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that should be all for our announcements so we'll go ahead and go to our third song it's going to be a new song for our church 172 love divine all loves excelling 172 love divine all loves excelling love divine all loves excelling joy of hand to earth come down fix in us thy humble dwelling all thy faithful mercies crown Jesus thou art all compassion pure unbounded love thou wart visit us with thy salvation enter every trembling heart breathe oh breathe thy loving spirit into every troubled breast let us all in the inherent let us find that second rest take away our bent to sinning alpha and omega b and of faith as it's beginning set our hearts at liberty come almighty to deliver let us all thy life receive suddenly return and never nevermore thy temples leave he we would be always blessing serve thee as thy hosts above pray and praise thee without ceasing glory in thy perfect love finished in thy new creation pure and spotless let us be let us see thy great salvation perfectly restored in thee changed from glory into glory till in heaven we take our place till we cast our crowns before thee lost in wonder love and praise while the offering plates are passed around turn in your bibles to acts chapter seven act chapter seven and we're going to read the entire chapter as is our custom acts chapter seven and you can follow along silently starting in verse one acts chapter seven the bible reads there then said the high priest are these things so and he said men brethren and fathers harken the god of glory appeared unto our father abraham when he was in mesopotamia before he dwelt in karan and sent it to him get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred and come into the land which i shall show thee then came he out of the land of the caldeons and dwelt in karan and from thence when his father was dead he removed him into this land wherein ye now dwell and he gave him none inheritance in it no not so much as to set his foot on yet he promised that he would give it to him for a possession and to his seed after him when as yet he had no child and god spake on this wise that his seed should sojourn in a strange land and that they should bring them into bondage and entreat them evil 400 years and the nation to whom they shall be in bondage will i judge said god and after that shall they come forth and serve me in this place and he gave him the covenant of circumcision and so abraham begat isaac and circumcised him the eighth day and isaac begat jacob and jacob begat the 12 patriarchs and the 12 patriarchs moved with envy sold joseph into egypt but god was with him and delivered him out of all his afflictions and gave him favor and wisdom in the sight of pharaoh king of egypt and he made him governor over egypt in all his house now there came a dearth over all the land of egypt and canan and great affliction and our fathers found no sustenance but when jacob heard that there was corn in egypt he sent out our fathers first and at the second time joseph was made known to his brethren and joseph's kindred was made known unto pharaoh then sent joseph and called his father jacob to him and all his kindred three score and 15 souls so jacob went down into egypt and died he and our fathers and were carried over into sycam and laid in the sepulcher that abraham bought for a sum of money of the sons of emor the father of sycam but when the time of the promise drew nigh which god had sworn to abraham the people grew and multiplied in egypt till another king arose which knew not joseph the same dealt subtly with our kindred and evil and treated our fathers so that they cast out their young children to the end they might not live in which time moses was born and was exceeding fair and nourished up at his father's house three months and when he was cast out pharaoh's daughter took him up and nourished him for her own son and moses was learned in all the wisdom of the egyptians and was mighty in words and in deeds and when he was full 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 him and avenged him that was oppressed and smoked the egyptian for he supposed his brethren would have understood how that god by his hand would deliver them but they understood not and the next day he showed himself unto them as they strove and would have set him at one again saying sirs you are brethren why do you wrong one to another but he that did his neighbor wrong thrust him away saying who made thee a ruler and a judge over us wilt thou kill me as thou didst the egyptian yesterday then fled moses at this saying it was a stranger in the land of madian where he begat two sons and when 40 years were expired there appeared to him in the wilderness of mount sina an angel of the lord in a flame of fire in a bush when moses saw it he wandered at the site and as he drew near to behold it the voice of the lord came unto him saying i am the god of thy fathers the god of abraham and the god of isaac and the god of jacob then moses trembled and durst not behold then said the lord to him put off thy shoes from thy feet for the place where thou standest his holy ground i have seen i have seen the affliction of my people which is in egypt and i have heard their groaning and have come down to deliver them and now come i will send thee into egypt this moses whom they refused saying who may be a ruler and a judge the same did god send to be a ruler and a deliverer by the hand of the angel which appeared to him in the bush he brought them out after that he had showed wonders and signs in the land of egypt and in the red sea and in the wilderness 40 years this is that moses which said unto the children of israel a prophet shall the lord your god raise up unto you of your brethren like unto me him shall you hear this is he that was in the church in the wilderness with the angel which spake to him in the mount sinah and with our fathers who received the lively oracles to give unto us to whom our fathers would not obey but thrust him from them and in their hearts turned back again into egypt saying unto erin make us gods to go before us for as for this moses which brought us out of the land of egypt we want not what has become of him and they made him a calf in those days and offered sacrifice unto the idol and rejoiced in the works of their own hands then god turned and gave them up to worship the host of heaven as it is written in the book of the prophets oh ye house of israel have you offered to me slain beasts and sacrifices by the space of 40 years in the wilderness yea you took up the tabernacle of moloch and the star of your god rem fan figures which he made to worship them and i will carry you all way beyond babylon our fathers had the tabernacle of witness in the wilderness as he had appointed speaking unto moses that he should make it according to the fashion that he had seen which also our fathers that came after brought in with jesus into the possession of the gentiles whom god drave out before the face of our fathers under the days of david who found favor before god and desired to find a tabernacle for the god of jacob but solomon built him in house howbeit the most high dwelleth not in temples made with hands as sayeth the prophet heaven is my throne and earth is my footstool what house will ye build me sayeth the lord or what is the place of my rest hath not my hand made all these things ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears ye do always resist the holy ghost as your fathers did so do ye which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted and they have slain them which showed before the coming of the just one of whom you have been now the betrayers and murderers who have received the law by the dispossession of angels and have not kept it when they heard these things they were cut to the heart and they gnashed on him with their teeth but he being full of the holy ghost looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of god and jesus standing on the right hand of god and said behold i see the heavens opened and the son of man standing on the right hand of god then they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their rears and ran upon him with one accord and cast him out of the city and stoned him and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man's feet whose name was saul and they stoned stephen calling upon god and saying lord jesus received my spirit and he kneeled down and cried with a loud voice lord lay not this sin to their charge and when he had said this he fell asleep let's bow our heads for a word of prayer father god we thank you for acts chapter 7 lord and uh for stephen and i just pray that you fill brother dylan aus with your spirit now and give him clarity of mind to thunder forth the message you've laid on his heart help us to pay attention minimize distractions in the room so we can walk out of the service this morning more complete christians we love you and in jesus name i pray amen amen well first i want to thank pastor shelley for the opportunity to allow me to fill the pulpit while he's gone it's always a great privilege and honor and thanks brother ben for that very long chapter but that was an epic chapter of the bible an epic sermon by this man named stephen i mean this guy was just completely filled with the holy spirit he's preaching in face of opposition and he's basically recapping the entire new old testament by memory i mean