Recognizing Christ — Acts 6-7

0:00 It's good to see everybody here today. It's good to welcome everybody here. Let's open with a word of prayer. Dear Lord, we thank you so much for this opportunity we have to come together and Recording. Stop.

0:10 And remember your son that was sent on this earth, who was born in a manger and and lived a perfect life and sacrificed himself on the cross for us. Lord, we thank you for your son. Lord, pray that you would give me wisdom as I speak today. Pray that the words would be from you, that they would land on listening ears, and that they would be impactful in the lives of those who hear them. Oh, Lord, we pray these things in your name.

0:34 Amen. So today, we are speaking on Acts chapter seven verses 17 through 61. Realistically, it's gonna be Acts six and seven as well. I'm gonna go back a little bit. I know mister Boss covered it, but I gotta go back a little bit.

0:52 And the title of today's message, for those who like a clean title, is just recognizing Christ through the story of Stephen and his sermon, which is what this passage is about. It's the sermon of Stephen and I hope you guys don't give me the same reaction they gave Stephen. I really appreciate that. If you guys have any disagreements with what I say, you can just come up talk to me afterwards or if you want to throw something, could find some fruit or something. But just no stoning.

1:17 Let's leave that let's leave that here. All I really knew about this passage coming into it was that Stephen was the first martyr. Like, that's the big thing we all we all know about this story is he was a man from God. We saw this in Acts chapter six, how he was chosen as one of the first deacons. How he served the body.

1:35 But then in Acts chapter seven, I really could have only told you about the last six verses, is where he was stoned. I never really paid much attention to the sermon that he gave and honestly that's a mistake on my part. It's a very impactful sermon and it was very carefully given. And it's very interesting because the Bible is so full of a lot of different storytelling tropes. You have adventures in there.

2:02 You have romances. You have stories of failure and restoration. You have intrigue. And today I would like to present you another one of the tropes that the Bible has and that is the courtroom drama. That is the case for Stephen and the things that he was challenged.

2:17 And you have all the great aspects of a courtroom. You have the first thing is the defendant, Steven. He was being charged with these crimes and we'll talk about that later. But first we're going to talk about Steven and Mr. Boss did an excellent job last week doing a summary on Steven and the things we know about him.

2:33 This is our defendant Steven according to Chad GPT. And then here are all the different things we learned about Steven last week. We learned about his physical characteristics, what he did. We learned that he had these gifts from God. We learned that the people who were prosecuting him were the freedmen from these areas.

2:56 We learned that he was a preacher, teacher, very persuasive, face of an angel, saw into heaven. And some would say he had a lot of aura with what it says in verse six verses 15. And all who sat in the council looking steadfastly at him saw his face as the face of an angel. And so that's kind of what we know about Stephen. So that's our defendant.

3:18 Next we have the prosecution which we see again in chapter six verses nine and ten where it says, then there arose some from what is called the Synagogue of the Freedmen, Cyrenians, Alexandrians, and those from Cilicia and Asia disputing with Stephen, and they were not able to resist the wisdom and spirit by which he spoke. And then they secretly induced men to say, we have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God. So the prosecution in this case is the freedmen from across the Roman world, These regions here and these are people who were Israelites but they had spread out and they were very zealous for the law because they were not located in their home country anymore. So they had to hold on to those things that they could and so they chose the law and the temple and they said this is what we believe in and this is what they based their identity on. So when Stephen came around and was preaching the gospel and the new covenant and how the law had passed away and we have freedom in Christ now, that would have been very disastrous to what they believe And that is why they brought these accusations against Stephen.

4:24 And here's who we have the prosecution. On your left over here would be the freedman. It's a little dark. Hold on. You can see a little better.

4:36 And so this is the prosecution that we have here. We have the case against Stephen as well. And this we find in verses 11 through 14. I read that first verse there where he's speaking blasphemous words against Moses and God. And then they stirred up the people, the elders and the scribes, and they came upon him, seized him, and brought him to the council.

4:55 Then they also set up false witnesses who said, this man does not seek to speak blasphemous words against this holy place and the law. So this is the accusation that they brought against him. This was the case. They brought false witnesses as well because they didn't really have a lot to bring against Stephen in this instance. And next we have the judge that was presiding over this case.

5:17 So these are the accusations speaking against Moses and God. Testimony of false witnesses speaking against the law in the temple. And we have the judge who this is a representation of the high priest and the Sanhedrin. And this is talked about in again verse 12. We talked about that and then he was brought before the Sanhedrin and the high priest.

