with Jesus.

You need a new heart and poor city.

Where are we stiff neck? Where?

Where are those, those of us who the spirit and dwells?

Where we still got that? Just don't want.

To turn and what tense. In my experience, it's just when

life ain't going my way in big ways, in little ways when I'm

irritated on down days, we justify in our weakness.

That's when I get stiff neck weakness leverages the moment

and weakness ain't always bad things.

It's when you're tired. It's when this it's when that's

when that's not going right. Money this, the car happened

this and then I just spazzing on people.

It's like I get it, but you're being stiff neck submit like you

want a pity party, get over it. So.

I just want to call you. Like stiff neck never leads to

life. Just don't.

It leads to death. It hurts you, it hurts others.

Doesn't build the Kingdom. Believers.

Is life disappointing? Does it feel like a wreck?

Open your ears to God's Word, my friend, and turn your neck.

All right, let's let's. Finish out talking about the

man. Let's talk about the man Steven.

Steven, we get told before the sermon his face is glowing like

an Angel. Moses references Jesus,

references his life clearly looks like Jesus, and then he

dies a lot like Jesus and Luke is just trying to.

Luke wrote Acts, by the way. So if you didn't know that Luke

wrote Luke and Acts. So it's kind of cool.

If you want, you can read them all together, take you a couple

hours, but skip a movie one night and just read them.

Luke and Acts, he wrote them. He's just trying to sprinkle in

there. This dudes looking like Jesus.

Look at me. We'll look at verse 15 to start.

Verse 15 Sorry, I might have I. Might have wrote down the wrong

one on that one. Yeah, I did.

I think it was. Oh, chapter 6.

Verse 15 Yeah, we good. And gazing at him, all who sat

in the council saw that his face was like the face of an Angel.

Again, I pointed that out to you.

But gazing at him, they saw that his face was like the face of an

Angel. He had a face like an Angel.

That's a human being. They they perceive that this man

is different than us. OK.

And then in verse 55. We see this.

But he, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the

glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.

I love this verse. Y'all we know in.

Scripture that when Jesus ascends into heaven or goes

back, he sits at the right hand of the Father, and he's often

described as seat at the right hand of the Father.

But right before Stephen died, Stephen sees him standing.

There's a sense in which his life was so beautiful.

This moment was so beautiful. Jesus stood up for this man.

How cool is that? How would you like to get Jesus

standing up for you like that imagery like finish strong

brother. Verse 59 as they were stoning

Stephen, he called out Lord Jesus receive my spirit, quoting

Psalm 31 verse 5, quoting Jesus on the cross.

Psalms 31:5

He says, Father into your hands I commit my spirit.

And then lastly verse 60 and falling to his knees, he cried

out with a loud voice, Lord, do not hold this sin against them.

When he had said this, he fell asleep.

I love that he fell asleep. That's because in the early

church, you ain't, you ain't, you ain't if you ain't Christ,

you ain't dead. You going to sleep, but you

going to rise again. OK, so and Jesus famously said,

Father, forgive them. They know not what they do on

the cross as well. So two things I want to tell you

about Steven #1. We were made to.

Look like Jesus. This man looked like Jesus, man.

He did. He looked like him.

But lest we think we weren't created to do the same, you

were. You were created not to look

like Old Adam, New Adam. Many of us get comfortable with

Old Adam. We think that's the normal.

That's not true. Steven should be what we think

is normal. Steven is what you were created

to be like, not what we see on the TV and on the phone.

This is this is you. This Is Us.

This is possible in Christ. We weren't.

And when I say that, it's not a conjuring of something.

You are a conduit believer of the Holy Spirit.

In the text he. Was careful to point out Steven

full of the Holy Spirit gazed into heaven.

So it's not like Steven had some gene, OK?

He just knew Christ, OK? So a conduit of the Spirit of

God. And y'all, the good news is we

can live like that no matter. You don't need a new job to be

Steven. We need Steven janitors, we need

Steven. We need Steven everybody.

We need Steven lawyer, Steven doctors, Steven teachers.

We need people full of the Spirit, intimate with God who

stand up under opposition. And then all of those jobs,

people are going to cheat, they're going to lie, they're

going to cut corners, they're going to use their power.

They're going to gossip, they're going to whine about the thing.

They're going to hand the things they don't like to the new

people. That's what they're going to do.

And you get a chance to be full of the spirit and just be

different. And then you going to take hits

for being the goody 2 shoes. And how you handle that?

Is part of the impact you'll make my wife for for Father's

Day this year she got a quote that she put on the wall.

One of my favorite quotes by a dude named Leonard Ravenhill.

He says he who is intimate with man, sorry he was intimate with

God, will not be intimidated by man Y'all.

This was a dude ready for the moment because he was full of

the spirit. But y'all, I think we we.

Daydream of these big moments, but the big moment, you just are

who you were before the moment. I mean, it's just hopefully the

Spirit's filling you in a unique way in those moments, but it's

just an overflow of our intimacy with God going viral, if you

will. And the greatest fruit,

honestly, maybe of his life is this forgiveness moment, right?

Like how much more can we be identified with Christ than when

we forgive, right? There is nothing that identifies

you more with Christ than what you do towards those who wronged

you. That's it, right?

And y'all, there's wisdom, you know, this is it's complicated

with family and when somebody's burned you a million times and

barriers all that. But what we do with those who

have wronged us is where we get to showcase most that Christ

indwells us. So when he says these words,

Father, forgive them for they know not what they do or Lord do

not hold the sin against them. That's not just cool religious

talk. This is a man who's about to die

who's so focused on Christ, he's not even like he.

