(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

It's great to be here tonight, and for those whom I haven't met, I am of course Pastor Steven Anderson, and tonight I'm going to be preaching on the biblical character Steven. But before I do, I want to talk a little bit about the name Steven. Now I was not actually directly named after the biblical character Steven. I was named after Steve McQueen, if anybody knows who that is. The actor and the motorcycle racer. And Steve McQueen was also in a lot of westerns. My brother's name is Clint, so you can probably guess who he was named after. And so obviously Steven wouldn't even be a popular English name though if it weren't for the biblical character Steven. So in that sense I'm kind of indirectly named after the biblical character Steven. So Steven is the English version of the Greek name Stephanos. And Stephanos is just the Greek word for crown. So that's what the name means, crown. And it's a really fitting name for him if you think about it because of the fact that the biggest thing that Steven's known for is being the first martyr. And if you would, flip over to Acts chapter 22 in your Bibles because actually the word martyr is first used about Steven. In Acts chapter 22, if you'll turn there, that word was coined for him in William Smith's 1901 Smith's Bible dictionary under the entry for Steven. It called him the proto-martyr because that was first used about him. And then I like this, it called him the archdeacon. I guess that's what the East Orthodox call Steven. They call him Saint Steven and they call him the archdeacon. That sounded pretty cool, huh? And then look at Acts 22 verse 20, it says, And when the blood of thy martyr Steven was shed, I also was standing by and consenting unto his death, and kept the raiment of them that slew him. So he's the first person called a martyr. And what is a martyr? A martyr is someone who dies for what they believe. So what does that have to do with Steven meaning crown? Well, Revelation chapter 2 verse 10 says, Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life. And so the one who's faithful unto death receives the crown of life. Steven was faithful to death. He was the first martyr. He receives the crown. So that makes sense for his name. Now the other great thing about Steven's name meaning crown is the fact that not only was he the first martyr, like I alluded to before, he's also the first deacon. And the word deacon literally means servant. You don't have to turn there, but in Matthew 20, 25, Jesus said, He that is greatest among you shall be your servant. And then a little bit after that, he said, You know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you, but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister, and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant, even as the son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many. So Steven gave his life, just as Christ talked about, Steven was a servant. So in God's eyes, the one who gets the crown, the one who achieves true greatness is the one who gives, the one who dies for Christ or is generous or is a servant and ministers unto people. As opposed to when we think of a crown, we would think of a crown being worn by a king or someone who lords over others or has great authority. But in God's economy, the servant is the one who wears the crown. And so my name being Steven, obviously I have a lot to live up to. I need to be faithful unto death and I need to be a servant. So let's get into the story. Go to Acts chapter 6, if you're not already there. Acts chapter 6, and we're going to start out here with Steven being introduced to us in the Bible. It says, And in those days, when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews, because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration. Then the twelve called the multitude of the disciples unto them, and said, It is not reason, it doesn't make any sense, it's not logical, that we should leave the word of God and serve tables. Therefore, brethren, look you out among you seven men 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. So these first seven deacons that are chosen in chapter 6 here are to help alleviate the workload of the apostles. The apostles have too much to do. They want to focus on the stuff surrounding the word of God and prayer. They want to do the spiritual work. They don't want to get too caught up in the mundane, everyday works. They need some help, you know, to help keep things moving. And I like how it uses the word business. A lot of people get offended by that and they say, you know, oh, you know, faithful word Baptist Church is run like a business or, you know, run a church like a business. Yeah, you better know we are. Jesus Christ said, I must be about my father's business, okay. And hey, it's a nonprofit business, but it's business. We're making profit up in heaven. We're laying up treasures in heaven. But let me tell you something. We ought to run the church decently and in order. And ideally we would have a well oiled machine. What's wrong with having a soul winning machine? What's wrong with having a preaching factory? What's wrong with having God's house doing the father's business? But people get really holier than thou and overly spiritual like, oh, I can't believe that he said, you know, business or, oh, I can't believe that you said you won someone to Christ. I mean, you know, isn't Jesus the one who does the savings? Should we give him all the glory? But here's the thing. There's all kinds of Bible verses where they talk about winning someone over to Christ or he that winneth souls is wise or, you know, these verses about, you know, I might by all means save some of them and so forth. So you don't want to be a holier than thou that's always trying to show how much more spiritual you are than everyone else by like, you know, distain. The only people who have a problem with the word business are long haired communist hippies. Amen. And I, you know, that's not who we are. Amen. So we're fine with words like business. There's nothing wrong with working hard, being clean cut, getting things done, being organized. So the deacons are there to help do the daily business, the daily administration, just take care of things because they said, look, we don't want to leave the word of God to serve tables. You know, we don't want to get too caught up in the mundane and then we're not able to fully give ourselves to the ministry of the word and to prayer. Verse 5, and the saying pleased the whole multitude and they chose Stephen. Now notice, it lists seven guys that they picked, but this guy kind of gets a special mention because it says they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost. And then he goes on and lists the others, you know, and fill up, progress and so forth. Now what I want you to understand first of all about Stephen is that they're not hiring this guy just to be a handyman or a table server or a janitor and there's nothing wrong with those jobs. Of course, those are all great jobs. I have way more respect than that than a lot of dishonest ways that people make a living. And you know, I encourage all my sons to go into blue collar work and I think it's some of the best