STEPHEN, A PATTERN OF WHAT IT IS TO BE FOR CHRIST ON EARTH
[p. 100] STEPHEN, A PATTERN OF WHAT IT IS TO BE FOR CHRIST ON EARTH
Stephen and the thief on the cross are pattern men. In the latter, I get the pattern illustration of grace to a sinner; in the former, God’s pattern specimen of a saint on earth linked to Christ in heaven.
Stephen is the pattern of a man that was not only going to God, but one who was for God on the earth; he not only knew what it was to belong to Christ in glory, but he was for Christ on earth. We have here the account of how he finished his course for God on the earth.
He died; that showed he was faithful unto death. But some one says to me. Can you point to an example that continued? Yes I can, Paul, he continued; he was sent back here after being in the third heaven. In Stephen, I get an example of what heaven is to a saint going to die. In Paul, of what heaven is to a saint going to live.
We are not all called as Stephen to martyrdom, but we have all the same grace, and Stephen is set before us as a pattern man, just as I should say to an unbeliever that the thief on the cross is the pattern man of grace. Stephen is the first one set before us actually as a heavenly man; he is the first man upon whom heaven opened. Enoch was translated, and Elijah went up to heaven in a chariot of fire, but that is not heaven being opened on man; heaven did open on the Lord Jesus Christ, but He was more than a man.
The heavens open here on Stephen, and he sees his Saviour up there, and so he is for his Saviour down here. There are two marks that belong to a believer now. One is, that by the Holy Spirit you are associated [p. 101] with Christ where Christ is; and the other, that you have the power of Christ where Christ is not. I trust you will remember these two. They are for each one of us; not only for a Stephen in giving up his life, but for everyone of us in whatever difficulties we have to pass through, be it a mother of a large family with all around to disturb and distract, or anything else, whatever it be, I say to you that these are the two marks of what grace can do for you. I have association with my Saviour where my Saviour is, and I have the power of my Saviour where my Saviour is not. When Paul came down from the third heaven, what was it for? That the power of Christ might rest upon him.
If you want to be powerful, to have practical power while walking down here, it must be by looking above, by association with Christ where Christ is.
Let me say here, that when your heart gets liberty, or rather deliverance, when it gets clear of judgment, the first, the chief thing that shows you are clear of judgment is that you want your Saviour. First you seek relief from your sin, from the burden, then you seek the One who relieved you. Like a man who is drowning, first he wants some one to save him, but when he has recovered a little, he says, I should like to see that man who, at the risk of his life, saved me. He looked first for deliverance, and next for his deliverer. Take another example. Jonathan did not look for David until Goliath was slain. When David struck at Goliath, Jonathan was not thinking of David, but when he saw the head of Goliath in David’s hand, what then? The soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David. That is the way it always comes. A person may be converted, and may be very genuine, and still not be looking for Christ where Christ is. He may, like Jonathan, see Goliath on the ground, but not be quite happy;
[p. 102] but when be sees the head in David’s hand, what now? He says, as it were, l am going to give up all my thoughts to David. And that is what we get in John’s gospel (chapter 1). When those two disciples followed our Lord, When they followed Him as the Lamb of God, their first question was, “Where dwellest thou?” Beloved friends, have you ever put that question to Him? Where dwellest thou? Do you remember the answer of the Lord, — “Come and see”;? And do you not think He would say that to you if you asked him?
That is what Stephen did. He, “being full of the Holy Spirit ... fixed his eyes on heaven”. (Acts 7:55) He saw Jesus there in the glory of God.
See what Colossians 3, says, “Set your affection, on things above”. Where? Where Christ is — above, “where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God”, (Colossians 3:1 - 2)
Now that is what the Holy Spirit sets before us in the case of Stephen. The heavens are opened, and he “saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on, the right hand of God”. (Acts 7:55) How was he able to look up to that glory? There was no check. The Spirit could not say, you must not look in here; on the contrary, the Spirit of God showed him what was there: “Being full of the Holy Spirit”.
This is the introduction; and, as I have said, Stephen was a pattern, not merely as a great martyr, but he sets forth what a heavenly man is.