it's just an incredible sermon and this morning i want to preach about lessons from the life of stephen lessons from the life of stephen and we're going to be pulling things from basically acts chapter five through seven but i wanted him to read acts chapter number seven because i didn't want to have to reread this entire sermon for you later you you know what the sermon's about you know what he was talking about but just to give you a little bit of background stephen was one of the first deacons ordained in the new testament and a deacon is simply just a servant it is an official office of the church it does have qualifications if you read first timothy chapter number three but a deacon is not someone you know that's like running a church or in charge or anything like that a deacon is just someone that is a servant and that's what stephen was and the reason why uh they needed a servant at this time why they needed a deacon at this time is because the apostles were accomplishing a lot of work let's look at acts chapter number five really quickly and look at verse 42 it says and daily in the temple and in every house they cease not to teach and preach jesus christ you know these apostles they're not like how a lot of pastors are today where they sit in their ivory tower and read charles spurgeon books all day from their office they're actually going house to house every single day going to the temple preaching the gospel getting people saved doing the work of an evangelist right so these apostles that are doing great works for god it would make sense that they need help that they need helpers what doesn't make sense is why a lot of these pastors you see today have a staff of 20 or 30 people when they're not preaching the gospel why do you need a staff why do you need deacons you're not even doing what the apostles were doing here preaching the gospel it doesn't make any sense but the apostles they did need help let's look at act chapter number six verse one says and in those days when the number of the disciples was multiplied there arose a murmuring of the gretans against the hebrews because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration so because the apostles were going preaching the gospel so much it caused the number of the disciples to be multiplied which increases the workload which increases the things that the apostles are possibly neglecting right and because of that one of those things that are kind of being neglected is the care of the widows which is something first timothy five talks about if you want to read more on that and so this isn't this is a problem look at verse number two it says then the 12 called the multitude of the disciples unto them and said it is not reason that we should leave the word of god and serve tables so the disciples and and the apostles here they're saying okay we recognize that this is a problem yeah this problem needs to be fixed but it doesn't make sense for us to leave the word of god and to serve tables right it doesn't make sense for the men that are the only men that could do the things that they're doing to stop doing what they're doing to serve tables to help with the administration to help with the widows and i don't think the apostles are saying i'm above serving a widow or i i'm above doing some sort of administrative task i don't think they're being prideful here they're just recognizing that hey they have their role other people have other roles you know there's some things that only you can do there's some things that only our pastor can do we all have different gifts and talents and places in life that god has put us and hey to be an apostle you had to literally have seen the risen lord jesus christ right that's i mean there's not very many of those people going around so they can only do what they can do but lots of people can help serve widows and serve tables and do administrative tasks and so that's where where they're at in this situation look at acts chapter number six verse three it says wherefore brethren look ye out among you seven men and i want you to notice the qualifications that these men had of honest report full of the holy ghost and wisdom whom we may appoint over this business but we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word in the saying please the whole multitude and they chose stephen a man full of faith and of the holy ghost and philip and procurus and nikinor and timon and parminis and nicholas a proselyte of antioc so what are their instructions hey i want you to look from among you seven men of honest report men that are full of the holy ghost full of wisdom to do what to do the administrative tasks to take care of the widows to take care of the more you know seeming seemingly smaller tasks in the ministry but they still had really high qualifications for these men they weren't just saying hey go find the derelict on the side of the road that doesn't have a job and make him start serving the widows go find the bum that's holding a sign on the side of the road and have him start taking care of the administrative tasks no they want to find men that are skilled men that are full of the holy ghost men that are full of wisdom to take care of the seemingly small tasks of the work of god and what does this teach us the first lesson from the life of stephen is that the work of god should be taken very seriously the work of god should be taken very seriously and it doesn't matter what that entails just anything you do for god should be taken very seriously you know some people could argue well you know the apostles they're laying their hands on people they're healing people they're doing miracles they're preaching the word of god that's very important and absolutely that is very important that's extremely important but you know what in god's eyes you know what else is also important taking care of the widows taking care of the administrative tasks because god would not have had a high qualification for this seemingly not important job if it wasn't important to him and that's the thing what may be less or more important in the eyes of man is not always what's more important in the eyes of god god wants every single work done for him every single good work done for the kingdom of god to be taken seriously and to be done by skilled people he doesn't want just a bunch of bozos running the church and taking care of the things of church right no he wants skilled people he wants people that are full of the holy ghost that take his word seriously that take the kingdom of god seriously and you got to think you know think about people in the secular world in history that have been close to kings right like cup bearers or security or even now we have like you know the secret service or cooks at the white house right why is it that these people are important is it because their job is necessarily important no it's really because of who they're in proximity to right i mean if you're a cup bearer for a homeless guy that's not as cool as being the cup bearer for the king right to be the cup bearer for the king you have to be vetted you have to you know be someone that's really trusted and you think about it who are we serving the king of kings the creator of the entire universe so it does not matter what task you're doing no matter how small it may seem to you that is a big deal because of who you're serving right i mean it'd be such an honor and such a privilege to be the cup bearer for the king of a nation but how much more of an honor and privilege would it be to serve the widows for the lord jesus christ how much more of an honor and privilege would it be to be a doorkeeper in the house of god serving the lord jesus christ right no matter what you do sweeping the floors cleaning something praying for someone you know folding the bulletins whatever you're doing hey you're doing that for the king of kings right and that should be something that you take seriously because realize that god takes it seriously and that god wants men that are wise and full of the holy ghost to be people that serve him because the work of god is always to be taken seriously i'll read for you if you want to go to exodus 18 i'll read for you ecclesiastes 9 10 the bible says whatsoever thy hand findeth to do do it with thy might for there is no work nor device nor knowledge nor wisdom in the grave whither thou goest and you know part of the reason why i think stephen was chosen is because god knew that no matter what stephen was doing he's going to do it with his might right hey if he's serving the widows he's going to do that with all of his might and if he's preaching a red hot sermon against the jews he's going to do that with all of his might right he's not just a one-trick pony he's actually someone that can fill many roles right he's someone that could be trusted with a lot of tasks we see a similar concept in moses's day you're in exodus 18 21 look at exodus 18 21 and basically to give you some context moses is just overwhelmed with work he's trying to judge the whole nation by himself he's trying to have everyone bring every matter to him and his father-in-law jethro gives him some advice look at exodus 18 21 moreover thou shalt provide out of all the people notice these qualifications again able men such as fear god men of truth hating covetousness and place such over them to be rulers of thousands and rulers of hundreds rulers of fifties and rulers of tens let them judge