work there is. But here's the thing though, you know, especially in the day that we live because of the fact that, you know, a lot of the jobs that people, you know, people are going to college and spending all this money and getting all this education, but you know, a lot of those jobs are going to be replaced by artificial intelligence. You know, there's all kinds of AI in the pipeline that's going to do all that math for you. You know, I'm not saying you shouldn't learn math now, but the point is, you know, jobs like electrician, plumber, carpenter, handyman, you know, those jobs are never going to go away because they require hand-eye coordination that only human beings have. But the point that I want to make though is that Stephen is a preacher. Okay, he's not just, it's not just like, hey we need a guy who's really handy, we need a fix-it guy, we need a guy who can turn the screwdriver and get things done, or we need a guy who's great at serving tables. No, they actually, even for the mundane work of the church, they still want to hire a spiritual guy. Even to, you know, and the point I want to make is that any time you're doing any kind of work around the church, you know, even if it's a mundane job, you know, it's important because you're doing it for the church. And so therefore, if they're going to pick guys to be deacons, to be servants of the church, to be workers, even though it's a lot of it going to be mundane work, he still makes sure that they pick guys that are full of the Holy Ghost, right? And these guys are spirit-filled preachers. Stephen, being a deacon, is not a second-class servant of God. He's first-class. And we're going to see that as the story goes on. And so Stephen is a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost. That's the qualification that he has. And it says in verse 6, when they set them before the apostles, and when they had prayed, they laid their hands on them, and the word of God increased, and the number of the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly. So what's the result of Stephen being put on staff? The result is the church grows, people get saved, multitudes are hearing the gospel. And it says in verse number 8, and Stephen, full of faith and power, did great wonders and miracles among the people. And of course, when you do a great work for God, you're going to face opposition. There are always going to be problems. Then there arose of the synagogue, which is called the synagogue of the Libertines, and Cyrenians and Alexandrians, and of them of Cilicia and Asia, disputing with Stephen. Boy, this guy made everybody mad. It's not like there's just one synagogue that's mad. It's like, oh, and they're mad, yep, oh, yep. It's like people from all over the world are mad at this guy. He's the deacon. He's not even the pastor. I mean, the deacon's making waves. The deacon's stirring things up. The deacon is hated on a few different continents here. And so they were not able, verse 10, to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he's baked. And let me tell you something, they never can. If you have a spirit-filled man of God with the King James Bible getting up and preaching it like it is, they can never beat the logic. They can never beat the preaching. They can't gainsay the wisdom and the spirit by which he's baked. So they always have to fight dirty, and they have to lie and slander and cheat. And so what they do, in verse number 11, then they suborned men, which said, we have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and against God. And they stirred up the people and the elders and the scribes and came upon him and caught him and brought him to the council. Look, this shows that even as a deacon, you can really reach a lot of people. You can get a lot of people saved. You can do great works for God. And you can even stir up trouble and raise hell and cause problems because everybody's just saying, we've got to stop this guy. So that tells me he's doing a lot. He's making waves. The devil is after this guy. And so they set up some false witnesses. It says in verse number 13, which said, this man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place in the law. For we've heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth shall destroy this place and shall change the customs which Moses delivered us. Now here's the thing, both of those things are a little bit true. It's kind of a twisting of the truth, trying to make it sound bad or make it sound like something it's not. But you know what? Jesus is going to destroy that place because this is happening, you know, around the 30s AD, right? Well, look, 30 some years after this, that holy place gets destroyed. And you know, guess who ordered that destruction? That's the Lord Jesus Christ from heaven pouring out his wrath and sending the Roman army to destroy it. Okay. And it was wiped out in 70 AD and, you know, change the customs delivered us by Moses. You know, some of those customs do change in the New Testament. And so there's a little bit of truth in this, but it's being twisted. It's being misrepresented. But you know, it's partially true. Verse 15, and all that sat in the council, looking steadfastly on him, saw his face as it had been the face of an angel. I love that verse. It's such a funny, it's like, ahhh. He's sitting in the council and basically they can't really find anything wrong with his preaching. They can't resist the spirit or the wisdom by which he preaches. You know, they can, they can try to spin things, but once he starts talking, he makes a lot of sense. And they can't argue with it. He makes them look stupid. And so even when he's in the council, they look at him and it's just like, they want to hate him. They want to be mad, but he just, he's just so legit. He just has the face of an angel. One guy that this reminded me of was, you know, Brother Tex Mars, who passed away a few years ago. You know, Tex Mars is the kind of guy where it's hard not to like him just because he's just kind of like this friendly old grandfather and he was just so friendly and so genuine. You know, just hanging around, because we got to hang around with him a little bit, and he just seemed so sincere and loving and just kind that it was just impossible not to like him. And that's kind of what I think is going on with Steven here. It's just they don't want to like him because they don't like the Lord. See that's their real problem. And here's what you have to understand. When you see people foaming at the mouth, mad at the deacon or mad at a preacher, mad at a pastor, you know, you think like, oh, they really don't like Corbin Russell or they really don't like Pastor Andrew. That's not it at all, folks. They really don't like the Lord. They really don't like the Bible. It's God that they have a problem with. You know, when you're out soul winning and people scream and slam the door, they just met you five seconds ago. They're not mad at you. They don't hate you. You know, they're just mad about Christianity in general. And so what we have to understand is that they're looking at Steven. It's not like, hey, Steven, I don't like your face. All right. They, you know, they had to make the effort to hate this guy because he's such a cool