5:36 And then in verse one of chapter seven, it's the high priest that's questioning him and saying, these things so? We also have the jury, same people. You've noticed. We also have the executioners, again same people. Not necessarily a fair court system, no one that we would not like to have in America today, but this is what Steven was up against and facing.

6:15 He was full of the Holy Spirit. He had great wisdom. And he absolutely cooked them. They didn't stand a chance. And so as happens a lot when I was a child, if I ever was losing an argument, maybe this happened to other people as well, might get angry.

6:28 I don't know. You might lash out. Who knows? It could happen to anybody. And that's what they did because if the things he said about Christ were true, then they had messed up in a major way with what they had done in their beliefs and also in the crucifixion of Christ.

6:44 And this was something that they really couldn't live with so they chose to just get rid of Stephen so they wouldn't have to live with that reminder of what they'd done Because for them, the law was all that they had. It was about proving their faithfulness. Like if they felt that they kept the law, then they were good. But now Stephen was saying that, similar to what Christ was saying, it was the law who was condemning them. And I'm using a little bit of inference here.

7:08 This is not literally written in the Bible but based on what they were saying about Stephen speaking against the law, this is a good guess of what we have because it's also written down in other places in the scripture from the Apostle Paul and other people where if you look at Romans three verses 21 through 29, it talks about how the law is no longer as relevant to the to the faith and it has now been replaced. Where it says in verse 21, but now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed being witnessed by the law and the prophets. Even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe. There is no difference for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God sent forth as a propitiation by his blood through faith to demonstrate his righteousness because in his forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed to demonstrate at the present time his righteousness that he might be the just and justifier of the one who is...

8:12 Has faith in Jesus. This was another thing that would have upset them as well, saying that salvation was now for the Jew and Gentiles, for everybody, not just the Jews, which they believed that they had the truth. That's what they were strongly believers in. Now the actual crime that Stephen committed here was not actually a crime and that was just preaching the gospel in the new covenant of Christ. This was inherently against what the the freedmen and the high priest and council believed.

8:39 He was saying that the law is not the means to salvation. That salvation was through Christ alone and that God no longer dwells in the temple. He dwells in all believers. We'll see that later in other passages as well. And so now starting in or chapter seven verse two, this is when Steven starts to give his defense.

9:03 He said here's the accusations you guys brought against me. You asked me what I have to say for myself and so now here's what we're going to have to say. Now on the on that same page we have the actual judges as Steven's giving his defense and I imagine this is more who Steven's giving his defense to is he knows that the actual judge is the one that holds the true impact in this world and then the next is the father and the son who are standing there looking. You can see this later in the chapter as well how he looked into heaven and he saw, he knew who he was preaching and he knew that he was vindicated in what he had to say here. In giving his defense, he was very, very specific in the examples he chose and he picked examples that the people there would understand and revere.

9:45 He knew that they would understand these Old Testament characters lives and the stories there. He picked people that they respected and he said I'm going to use the very examples that you guys want to use and then essentially use them against you. Showing how crisis demonstrated in this old testament. This happened occasionally when I was doing speech and debate. You would have somebody present a piece of evidence and sometimes you would have a piece of evidence that said the opposite to what they said from the same person and the same source.

10:13 It was a very good feeling when you could show that the same person said the exact opposite and so their evidence was mute. If your evidence was more recent that was even better. Was awesome. That's kind of what Stephen's doing here. He said you guys believe what you believe because of these people so I'm going to show you why you believe is wrong using these same people.

10:55 They're all descendants of Abraham. God gave his promise to Abraham for the children of Israel. So he's establishing a common ground that they can work from. Now from there, he works into what I like to call Exhibit A, which is the story of Joseph. And he uses the story of Joseph again to typify Christ and that's what he does with all these examples.

11:15 He's showing hey, here's people in the Old Testament you believe, here's how they typified Christ and here's how Christ, and I'll show them later how Christ came to be the culmination of these people. And you see a lot of similarities between these people. So here you have Joseph and some of the similarities between him and God or between him and Jesus. Joseph was the beloved son of Jacob. We know that Christ was the beloved son of God.

11:40 We know that Joseph was hated and rejected by his brothers. We know that Christ was rejected by his own people. Joseph suffered unjustly when he was sold by his brothers into slavery. Suffered more when he was falsely accused of misdoings with Potiphar's wife. Thrown into prison for that.