Well now, let me turn to a verse or two (Ezekiel 1:26) Here the prophet sees the glory of God on the earth. God connected Himself with the earth, as we see in the tabernacle, in the glory cloud by day, and in the pillar of fire by night. In chapter 1, the glory was going away, leaving the earth, because Israel was so wicked. God could not connect Himself any longer with them .He is retiring. But now what is the wonderful thing? As the prophet sees the glory retiring, what is there? There is the figure of a man [p. 103] in the retiring glory, and from the brightest spot in it, from the midst. Where was the colour of amber. In the brightest spot there was the figure of a man. “Where sin abounded grace did much more abound”. (Romans 5:20) Man’s wickedness has caused Him to retire from the scene, but it was that there should be a Man in the glory of God.
Now if you turn to Luke 2:9, we read, “And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them”.
The glory never came back to the earth from the time it had gone away in Ezekiel till now. Now it had come back to announce this, “And the angel said unto them. Fear not? for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord”. (Luke 2:10 - 11) There the glory has come down to announce the birth of the Saviour, that there might be a Man in the glory of God for us. Here we have, in the Babe that is born, the Man — God manifest in flesh.
Now turn to chapter 9, of this gospel, verse 29. “And as he prayed, the fashion of his countenance was altered, and his raiment was white and glistering. And, behold, there talked with him two men, which were Moses and Elias: who appeared in glory, and spake of His decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem. But Peter and they that were with him were heavy with sleep: and when they were awake, they saw his glory”. (Luke 9:29 - 32) Now mark, beloved friends, from that time (Luke 2), when from the glory it is announced that He is come, He spends thirty years in retirement. It is sometimes said that Christ went from the cradle to the grave, but that is not a correct way of expressing it. He was thirty years in retirement. At the end of it heaven opened upon Him, and announced its fullest delight. A voice proclaiming the Father’s good pleasure in Him, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased”. (Matthew 3:17) Then he goes into the wilderness, and from there into public service, as the Obedient, dependent One, whose meat is to do the will of His Father, and to finish His work; He always does those things which please the Father, delights to do His will, manifests God in every act and word, glorifies God in public life, as before He had done in private life. And here is the close of His public life, public ministry rather. Now at the close, glory salutes Him. God again announces, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased”. (Matthew 3:17) He could have gone to heaven, then and there; glory claims Him, but the astonishing thing is that Moses and Elias speak with Him of death, not of glory; they spake of His decease, which He should accomplish at Jerusalem. Like the Hebrew servant He might have gone out free, but, instead of that He descends from the mount to die. He comes down from that point of His exaltation. He had done all the will of God, magnified the law and made it honourable: the one perfectly righteous One. Now with a title to everything as Man, He says, “No, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free”. (Exodus 21:5) Now turn to John’s gospel “Verily, verily, I say unto you. Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit”. (John 12:24) He must die, unless He would abide alone, and He comes down to die, to obtain the glory for us, Hence if you look at the next chapter you find, “Therefore, when he” (Judas) “was gone out, Jesus said. Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him”. (John 13:31) Here is the glorious One, the One who pleased God in everything, with a title to everything. He comes down from that point. Now He says, I will die for the man who never pleased God in anything. As an individual in Himself, glory saluted Him; but now [p. 105] He bears the judgment due to us. “If God be glorified in him, God shall also glorify him in himself, and shall straightway glorify him”. (John 13:32) Glory claims Him. Why? Because He so perfectly glorified God, so maintained it under all the weight and judgment due to sin. He was so perfectly holy. He so met all the mind of God in His whole path as an individual; and then from that point He came down to bear the judgment due to us. He was raised from the dead by the glory of God, and now He is set down at the right hand of God. Now it is there Stephen saw Him, “being full of the Holy Spirit, having fixed his eyes on heaven, he saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God”. (Acts 7:55)
