Acts 6,8 8,3

The Witness of Suffering
Acts 6:8–8:3

Acts 1:8
But you will receive power. . .
and you shall be. . .
and even . . .

What is the extent of your witness?
How far are you willing to go?
What if God wants to use suffering to
advance his gospel?

What is the extent of your witness? How far are
you willing to go?
What if God wants to use suffering to advance his
gospel?
God uses the witness of our suffering
to advance the good news of Christ’s
suffering for the salvation of others.

Acts 6
8 Now Stephen, a man full of God’s grace and
power, did great wonders and miraculous signs
among the people. 9 Opposition arose, however,
from members of the Synagogue of the Freedmen
(as it was called)—Jews of Cyrene and Alexandria
as well as the provinces of Cilicia and Asia. These
men began to argue with Stephen, (10) but they
could not stand up against his wisdom or the Spirit
by whom he spoke.
11 Then they secretly persuaded some men to say,
“We have heard Stephen speak words of
blasphemy against Moses and against God.”

Acts 6
12 So they stirred up the people and the elders and
the teachers of the law. They seized Stephen and
brought him before the Sanhedrin. 13 They
produced false witnesses, who testified, “This
fellow never stops speaking against this holy place
and against the law. 14 For we have heard him say
that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place
and change the customs Moses handed down to
us.”
15 All who were sitting in the Sanhedrin looked
intently at Stephen, and they saw that his face was
like the face of an angel.

Peter’s Model for Preaching
1. Straight from the text of scripture.
2. Centered upon the person and work of Jesus
Christ.
3. Explained and illustrated in light of the
contemporary audience.
4. Containing an urgent appeal to believe and
obey.

Acts 7
7:1 Then the high priest asked him, “Are these
charges true?”
2 To this he replied: “Brothers and fathers, listen to
me! The God of glory appeared to our father
Abraham while he was still in Mesopotamia,
before he lived in Haran. 3 ‘Leave your country and
your people,’ God said, ‘and go to the land I will
show you.’

Acts 7
4 “So he left the land of the Chaldeans and settled
in Haran. After the death of his father, God sent
him to this land where you are now living. 5 He
gave him no inheritance here, not even a foot of
ground. But God promised him that he and his
descendants after him would possess the land,
even though at that time Abraham had no child. 6
God spoke to him in this way: ‘Your descendants
will be strangers in a country not their own, and
they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred
years.

Acts 7
7 But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves,’
God said, ‘and afterward they will come out of that
country and worship me in this place.’ 8 Then he
gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision. And
Abraham became the father of Isaac and
circumcised him eight days after his birth. Later
Isaac became the father of Jacob, and Jacob
became the father of the twelve patriarchs.

Acts 7
9 “Because the patriarchs were jealous of Joseph,
they sold him as a slave into Egypt. But God was
with him 10 and rescued him from all his troubles.
He gave Joseph wisdom and enabled him to gain
the goodwill of Pharaoh king of Egypt; so he made
him ruler over Egypt and all his palace.
11 “Then a famine struck all Egypt and Canaan,
bringing great suffering, and our fathers could not
find food.

Acts 7
12 When Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt,
he sent our fathers on their first visit. 13 On their
second visit, Joseph told his brothers who he was,
and Pharaoh learned about Joseph’s family. 14
After this, Joseph sent for his father Jacob and his
whole family, seventy-five in all. 15 Then Jacob
went down to Egypt, where he and our fathers
died. 16 Their bodies were brought back to
Shechem and placed in the tomb that Abraham
had bought from the sons of Hamor at Shechem
for a certain sum of money.

Acts 7
17 “As the time drew near for God to fulfill his
promise to Abraham, the number of our people in
Egypt greatly increased. 18 Then another king, who
knew nothing about Joseph, became ruler of
Egypt. 19 He dealt treacherously with our people
and oppressed our forefathers by forcing them to
throw out their newborn babies so that they would
die.

Acts 7
20 “At that time Moses was born, and he was no
ordinary child. For three months he was cared for
in his father’s house. 21 When he was placed
outside, Pharaoh’s daughter took him and brought
him up as her own son. 22 Moses was educated in
all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was powerful
in speech and action.

