Words in italic type have been added for clarity. They are not found in the original Hebrew or Aramaic.

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Acts 7

Stephen’s Address: The Call of Abraham

Acts 7:¹ Then the high priest said, “Are these things so?”

Acts 7:² And he said, “Brethren and fathers, listen: The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Haran,

Acts 7:³ and said to him, ‘Get out of your country and from your relatives, and come to a land that I will show you.’

Acts 7:⁴ Then he came out of the land of the Chaldeans and dwelt in Haran. And from there, when his father was dead, He moved him to this land in which you now dwell.

Acts 7:⁵ And God gave him no inheritance in it, not even enough to set his foot on. But even when Abraham had no child, He promised to give it to him for a possession, and to his descendants after him.

Acts 7:⁶ But God spoke in this way: that his descendants would dwell in a foreign land, and that they would bring them into bondage and oppress them four hundred years.

• Four hundred is Forty times ten.
  See: Topic Numbers Symbolism

Acts 7:⁷ ‘And the nation to whom they will be in bondage I will judge,’ said God, ‘and after that they shall come out and serve Me in this place.’

Acts 7:⁸ Then He gave him the covenant of circumcision; and so Abraham begot Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day; and Isaac begot Jacob, and Jacob begot the twelve patriarchs.

• Circumcision is a physical act to demonstrate a spiritual act, that is, the cutting away of the desires of the flesh and its worldliness.

The Patriarchs in Egypt

Acts 7:⁹ “And the patriarchs, becoming envious, sold Joseph into Egypt. But God was with him

Acts 7:¹⁰ and delivered him out of all his troubles, and gave him favor and wisdom in the presence of Pharaoh, king of Egypt; and he made him governor over Egypt and all his house.

Acts 7:¹¹ Now a famine and great trouble (affliction) came over all the land of Egypt and Canaan, and our fathers found no sustenance.

Acts 7:¹² But when Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt, he sent out our fathers first.

Acts 7:¹³ And the second time Joseph was made known to his brothers, and Joseph’s family became known to the Pharaoh.

Acts 7:¹⁴ Then Joseph sent and called his father Jacob and all his relatives to him, (seventy or..) seventy-five people.

Acts 7:¹⁵ So Jacob went down to Egypt; and he died, he and our fathers.

Acts 7:¹⁶ And they were carried back to Shechem and laid in the tomb that Abraham bought for a sum of money from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem.

God Delivers Israel by Moses

Acts 7:¹⁷ “But when the time of the promise drew near which God had sworn to Abraham, the people grew and multiplied in Egypt

Acts 7:¹⁸ till another king arose who did not know Joseph.

Acts 7:¹⁹ This man dealt treacherously with our people, and oppressed our forefathers, making them expose their babies, so that they might not live.

Acts 7:²⁰ At this time Moses was born, and was well pleasing to God; and he was brought up in his father’s house for three months.

Acts 7:²¹ But when he was set out, Pharaoh’s daughter took him away and brought him up as her own son.

Acts 7:²² And Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and deeds.

Acts 7:²³ “Now when he was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brethren, the children of Israel.

• Moses born: 40 years in the Pharaoh’s house until he visited his brethren (Acts 7:23)
  Moses exile: 40 years in his exile until the Exodus
  Moses’ call: 40 years in the wilderness until his death

Forty is Symbolic for “Testing” and “Time for Change“

Acts 7:²⁴ And seeing one of them suffer wrong, he defended and avenged him who was oppressed, and struck down the Egyptian.

Acts 7:²⁵ For he supposed that his brethren would have understood that God would deliver them by his hand, but they did not understand.

Acts 7:²⁶ And the next day he appeared to two of them as they were fighting, and tried to reconcile them, saying, ‘Men, you are brethren; why do you wrong one another?’

Acts 7:²⁷ But he who did his neighbor wrong pushed him away, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and a judge over us?

Acts 7:²⁸ Do you want to kill me as you did the Egyptian yesterday?’

Acts 7:²⁹ Then, at this saying, Moses fled and became a dweller in the land of Midian, where he had two sons.

Acts 7:³⁰ “And when forty years had passed, an Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire in a bush, in the wilderness of Mount Sinai.

Acts 7:³¹ When Moses saw it, he marveled at the sight; and as he drew near to observe, the voice of the Lord came to him,

Acts 7:³² saying, ‘I am the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ And Moses trembled and dared not look.

Acts 7:³³ ‘Then the Lord said to him, “Take your sandals off your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.

Acts 7:³⁴ I have surely seen the oppression of My people who are in Egypt; I have heard their groaning and have come down to deliver them. And now come, I will send you to Egypt.” ’

Acts 7:³⁵ “This Moses whom they rejected, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and a judge?’ is the one God sent to be a ruler and a deliverer by the hand of the Angel who appeared to him in the bush.