Mark, beloved friends, when Adam was turned out of the garden, there was the cherubim with flaming sword that turned every way to keep the way of the tree of life. But now, if I look up to that glory, I see my Saviour is there. The place that naturally I should fear the most is the place where I have the least fear. Why? Because my Saviour is there. What place would you fear where your Saviour was. You remember about the prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 6). He saw the glory of God in a vision. Then he says, “Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts”. (Isaiah 6:5) Then what was done? “Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand”(not a dead one), “which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar: and he laid it upon my mouth”. (Isaiah 6:6 - 7) He does not abate the holiness of God one bit; but He says, while I utterly refuse your state, I can show grace to you. “Thine iniquity is taken away”. (Isaiah 6:7) From the point we most feared relief has come. Well if you get relief there, you do not fear it in any other place. As we read in another place: “Perfect love casts out fear”. (1 John 4:18) Well, Stephen’s [p. 106] fear was so cast out that we find him here looking up steadfastly into heaven, and seeing the glory of God and Jesus. This the apostle shows us in another place. Where he sets forth the contrast between law and grace (2 Corinthians 3). From the glory there came the demand of righteousness, but there was none to be had. “There is none righteous, no, not one”. (Romans 3:10) But now if I look up to the glory, there is the ministration of it. There never was such a moral revolution. The law came from the glory claiming righteousness, but there was none. Then God sent His Son, the perfectly righteous One to bear the judgment due to me. Now I look up, I see not the seraphim, but the Saviour. Instead of the glory being a thing to terrify me, it is the very opposite. Under the law it would terrify me, because I could not meet the demand, but now it is God’s gift. I do not know how to illustrate it. You cannot find such a thing in this world. But suppose a number of tenants, and their landlord calls them all up and demands from them his rent, but they have nothing to pay: now what is to be done? Well, he says, I will pay it myself, and he pays for them all round. So God was demanding righteousness, but now He has paid the demand, and there is none. He ministers righteousness, the very opposite: to demanding it; and now to the place I most feared l can look up without a fear. People say. But I am not up to it. Well, all I can say is, you will be up to it one day and a pity you should not be enjoying it now.
I had a very interesting instance of this in a dying sailor whom I visited. He said, I have faith in Christ, but I sometimes have a cloud. I said, well Stephen had no cloud. Now, beloved friends, though we are not all called to the same, place of suffering and martyrdom, we have all the same grace — that poor dying sailor in common with all believers. I said to him, Stephen had not a cloud. He was very weak,
[p. 107] and I did not say much more. After I had gone, he turned round to his mother, an old believer, and said ‘Mother, you never told me I had a Saviour in the glory, I have not a cloud now’. He could not have a cloud when he looked up. But many people have not found that they have a Saviour in the glory of God.
Stephen, being full of the Holy Spirit, looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God.
Heaven opened upon him, and it has never closed since. But I cannot get up to heaven without the Spirit of God. It is like Jacob’s ladder, it came down to earth, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. Now the Holy Spirit has come down, and enables us to look up to heaven and see the glory of God.
We get an illustration of this in the new invention called the telephone, by which you may speak to a person at a distance, and in five minutes near your friend’s voice answering you. Man has found out by his experiment a thing which may be known to every believer. I speak to Christ up there, and He hears me, and answers me, not by thunder and lightning, but by the Spirit of God.
You say. Oh, but none of us can be like Stephen. You may not be up to his measure, but a child may enjoy the comforts of the father’s house as well as the grown-up person. The clothes, the ring, and the shoes, were all provided for the prodigal, and put on him before he was brought into the father’s house. The grace that was for Stephen is for you.
Well, that is the first thing; now turn to the second. The second is the power of Christ where Christ is not, and you always find the two connected.
Every person’s power and sense of grace is in proportion, or according to where he sees Christ. I ask you, where do you see Christ? You may reply, I see Him going unto death. Well, that is very blessed,
[p. 108] and you maybe a genuine man, but that will not give you power. I remember an officer in the army telling me his experience. He said he was speaking to a lady, and telling her that thrice every day he went down on his. knees and prayed to the Lord Jesus on the cross. The lady said (it shows how one person may help another), “Why, He is not there”. “And do you know”, he said, “it had the most wonderful effect on me”. What was the effect? He had got a new sense of power. He saw Christ not only dying for him, but that He was out of death and judgment. Well, I say, if you look up, you see Him on the right hand of God. That is what you get in Exodus 15, “The Lord ... hath triumphed gloriously”. (Exodus 15:21) Many a believer has seen Him in the battle, and feels truly that was the most wonderful thing to his soul, to see the Lord taking his place; going into those depths, surrounded by those crystal walls, the waves and billows going over Him; that was a marvellous moment for his soul. I admit it, but that is not all. He has not only gone unto death for you, but He is triumphant out of death; and you will never get occupied with the Lord Jesus Christ till you learn that He has so perfectly cleared the ground for you, that now you can turn round and delight yourself in Him.
