The Pulpit Commentary — Acts — Volume 1 — Section 249

Here is eomething very different- man with the splendour of the glory or God and the realities of hea'l"en and the exalted Jesus bursting on his vision, and yet, a.mid storms of st-0nes, recalled to prayer for himself and the trustful committing of his soul to the charge of Jesus, and to intercession on bended knees for hie murderers. To .disregard the suggestions of the patience of Stephen, the dying charge of his spirit, and the prayer for those who kill him, in their power to recall the temper and the trust and the for- givingness of his great Master and Saviour, were to disregard Christ's own grandest achievements. Of such achievements bis force, his word, his Spirit, have now wrought in Stephen so early a.n illustrious and ever-enduring monument. Nor, amid a.11 the rest of the splendour of the surroundings of Stephen's departing from this world, was thei:e _any more intrinsic mark of what it all meant than the copy which he himself exh1b1ted of a character and a portrait" after the Master "-the Master Jesus. V. A WORD APPLIED IN THE NARRATIVE TO DESCRIBE THE DEATH OF THE MARTYR AS SINGULARLY IN BARMOXY WITH THE WHOLE WORLD'S IRRESISTIBLE CONVICTION OF THE PERFECT PEACE OF THE SPIRIT, AS IT WOULD BEEM INAPPROPRIATE TO THE SUFFERINGS OF THE BODY. "And ·when he had said this, he/ell asleep." 'l'he beautiful expression was not unknown nor unused before Christians used it; but men may be pardoned if they felt (perhaps against strict letter of fact) it could never be appropri- ately drawn upon without Christian revelation. But its use now, its use in the circum• stances presented here, is a sign and a mark indeed. 'l'his is not some occasion where truth is complimentarily sacrificed, and facts dragged in disgraceful chains in the train of words. On the contrary,facts, in spite of all appearances, deeper/acts, despite the sight and the sounds and stones that are flying about,/acts that insist on giving expression to themsel,es, triumph over words and over all opposing forces, and demand that, as the last thing we know of Stephen in this world, we shall know this-that his death was as thongh a "sleep," and his yielding to it a.s though he yielded to Heaven's gracious remedy for nature's deepest need-sleep I " He fell asleep "-in Jesus (1 Thess. iv. 14), " Well done, good and faithful servant"-" faithful unto death," And in death also faithful-a faithful witness of the Lord's faithfulness to his own. .. He fell asleep in Christ his Lord; He gave to him to keep The soul his great love had redeemed, Then calmly went to sleep. • .And as a tired bird folds its wing Sure of the morning light, Re laid him down in trusting faith. And dreaded not the night.n D. Vera. 2-53.-Stephen', defence. It was usual in the court or the Sanhedrim to allow an a.ccused person to plead guilty or not guilty, and to speak in his own defence . .As this address of Stephen's is his defence, we mnst know of what he was accused. Generally it may be said that he was a blasphemer of God and the Law; but, to under- stand how snch a charge could possibly be made, we must appreciate the intense and snperstitious feeling concerning Mosaism which characterized the rulers of that day. The more manifestly that the spiritual life faded out of the older system, the more intensely the people clung to its mere forms and traditions; jealousy of it as a national system had taken the place of faithfulness to it as a revelation of God and a means of grace. Stephen was "the first man who dared to think that the gospel of Jesus was a Divine step forward, a new economy of God, which the existing Hebraio institutions might indeed refuse to accept, but which, in that case, would not only dis- pense with, but in the end overturn, the Hebraic institutions." So far as a charge was brought against Stephen, it closely resembled that brought against our Lord. The false witnesses declared that they had heard him say" that this Jesus of Nazareth shall destroy this place [i.e. the temple], and shall change the customs which Moses delivered us." But while this was the definite charge, we find that the real offence must have been his bold and unqualified assertion of the Messiahship and divinity of Christ. St.ephen's crime, in the eyes gf bigoted Jewish nuers, was his dlscern1I1ent of tlle llII, VU. 1-60.] TRE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 215