the people at all seasons and it shall be that every great matter they shall bring unto thee notice these words but every small matter they shall judge so shall it be easier for thyself and they shall bear the burden with thee you say oh well who cares what the judge is like if all he's doing is judging the small matters right i mean if a judge is only taking care of like menial tasks and just menial judgments it shouldn't really matter what his qualifications are right wrong look he's saying find able men that fear god men of truth that hate covetousness so they could judge the small matters right that shows you that god because obviously god worked this out for this to happen and god approved of this you know god wants to have skilled high quality people serving him even for the smaller tasks even for the menial items even for judging the small matters and of course we still have moses right and he's going to judge the great matters hey we still have a pastor that's going to be the leader we still have the apostles that are going to be laying their hands on people and leading the charge of christianity but guess what steven matters too the lesser judges matter too and every single person in the kingdom of god doing any work for god god wants you to take that job seriously and god wants you to do it with all your might he wants you when you come to church when you're singing the hymns to sing it with your might to praise him with your might not to just be mumbling to god be the great things he have done no that's not how god wants you to sing he wants you to praise him from your heart and sing out with your might right hey when he when you're out soul winning he wants you to go and talk to people with your might not just be like yeah we're from a church yeah you want to get saved no okay bye like that's not how god wants us to be right god wants us to be persuasive and full of the holy ghost and full of wisdom and actually look like we believe what we're saying and actually look like we're excited to be a christian and excited to be saved and show up to church and do all the tasks of the church with all of your might everything the audio video guys that we have help with our church hey do that with your might the ushers do it with your might the security guys do it with your might when you're preaching preach with all your might right reading the bible hey pay attention with all your might look in the scriptures when we're preaching with all your might right not just scrolling facebook not just playing games on your phone you know i've been in church before since you know i'm not usually back here i'm usually over there and i've seen this in many churches you walk by and oh someone's on craigslist oh someone's scrolling ebay it's like what are you doing we're here to serve the king of kings right now do it with your might that's the type of person god's looking for and that's the type of person that stephen was you know i bet you that stephen when he read his bible read it with all his might i bet you he wasn't just kind of having his audio bible on in the background and kind of half listening for one chapter a day and calling that good i'm pretty sure he knew his bible because i'm pretty sure he preached the whole sermon basically quoting the old testament rebuking the jews right you know the bible says in psalm one blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly nor standeth in the way of sinners nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful but his delight is in the law of the lord and in his law that he meditate day and night i guarantee you that was stephen i guarantee you oh he's only a servant yeah so what he still loved the lord is god he still meditated on the scriptures day and night he still you know believed in the word of god and it was a treasure to him even as if he's just a servant he still was a good preacher even though he's just a servant hey he still was literally a martyr for christ as being just a servant and what does that teach us it tells us that every single task for god you should take it seriously you should realize that it's important to him and when you're praying for your brothers and sisters in christ hey take that seriously that's important to god you know you fellowshipping with visitors and being nice to people that are new in the faith and discipling someone and getting people to grow in the lord look god takes that seriously and he wants us to take it seriously as well not just have this apathetic attitude where you don't care about anything where you don't care about anything about the church let's go to uh colossians chapter number three colossians chapter number three you know if you struggle with this i think this verse can help change your perspective to change your heart to just cause you to care more colossians three verse 23 says and whatsoever you do do it heartily as to the lord and not unto men knowing that of the lord you shall receive the reward of the inheritance for ye serve the lord christ you know i already talked about how you're supposed to do everything with your might right you're supposed to go to work with your mind you're supposed to serve god with your might you should do everything with your might but you say well you know i don't like my boss at work well do it unto christ forget about your boss you say well well i have a hard time being a submissive wife and following what the bible says because you don't understand i have a bad husband well do it unto the lord follow god's commandments because of christ not because of your husband say well i have a hard i have a problem forgiving my wife and i always want to stay bitter against her hey forgive her for christ forgive her for the lord right do what you do instead of for man do it for god because when you're doing it for god then you won't care about the recognition then you won't care if you're just a servant right because you realize that god takes every single task in the kingdom of god very seriously what about soul winning go to matthew chapter number nine matthew chapter number nine matthew nine look at verse 35 and jesus went about all the cities and villages teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing every sickness and every disease among the people but when he saw the multitudes he was moved with compassion on them because they fainted and were scattered abroad as sheep having no shepherd then saith he unto the disciples the harvest truly is plenteous but the laborers are few pray ye therefore the lord of the harvest that he will send forth laborers into his harvest you know you look out into our world today even in our own community here with 8 million people living in this metro that's a lot of people for this church to reach with the gospel right you know it just makes me think like man i just wish people would care i just wish people would realize how important the work of god is to the lord and how important you are to that work how god looks down at the people without a shepherd he has compassion on them and he says hey the the harvest is plenteous i mean there's 8 million people here but you know what the problem is the laborers are few and it's because people do not take seriously the work of god people do not take seriously the commandment to go out and preach the gospel to every creature otherwise they'd be doing it and look i won't encourage you if you don't go soul winning or if it's been a while you need to get back out soul winning you need to get back out soul winning it's the reason why we're on this earth and look no one's going to make you feel bad for it we try to make it easy for you to go so winning at this church if you're a lady and you you want to go with the ladies we have a ladies only soul winning time that you can show up to in the middle of the week on tuesday morning you know hey people you said well i have kids they all have kids have your kids together right i mean go to the doors with all your kids together people are going to be nicer to you anyways you know you ladies don't realize that two men going to the door we get a lot more slack from people than when you're a lady or when you have kids with you right i mean solely with my wife people are always nice it's not always like that when it's two dudes okay especially where i'm from okay texas a little bit better but look we make it easy for you there's times almost every day of the week we've got soul winning captains we've got other mentors of this church that would be happy to teach you how to preach the gospel you say well you know i'm kind of embarrassed because i used to preach the gospel but i don't do it anymore hey who cares you're going to be in heaven for all of eternity would you rather just regret your your made up phantom of embarrassment that no one's even going to care about anyways and just regret that for all of eternity or just get over yourself and show up soul winning and earn some rewards in heaven and do something great for god why because the work of god is important to him the second lesson we can learn go to act chapter number six verse five the second lesson we can learn from stephen's life is that there's a prepared place for a prepared person and we've heard this phrase a lot but it's true and it's important to dwell on there's a prepared place for a prepared person look at act chapter six verse five and the saying please the whole multitude and they chose stephen