11:59 He was suffering in prison for a number of years. And we also know the Lord Jesus Christ suffered unjustly at his trial and crucifixion. And then we also see how Joseph forgives his betrayers in the end of Genesis there where he welcomes his brothers back. And we also saw how the Lord Jesus Christ forgave those on the cross who wronged him. He saved his family from certain death.

12:23 There was famine in the world for seven years. They certainly would not have made it, but Joseph was able to save his family through his actions. And we know that the Lord Jesus Christ saved God's family from sin and death. And then we see this line here where it's you meant it for evil but God meant it for good. And we see that it is finished God's ultimate good finally completed there.

12:41 And we see these similarities between Joseph and Christ. And we see it really exemplified in Genesis 45 verses four through seven and you don't have to turn there. But it says, Joseph said to his brothers, come close to me. And when they had done so, he said, I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt. And now do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you.

13:11 For two years now, there's been famine in the land. And for the next five years, there will be no plowing and reaping. But God sent me ahead of you to preserve you for a remnant on earth and to save your life by a great deliverance. So again, we have this comparison of the deliverer, Joseph, and compared to Christ. And now we're going to move on a little bit into the uncharted waters here that Mr.

13:33 Boss didn't have a chance to cover last week, which is Exhibit B. And that is Moses. And again, we see a ton of similarities between Moses and Christ. We saw how Moses was chosen and preserved by God from birth. We saw how his mother chose to hide him for the three months and protect him from pharaoh's commands to kill all the male children of Israel.

13:57 We saw how God was, Jesus was chosen by God and preserved as a child when Herod tried to kill all the young boys and he was delivered by God and protected when they moved to Egypt. We saw how Moses was specifically raised by God to deliver Israel. And then we see how the Lord Jesus Christ delivers humanity. And then we see, and this is a common theme that you see throughout the message, and we're going talk about this more later in the closing arguments. That he was rejected by Israel the first time.

14:29 We have this story of how when Moses was 40, he saw a children of Israel being wronged by an Egyptian and he killed the Egyptian and tried to hide the body. Then the next day, when he tried to break up an argument between two children of Israel, they said, Are you going to kill us like you killed this Egyptian? He was rejected for this. The verse that talks about this is in chapter seven as well. Stephen makes sure to bring this to the attention of the council there.

14:58 And it's starting in verse 23, where it says, now when he was 40 years old, it came into his heart to visit his brethren, the children of Israel. And seeing one of them suffer wrong, he defended and avenged him who was oppressed and struck down by the Egyptian. For he supposed that his brethren would have understood that God would deliver his brethren, deliver them by his hand, but they did not understand. And the next day he appeared to two of them as they were fighting and tried to reconcile to them saying, men, are brethren. Why do you wrong one another?

15:26 But he who did his neighbor wrong pushed him away saying, who made you a ruler and judge over us? Do you want to kill me as you killed the Egyptian yesterday? Then at this saying, Moses fled and became a dweller in the land of Midian where he had two sons. So here we see how it's specifically mentioned by Stephen. How Moses was rejected by the children of Israel.

15:47 And we see this very strongly typified in Christ as he was rejected the first time he came into the world and how he was not accepted as the son of God. And we see this more later in verse 35. It literally says, this Moses whom they rejected saying, who made you a ruler and the judge is the one who God sent to be a ruler and a deliverer by the hand of the angel who appeared to him in the bush. And again, Stephen is emphasizing, this Moses, you rejected as well. We see the similarities in the signs and miracles that Moses performed through God's power in Egypt with the 10 plagues, the or the rod turning into the snake, these different things that he did.

16:30 We saw the miracles performed by Jesus demonstrating His divine authority on earth. Moses did not deliver the first covenant. The first covenant was given to Abraham, but Moses gave them the law. This was the set of rules by which they were to live their life for the next hundreds of years until the second covenant came through Jesus Christ. We see Jesus delivering the second covenant, replacing the law with the new covenant where we can have righteousness through faith alone and we don't have to follow the law.

16:58 Or it's not salvation through the law. Then we see how Israel refused to obey and turned to idols and Stephen mentions this as well later on in verse 37, where he says, this is that Moses who said to the children of Israel, the Lord your God will raise up a prophet like me from your brethren, Him shall you hear. And before we go on, we see even Moses is predicting the coming of Jesus. He is the one that they respected the most in their Hebrew faith and he says, hey, there's another one coming that's going to deliver you. And even through this, they still didn't recognize who Christ was.