guy. He's making so much sense. He's a righteous man. They're having trouble finding what's wrong with what he said because they hate the gospel. That's why they kind of force themselves to be against this guy even though he's got the face of an angel, which is the exact opposite of the face only a mother can love. This is the face that everybody wants to love, right? Yeah, the face of an angel. I love that verse. So into chapter seven is where we get into his preaching, right? It says in verse number one, then said the high priest, are these things so? And he said, men, brethren and fathers, hearken. The God of glory appeared unto our father, Abraham. I mean, this guy, he takes the witness stand. He's not on the defensive at all. He's not getting up and saying, well, listen, I can explain, let me explain to you what I meant by that because I'm being taken out of context here. He just takes this opportunity to preach, and he just gets up and just preaches a home run sermon. He just figures, hey, everybody's gathered together, I'm just going to get up and just preach a powerful sermon. So he doesn't even answer the question. It's just like, so are these things so? And then he just rolls into this sermon. Men, brethren and fathers, hearken. He's telling him, you listen to me, hearken. Hearken means pay attention. The God of glory appeared unto our father, Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Karen, and said unto them, this would be like if I was arrested for preaching or something. It's like, I get to take the stand, and I'm just like, in the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. I started just telling the whole story of the Bible and going through. So Jesus was born as a virgin, and I started going through the whole thing. So he gets up and he starts to preach this sermon. And one thing that we see here is that Stephen is a guy who knew the Bible. He knew the Bible. He didn't have this typed up or anything. I mean, he's just getting up and preaching as the spirit leads. And he knew his stuff. I mean, he's able to just get up and just off the top of his head, extemporaneously impromptu, he's able to just give the history of the Old Testament and just go through the whole history up to that point. And he knows the Bible. And this first part of the sermon, which is really the bulk of the sermon, he's going through a history of the children of Israel. Now, at first, this seems like a really benign sermon. It's not really going to offend his audience, because the audience that he's preaching to are the children of Israel. And they love this stuff. I mean, they love hearing about Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Moses. I mean, this is their favorite subject. And he's getting up and preaching about this. But what's interesting is that he's kind of sowing seeds as he preaches this. He's sowing seeds of the main point that he's kind of getting to. But he doesn't just come in and just start swinging right away. He doesn't just start attacking them and defending himself. He takes a more gentle approach. And it's really a smart approach, where he kind of wants to try to get them on his side. So he starts telling them the Bible story. And he's kind of getting them to see how at each stage of the story, the children of Israel are disobedient, and how they're not accepting Moses. And here's where they sinned, and here's where they disobeyed. So even though he's telling a story that's positive about their nation, he's starting to plant the seeds of the balm he's going to drop at the end. But he's doing it in a way where it's more gentle. He's getting them over to his side. And so he goes through this whole history. I'm not going to go through the whole entire history for sake of time. But it's a great chapter. It's always been one of my favorite chapters because I love these kind of chapters that just kind of put the whole Old Testament in a nutshell, or just kind of are a synopsis of Bible stories. I think it's great. And I've attempted to preach sermons like this too, where I give great overviews of whole books of the Bible or of the whole Bible. So he gives this great overview. And he uses these different examples that point to what he's going to say. But if you get to verse 51, this is where he just totally changes gears. So up to this point, he's just giving a biblical history lesson. They don't know what he's getting at. But he's putting in all these little points showing how the children of Israel are constantly disobeying and that basically rejecting Christ is just another disobedience in a long series of them not doing the right thing, not accepting the Word of God. And so it's funny because up to this point, they're ready to acquit. I mean, they're probably listening to this sermon thinking, this guy's not, this guy's like one of us. This guy's not so bad. You know, they're already ready to declare him not guilty. I mean, they're ready to just dismiss, case dismissed with prejudice. But Stephen's not going to, he's not going to trim the message. He's not going to leave it at that. You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in hearts and ears. This is the last thing they want to be called. Uncircumcised. That's like the worst thing. That might not seem like the worst thing to us, but to them, these people are hateful toward the Gentiles, which God never taught them that. God has always so loved the world and he loved all nations. He's not a respecter of persons and God always wanted to reach out to the Gentiles. But they, as Jews, had developed in their history a disdain for the Gentiles where they looked down on them, they thought they were better, they were kind of a Jewish supremacist mentality. And so to be called uncircumcised is the worst thing you could call them, but you know what, that's exactly what they were. They think they're so special, they think they're the chosen people. You know, he's basically saying you're not the chosen people. That's what he's saying. The circumcision was the picture of the fact that they were the special separated nation separated unto God. And he said, you are uncircumcised in your heart. And what does the Bible teach? It says in Romans 2, 26, for he is not a Jew which is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh, but he is a Jew which is one inwardly. And circumcision is that of the heart and of the spirit and not of the letter, whose praise is not of men but of God. And so the Bible is really clear that it's the circumcision of the heart that really matters, not the flesh. You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you'd always resist the Holy Ghost. As your fathers did, so do ye. Which of the prophets have your fathers not persecuted? And they've slain them which showed before of the coming of the just one, of whom you have been now, the betrayers and murderers who've received the law by the disposition of angels and have not kept it. Now look, that's three verses. Look how long the sermon is. The sermon starts in verse two, right? So 53 minus one is 52, so it's 52 verses, three of them, he's ripping face. Forty-nine of them are benign, right? The first 49 verses are just kind of men and brethren, Abraham our father when he was on the other side of the flood, and