notice who what he's like he's a man full of faith and of the holy ghost and philip and procurus and nikonor and timon and parmenus and nicholas a proselyte of anioc so it wasn't just stephen it was also these men but notice what their characteristics were they're men full of faith they're men of the holy ghost right these people were not just not taking the word of god seriously just coasting through life just derelicts no there are people who have been serving god already before they got this opportunity it wasn't like god looked down and said well i know stephen's not a hard worker now i know stephen doesn't care about the word of god now i know that stephen isn't going to be able to stand against persecution now but when i give him a position when i give him an opportunity then stephen will start to work hard then stephen will care about the things of god that's not how it works in anything in life in anything in life you're not going to get hired because the boss hopes that someday you'll know how to do the job and someday you'll be a good worker no he's going to look at a pool of candidates and say who is a prepared person and guess what there's a prepared place for you right this goes for anything in life i'll read for you uh yeah let's go to a couple examples in the old testament think about king saul this was a man that was a prepared person and there was a prepared place for him look at first samuel chapter number nine first samuel nine verse one now there was a man of benjamin whose name was kish the son of abiel the son of xeror the son of becorath the son of aphiah a benjamite a mighty man of power and he had a son whose name was saul a choice young man and a goodly and there was not among the children of israel a goodlier person than he from his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people and the asses of kish saul's father were lost and kish said to saul his son take now one of the servants with you and arise go seek the asses so before king saul is ever king you know what he is he's a servant he's a servant to his father right he's out working his father's giving him tasks hey go go seek these asses right kind of a picture of being a shepherd right and the future it's foreshadowing the future of king saul that he's going to be the king of the nation he's going to be looking out for the nation right but before he was ever king before he was ever glorified he was working and the way he even ran into samuel was they were starting to get worried that they couldn't find his father's asses and so they're like hey well let's go inquire at the man of god to see if he can help us find my father's asses and that's when samuel anointed him and said hey i'm anointing you captain over israel right so before he was ever anointed captain what was he doing working hard saul wasn't just lazy and just thought well someday i'm going to be the king somehow no he was a prepared person and there was a prepared place for him how about king david go to first samuel 16 flip the page a couple times first samuel 16 over and over we're going to see that men that god uses men that are already working he doesn't just pick lazy people and then assume they're going to change he finds people that are already hard workers then gives them an opportunity look at first samuel 16 11 and samuel said unto jesse are here all thy children so this is where samuel is coming to anoint who's going to be the next leader of israel and he said there remaineth yet the youngest and behold notice this he keepeth the sheep so while samuel's looking to anoint someone what is david doing working you don't see david coming up to samuel saying you know i'd like to apply for the position to be king right you know we've had people literally email our church saying hey are you guys hiring any full-time soul winners no are you out of your mind who are you like you what work are you doing we should know about you right you don't just contact the church be like hey you want to hire me as a full-time solar oh do you think we're hiring full-time prayer warriors too uh do we need to hire full-time bible readers this is ridiculous right no if god wants to use it he should just see you already working and you should be called into it right not not you got some bright light in your room i mean like literally called like hey do you want to come work here right that's like how it should be that's how it is when you look at these men of god where was i verse number 11 second part of verse 11 it says and samuel said unto jesse send and fetch him for we will not sit down till he come hither and he sent and brought him in now he was ruddy and with all the beautiful countenance and goodly to look to and the lord said arise anoint him for this is he then samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brethren the spirit of the lord came upon david from that day forward so samuel rose up and went to raima and of course we see all throughout david's life that he's a hard-working person he's keeping the sheep and he's fighting the lion he's fighting the bear he's fighting goliath he's fighting the philistines right he was a man of action he was a man that was prepared for the job and that's why god chose him here's another example i'll just read for you the man of god amos amos 714 says then answered amos and said to amaziah i was no prophet neither was i a prophet's son but i was in herdman a gatherer of sycamore fruit right he's just a worker he's just a laborer he wasn't you know in some sort of spiritual lineage of priests or pastors or preachers he was just a hard-working person and god saw from heaven hey this man's a hard worker he's got a good heart let's make him the man of god and that's the same thing with stephen you know it's not like we get some sort of lineage from stephen that makes him special you know that's what i like a lot about the pastors in our movement is it's not like they're have this super long lineage of baptist pastors like you know pastor shelley's dad was a baptist pastor and his grandpa was a pastor it doesn't work like that it's like our pastor was a software developer he was a hard worker and god saw that he was a man fit for the job and chose him for the job you know pastor anderson was an electrician and god saw that he had a good heart that he cared about things of god that he took it seriously and made him a man of god right and i give you example after example like that it's not like these men were just you know raised in some sort of pastor's family which there's nothing wrong with being raised in a pastor's family okay i'm just saying that it's not always those type of people that god chooses it's the people that work hard you know you don't want to you don't want to you don't want to wait for an opportunity to start working hard you want to start working hard and then the opportunity will meet you right it's like you know these single guys it's like instead of worrying so much about how bad other women are and how there's no good women why don't you just focus on being a good man why don't you just focus on being a man that's worth marrying and focus about yourself and start working hard inwardly rather than just pointing the finger everyone else hey you don't think that god has a prepared woman for a prepared man you don't think god can give a godly man a good wife why wouldn't he do that you know a prudent wife the bible says is of the lord why would god not give you that right you know some of these guys they need to stop pointing the finger outward and point at themselves and just accept the hard pill of reality and just start working on it getting better same thing you know you want to be a good wife you want to be a good spouse right don't point the finger at everyone else just start working hard just start working hard to start focusing on yourself you want to be a business owner someday well be a good employee right this goes for anything in life i'll read for you first corinthians uh three five says who then is paul and who is apollos but ministers by whom you believed and i love this phrase even as the lord gave to every man you know the most important thing when it comes to uh there being a prepared place for prepared person is that god has prepared people in this world for you to preach the gospel to that's the most important thing that god is prepared for you god is prepared for you souls that need to be saved that you need to reach with the gospel because the bible says here hey there's ministers even as the lord gave to every man you know god has given to every man in this world a minister to preach the gospel but if you're not prepared for that job then that fruit is going to die right they're not going to hear the gospel they're not going to be saved they're not going to go to heaven if you refuse to do your job if you refuse to be a prepared person and you know there's no excuse right we have the soul winning we give you a handout we teach you how to preach the gospel there's no excuse not to be a soul winner in this church and god wants you to do it god wants you to be a prepared person and he has a prepared place for you go back to ax chapter number six ax chapter number six the third lesson from his life is that you could earn great rewards in heaven no matter your position no matter your position because some people would look at a guy like stephen and say well he's just a servant he's just you know dealing with the