17:38 Anyways, continuing in verse 38, it says, this is he who was in the congregation in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai, who received the living oracles to give to us whom our fathers would not obey but rejected. And in their hearts, they turned back to Egypt saying to Aaron, make us gods to go before us. As for this Moses who brought us out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him. And they made a calf in those days, offered sacrifices to the idols and rejoiced in the works of their own hands. And so here we see again that similarity between refusing to obey and turning to idols.

18:13 And then the last similarity we see is how Moses led the children of Israel out of bondage in Egypt, led them through the the red earth through the desert, through the Red Sea and the desert, and then we know how Christ leads these us out of sin and delivers us from our sins. And then we come to Exhibit C and this was the next thing that Stephen had to defend himself from. So we saw how they were saying, hey, you're speaking against Moses and the law and he's saying, hey, here's my defense for that. Here's how Moses typified Christ. I'm not speaking against Moses.

19:04 And here we have a couple different examples of what the house of God looks like. So the house of God, when it was first given to the children of Israel in the desert, was the Tabernacle. And he gave very specific instructions for how to set up the Tabernacle and God chose to dwell in that Tabernacle. From the tabernacle, God moved his presence into the temple that Solomon built. And this is, again, are chat GPT renderings of the tabernacle and the temple.

19:34 Where God said, this is where I'm going to dwell now. But Stephen was saying God no longer dwells in the temple. This is not the only place to worship the Lord because God now dwells in myself and all other believers. We are the temple of the living God. And it says this in first Corinthians three sixteen through 17, where it says, don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's spirit dwells in your midst?

20:01 If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy that person for God's temple is sacred and you together are that temple. So he was saying that we no longer... The temple is no longer where God dwells. He dwells in all of us. And this is in verses 44 through 50 in the chapter and Stephen does a great job of explain...

20:21 Expressing this accurately. He says, our fathers had a tabernacle of witness in the wilderness as he appointed instructing Moses to make it according to the pattern that he had seen, which our fathers having received in turn also brought with Joshua into the land possessed by the Gentiles, whom God drove out before the face of our fathers until the day of David, who found favor before God and asked to find him a dwelling for God... For the God of Jacob. But Solomon built him a house. However, the Most High does not dwell in temples made by hands as the prophet says.

20:53 And this is quoting Isaiah chapter 66 verses one and two, which again is another prophet who the children of earth through the Hebrews and the high priest would have believed in and he's using their own evidence that they would have believed in saying, hey, here's what it actually means. Where it says, heaven is my throne and earth is my footstool. What house will you build for me? Says the Lord or what is the place of my rest? Has my hand not made all these things?

21:19 And so we see how he makes his final defense for the accusation of speaking against the temple saying, things have changed now. It is no longer the temple that is God's dwelling place. We have received the new covenant and as believers of Christ, we are the new dwelling place for God. And then after making his three arguments or three evidence points out, he comes to his closing arguments. This is not a typical closing argument where you try to wrap up all your cases with a nice bow and say, hey jury, find sympathy with me.

21:52 I'm innocent. This is like a salt in the wound mic drop. I'm right. You're wrong closing arguments. He really laid into them.

21:59 He did not hold back at all. It was pretty aggressive. His goal here was not to clear his name. We can say that for sure. His goal was not to walk away from this and saying, wow, they all believe I'm innocent.

22:11 His goal was to proclaim the name of Christ and to do it unflinchingly and unapologetically. He was showing them that the law had no power here, the law that they pried so highly and that they were the ones that were foolish and ignorant for rejecting Christ the first time around. It's... I'll go ahead and read these verses and this is verses 51 through 53. And you can just imagine being in this room.

22:57 Never a great start to compare somebody to their parents. It's just really not the most endearing thing you could do, especially in this kind of situation. Sometimes it is endearing, not negatively in this situation. It says, you always resist the Holy Spirit as your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did your father not...

23:15 Fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the just one of whom you now have become the betrayers and murderers who have received the law by the direction of angels and have not kept it. This is a really interesting concept that I found going through here. I don't know if it was supposed to be done on purpose, but you see how the children of Israel really struggles to believe something, hear something the first time. We saw with Joseph the first time his brothers came to Egypt, they did not recognize him.

23:47 And it wasn't until the second time that he revealed himself to them that they realized this is our deliverer. He is the means by which we are going to be saved. We see this with Moses. Moses was rejected the first time. We saw it written in these verses how the first time he went to come they rejected him and they did not see him.