Acts 7
23 “When Moses was forty years old, he decided
to visit his fellow Israelites. 24 He saw one of them
being mistreated by an Egyptian, so he went to his
defense and avenged him by killing the Egyptian.
25 Moses thought that his own people would
realize that God was using him to rescue them, but
they did not. 26 The next day Moses came upon
two Israelites who were fighting. He tried to
reconcile them by saying, ‘Men, you are brothers;
why do you want to hurt each other?’

Acts 7
27 “But the man who was mistreating the other
pushed Moses aside and said, ‘Who made you
ruler and judge over us? 28 Do you want to kill me
as you killed the Egyptian yesterday?’ 29 When
Moses heard this, he fled to Midian, where he
settled as a foreigner and had two sons.

Acts 7
30 “After forty years had passed, an angel
appeared to Moses in the flames of a burning bush
in the desert near Mount Sinai. 31 When he saw
this, he was amazed at the sight. As he went over
to look more closely, he heard the Lord’s voice: 32
‘I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob.’ Moses trembled with fear and did
not dare to look.

Acts 7
33 “Then the Lord said to him, ‘Take off your
sandals; the place where you are standing is holy
ground. 34 I have indeed seen the oppression of
my people in Egypt. I have heard their groaning
and have come down to set them free. Now come,
I will send you back to Egypt.’

Acts 7
35 “This is the same Moses whom they had
rejected with the words, ‘Who made you ruler and
judge?’ He was sent to be their ruler and deliverer
by God himself, through the angel who appeared
to him in the bush. 36 He led them out of Egypt
and did wonders and miraculous signs in Egypt, at
the Red Sea and for forty years in the desert.

Acts 7
37 “This is that Moses who told the Israelites, ‘God
will send you a prophet like me from your own
people.’ 38 He was in the assembly in the desert,
with the angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai,
and with our fathers; and he received living words
to pass on to us.

Acts 7
39 “But our fathers refused to obey him. Instead,
they rejected him and in their hearts turned back
to Egypt. 40 They told Aaron, ‘Make us gods who
will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who led
us out of Egypt—we don’t know what has
happened to him!’ 41 That was the time they made
an idol in the form of a calf. They brought sacrifices
to it and held a celebration in honor of what their
hands had made. 42 But God turned away and
gave them over to the worship of the heavenly
bodies

Acts 7
This agrees with what is written in the book of the
prophets:
‘Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings
forty years in the desert, O house of Israel?
43 You have lifted up the shrine of Molech
and the star of your god Rephan,
the idols you made to worship.
Therefore I will send you into exile’ beyond
Babylon.

Acts 7
44 “Our forefathers had the tabernacle of the
Testimony with them in the desert. It had been
made as God directed Moses, according to the
pattern he had seen. 45 Having received the
tabernacle, our fathers under Joshua brought it
with them when they took the land from the
nations God drove out before them. It remained in
the land until the time of David, 46 who enjoyed
God’s favor and asked that he might provide a
dwelling place for the God of Jacob. 47 But it was
Solomon who built the house for him.

Acts 7
48 “However, the Most High does not live in
houses made by men. As the prophet says:
49 ‘Heaven is my throne,
and the earth is my footstool.
What kind of house will you build for me?
says the Lord.
Or where will my resting place be?
50 Has not my hand made all these things?’

Acts 7
51 “You stiff-necked people, with uncircumcised
hearts and ears! You are just like your fathers: You
always resist the Holy Spirit! 52 Was there ever a
prophet your fathers did not persecute? They even
killed those who predicted the coming of the
Righteous One. And now you have betrayed and
murdered him— 53 you who have received the law
that was put into effect through angels but have
not obeyed it.”

Acts 7
54 When they heard this, they were furious and
gnashed their teeth at him. 55 But Stephen, full of
the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the
glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand
of God. 56 “Look,” he said, “I see heaven open and
the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.”

Acts 7
57 At this they covered their ears and, yelling at
the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, 58
dragged him out of the city and began to stone
him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their clothes at
the feet of a young man named Saul.
59 While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed,
“Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” 60 Then he fell on
his knees and cried out, “Lord, do not hold this sin
against them.” When he had said this, he fell
asleep.

Acts 8
1 And Saul was there, giving approval to his death.
On that day a great persecution broke out against
the church at Jerusalem, and all except the
apostles were scattered throughout Judea and
Samaria. 2 Godly men buried Stephen and
mourned deeply for him. 3 But Saul began to
destroy the church. Going from house to house, he
dragged off men and women and put them in
prison.

Acts 6,8 8,3

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Acts 6,8 8,3