widows he's just dealing with the administrative tasks how can this guy be great in heaven and also you know maybe sometimes moms and stay-at-home wives would look at themselves and say well how can i be greatly rewarded in heaven isn't it always going to be the guy behind the pulpit and the guys running the show no it's not always going to be like that and god doesn't reward you based on the position that you're in okay we'll get to that in a second but ax chapter number six look at verse seven it says this is the result of what stephen did and the word of god increased and the number of the disciples multiplied in jerusalem greatly and a great company of the priests were obedient to the faith think about this if you are helping the kingdom of god no matter what role that's in whether that's the pastor whether that's a servant of the church whether that's someone that comes and goes soul winning whether that's someone that volunteers with the tasks around church or prays for other people in whatever capacity you're supporting and lifting up the kingdom of god hey if the kingdom of god is increasing you're a part of that work and you're going to be rewarded for that work right think about in warfare it's not just infantrymen riflemen that win wars right i mean you have engineers you have cooks you have medical personnel you have commanders you have officers you have an air force you have a navy it's all of this coming together for the same cause right well the kingdom of god is not just nothing but apostles it's not just nothing but pastors nothing but deacons nothing but evangelists no it's the entire kingdom of god fulfilling each individual's role together that's what causes the work of god to increase and notice what happened it says that the word of god increased also you know if you just see that results are happening hey you know that you're going to be rewarded for that work and i think steadfast baptist church it's like you just look at the results even in face of adversity even in face of all the challenges we've had it's like hey people are growing here praise god people are getting baptized here people are getting saved our attendance just continues to increase right so that shows you that shows me that there's hard working people in this church that care about the work of god and hey we need to make sure it always stays that way we don't want to just get complacent and say oh well we're a great church today yeah we want to make sure we're still a great church next month and still a great church in the coming years and still a great church to pass on to our children someday that that should be every church's goal right and think about this also because the point is that you could be greatly rewarded in heaven no matter what your position is right the greatest thing that you could possibly be as a christian anyways is a servant do you know that you look oh well he's this person who's just a servant how is this person going to be rewarded i'm just a mother i'm just serving my kids i'm just serving my husband you're this employee oh i'm just serving my employer the greatest thing you could ever be as a servant and i'm going to prove that to you go to luke chapter number 22 luke chapter number 22 jesus's disciples here they start arguing amongst themselves look at uh luke 22 verse 24 and there was also a strife among them which of them should be accounted the greatest so picture this this is kind of funny human nature here pride right the disciples they're arguing about who's going to be better it's like well you know i say i you know revive more people from the dead and no i did more miracles i cleaned more lepers i helped more deaf people here they're arguing oh i'm gonna be the best in heaven right and this is how human nature is it's embarrassing but we're all humans we've all done it 25 and he said unto them the kings of the gentiles so like the people of the world exercise lordship over them and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors but ye shall not be so but he that is greatest among you let him be as the and he that is chief as he that doth serve for whether is greater he that sitteth at meat or he that serveth is not he that sitteth at meat but i am among you as he that serveth you think about the greatest person that's ever lived ever will live it's the lord jesus christ and what was he a servant right he didn't come to this earth to have people fan him and feed him grapes and carry him up on a chair and walk him around everywhere he goes he came to be a beast of burden to be a servant to us even though he's god even though he's perfect high holy lifted up sinless and we are just complete dirty rotten sinners undeserving of salvation he came here to serve us talk about humility and you got these disciples arguing about who's going to be the greatest and jesus is saying well let me tell you something i'm the greatest you know what i am a servant so the best thing that you and i can ever be in our lives is a servant right and that doesn't matter if you have a position of authority or not it doesn't matter if you're a husband or wife a boss or an employee a pastor or a church member in whatever position you're in if you want to be great in that position just serve just make it all about serving other people and when you do that you will be greatly rewarded in heaven because that's what jesus is saying that's the best thing you could ever be go to philippians chapter number two philippians chapter number two it's our human nature that always wants to see the outward appearance and always wants to see the the ceo of the company as the greatest person right and always wants to see the commander in chief except for america as the greatest person right no one takes our commander chief seriously obviously right but hey you always want to see the person you know that's leading the charge as like the greatest they're just always going to be the best but look it's not always that way it can be a humble mother in a church i'm sure there's been many churches throughout history where the person rewarded by god the most has been a mother i guarantee it and i guarantee you in other churches it's been a guy that just works a blue-collar job that just goes to work really hard during the week and spends his extra time for free going soul winning and volunteering with the church that's a great work you say well i'm not doing much yeah but you're giving a lot of what you have to give god sees that philippians chapter 2 verse 5 says let this mind be in you which was also in christ jesus who being in the form of god thought it not robbery to be equal with god but made himself of no reputation you know jesus wasn't going around making a bunch of tik-tok videos trying to become famous he wasn't you know ordaining himself and and doing a bunch of weird stuff he wasn't trying to get a reputation he wasn't trying to be well known and look he says and took upon him the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself and became obedient unto death even the death of the cross wherefore god also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name that at the name of jesus every knee should bow of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth and that every tongue should confess that jesus christ is lord to the glory of god the father hey you want to be great you want to be used greatly by god serve because the man who didn't even try to build a reputation for himself the man that wasn't trying to lift himself up he was trying to serve other people is going to be the most exalted person in the history of the world and every single person that's ever spoken against christ and all the people that hate them will bow on their knees and give him glory someday wow that's incredible coming from a servant coming from someone that made himself low what does that tell you the greatest thing you could ever be is a servant and you can be greatly rewarded by god no matter what position you have no matter what title you have no matter where you went to college no matter what country you're born in no matter what your skin color is just be a servant and you'll be used greatly by god you know this man steven he's just a servant right preached an awesome sermon stood in the face of persecution it was martyred for christ just a servant right you don't think he's gonna be rewarded greatly for that absolutely will fourth lesson we can get from his life this is the obvious one is that godly christians will be persecuted godly christians will be persecuted let's look at verse number nine of acts chapter six act six nine says then there arose certain of the synagogue which is called the synagogue of the libertines and sirenians and alexandrians and of them of silicia and of asia disputing with stephen and they were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he spake and they suburned men who had said we have heard him speak blasphemous words against moses and against god so you see so far here steven has all this opposition out of nowhere right all these jews all these synagogue of satan christ hating jews just come out of nowhere to speak against steven and just and they subborn men unto him for what what has he done so far he's just godly he's just a godly servant he's done absolutely nothing but yet he has this persecution and this opposition against him for no reason other than him being godly now notice this word subborn says