Acts 6:8—7:2a, 51-60

Companions of the Christ Child | St. Stephen, Deacon and Martyr (26 December 2021) | Sermon on Acts 6:8—7:2a, 51-60 | by Paul Bieber |

Acts 6:8—7:2a, 51-60 Revised Standard Version

⁸ Stephen, full of grace and power, did great wonders and signs among the people. ⁹ Then some of those who belonged to the synagogue of the Freedmen (as it was called), Cyrenians, Alexandrians, and others of those from Cilicia and Asia, stood up and argued with Stephen. ¹⁰ But they could not withstand the wisdom and the Spirit with which he spoke. ¹¹ Then they secretly instigated some men to say, “We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God.” ¹² They stirred up the people as well as the elders and the scribes; then they suddenly confronted him, seized him, and brought him before the council. ¹³ They set up false witnesses who said, “This man never stops saying things against this holy place and the law; ¹⁴ for we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and will change the customs that Moses handed on to us.” ¹⁵ And all who sat in the council looked intently at him, and they saw that his face was like the face of an angel.

7 Then the high priest asked him, “Are these things so?” ² And Stephen replied:

“Brothers and fathers, listen to me.

⁵¹ “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you are forever opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors used to do. ⁵² Which of the prophets did your ancestors not persecute? They killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, and now you have become his betrayers and murderers. ⁵³ You are the ones that received the law as ordained by angels, and yet you have not kept it.”

⁵⁴ When they heard these things, they became enraged and ground their teeth at Stephen. ⁵⁵ But filled with the Holy Spirit, he gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. ⁵⁶ “Look,” he said, “I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!” ⁵⁷ But they covered their ears, and with a loud shout all rushed together against him. ⁵⁸ Then they dragged him out of the city and began to stone him; and the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul. ⁵⁹ While they were stoning Stephen, he prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” ⁶⁰ Then he knelt down and cried out in a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” When he had said this, he died.

Grace, peace, and much joy to you, people of God.

Not many congregations, I think, will be celebrating St. Stephen on this Second-Day-of Christmas Sunday morning. In this second bleak midwinter of our Covid discontent, can’t we just sing Christmas Carols and hear a little more about the baby in the manger, the angels’ song of praise, the shepherds’ visitation?

In short, can’t we just rest in the sentimentality of the Christmas celebration? No, and there’s a reason for the refusal. The sentimentalization of Christmas is as dangerous to the Christian faith as is the commercialization of it. The Church’s year of grace is emphatic on this point: the incarnation of Jesus cannot be understood apart from his passion, death, and resurrection—and his call to follow. “True Christmas joy,” wrote the twentieth century Lutheran martyr Kaj Munk (1944), “means that you have Christ, and that you go where he wants you to go.”

And so, following in the train of the celebration of the Nativity of our Lord comes the retinue of the king: St. Stephen on the twenty-sixth, St. John, Apostle and Evangelist on the twenty-seventh, and the Holy Innocents on the twenty-eighth. With these celebrations, the Church shows us an inner circle around the Lamb who has appeared at Christmas. These three different examples of martyrdom and sanctity sing a new song around the throne; it’s not a Christmas carol. At least it’s a different kind of Christmas carol.

It is the song of the martyrs, sung in three different registers: St. Stephen, a martyr in will and deed; St. John, a martyr in will, though not in deed; and the Holy Innocents, martyrs in deed only. These companions of the Christ Child present us with a second kind of birth. Christ came from heaven, born into this world to save those who would believe in him. The martyrs witness to their belief to the point of death and so are born from this world into heaven.

Today is the Feast of Stephen: he is one of the original deacons of the Church, the seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit and wisdom, chosen to assist the Apostles in the Jerusalem Church. Acts tells us that Stephen also preached and performed miracles; this brought on the inevitable conflict with the Jewish leaders (Christianity is still regarded as a Jewish sect this early in its history) and so Stephen was accused of blasphemy—as was Jesus—and brought before the Sanhedrin. But even though there was no proper trial, Stephen makes a speech. The Lectionary omits most of Stephen’s rehearsal of the recurrent pattern of salvation history: God’s people reject his messengers and turn to idolatry. Suffice it to say, it so enraged Stephen’s accusers that they dragged him out of the city and stoned him to death.