Now, the second point: I have the power of Christ where Christ is not. A great many people are trying to get power. Now if you do not see Christ, you have no power. Elijah gave the secret to Elisha when the latter said, I want a double portion of your Spirit. I am willing to stay down here but I want a double portion of your spirit. Now if we were asked tonight what is the thing we would like most, how many of us would say, the thing I want most is a double portion of the Spirit of Christ? Well, Elijah says you shall have it on one condition, if you see me taken. That confirms what I have said,
[p. 109] that wherever you see Christ, that is the measure of your power.
Now turn to Matthew 14:10. John was beheaded. That was an intimation that Christ should be rejected. Well, in verse 13, you find Him in a desert place apart. “And Jesus went forth, and saw a great multitude, and was moved with compassion towards them”. (Matthew 14:14) And then He feeds the multitude. The Lord was to be rejected from this earth. What does He do then? He feeds the poor of the flock who sought Him in the desert. I know this is a favourite text to prove there should be ministry; and so there is ministry, and we can thank God for it. I remember once being at a reading, and a clergyman read that chapter, down to where the Lord took the loaves and blessed and gave to His disciples to give to the multitude, to prove that there should be an ordained ministry. I said to him, let us read the rest of the chapter and we shall see another thing. Now, I said, there are two things in that chapter; one is, Christ feeds the poor of the flock, during all the time they are with Him in the desert; but there is something else also, there is the man of faith and power that leaves the ship to walk on the waters to Jesus. Peter says, “Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water”, and “he walked on the water, to go to Jesus”. (Matthew 14:28 - 29) That is the second thing. Faith leaves the thing that was made for the water, to walk on the water. All that were in the ship saw it. They could not but see it.
Before, when the Lord was in the ship. He was asleep. His head was on a pillow, but things were changed: a new thing comes out in light — Christ was to be rejected. He says, I will feed the poor of the flock in spite of all the wilderness of this world (and this Book is His word, the witness of it), but that is not all; the one who has faith leaves the thing made for the water, at the word of the Lord.
[p. 110] and goes on the water. Why? Because Jesus Himself is on the water. Christ is in power over everything here, and I, looking at Him in faith, become superior to all here. As Peter says “Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him”. (1 Peter 3:22)
But what I want to press on you is this — the character of this new order. Now I am set here on earth in a place of trial. It is not made easy for me; but in this place of trial, this place where the flesh cannot stand (how could the flesh stand on the water for a minute? it must go down), here in this very place, I am to be superior to it. Whatever be the trial, if I look up to the Saviour in glory, I can be superior to it. The difference between the old and the new order is, the old was to change your circumstances, and to give you ease and relief. Look at the children of the captivity; they were cast into the furnace, and there was not a hair of their head hurt. Daniel is cast into the lions’ den, and their mouths are shut. The new order is this: “As the sufferings of Christ abound”, (2 Corinthians 1:5) so also the consolations of Christ abound. As the sufferings increase, so also does the capability to suffer increase. You are not taken out of the trial, but you are made superior to it. Do not look for a change in your circumstances, but keep your eye so on Christ there, that while by the power of the Holy Spirit you have association with Him where He is, you will have His power where He is not.
There are two ways of getting a fortune in this world. One man makes his fortune, another gets his fortune. Now the fortune of a saint is the gift of God. If he does not know of it, that is another thing. I may say to a man, your father left you all that land. He says, I did not know it was mine. I say, what foolish man. Well, Christ has given you all this; but [p. 111] you say, I have not made it mine. Why do you not? A man may have a beautiful estate, and yet not be able to enjoy it, because he has bad health. That is how it is with many saints; they have not spiritual health to enjoy their possessions.
Now turn to John 14, verse 2. The Lord says, “I go to prepare a place for you”. (John 14:2) It is a place in heaven then, not a place here. Verse 12. He makes this very remarkable statement, “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father”. (John 14: 12.) When the Lord was here. He raised a dead man to life. But what does the Holy Spirit do now? He makes a man superior to himself. That is the wonderful thing that comes out in Stephen. You may not have the same enemies Stephen had, you may not be in the same position, but you have the same grace that he had in that position. Stephen was put into the most trying position conceivable to man; in order to show that there is nothing too trying or too difficult for us to be made superior to through grace, and in the power of the Holy Spirit. What really hinders souls is this: they are looking for easy circumstances, looking to God to take away the difficulties, instead of looking to God for grace to be superior to them.