then they suborned men which said we have heard him speak blasphemous words against moses moses and against god i looked up the definition of this word it says to bribe or induce someone unlawfully or secretly to perform some misdeed or to commit a crime or to induce a person to give false testimony or to obtain false testimony from a witness so you know since it's 9 11 here's your conspiracy plug all right here conspiracies exist conspiracies are real conspiracies are all through your bible what is a conspiracy it's one or more people conspiring planning to do something bad to do something evil to do something illegal look i know that the media wants to like make you feel bad for believing in conspiracies but conspiracies exist throughout humanity it's part of human nature right you see it right here in the bible they're suborning men which said we have heard him speak blasphemous words against moses and against god now is that true no it's a complete lie it's a complete false accusation but these jews came together they conspired they suborned people so they bribed or induced someone to give a false testimony against stephen and guess what it's the same exact thing today it was the same thing on 9 11 2001 it's the same thing that's happening in every country all throughout human history read psalms chapter 2 you know the kings and the rulers of this earth set themselves against the lord and against his anointed saying let us break their bands asunder let us cast their cords from us right so obviously the kings the princes of this world people in leadership they conspire against god they conspire against christianity if you've been a part of this church you realize that that is more true than sometimes we'd like to admit i'll read for you second timothy 312 yay and all that will live godly in christ jesus shall suffer persecution hey just like how it doesn't matter what your position is you could still earn great rewards in heaven well here's a little bit of a more negative one it doesn't matter what your position is you could still earn great persecution and it doesn't matter that stephen wasn't the apostle it doesn't matter that stephen wasn't the man in charge it doesn't matter that stephen was just the servant he still was persecuted to the point of martyrdom right and so you know you need to count the cost and this goes back to point one of taking the work of god seriously taking christianity seriously and realize that yeah you might be a layman you might be just a servant like stephen was but guess what you also can receive great persecution and there's coming a time during the great tribulation that jesus warns us about where there will be great persecution of pastors no of all christians of all christians and you need to get that reality settled deep into your heart today before it comes so it's not just a total shock to you so it's not just a total surprise to you to where you're moved so you could remain steadfast and realize yeah i i may not be in any position of leadership or anything that i might be a stay-at-home mom i might be a blue-collar dad but hey you could still receive great persecution no matter your position because the bible says hey all that will live godly in christ jesus it doesn't say all that have a position it's all that will live godly and now obviously when you read this story i mean it's just screaming to you that this is very closely parallel to the story of christ right i mean the jews are subverting men just have false accusations against them let's go over some of the similarities between jesus and stephen here so the first one obviously is that they're both servants right we already talked about that jesus came to be a servant he didn't come to be served same thing with stephen he's a servant both shut the mouths of their adversaries both spoke with such wisdom that they shut the mouths of their adversaries look at acts chapter 6 verse 10 says and they were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he spake i mean when stephen's speaking when stephen's preaching the word of god it's so sound doctrine and so full of the holy ghost that hey these people they can't say anything against it they can't disprove what he's saying right same thing with jesus go to matthew chapter number 22 matthew chapter number 22 verse 41 and to give you some context you know the sadducees here are trying to ask jesus this convoluted question about the resurrection and a wife and a husband that were married and the husband died and she had like six other husbands they all died and who's who's going to be in the resurrection how are they going to be married or whatever and it's just this foolish question of course jesus answers makes them look dumb you know same thing they try to tempt him by asking what the greatest commandment is he answers that makes them look dumb but notice this in verse 41 it says while the pharisees were gathered together jesus asked them so now he's going to ask them a question saying what think he of christ whose son is he they say unto him the son of david he saith unto them how then doth david in spirit call him lord saying the lord said unto my lord sit thou on my right hand till i make thine enemies thy footstool if david then call him lord how is he his son boom just dropping these questions on them and and do they do they know how to answer it says no man was able to answer him a word neither just durst any man from that day forth ask him any more questions jesus roasted these people so hard he just destroyed them in this intellectual battle where they're like i'm just never going to ask jesus a question ever again just because he's too he's too wise he's too skilled he has too much knowledge and you know what same thing with stephen when he spoke they weren't able to resist the things that he was saying you know the gainsayers weren't able to resist him he had sound speech that could not be condemned as titus talks about right here's another similarity go to uh mark 14 in acts chapter 6 mark 14 in acts chapter 6 they're all both brought before council they're both brought before the judge in a sense right and had false testimony against them acts chapter 6 look at verse 11 when they suburned men which said we have heard him speak blasphemous words against moses and against god and they stirred up the people that sounds familiar and the elders and the scribes and came upon him and caught him and brought him to the council and set up false witnesses which said this man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place and the law for we have heard him say that this jesus of nazareth shall destroy this place and shall change the customs which moses delivered us and all that sat in the council looking steadfastly on him saw his face as it had been the face of an angel so these jews are of course lying about stephen saying he hasn't ceased from speaking blasphemous words like not only has he blasphemed he just won't stop blaspheming and he's saying that jesus is going to come destroy this place and change the customs it's just all lies none of it's true you know and it goes to show that you know sometimes you could have a bad day in court and still be right you know you could still be convicted of something and still be right i mean how many men of god in the bible were thrown in jail for preaching the gospel does that make them bad does it make them wrong no i feel like sometimes people are like don't want to touch people that have been to jail or whatever but you don't realize that a lot of times people go to jail for stupid reasons a lot of times people lose in court as it were for stupid reasons because you know they didn't follow what exodus talked about about having judges that love truth and hate covetousness you know they just want to follow political agenda that's why you have so much bad judgment in our country but the same thing happened to christ right i told you to mark 14 55 and the chief priests and all the council sought for witness against jesus to put him to death and found none so they couldn't find any evidence against christ verse 56 for many bear false witness against him but their witness agreed not together and there arose certain and bear false witness against him saying we heard him say i will destroy this temple that is made with hands and within three days i will build another made without hands but neither so did their witness agree together hey so you know if you've ever been lied about you ever have people conspiring to come after you you're in good company because the same thing happened to the lord jesus christ who had no sin and the same thing happened to stephen who did nothing wrong here right so just because these things are happening to you doesn't mean there's something wrong with you it could be because there's something right with you honestly here's another similarity both were martyred of course we know the lord jesus christ allowed himself to be crucified you know they mocked him they spit on him they put a crown of thorns on his head they beat him made fun of him put the nails through his hands and through his feet pierced his side they murdered him on the cross he was martyred right well here's what happened to stephen let's read a little bit of acts chapter number seven verse 51 you know and of course we read act seven at the beginning of the sermon and he's basically like i said just this whole sermon is basically a rebuke of the