Acts 7:³⁶ He brought them out, after he had shown wonders and signs in the land of Egypt, and in the Red Sea, and in the wilderness forty years.

Israel Rebels Against God

Acts 7:³⁷ “This is that Moses (a type of Christ) who said to the children of Israel, ‘The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me (Moses) from your brethren. Him you shall hear.’

• Deuteronomy 18:15-A New Prophet Like Moses-“The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren. Him you shall hear.
• The prophet like Moses is Jesus, a prophet and the Son of God.

Acts 7:³⁸ “This is he who was in the congregation (Greek: ecclesia, assembly aka church) in the wilderness with the Angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai, and with our fathers, the one who received the living oracles to give to us,

Acts 7:³⁹ whom our fathers would not obey, but rejected. And in their hearts they turned back to Egypt,

Acts 7:⁴⁰ saying to Aaron, ‘Make us gods to go before us; as for this Moses who brought us out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.’

Acts 7:⁴¹ And they made a calf in those days, offered sacrifices to the idol, and rejoiced in the works of their own hands.

Acts 7:⁴² Then God turned and gave them up to worship the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the Prophets:

‘Did you offer Me slaughtered animals and sacrifices during forty years in the wilderness,
O house of Israel?

Acts 7:⁴³ You also took up the tabernacle of Moloch (where children were sacrificed alive),
And the star of your god Remphan (Chiun),
Images which you made to worship;
And I will carry you away beyond Babylon.’

• Reference Verse:
  Amos 5:^26-27 You also carried Sikkuth (tabernacle of Moloch) your king (A pagan deity)
  And Chiun (Saturn), your idols,
  The star of your gods, which you made for yourselves.
  Therefore I will send you into captivity beyond Damascus (Babylon),”
  Says the Lord, whose name is the God of hosts.

God’s True Tabernacle

Acts 7:⁴⁴ “Our fathers had the tabernacle of witness in the wilderness, as He appointed, instructing Moses to make it according to the pattern that he had seen,

• Moses saw the pattern of the tabernacle of witness on Mount Sinai. This pattern would also be recreated during Solomon’s time when he builds the temple with the ark of the covenant which is seen in heaven by John.
  • Exodus 25:⁹ According to all that I show you, that is, the pattern of the tabernacle and the pattern of all its furnishings, just so you shall make it...⁴⁰ And see to it that you make them according to the pattern which was shown you on the mountain.
  • Revelation 11:19 Then the temple of God was opened in heaven, and the ark of His covenant was seen in His temple. And there were lightnings, noises, thunderings, an earthquake, and great hail.
• The pattern is critical if, in the spiritual realm, God is able to connect the temple and the ark in heaven with each one on earth. Quantum Physics describes this as “entanglement” and is best understood as a hyperlink on one’s computer. Scientists have been able to entangles two particles 750 miles apart such that when one is affected the other also responds.
  Must See: Topic: Quantum Physics

Acts 7:⁴⁵ which our fathers, having received it in turn, also brought with Joshua into the land possessed by the Gentiles, whom God drove out before the face of our fathers until the days of David,

Acts 7:⁴⁶ who found favor before God and asked to find a dwelling for the God of Jacob.

Acts 7:⁴⁷ But Solomon built Him a house.

Acts 7:⁴⁸ “However, the Most High does not dwell in temples made with hands, as the prophet says:

Acts 7:⁴⁹ ‘Heaven is My throne,
And earth is My footstool.
What house will you build for Me? says the Lord,
Or what is the place of My rest?

Acts 7:⁵⁰ Has My hand not made all these things?’

Israel Resists the Holy Spirit

Acts 7:⁵¹ “You stiff-necked (stubborn) and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.

Acts 7:⁵² Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the Just One, of whom you now have become the betrayers and murderers,

Acts 7:⁵³ who have received the law by the direction of angels and have not kept it.”

Stephen the Martyr

Acts 7:⁵⁴ When they heard these things they were (furious) cut to the heart, and they gnashed at him with their teeth.

Acts 7:⁵⁵ But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God,

Acts 7:⁵⁶ and said, “Look! I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!”

Acts 7:⁵⁷ Then they cried out with a loud voice, stopped their ears, and ran at him with one accord;

Acts 7:⁵⁸ and they cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul. (aka Paul of Tarsus)

• I Corinthians 15:9 For I am the least of the apostles, who am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.

Acts 7:⁵⁹ And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.”

Acts 7:⁶⁰ Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not charge them with this sin.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep (died).

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