Karen telling the story. Then he just drops the bomb in the last three verses. And you know, one of the things I want to point out here is that for a preacher not to be persecuted, for a preacher not to be hated, for a preacher not to go through trials and tribulations for the word of God, he really only has to trim about 1-17 approximately of the sermon. And here's the problem with most preachers, it's not what they say, it's what they don't say. You know, we could go to one of these liberal churches in Tucson on Sunday, we could show up at one of these liberal fun centers, and there's a pretty good chance that everything that would be said in the sermon would be 100% right. There'd be a great chance, because they'd be like, hey man, we need to love people. We need to love God, we need to put God number one in our lives. We got to put God first, right? We've got to love people. You know, they might be telling the story of the Good Samaritan, or the prodigal son, or they might be telling all number of Bible stories and telling truths about them. And it's not the part that they say, it's the part that they trim those three verses is what's going on. And you know what, I can't even count how many times people have told me, hey just trim those three verses. Like you know, it's a great movie, but just that one part, can you just cut out that two minute part? No? You know, and the thing is, God wants us to preach everything. I just don't think it's right for us to stand in judgment of the word of God and decide what we think should be preached and what shouldn't. Who are we to sit there and say, well, you know, I think we should just leave this part out because I don't think people can handle this. Hey, God has commanded us to preach the word, and Jesus said that every word is what we need to preach. He said, heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away. Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Hey, we are to preach all the counsel of God. All of it. We cannot trim the message, and you know what, there are just a few things that if we didn't talk about, we wouldn't be persecuted. I mean think about it, what are the things that really get me in hot water? You know, it's just a few small things, you know, preaching against the sodomites is one of them. As far as getting in hot water with the worldly people like the people that are running YouTube and stuff like that. You know, I mentioned something about vaccines and got my entire channel deleted minutes later because I'm speaking against vaccines. Say goodbye to this YouTube channel, no I'm just kidding, but anyway, I didn't say the C word with it. As long as I don't say the C word, I should be okay. But the point is, you know, there are certain subjects that trigger them, you know, back when my channel would have like two strikes on it, I knew that there were just certain sermons that needed to be uploaded to a different channel. You know, and it was typically stuff about feminism or the sodomites, it was just a few things. And here's the thing, there are preachers all over America that just skip those few subjects, but you know what, you're sacrificing the power of God. Because I don't think it's a coincidence that Stephen is a preacher that was full of power and of the Holy Ghost, and he's also a preacher who just goes right into the lion's den, right behind enemy lines, and says you're sick-necked and you're uncircumcised in your heart, and he didn't hold back anything. I guarantee you that if he was the kind of guy that would hold back, the Bible would not describe him as full of the Holy Ghost and full of faith. If you're full of faith and full of the Holy Ghost, you preach everything you believe. You don't hold back. You don't trim the message. And these guys that trim the message, the Holy Spirit's not leading them to do that. That is them refusing to preach everything that God has told us to preach. We've got to preach everything. You know, the Apostle Paul said, and I, brethren, if I yet preach circumcision, why do I then suffer persecution? For then is the offense of the cross ceased. Let that sink in. He said, if I preach circumcision, then how come I'm getting persecuted? Because he's saying it's the fact that I'm not preaching circumcision. That's why I'm getting persecuted. So Paul would only have to change one thing, according to Paul, and Paul's writing on the inspiration of the Holy Ghost. We know everything that the Bible says is true. And the Bible says in Galatians chapter 6 that if the Apostle Paul would just preach, hey, you have to be circumcised, that he would not be persecuted if he just would Judaize it. And I think what he means, circumcision is kind of representing just kind of the whole Judaizing package. So he's basically saying, hey, if I was a Hebrew roots guy, if I were a Judaizer, if I were up here talking about Yeshua, Hochflem, and Chanukah, and Rosh Hashanah, he's saying, look, if I would be that kind of a guy, I wouldn't be getting persecuted. Now let me ask you this. Theoretically, would it be possible to preach the true saving gospel of Christ and just kind of Judaize it? But you can still preach the right salvation. Would that be humanly possible? Yeah. I could get up and tell the truth about the gospel and then lie about that. I could get up and say, hey, salvation is simply by believing on Jesus Christ. All you have to do to go to heaven is just believe on Jesus. His death, his burial, his resurrection, Jesus paid it all. You put your faith and trust in him and you have eternal life. Amen. But once you're saved, you need to get circumcised. You need to be kosher. You need to follow the Jewish customs. Okay, not for salvation, but just what you should do. Now look, there are people out there who do that. But let me tell you something, it's wrong. It's a lie. And here's the thing. The apostle Paul could have saved all the times that he went to jail, all the beatings, all the problems, if he would have just thrown the Jews a bone. That's what he's saying. And he could still preach the gospel. He could still preach about Jesus. And this is the wicked thought that comes into the mind of preachers. I can still preach the gospel. I can still be big on soul winning. I can still do a great work for God. Hey, well, I don't need to mention homos. Just leave that alone. Let sleeping dogs lie, amen. And I mean that in every sense of the word. Let sleeping dogs lie. Leave that alone. Stay away. Hey, I don't have to get on these hot button issues, but hold on a second. In 2020, America is in crisis. America is at a crossroads. America is turning into a modern day Sodom and Gomorrah. Somebody's got to get up and say it. And if you're not willing to get up and rebuke that sin and preach it the way the Bible preaches it and preach it hard. I didn't say the way the Republican Party preaches it. I said the way the Bible preaches it. If you get up and preach it the way the Bible preaches it, then I'll call you a man of God. Then I'll say you're filled with the Spirit of God. But this attitude that says, well, I know better, I'm going to figure out the balance point where I can still preach the gospel, but I can keep my head off the chopping block. You know what? That's not the way Stephen thought. The way Stephen thought was, you know what? I am here to preach the Bible and I'm going to preach the whole message. I'm going to preach what these people need to hear. I'm not going to hold back. I'm not going to trim it. Now some people would look at Stephen and say, well, this strategy failed. Because look at verse number 54. 