When Jesus says blessed are those who are persecuted,

there's something they've tapped into that they know what they're

experiencing isn't about them, it's about God.

This has nothing to do with me. This opposition is about God.

I'm the conduit of God's opposition.

That's really what you are. You're stepping into something

through your intimacy and then it turns into opposition and you

just embrace it and it extends itself through forgiveness.

So y'all, what is the fruit of forgiveness look like in our

life right now, where we are intimate with God, there will be

great forgiveness. Y'all, the Lord's Prayer has

forgive us our debts. That's not just a cool slogan we

should say every day. It should be the lifeblood of

the the the Christian soil, if you will, is rooted in

forgiveness and that's what we're extending again.

We could write 5 sermons on that.

OK, second thing. So look like.

Jesus, you have to look like Steven.

Now, this is a plain word, so stay with me.

To look like Jesus, you have to look like Steven.

I don't mean copy Jesus. By copying Steven to look like

Jesus, you have to look like Steven who's looking at Jesus.

You get what I'm saying? What makes Steven unique is what

he's looking at. In the Bible.

You shine not because of what you do, but what you're in

intimate proximity to. So Moses shines after coming

down the mountain because he was with God.

That makes sense. So the the reference to his face

being like that of an Angel isn't because he did some, it's

because of who he's living intimately with his look.

Is what makes. Him look like that.

You want to live like Steven, You got to look like Steven.

Does that make sense? You got to look the way he

looked if you want to live the way he lived. 2nd.

Corinthians 318 It's a good one to write down.

Go to Go to page 9 O 7 if you're in our Bibles. 2nd Corinthians

3. 18 Paul says it this way. I just.

I just want to. Drive home.

This is not a special gene that we don't have, OK?

This is what it says and we all somebody say all is all like

most of the people in the church or it's all of them, OK, and we

all with unveiled face. Beholding.

The glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image

from 1° of glory to another, for this comes from the Lord who is

the Spirit. Y'all, I just want us to hear

that you were created to look like Jesus because you're

looking at Jesus. And I think sometimes.

We hear the word and we feel burdened of what we're not

looking like. And I just want to say, look at

him and you will look like him. Look at him and you will look

like him. Look at him.

Y'all another way to ask? This would be like pay attention

to your fixation. Your look is what you're.

Fixed on fancy way to say is we become what we behold.

What you look at becomes your legacy.

You know, a lot of people, they, they, I hear a lot of talk about

legacy. Legacy is what the way we tend

to say is what you think you're building your stats, your, your

111 concern I have in our current cultural climate is we

think we can measure our impact. This is not a bad thing.

This is a good thing, OK? It's just a fact.

Like when you do a a post online, you know your footprint

of how many people it's reaching down to the number of seconds

it's watched. But what it's doing is we think

subconsciously we live in a world where all can be

calculated. Y'all?

That's just not how the Kingdom works.

It's not We're going to talk. Next week about how the Lord

uses this and Saul's life becomes Paul and the persecution

of the church. All the things but Stevens

legacy. He had no idea this is changing

the world. His look was his legacy and it

changed the world. So y'all let me tell you

something. Your legacy isn't what you say

it is. Your legacy is what you looked

at with your life. Does that make sense?

Your legacy is the type of soul you leave behind.

It's what you looked at, it's what you were fixated upon is

what will go forward. It's what God can use.

What you look at? Is what you leave behind.

You ever noticed people I. Mean anything you celebrate,

anything you love, you begin to take on some of those

attributes. Athletes, you dress like them,

you wear the jerseys like we, we spouses get mannerisms like each

other, Siblings talk like each other.

I mean, it's just, it's just natural.

You become what you call, you become what you fixate on.

So what has captured your imagination and your attention?

What's got you right now and what's behind that?

What promises are behind that? The statement has.

Been true as long as it's been told.

Look at your looking, my friend, because you become what you

behold. So y'all just want us to hear?

As we close, this is what you were made for.

You were made to look like Jesus by looking at Jesus.

You were made not to have a stiff neck but have a

circumcised heart for the spirit to indwell you.

And the good news y'all. What I'm so hype about this

series is our looking can come become somebody else's seeing.

Does that make sense? It is through you looking at him

that others will see him. That's the good.

News is many will come to Christ if we look at Christ.

Our looking. Can become their seeing.

I see because somebody else saw and then show me what they saw.

Does that make sense? Nobody gets saved alone because

of what we tell them. We tell them because the ear is

connected to the heart and they see That makes sense.

It's all so linked. That's why it's all so

important. This is a show and tell game.

We end, you know what I mean? We got to show, we got to tell.

We show and we tell, but y'all, I just want you to dream of what

God could do. Dream of what people's lives

could look like if they looked at Christ.

Dream of what generational sin patterns could be changed.

I know you got them in your family.

I got them in mine. I dream and God has started

something new and you Amen. Praise God.

And also he wants to do it again and again and again and again

and again. And people as bad as they want

to can't be saved by going to Spotify in five ways to reduce

anxiety in your life. It's it's great.

They need to look at Christ, man.

That's what they need more than we need an efficient new life.

We need the spirit to invade our life.

Just dream of what Christ could do if we look at him and the

spirit invades. Let's pray our Father, we love

you. Thank you so much for this text.

Thank you so much for the sermon from Stephen.

God, I pray for any who need a new heart.

I pray for them to turn their neck, to open their ear, to

repent, to believe, to trust in God.

We are church who are in Christ. God, would you fill us with the

Spirit? God, would you teach us to look

at? Look at you, God, forgive us for

where we look at other things. Forgive us for other fixations.

Forgive us for just chasing legacies in the flesh.

God give us. Hearts that love you.

Eyes locked on you, we pray in Christ's name, Amen.