jews let's start reading in verse number 51 it says he stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears you do always resist the holy ghost as your fathers did so do ye by the way this is hard preaching not when you're preaching to a whole crowd that agrees with you when you're preaching to people that want to kill you to people that hate you honestly the the smallest taste that i've ever had of hard preaching was the city council and that was nothing near what what stephen was going through but that was probably the hardest i've ever spoke because everyone in that room hates you everyone disagrees with you i mean when pastor shelly speaking it's like the demons are like coming out of them it's like oh what's going on here like that's actually real hard preaching in opposition right and he's doing this in in the face of people that want to kill them verse 52 which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted and and they have slain them with which showed before of the coming of the just one of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers he's calling these jews the murderers that they are who have received the law by the disposition of angels and have not kept it when they heard these things they were cut to the heart and they gnashed on him with their teeth that sounds familiar right but he being full of the holy ghost looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of god and jesus standing on the right hand of god and said behold i see the heavens open and the son of man standing on the right hand of god you know i believe that god allowed stephen to see this vision to kind of put his stamp of approval on stephen saying hey i'm with you i agree with what you just preached i'm for you right now and he let him see heaven open and see the lord jesus christ sitting on the right hand of the father and look at verse 57 then they cried out with a loud voice voice my jesus doesn't preach your hate call 911 kids run right that's what they're that's what these jews are yelling a bunch of idiots a bunch of demon-possessed morons they cried with a loud voice and stopped their ears and ran upon him with one accord and cast him out of the city and stoned him and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man's feet whose name was stall saul they stoned stephen calling upon god and saying lord jesus receive my spirit and he kneeled down and cried with a loud voice lord lay not this sin to their charge and when he had said this he fell asleep you see because stephen was a man of god that was full of the holy spirit and what was it they couldn't speak against the words that he said they couldn't gainsay the words that he said so they couldn't beat what he was saying they didn't have better ideas they didn't have truth on their side so instead they wanted him to shut up and when they couldn't shut him up you know what they did next they killed him and this is always the plan against christianity fight against it fight against it lose because you don't have the truth and we do then try to shut us up try to silence us and you know what comes next try to kill us it's happened all throughout history it's what will happen again it's what jesus warned us about in the all of it discourse we know it's coming this is the plan this is the conspiracy of the wicked is to kill christians and it was this conspiracy against stephen why because all that will live godly in christ jesus shall suffer persecution period oh yeah he's just a servant yeah he suffered persecution as just a servant yeah he's just helping the widows yeah he was just doing the administrative task but when he spoke the word of god it doesn't matter who you are when you're speaking the word of god people are going to hate you because they hate christ it's not you that they really hate jesus said me they hate jesus said right it's not really pastor shelley that they hate it's not really the other pastors of our movement that they hate it's not really you and i that they hate when we walk into this church it's the lord jesus christ because any other church that believes what we do also is hated by the wicked and any other person like stephen who preached the word of god to the jews you know that's the adversary at that time they hated him too they wanted to kill him too and jesus warned us about this this should be no surprise to us go to matthew chapter number 10 matthew chapter number 10 matthew 10 22 and he shall be hated of all men for my name's sake but he that endured to the end shall be saved but when they persecute you in this city flee into another for verily i say unto you you shall not have gone over the cities of israel till the son of man become the disciple is not above his master nor the servant above his lord it is enough for the disciple to be as his master and the servant as his lord they have called the master of the house beelzebub how much more shall they call them of his household and you know if the world if if the wicked aspects of this world never treat you like they treated jesus you know it makes me wonder are you even jesus's disciple because what they did to jesus was they lied about them what they did to jesus was they railed against him they mocked him they conspired against him they had a false trial against him and they killed him they called him a blasphemer that's what the world did to the lord jesus christ so if the entire world loves you and loves everything that you say makes me realize you're not a disciple of christ you're not a disciple of christ these churches that preach the positive only sermons they never get anyone upset they never make the news they never get any protesters hey it's because you're not the disciple of christ verse 26 fear them not therefore there's nothing covered that shall not be revealed and hid that shall not be known what i tell you in darkness that speak ye in light and what you hear in the ear that preach ye upon the housetops and fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell you know eternity settled the score between the jews and steven here right eternity settled the score between the lord jesus christ and the jews in the bible why because one went to heaven and one went to hell right steven went to heaven and these jews that don't believe on christ go straight to hell so don't be afraid of him that could kill the body rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell right and so we shouldn't fear persecution we shouldn't back down when persecution comes our way rather we should just keep preaching on the housetops what jesus told us in the ear right we could should just keep saying exactly what the bible says no matter who anyone thinks about it because eternity will settle the score it doesn't matter even if they win in this life they won't in the next we win forever and there's nothing they can do to ever stop that that is how it is verse 29 or not two sparrows sold for a farthing and one of them shall not fall to the ground without your father but the very hairs of your head are all numbered fear ye not therefore you're of more value than many sparrows whosoever therefore shall confess me before men him will i confess also before my father which is in heaven but whosoever shall deny me before men here's the people that won't preach the full counsel of god him will i also deny before my father which is in heaven think not that i am come to send peace on earth i came not to send peace but a sword this is just the reality this is just the way it is christianity is not all about sunshine and rainbows and just having peace all the time no there's battles no there's oppositions get over it it is how it is if you want to go to a church where there's always peace and no problems you could find just about any other church in america just about any other church in this area hey you can go over to the nazarene church over there and join pastor vanilla soybean latte and have him go serve some subway sandwiches to pedophiles yeah you can go to that church and yeah there'll be peace you could be weak you could do nothing for god you could be the enemy of god if you want to do that but actually if you want to be on the right side if you want to be on stephen's side hey that's just how it is division persecution this is just the reality it's not fun it's not pleasant but it's just reality accept reality or quit that's your options last point here i'll make it quick is that god can use your tribulation for good god can use your tribulation for good and i didn't say god will use your tribulation for good i said god can use your tribulation for good and i think that god using your tribulation for good depends on your response to your persecution and your response to your tribulation because think about how stephen responded to his persecution well first we see that he just continues steadfast he just keeps preaching the word of god in the face of these people that want to kill him in the face of these people that are lying about him he didn't change his message i'll read for you uh second timothy 4 2 says preach the word the instant in season out of season reprove rebuke exhort with all long suffering and doctrine you know steven didn't just say well you know you're right i changed my mind if you go back to the greek uh the jews didn't kill jesus if you go back to the greek you know the prophets of god in the past never made anyone mad if you go back to the greek you don't