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. He doesn't see God because of the fact that no man can see his face and live. So he doesn't see actually God the Father, but he sees the glory of God, the brightness or the light that no man can approach unto. Because God dwells in the light that no man can approach unto. So he sees the glory of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God. And said, there's only one throne, I only see one throne. He sees the glory of God and then he says, Jesus is on the right hand of God. So you got God and then you got Jesus on the right hand of God. Let me draw you a diagram here, all right, all right, God, Jesus is on the right hand of God. Any questions? This is your brain, all right? This is your brain on drugs. Any questions? One throne, every single time in the Bible there's only one throne. It's like, no. Because there are lots of times where Jesus is seated on the right hand of the Father. And even if there is only one throne, this is what he said, he that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne even as I also overcame and am set down with my Father in his throne, with my Father in his throne. So he's at the right hand of God, that has nothing to do with the sermon, but just figured I'd throw that out there. Then they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and ran upon, ahhh. We can't listen to this guy. Folks, he is so powerful of a preacher, they can't resist what he's saying, it's just shut him up. That's why they're deleting our YouTube channels every week. Why? Because they can't argue with what we're saying. Because you know what, if we're so wrong, then why don't they just put us in the comedy section on YouTube? Right? Just move us over to the comedy section. I'm okay with that. You know what I mean? Just go ahead and just label every single video. They can put us in film and animation, comedy, sports, I don't care what they put us in. But you know what? If we're so easy to prove wrong, why don't they just put up one of those little disclaimers like they like to do? Independent fact checkers think that Pastor Anderson is full of baloney. Click here for more reasons why. I'm okay with that. Put a warning label on me. But you know why they don't want my voice to be heard is because what I'm saying is true. What I'm saying is right. And not only is it true, it's powerful. It's convincing. It's persuade, people will jump on board. Look, well I don't have time, but anyway. Look down at your Bible there. They covered their ears, they 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, receive my spirit. So of course he can call upon God and say Lord Jesus because Jesus is God, because God the Father is God, Jesus is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. It's called the Trinity, right? Three persons, one God. And so it says, 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 know what people would say about Stephen today if he were alive? They'd say he's a hate preacher. I mean to go in there and say, you stiff necked, you're uncircumcised in your heart. They'd say, that's hateful. That's hate speech. You're a hate preacher. Of course you're antisemitic, is what you are. Isn't that what they would label him? Antisemite hate preacher. But let me tell you something, Stephen was a very loving man because as the rocks are hitting him, I mean imagine being stoned, you're being hit with rocks. You are getting bashed, you're having life bashed out of you, literally. And what's the last thing he says? The last thing he says as he's literally breathing his dying breath, Lord, let not this sin be laid to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep. That's the last thing. I mean, he's already in incredible pain. The life is leaving his body. He's just about to give up the ghost and he uses his last breath to say, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. Now why is that so important? Well, because one of those guys to whom the sin is not laid at their charge is Saul. I mean, what if God just said, man, everybody's there, everybody, you guys are all toast. You know, but Stephen is interceding for Saul. Stephen's interceding for those that are there and he's also interceding for Saul. And of course, Saul is Paul. He starts out being called Saul of Tarsus and then his name is later known as Paul because he goes out preaching in the Greek speaking world. And so he takes on a more Greek sounding name of Paul. Saul is a Jewish name, like King Saul of the Old Testament. So he takes on the Greek version of Paul, be like, if I went into the Spanish speaking world and instead of being Stephen, I would be Esteban, right? Same principle. So we see here that Stephen, you could say, he failed because he didn't use wisdom. If he would have used a little more wisdom, his ministry could have lasted longer and he would have reached more people. But chapter six already says he was totally full of wisdom. So who are we going to believe? The Bible or these bozos who tell us to trim the message? No, the Bible says he was full of wisdom. He's a very wise man. Well, what he did here wasn't wise. You got to use wisdom, brother. Folks, he did the best he could. He tried to get the crowd on his side. He preached all the Bible stories, but you know what? He needed to rebuke sin where it needed to be rebuked. He preached it right. And you say, well, how many people could he have reached though if he hadn't have done that? And you know, I've had people try to tell me, oh man, think about how many people more you'd reach if you just back off on X, Y, and Z. Wrong, I'd reach less. Because it's not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord. We reach people through the power of God, not through our own strength. And the Bible says we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us. The power is of God, it's not of us. And so what is it worth to have the power of Christ resting upon you? What is it worth to be filled with the Holy Ghost? What is it worth to be filled with power? Because nothing is worth trading for the fullness of the Holy Ghost. Well, but if I do this, I could be more popular. Not worth it. Well, if I do this, I won't get persecuted. Not worth it. If I do this, I could still have my YouTube channel. I could even have 200,000 subscribers or 300,000. Hey, I don't even want a million subscribers or 5 million subscribers. But dude, you could give the plan of salvation. You know what? Either have 1,000 subscribers and preach the entire Bible unfiltered and know that the Spirit of God is leading me when I preach. What's that worth? What's it worth to be led by the Spirit of God? Okay. And you say, yeah, but you reach more people. Look, all the people who've gone that route have reached more people. You know what they end up not doing? They end up not reaching more people. Oh, they end up speaking to millions of people, but