24:04 It was when he came back a second time delivered Him that, hey, the children of Israel recognized this might be our deliverer. We know this is true for Christ as well. The first time He came, He lived this perfect life on earth and what happened? He was rejected and betrayed and murdered by His own people. But we know based on Zechariah twelve and thirteen that when he comes again the second time, the children of Israel will recognize who he is and be delivered by the...

24:31 By him. And the remnant will be be delivered. And we see this in Zechariah chapter 12 and I'm just going to read a couple verses here just to show this this amazing prophecy that even in the Old Testament showing that when the Lord Jesus comes again, the children of Israel will recognize who he is and be delivered by him. Starting in Zechariah 12 verse 10. It says, and I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and supplication.

25:01 Then they will look on me whom they pierced. And we see a reference to Christ's crucifixion here, the one who was pierced. Yes. They will mourn for him as one mourns for his only son and grieve for him as one grieves for a firstborn. In that day, there shall be great mourning in Jerusalem like the morning at Hadad Rimnon and the Plain Of Megiddo, and the land shall mourn every family by itself, the family of the house of David by itself and their wives by themselves, the family of the house of Nathan by itself and their wives by himself and the family of the house of Levi by themselves and their wives by themselves and the family of Shimei Shimei Shimei by himself and their wives by themselves.

25:37 All the families that remain, every family by itself and their wives by themselves. We see how they're going to mourn for realizing what they did to the Lord the first time. Another really cool thing here is these names are very specific in what they were picked. They represent a different aspect of every part of the nation of Israel. Where the first one is you have the families.

25:57 You have the general population. They will mourn. They will realize this terrible thing that they've done. It mentions David, represents the kings. The kings, the leaders, they will mourn what they have done.

26:07 Mentions Nathan, that's the prophets, mourns the prophets. Then the house of Levi represents the priests. And then Shimei was a famous teacher. So you have the prophet, priests, kings, teachers and all the families of the children of Israel recognizing that looking on the one whom they pierced and realizing mourning for what was happened but repenting and coming to salvation because of that. We see this beautiful picture of Christ being recognized by his chosen people and them receiving salvation.

26:51 Yep. It's a very fun movie where these 12 men who are on a jury spend long, long hours deliberating whether or not they think the man is innocent or guilty of murder. They talk it over. They look at all the evidence. They say, What are we going to do here?

27:03 What are we not going to do here? I'll be honest, I don't remember how the movie ends. I have to assume based on how movies work that he was innocent, but I don't know. Anyways, they spend all these long hours deliberating. That's not what happened here.

27:12 It's quite the opposite of what happened here. We see this in verse 54. It says, When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart and gnashed at him with their teeth, which is not like, You're innocent. It's a We're about to kill you type action. Then we have the final verdict, which is verses 55 through 60.

27:35 Go ahead and read those real quick. It says, When they heard these things they were cut to the heart and they gnashed at him with their teeth. But he being full of the Holy Spirit gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God and said, look, I see the heavens opened and the son of man standing at the right hand of God. Then they cried out with a loud voice, stopped their ears and ran at him with one accord, and they cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul.

28:06 And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, Lord, do not charge them with this sin. And when he had said this, he fell asleep. And so here we have a representation of the final verdict. You have Stephen being stoned, looking up into heaven, and seeing the Lord Jesus Christ standing at the right hand of God.

28:29 Stephen's death is very interesting. If you were to look at it, you would say from a non religious perspective, this is a copycat killing. This is somebody who wanted to die almost exactly like Christ died. You have almost word for word similarities in quotes and actions that took place. Before he died, you have Stephen saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.

28:51 Before Jesus died, you have him saying, Father, into your hands I commit my spirit. Before Stephen's eyes, he says, Lord, do not charge them with this sin. Before Jesus died, said, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. Then you also have the really interesting example of both of them were taken out of the city before they were killed as we saw in Hebrews thirteen twelve where the Lord Jesus Christ was taken out of the city before his killing. We see here Stephen was taken out of the city before he was stoned.

29:21 And I don't know exactly why Stephen did these things. I think it would interesting to ask him, but we do see a very clear representation of Christ's death here as well-being emulated by Stephen. That kind of wraps up sermon that Stephen gave showing his defense for the accusations, Showing how Christ is the Redeemer, the Deliverer, the one whom they rejected was the one that was going to save them. He showed them through the examples that he gave from the Old Testament previous deliverers that God had sent that had been rejected. But what can we take away from this message and apply to our own lives?

