Acts 7:54-8:3

Mysterious

One “Bible” verse that many people know, but which isn’t actually in the Bible is, “God moves in mysterious way His wonders to perform.” This is actually the title taken from the first two lines of a hymn by William Cowper (1731-1800). While this isn’t actually a verse from the Bible it is certainly a biblical concept.

The Lord Himself tells us in Isaiah 55:8-9, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,  neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” That tells it plainly. The passage before us today demonstrates it plainly.

Stephen was stoned to death for nothing more than telling the truth. Many people claim to tell the truth but those who really do tell the truth don’t have to advertise it. Actually telling the truth is now, as it has always been in this fallen world, a very dangerous proposition. This seemed to be a tragedy, but look again.

Stephen didn’t seem to be unduly troubled by it. He saw Jesus! He commended his spirit unto the Lord and prayed for the forgiveness of those who were killing him. That’s powerful, and it must have been quite frustrating to those killing Stephen.

The church certainly wasn’t stopped by this event. On the contrary. The nascent church which had become quite comfortable in Jerusalem was forced to leave town. They were forced to spread out. And everywhere they went guess what happened? That’s right, the kingdom grew!

And then there was this young man named Saul. Saul was one bad dude. This event really cranked him up. He just went postal on the church. That’s a bad thing, right? It would seem so. But we will hear more of this Saul in the near future. After all, God moves in mysterious way His wonders to perform.