their message has no power. Their message does not have the effect of an actual bonafide spirit-filled man of God. They lose their effect. If the salt has lost its savor, wherewith shall it be salted? And it's like, yeah, but we got a whole truckload of this salt. Yeah, but it's all worthless. I'd rather have a little salt shaker of the good stuff than a whole truckload of bland, useless salt that's good for nothing but to be cast out and to be trodden underfoot of men. The only thing it's good for is to take care of the ice on the road or something. It's not going to season any food. So we need to not get sucked into the world's wisdom that says, well, maybe if we could just tone things down a little bit, maybe if we could just trim the message a little bit, maybe if we could just water it down a little bit, folks, it's not worth it. And you know what? I'm also all for trying to polish the apple and trying to basically reach people and be kind and love people and try to come out with sermons and material that are going to appeal to people. And I'm also all for not just dropping a bomb on people at the beginning of the sermon. Most of our documentary films, they don't just drop the bomb at the beginning. They kind of build people up to things. And you know, when I go soul winning, if I'm witnessing to a Catholic out at the door soul winning, I don't just start out and just be like, oh, you're Catholic, huh? The great whore, you know, Babylon, mystery Babylon, you know, and so, you know, yeah, you know, you know, the Pope is, you know, and just go on and on. That's not going to, that's not going to work. Here's what I do. When I go to the door soul winning, I start out friendly, kind, gentle, and I preach the whole plan of salvation. I preach the entire gospel. Then after I'm at the very end of the gospel, then I confront them with the errors of Catholicism. And the reason I do that is simply because I don't want them to just pray a prayer and just repeat a prayer and just kind of be adding that. Like well, I'm still Catholic, but this other prayer can't hurt, you know, I want to make sure that they understand like this is something different than I'm showing you. And so what I do is I go through the whole plan of salvation, I get down to the end and I say, now you mentioned that you're Catholic, you know, what I explained to you right now is completely different from what the Catholic Church teaches. They teach that you do have to do works. They teach that you can lose your salvation. They do teach that going and doing the sacraments is part of how you make it into heaven. So which one do you believe, you know, do you believe what I've showed you here from the Bible today? Or do you believe like the Roman Catholic Church that you have to do these other things as well? And here's the thing, sometimes they'll say, well, I'm going to stick with what the Catholic Church says. And most of the time, if I've been thorough, and they were tracking with me, most of the time, they'll say, well, no, I'm going to go with what the Bible says. And then I'm going to pray and win that person to Christ. But I want to make sure that they know the difference. That this isn't just, well, I don't want to put new wine into an old bottle, right? We want new wine to go into a new bottle and want to make sure that they understand this is a change. There's repentance there. People are like, you don't preach repentance. Yeah, I do. Repentance from Catholicism to the real gospel. Repentance from Buddhism to Christianity. Repentance from Islam to Christianity. Repentance from Hinduism to Christianity. That's the repentance I believe in regard to salvation. What I don't believe in is cleaning up your life to be saved, because that's work salvation, or being willing to clean up your life, or willing to keep the commandments, or I'm going to turn from my sins. Well, you know what? That's funny, because I've been saved now for 33 years, and I still haven't turned from all my sins. And there's not anybody that could say, well, I've turned from all my sins. Yeah, you're a liar. You just sinned right now, this second, by lying to me and claiming to be without sin. That's garbage. You don't get saved by turning over a new leaf. You get saved through Christ. But the point is, yeah, be kind. Yeah, be friendly. Be tactful. Be gentle. Look, I remember the first time I preached against the pre-trib rapture. I didn't just get up in my church and say, all right, everybody, I'm going to tell you why the pre-trib rapture is a lie tonight. Because some people might have just walked out, because they're like, what? How dare you? Because look, when I started the church 15 years ago, if you weren't pre-trib, you were blackballed in the independent fundamental Baptist world. I mean, they would just rail on you, and they would say, you're not even saved if you're not pre-trib. I mean, it was wild. It's not that way anymore. We've got them on the run. Now they're like, well, hey, I can kind of see both sides. You know, it's OK to be post-trib as long as you're not listening to that Stephen Anderson guy. But hey, I'm OK with you being post-trib as long as you're not listening to Pastor Anderson. It's fine. Because they've really backed off on that. But I'm telling you, the culture was different 15 years ago. It was pre-trib or bust, believe me. But I'm telling you, when I preached that sermon, I spent the first 45 to 50 minutes of that sermon, and nobody knew I was preaching against the pre-trib rapture. I was doing like Stephen, where I was just kind of planting all these seeds. I was explaining the day of the Lord. Then I got to the end and dropped the bomb and said, hey, now that you've seen all that, look what the Bible says. It's after the tribulation. And then it was like inescapable, because I'd already laid the foundation. Pastor Roland Rasmussen, who passed away recently, he came out post-trib pre-wrath in 1996. And when he came out with that in 1996, he was a pastor of a big church. When I came out with it, I had about 20 to 25 people in my church at that time. So it wasn't like a big, giant leap of faith, because I didn't have a lot to lose. Whereas Pastor Rasmussen had many hundreds of people in his church, and he had the Christian school with over 1,000 students, and he was also an in-demand conference speaker, preaching all over the country and everything. So he wanted to be careful how he came out with this. Now here's the thing. Let's say he just never preached it. That'd be a shameful thing, for him to know the truth of what God's word teaches and refuse to preach it because of the consequences. So he had to make a decision. Is he going to preach this? And here's what he did. He actually spent weeks, he started a series on Wednesday nights where he was teaching on end times, but for the first four, five weeks, he never mentioned anything about not being pre-dribbed. He was just laying down the principles. What is the day of the Lord? What is the day of Christ? And just giving the sequence. What's Matthew 24 about? What's Revelation 6 about? And he's teaching all this stuff. He had people coming up to him after the sermon saying, Pastor Raspin, I'm starting to think maybe the pre-drib rapture isn't right. And he's