30:00 The first application is to always be ready to give a defense for the hope that is in you. We see this in first Peter three fifteen where it says, But in your hearts honor the Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect. I add, well, I don't want to add onto the Bible. I would also say that another thing we could add to that is with gentleness, respect, and wisdom.

30:27 We see how the Lord Jesus or how Stephen was full of wisdom. Moses was mentioned as being full of wisdom and power. Joseph, known as a very wise man throughout the land of Egypt. And it's the wisdom to give a defense in a way that the people you are speaking to will understand. Because you can have all the Bible knowledge but if you don't know how to communicate to the person who's asking you, then it doesn't really matter.

30:52 Had a perfect under Steven had a perfect understanding of his accusers points of what they were accusing him of based on the law and he was able to use the law to answer their questions and point them to Christ because of it. I think a great example of this in our church is Mason. He's constantly at CSU witnessing and doing all these things. One thing he does that I really admire about him is he spends countless hours preparing and understanding the other side before he goes into those conversations so he can fully understand what they're trying to say and then point them to Christ based on some of the things that they believe and showing them some of the errors because he fully understands it. Recently having a conversation with Mormons who don't believe that Jesus is the son of God.

31:33 They believe that God was created. He understood these things going into the conversation so he was more effectively able to communicate with them and point them to Christ. It's being able to give a defense with gentleness and respect and wisdom, understanding what the other people believe and are accusing you of. Then the next thing and this is the title of the message is recognizing Christ because Stephen throughout the whole of his sermon was pointing them to Christ through Old Testament examples. But we also have to work at recognizing Christ in our own lives and seeing what he has for us.

32:28 Things are going pretty good. I was accused of sleeping with his wife. Things are not going good. I'm in prison for a number of years. I don't know what's going on.

32:36 But through all this, in the hard times, he chose to stay consistent to God and look for the moments when God was using him. He was able to recognize these moments and taking advantage of them when they came. When he was asked to interpret Pharaoh's dream and say this is the wisdom that comes from God. This is what's going to happen. He was not rejecting Christ but he was recognizing Christ in his life and staying faithful to that.

33:02 We say the same thing in Moses' life as well where it started off the first thing that happened to Moses was that everybody wanted to kill him but he grew up. But even still, we saw how he was rejected by the children of Israel. He had to flee the land for forty years. He had to lead the children of Israel for the forty years in the desert, which I would like to posit as the hardest job that's ever existed in the history of the world. Just dealing with 2,000,000 of the most ornery, stubborn individuals that you've ever run into or constantly rejecting.

33:29 You leave for three days and they do the opposite of what you say. Well, forty days, but still. He, through all of this, was looking to recognize Christ in his life. That's something we need to work on because not every moment in our life is going to be a burning bush moment where we hear a voice telling you, this is what I need you to do. You need to go.

33:50 Sometimes you're going to be stuck between Pharaoh's army and the Red Sea with nowhere to go. You're going think, am I going to give up and return to the things of this world, to the land of Egypt? Or am I going to trust God to deliver me that he will work miraculous things in my life? That he will spread the Red Sea open and we will walk across it on dry ground. That is what we need to work on recognizing in our life.

34:14 These moments of tough decisions. We saw Steven did this. Faced with this toughest decision of his life, he's being accused of these crimes where he knows the punishment is death. He could have chosen to flake and say, I didn't mean it. I'm sorry.

34:26 I walk my words back. But he knew that God had called him and put him there for a reason. He doubled down and said, No. This is what I believe. This is the truth of the scriptures.

34:35 This is what God wants for you. And in that tough moment, chose to recognize Christ. And we saw how even literally he recognized Christ looking up into heaven and seeing Christ at the right hand of God at his death. So that is my encouragement for you today is to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is in you. Let people see the hope of life that is in you.

34:56 And as you go through life, looking to recognize Christ, not even in the just in the easy moments or the obvious moments, but when life seems hard and you don't know what to do, looking for Christ in those moments and staying faithful to him. Let's close in prayer. Dear Lord, we thank you for your son. Thank you that you sent him as a deliverer and that through your grace, can receive him and have faith in him and have deliverance through him. Lord, we pray for the salvation of all souls that they would hear your word, that they would have their eyes open and they would see their need for a savior and that they would come to a saving knowledge of you through your son.