Stephen saw heaven opened and Jesus standing at God’s right hand to welcome him. He prays, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit,” as Jesus on the cross had prayed, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” Then Stephen prayed for those who were stoning him, saying “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”

It is because of these last words of Stephen that we hear today’s Gospel from St. Matthew 23 and the First Reading from II Chronicles. Zechariah the son of Jehoiada was stoned to death in Jerusalem by powerful people who conspired against him. In contrast to Stephen’s prayer that the Lord forgive his killers, Zechariah said, “May the Lord see and avenge!”

Jesus makes reference to this murder in St. Matthew 23 at the end of a long series of sayings of woe to “scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites.” (Yes, I know that the Gospel refers to Zechariah the son of Barachiah. That’s the writer of the Book of Zechariah. But Zechariah the son of Jehoiada is the one who was murdered in the temple, in the court between the sanctuary and the altar. We will leave until some Adult Forum the ramifications of St. Matthew’s mistake on our understanding of biblical inspiration.)

During the reign of Joash, King of Judah, c. 837–800 B.C., the king followed the advice of Jehoiada, the faithful high priest, until his death, whereupon Joash turned to idolatry. When Jehoiada’s son, Zechariah, warned about this, he was conspired against and stoned to death. We read this in II Chronicles which, although it shows up a little before midway through our Lutheran Bibles, is actually the last book in the Hebrew Canon.

Hence Jesus’ reference to “all the righteous blood” shed by those who rejected the faithful from Abel, the first murder victim in the Old Testament, to Zechariah, the last. We hear this on St. Stephen’s Day to remind us that this kind of rejection, even perhaps unto martyrdom, is the kind of life to which those who take seriously the birth of Jesus can expect, not the sentimental peace of Christmas cards.

The celebration of St. Stephen’s Day on this date is very ancient. Its celebration in Jerusalem is older than the tradition of celebrating Christmas on December 25. This date may be the actual date of his martyrdom. Behind this story of Stephen’s martyrdom lies the confident faith of Jesus’ disciples, who, because of his birth, can live in faith and die without fear, even in the face of persecution.

In our part of the world, the Church is not actively persecuted. Our world’s rejection of God and his messengers takes the form of silence and absence. How many of those who gathered on Christmas Eve and sang Christmas Carols will be unseen until it’s time for Easter Alleluias? But this sermon is not a call to evangelize, but to persevere in the faith. The Baptist reminded us in Advent that God is able from stones to raise up children to Abraham. On Palm Sunday Jesus says that if his followers were silent the very stones would cry out. Even our stony hearts, even our silence, even our absence, even our resentful cries for vengeance: God can raise up faith even here, and every stone shall cry.

It’s a different kind of Christmas Carol, a song of confident faith even as we confess our own hypocrisy, resentment, silence, and absence, a song sung even so to the baby in the manger whose coming among us reconciles us—not calling for vengeance, but for forgiveness, and commending ourselves to Jesus. Although we are poor, sinful people, through grace we have been made holy saints and joined to the Church so that we, too, can greet the King in the manger, on the cross, at the empty tomb, and follow in his train.

Jesus’ visitation can break the power of idolatry, of rejection of divine messengers, of stones of violence, silent in their seething vengeance. This Christmas let the stones cry not our discontent but our confidence, even here and now. At Bethlehem, God’s kingdom came into existence. How did it fare? What made it grow? The ancient maxim is: “the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.” Reducing our faith to sentimental feelings does not grow the kingdom nor strengthen us to follow. St. Stephen’s Day declares the Church’s confident faith that the outcome of the Christian story—that begins with the baby in the manger, the angels’ song of praise, the shepherds’ visitation—is certain, because it is in God’s hands, not our own.

We, too, are companions of the Christ Child. And whenever we approach this altar, we do say, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” We sing a different kind of Christmas carol, and every stone shall cry.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

—

[The Hymn of the Day is Richard Wilbur’s “A Stable Lamp is Lighted.”]

The Rev. Dr. Paul Bieber

San Diego, California, USA

E-Mail: paul.bieber@sbcglobal.net