like, bingo. He wanted them to kind of figure it out on their own a little bit. And even before he did that, he took his staff aside and got the staff all right on the doctrine. He taught it to them. And then he taught it to the church over the course of several weeks, building them up to it so that they don't just knee-jerk, oh, you know, what's up, pre-drib, run away before they even have a chance to hear what the Bible says. But he taught them the Bible in such a way that they couldn't escape it. It's all right there because the pre-drib rapture is not that hard to debunk, folks. But people are emotional about these things. And so, look, that's what Stephen did. You know, he doesn't just go in there guns a-blazin'. He didn't just go in there and start out by stepping on their toes. You know, first he builds some credibility, first he lays down the principles. At that point, if they reject what he says, at the end, you know what, they're fighting against God at that point. And they were because he preached a powerful sermon. They should have listened to him. They should have accepted what he said. Now you say, yeah, but he's a big failure. Here's the thing. It was God's will for Stephen to be martyred. This was God's plan. Stephen was right smack dab in the middle of God's will when he did this. This isn't Stephen getting a little wild, getting a little carried away and getting killed. You know, there were people in the Bible who got a little carried away and got killed. Like for example, King Josiah, you know, he goes out, I'm going to fight against the King of Egypt. And God told him through the King of Egypt, look, don't fight with me. I don't have a problem with you. I don't have a beef with you. Leave me alone. He got a little overzealous. He got in the wrong battle. He picked the wrong fight and he ended up getting killed. That's not what happened here, folks. Stephen is filled with the Holy Ghost. He's wise. He's doing it right. God's clear here that what he's doing is right. And God could have easily worked it out where he escaped because look at all the times where the mob was going to kill Jesus and he just kind of escapes through their midst. He just kind of passes through the midst and gets away. Remember when they were going to shove him off a cliff in his hometown? Well here, Stephen is in God's will and God just had a different plan. But we don't want to think we're so smart that we'll... Well yeah, see that guy, that idiot, he lost his opportunity. He could have preached the Word of God for decades but he was being prideful. He got cocky. He got arrogant. Is that what the Bible is teaching here? That's not cocky. That's not arrogant. That's not prideful. That's a spirit-filled preacher ripping some face on the old synagogue of Satan. He was right. He was doing it right. He got killed because you know what, sometimes you get killed doing what's right because what does the Bible say? It says, be faithful unto death. The devil shall cast some of you into prison. Be faithful unto death. These things are going to happen. Here was God's plan. God's plan was not for Stephen to be the red-hot missionary that's going to go around the world turning the world upside down. That's just not what God had in mind. What God had in mind was for Stephen to preach this powerful sermon and go out in a blaze of glory and that Saul would be influenced by that. Saul would be there and Saul would be the one who would do what Stephen would have done. And here's the thing. God had a better plan. God knew that the Apostle Paul was a special person. And here's the thing. Stephen could have done the same stuff. And you could even argue, you could even say, I think Stephen is a more spiritual guy than Paul. I think Stephen would have been even better. You could speculate like that. But here's the thing. God knew that Paul is the right guy to use. God wanted to use Paul maybe because of his background, because he was brought up at the feet of Gamaliel and everything. And so he had a certain kind of unique background, a unique education. Maybe he wanted to use someone who had persecuted the church before just to show the extreme contrast of going from persecuting the church to preaching the faith which he once destroyed. Whatever the reason, maybe Stephen, we just don't know what would have happened. But God knows all things. God knew that the best way for this to go down was for Stephen to be the first martyr, Stephen to preach the powerful sermon, Stephen to rip some face and be stoned to death and killed and then for the apostle Paul to do the lifelong journey. And here's the thing. You don't see Paul holding back. You can see Paul shaking his garment and telling people they're stiff-necked and I'm sick of you and I'm going to the Gentiles and everything. I mean, Paul's in the same spirit. Paul was a hard preacher as well. Now let's finish up here. Go if you would to Acts chapter number eight, Acts chapter number eight, verse one. It says, and Saul was consenting unto his death and at that time there was a great persecution against the church which was at Jerusalem. So Stephen was that proto-martyr. He was the first martyr but he's not the last martyr. Stephen being persecuted triggers a whole wave of persecution. This is part of God's plan. Why is this God's plan? Why is it that God allowed Stephen to be killed? Why can't he spend a whole life serving Christ? Because Stephen getting killed triggers a great persecution against the church. He's just the first shot fired. And they were all scattered abroad, verse one, throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria except the apostles. And devout men carried Stephen to his burial and made great lamentation over him. As for Saul, he made havoc of the church, entering into every house and hailing men and women committed them to prison. Therefore they that were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the word. This was God's plan. You know the problem with the church at Jerusalem is that they weren't doing missions. They were all just right there in Jerusalem and they weren't branching out. And Jesus had already spent three and a half years with that nation. It was time to branch out. It was time to go to Macedonia and Greece and Asia Minor and the uttermost parts of the earth. And it wasn't happening. The persecution about Stephen, it literally calls it that if you go to chapter eleven verse nineteen, last place we'll turn, Acts chapter eleven verse nineteen. Now they which were scattered abroad, upon the persecution that arose about Stephen. So is there any question that Stephen being killed was the beginning? That was the flashpoint. I mean, that's where the persecution came from. That's where it started. It all goes back to Stephen. Stephen made them so mad that killing him wasn't enough. Stephen struck such a nerve that they're like, not only are we going to kill him, we need to destroy all Christianity. So you could make the case that Stephen, if he would have preached a watered down message and got off the hook, there wouldn't have been a major persecution at this time. They would have stayed in Jerusalem and, oh it's great, we're reaching more people. Yeah, you're preaching to the same people that you've been