always resist the holy ghost you actually always accept the holy ghost you guys are great people wonderful people right no that's not how his attitude was he stuck with what the bible says even though it was an ugly truth for these people to hear he didn't quit preaching the word of god and lastly what's another way that he accepted his persecution was that he finished his life with a charitable heart with a loving heart look at acts chapter number seven verse 55 let's read this again but he being full of the holy ghost looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of god and jesus standing on the right hand of god and said behold i see the heavens open and the son of man standing on the right hand of god then they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and ran upon him with one accord and cast him out of the city and stoned him and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man's feet whose name was saul and they stoned stephen calling upon god and saying lord jesus received my spirit and he kneeled down and cried with a loud voice notice this lord lay not this sin to their charge when he had said this he fell asleep and this also is another similarity between the lord jesus christ and stephen when lord jesus christ died he said father forgive them for they know not what they do right and stephen is just saying basically the same thing hey lord lay not this sin to their charge you know our desire should always be for people to be safe our desire should always be for people to be forgiven by god and even in the midst of reprobates which i guarantee you there are some reprobates cruising the lord jesus christ and even in the midst of reprobates and i guarantee you there are some reprobates in the midst of the people stoning stephen sometimes there's people that are just dragged along for the ride sometimes sometimes people bring their kids to a protest preach protesting against the church they're young children you think these young children know what they're doing absolutely not and you know our desire for people that are caught in the balances should always be lord forgive them for they know not what they do lord lay not this sin to their charge that should always be our heart for people now of course there's other parts of the bible we know that once a person's reprobate they're rejected by god there's no more hope of salvation and we're not supposed to hope for good for those people but realize that there's a lot of people that you may think is a reprobate that may not be and you should always try if possible to give people benefit the doubt and love people even if they're your enemies love your enemies the bible says right now not love god's enemies but love your enemies pray for them and something and it's okay sometimes to pray an if prayer lord if this person has any hope if this person's not a reprobate will you please soften their heart will you please allow them to hear the gospel you please allow them to hear the truth lord please lay not this into their charge and if they are a reprobate lord please judge them it's okay to pray like that right that way you continue to have a charitable heart but not a bleeding heart have the heart that the lord jesus christ had had the heart that stephen had but don't try to have a heart that's more loving than god or less we should try to love the way god loves we should try to love the way stephen loved and how did and and realize that you know because getting back getting back to the point about god working out your tribulation for good i told you how steven responded to his tribulation that's he did those two things he kept preaching and he finished with a charitable heart that's why i think god used his tribulation for good but just realize that not everything that's bad that it happens to you is actually bad right you know the blind man in john chapter nine you know the question was asked why was this man born blind was it his sin or was it his parents sin and jesus said you know this guy didn't sin neither did his parents sin but it was for the glory of god right so that jesus can be glorified so we could have a story in the word of god of jesus healing a man that's why he was born blind he's born blind so that jesus can heal him right and realize that not every bad thing happens to you is always bad because something really amazing came out of the death of stephen because you could look things through a one-dimensional lens and just say steven was killed that is bad okay is steven being killed bad yeah that sucks right no one wants to be martyred no one wants to be murdered but there was an amazing good that came from it look at acts chapter number seven let's read verse 58 and cast him out of the city and stoned him and the witnesses lay down their clothes at a young man's feet whose name was saul you want to know who was a witness to the martyrdom of stephen who was a witness to the murder of stephen the man who would someday become the apostle paul the man who would someday change the world just turn the world upside down with the gospel of christ getting the gospel to the entire eastern world leading the charge starting churches getting christianity off the ground he witnessed the stoning of stephen you don't think that left an impact on the apostle paul you don't think that made a deep impact on his heart when he realized that he was on the wrong side of things the things that he allowed happen the the preaching that he heard stephen preach and he allowed that to happen you don't think that motivated him to serve christ better and where would we be today without the apostle paul right all from who a servant all from a lowly servant who decided to care about the word of god who decided to take it seriously who decided to be a prepared person who decided to keep preaching in face of persecution and to handle it the right way because of his example we have christianity that we have today that's incredible that's an incredible uh just testimony of a servant and of a christian in general and it just goes to show that god can use your tribulation for good and you don't always know what that looks like you don't always know how god is going to use it for good but hey just make just focus on responding the correct way and let god figure out how he's going to use it for good hey you just keep preaching no matter what you just keep having a charitable heart you just keep loving people no matter what and god will make sure to work it out for good i'll close with this romans 828 says and we know that all things work together for good to them that love god to them who are the called according to his purpose you know i can't think of a more fitting verse for the life of stephen you know if you're just only looking things through the carnal lens you would say man this is a rough life he's just a servant that gets persecuted that gets stoned hey but god's able to work this thing out for good and i guarantee you that stephen has an incredible amount of reward in heaven just an absolutely incredible amount of reward in heaven and realize that there's nothing stopping you from also being greatly rewarded by god you don't have to become an apostle that's not even possible anyways nowadays you don't have to become a pastor though we need pastors and it'd be great if people became pastors you don't need to become a deacon or evangelist though it's great to do those things you can do great things for god as the person that you are right now just as a recap number one the work of god should be taken very seriously number two is a prepared place for a prepared person number three you can earn great rewards in heaven no matter your position number four godly christians will be persecuted and number five god can use your tribulation for good let's have a word of prayer lord thank you so much for this day and thank you for the word of god thank you for the story of stephen and just thank you that he was truly a steadfast christian that he's able to be a great example for us i pray that you help us to follow in his footsteps just to take the word of god seriously to be prepared to continue in face of persecution and i pray that any persecution that steadfast baptist church has received and will receive in the future lord i pray that you would work it out for good for your honor and for your glory in jesus name we pray amen can i get that mic please let's go to our fourth song my faith has found a resting place 150 150 my faith has found a resting place song 150 my faith has found a resting place my faith has found a resting place not in device nor creed i trust the ever-living one his wounds for me shall plead i need no other argument argument i need no other plea it is enough that jesus died and that he died for me enough for me that jesus saves this ends my fear and doubt a sinful soul i come to him he'll never cast me out i need no other argument i need no other plea it is enough that jesus died and that he died for me my heart is leaning on the word the written word of god salvation by my savior's name salvation through his blood need no other argument i need no other plea it is enough that jesus died died for me my great physician heals the sick the lost he came to save for me his precious blood he shed for me his life he gave i need no other argument i need no other plea it is enough that jesus died and that he died for me thank you all for coming god bless you are dismissed