You’ve got to be kidding me. I cannot believe how this chapter begins, or how it ends.
The beginning of this chapter is truly amazing for a minister to read. Here’s what I see: Christians from two different backgrounds worshipping together when somehow they begin to grate on each other. This time it was the food distribution. The next time might be political differences, or what you believe about communion….or the worship music, or the presence, type or quantity of snacks available before or after worship. Whatever.
These issues are common, and aren’t a sign of sin within the church. We all have different beliefs, largely based on how we were brought up, so we need to learn how to work together.
Here’s something amazing: The apostles recognized that this matter needed to be handled by others. I think too many ministers (or leaders) try to control too many of the decisions. What this does is take your time away from the decisions that only you can make, which are truly important. If the apostles had allowed themselves to be distracted by cafeteria decisions, it would have taken time from prayer and teaching. They recognized that.
And here’s another thing: The people were godly enough to recognize it as well. They didn’t insist that the apostles weighed in on every decision. They acknowledged the need for a select few to be in prayer and study.
I take this away from the text today: The apostles didn’t ramrod a decision through, they brought it up, discussed it together and the best option surfaced. I suppose that meeting got off to a rough start, but they managed it well, and it turned out great. I remember reading that these men were both Jews and Gentiles, so they reflected the makeup of the people they were serving. I think that’s important, to some extent.
Did you catch the last amazing thing? Many priests were converted! When I think about the Priests my mind goes to their antagonism of the Gospel, but here we learn that many of them became believers. That’s wonderful news! On a slightly less serious side: I’ll bet they saw people meeting together, sharing and loving one another and said “this must be real…because that just doesn’t happen”.
And now for the crazy ending. One thing that really bothers me is two part TV shows. I can put up with an occasional series, because the story is much longer than you can tell at once, and every show has it’s own story line. But a two part show makes you wait an extra week for the ending. Thankfully, Netflix has provided a solution to that….
Anyway, in this passage we see Stephen, and man who has done nothing but help people, work miracles and win debates brought up on trial. And when he comes to trial (on false charges) his face begins to glow. Word to the wise: When someone works miracles in the name of Jesus, and their face begins to glow….don’t accuse them of being evil, or pass judgment to harm them. Wow. How dumb can the leaders here possibly be. I thought our government was blind…apparently blindness is nothing new.
I would skip ahead to the next chapter and see the conclusion, but since I already know it…..I’m going to wait for tomorrow.
Delighted to be serving with genuine believers,
PR