preaching to for the last three and a half years. God's plan is to branch out. So Stephen had to be killed so that it could start the persecution wave, so that it could lead to the disciples being scattered everywhere. It's sort of like, you know, if we refuse to preach the gospel in all the world, he'll just have to send us into all the world by hook or by crook to get us to do it. And it says, they that were scattered abroad upon the persecution and the roads about Stephen traveled as far as Phoenice and Cyprus and Antioch, preaching the word to none but unto the Jews only. Now in the beginning, they're still not doing it right because they're only going to the Jews. But hey, at least they're going to the Jews in far flung places. At least it's not just the same Jews that Jesus and the apostles have been preaching to for three and a half years. At least they're getting into Jews that are located far away in places like Cyprus and these other places. And of course, eventually, God opens these people's eyes as we read through the book of Acts to where they start reaching Gentiles too. In the end, the gospel is going everywhere, it's going to the Gentiles. And here we are folks, here we are in 2012. Why are we here right now? Why are we here? Why are a bunch of Americans here today? It's because the gospel ripped through Europe like wildfire. That's where it really took root. Not in Palestine, not in Judea. That did not become the hotbed of Christianity. The hotbed of Christianity was the Greek speaking world. That's why the New Testament was written in Greek, you know, Turkey, modern day Turkey, and Greece and Macedonia became the hotbeds and it just spread from there. And here we are to this day in the United States, which obviously was mainly started by European powers. And so there's a huge Christian background, Christian influence, Christian heritage. And it dates back to what? The fact that they got out of Jerusalem, they got out of Judea. So Stephen did something that was great for God. And you know what folks? Yeah, you can spend your whole life serving God, or you can have a chapter and a half of the Bible about you. Say, well, that was a short-lived, hey, I'd rather have, you know, I don't believe Stephen's ministry was short-lived. You say, well, Stephen had a short ministry. Really? Because he's still ministering to me right now. I guarantee you that there were some Christians that looked at Stephen and said, he didn't play his cards right. He should have chilled out a little bit. That was not the place to preach that sermon. He didn't do it right. And you know what? We don't know who they are. And you know what? They might have ministered for 30 more years. Hey, Stephen ministered for almost 2,000 more years. Because Stephen is ministering every day. I guarantee you that every second of every day, somebody's reading Acts chapter seven. You believe that? It's all the different time zones and everything. You know how many people read the Bible every day? I guarantee you, every Sunday, there are probably thousands of preachers preaching on Stephen. On any given Sunday. Out of all the millions and millions of churches. Stephen's probably getting mentioned. I mean, if he's up in heaven, if a bell rings every time he gets mentioned, it's like, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. It's just like, there's like a little counter. It's just like, click, click, click. You know, just every time somebody preaches about him, every time somebody reads his story, it's like, brrrr. I mean, he's probably literally being thought about, preached about, read about, every second of every day. That's a ministry. But if he would have just, you know, been a little more circumspect. No. Stephen did it right. Stephen wasn't a jerk. He was kind. He was loving. What's the proof? Lord lay not the sin to their charge. That is the proof. He was kind. He was loving. He was wise. He was bold. He preached hard. He had the face of an angel. And you know what? God used him. And you know what? God can use you too. And why am I preaching about this? I'm preaching for you to be like Stephen. I want to be like Stephen. You ought to be like Stephen. What does that mean? It means that we're a servant. You know what? Stephen didn't say, well, you know, I'd rather be an apostle or is there, what about that bishop opening? You know. He didn't even, it's not like he called himself the archdeacon. You know, somebody else called him that later. Okay. So the point is that he wasn't looking for a title. He wasn't looking for a position. He wasn't looking for recognition. He just did a lot of great work for God, ripped some face, went out in a blaze of glory, loved the Lord. And you know what? We can be like Stephen if we will be willing to serve without a fancy title or position, if we'll just be willing to preach the word of God, kind and loving, but tell the truth and don't trim the message. And you know, when there are Stevens in our life, we need to support them and not sit back and well, let me think how I could do better. Now one of the reasons why I chose this sermon is because of the fact that this church down here is celebrating its two year anniversary and this church is run by a deacon. And as I understand it, Pastor Bruce Mahia tomorrow night is going to preach on Philip, which is the other deacon, you know, that we know a lot about. You know, we know a lot about Stephen, we know a lot about Philip. So that's kind of a little theme we got going this week about the deacon. And here's the thing, a deacon can be greatly used by God. And he can be a top class servant of God. It's not like, well the deacon is lower than the, you know what, here's the thing, you know who's the greatest among us is the servant. So a title doesn't make you greater. Now obviously there's a chain of command, obviously there's authority, but it's sort of like in a marriage. There's a chain of command in the marriage. The Bible says the husband's the head of the wife. Does that mean the husband's better than the wife? No. The husband's not greater, they're equal. Because in Christ there's neither male nor female. Well here's the thing. Men of God, you know, may be missionaries, deacons, evangelists, pastors, whatever, whatever the title, or just a layman, just a godly layman, sole winner. But you know what? The first shall be last and the last shall be first. And God can greatly use a deacon. He that useth the office of a deacon well purchaseth to himself a good degree, and great boldness in the faith which is in Christ Jesus. And so I just want to encourage you guys down here, it's a great church down here, you're fortunate to be preached to week after week by brother Corbin Russell, and support him. And when he gets up and preaches hard, don't get nervous. Don't be like, I don't know if I want to invite my friends. Invite your friends, they can handle it. Your friend that you're so worried about, he's going to love it. Bring him down. Support the man of God, and don't pick him apart and try to say, well here's how you can do it better. I guarantee you that if Stephen weren't in the Bible and people were back then, I guarantee you he got criticized for this. Don't be the critic, be the Stephen. Inspire the devil to pray.