I turn to Psalm 22, to show how Stephen in his measure was made practically superior to even what Christ had to encounter: There I get the sufferings of the Lord and all that was against Him. There are seven distinct things that He had to encounter. “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Psalm 22:1) In that Christ was alone. Stephen, or no one, could follow Him there. He was the solitary one in bearing sin. He was made sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him; and if I have that, I can look up to heaven without a cloud between. When I come to Jordan, not a drop of water is to be [p. 112] seen; death is abolished, there is not a thing between me and the throne. Simeon says, I am ready to go, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation. Stephen says, I am happy to go, I have a Saviour in the glory. Paul says, I am longing to go.
Then we come to the second thing, verse 6; “a reproach of men, and despised of the people”. (Psalm 22:6) Stephen knew what that is, but he is unmoved, he does not give way.
Then there is the third, “Many bulls have compassed me”. (Psalm 22:12) The bulls would represent the high priest, what is called the ecclesiastical thing in our day. How does he bear up against that? Unmoved. What a wonderful thing to walk on the water. It is an old saying, ‘It is a fine thing to see a man struggling’. I say it is a wonderful thing to see a man, utterly weak in himself, superior to all through the power of Christ; that is Christianity. That is what Paul has “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me”. (Philippians 4:13) “I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content”. (Philippians 4:11) I look upward, see my Saviour there, and I can encounter all down here.
Now we come to the fourth thing, weakness of body, verse 14; “I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dried up like a potsherd; and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws; and thou hast brought me into the dust of death”. (Psalm 22:14 - 15) This only fully appears in the Lord, but Stephen knew it in his measure; when they were battering him with stones he stood on, how thoroughly bodily weak, we cannot imagine. We all know how bodily weakness overcomes us. A man who is bodily weak is like one who has a number of servants, and he finds they have all left him — eyes, hands, feet — he does not know what to do. Then I have the power of Christ, not to make me strong in [p. 113] body, but to make me superior to the weakness, that is what I want.
Fifth, “dogs have compassed me” (Psalm 22:16) — Man’s power. Then the lion — Satan’s power, verse 21. Then, seventh, “the horns of the unicorns” (Psalm 22:21) — death itself. He kneels down and prays, and says, “Lord, lay not this sin to their charge”. (Acts 7:60) He says, as it were, I’ll spend my last breath in their service. He never swerved from his post. That brings out the power of Christ to sustain a man when the greatest power on earth is brought to bear upon him. He can sing that hymn ‘We triumph in Thy triumphs, Lord’. Christ has overcome all enemies, now He is out of it, and as I have my eye on Him I have His power. I have set the Lord always before me. When we are in difficulty and want power, we have just to look up. If you say. What is the use of looking up, it will not alter things. I reply, just try it and see. It connects you with Him. And He says, “Without me ye can do nothing”. (John 15:5) That is not a question simply of being united to Christ. It is dependence on Him. It is like a wife whose husband says, I will give you everything you want, but you must come to me for it; for every single thing: I won’t give you ten things at once. So with Christ. He says, I won’t give you power for two things at once, “Without me ye can do nothing”. (John 15:5) You have a trial; you get through it very well one day, but the next day you are perhaps so elated with your past victory that you forget your need of dependence and you fail most miserably. Look at Paul when he came down from the third heaven. The enjoyment he had up there would not keep him; he needed the thorn, but the Lord says, “My grace is sufficient for thee”. (2 Corinthians 12:9)
The Lord grant us not only to look at this as a picture, but to have the reality. The Lord give us not only to see these two marks so blessedly set before us in Stephen, but to know his Christ as ours. It may not be in Stephen’s place; but in whatever place you are. Take a slave for instance, what does the apostle say to him? — “Adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things”. (Titus 2:10) But he may reply, I have a hard master. Well, adorn the doctrine in all things. You must walk on the water. “Greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father”. (John 14:12) In the old order, the Lord came in to deliver His people, and showed He was for them. Now He shows, not only that He is for us, but what He is to us. Mark in Romans 8:31 the change, “If God be for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31) Then read further down, “Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us”. (Romans 8:34) That is God for me. Then, “As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long”, (Romans 8:36) that is for Christ’s sake. Yet we are not overcome, “Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us”. (Romans 8:37)
The Lord grant that each of us, in the place in which we are called, may have these two marks: by the Holy Spirit I have association with my Saviour where He is, and then power to be for my Saviour where He is not.