“The Biography of a Complete Person”
Sermon Preached by
The Rev. Dr. Andrew Stirling
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Text: Acts 6:6-17, 7:54-60
It is probably not a name that anyone would recognize: the name of Dr. Joseph Ton is a name that in Romanian history will go down as being of one of the saints. Joseph Ton was a pastor in Romania during the Communist takeover. One day, he was asked by the church to write an opinion piece in a local newspaper defending the church's freedom from the state, ensuring the state would not control the appointment of pastors and the closure of churches. Dr. Ton wrote his piece, and he did it boldly.
A few days later, he was arrested. He was interrogated. He was tortured. They asked him to take back his comments or the might of the Communist state and of the secret police would be brought on him. He defied them. He said, “No.” They threatened again to kill him, and this was his response: “Sir, let me explain that to you. You see, your supreme weapon is killing; my supreme weapon is dying. You know that my sermons are spread all over the country on tapes. When you kill me, I only sprinkle them with my blood. They will speak 10 times louder after that, because everyone will say 'That preacher meant it, because he sealed it with his blood.' So, go on, Sir, kill me, and when you kill me, I win the supreme victory.”
Dr. Ton was released. He was held captive again a short time later, and in 1981, he was forced into exile. He fled to the United States of America and there immediately he established the Romanian Missionary Society. He trained young pastors in Illinois on how to be Evangelists. He sent them to Moldova, to Hungary and to other parts of the Soviet Empire. He had hundreds of students who he trained for the Centre for Theological Education.
His influence became far and wide, and young ministers, pastors, male and female, risked their lives and their liberty in the Communist bloc. Why? It was because they had seen in Dr. Ton a man who was willing to die for his principles, and who was willing to give everything for his faith. He had integrity and strength of character that motivated them to emulate his views.
When you think of it, throughout the history of Christianity there is woven this web, throughout the ages, of those who have been willing to make sacrifices for the sake of what they believe to be true and for the sake of others around them. Whether it was at the beginning, in the early church with Ignatius or Polycarp of Smyrna, whether it was Menno Simons, the creator, the founder of the Mennonite movement, whether it was Trevor Huddleston in South Africa, Oscar Romero in Latin America, Sergio Vatech in Chile, or whether it was Dietrich Bonhoeffer in Germany, the list goes on of those who either died because of their convictions or were exiled and imprisoned because of their convictions.
Why? Why are people willing to do that? Not to be martyrs and kill others but martyrs, knowing that they would be killed. I think the answer is simple: they are following Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus allowed us to have a foundation of self-giving sacrificial love. In the cross and in the resurrection there was the willingness to be obedient to the will of the Father, and there was the vindication of the son by the Father at the end. And, no one exemplifies that in the Bible more than Stephen.
Stephen was an early church convert, a youngish man probably. He was somebody who heard the Christian Gospel preached and believed it. He is the first martyr within the Christian tradition. He could be likened to the chairman of the board, the senior officer of the church in Jerusalem, the head of the deacons, the head of the elders, and maybe the head of the stewardship committee. He was the one who was chosen and appointed to have this special and unique ministry. But, Stephen died for his convictions and his beliefs.
There are some who say, “But isn't an ideal picture of Stephen painted by the biblical writers and by Luke in Acts in particular? I mean, was he really that good? He was called a man of wisdom and grace and power and of the spirit, isn't that a little hyperbole, a little over the top?” However, when you think of it, the Bible does not whitewash its characters. It is not like mythology where someone is looking to be superhuman.
On the contrary, a study of biblical literature reveals that many of the so-called greats of the tradition had their weaknesses and their flaws, whether it was Jacob, who was a trickster or Noah, who was a drunk, which many of you don't remember, or whether it was Peter who cursed, or whether it was James and John, who were way too aggressive and pushy, or whether it was Judas, who was a betrayer and a thief, so many characters are painted as they were rather than in an ideal way. Even David, the most glorious of all of the Old Testament figures was someone who was an adulterer. No! There is not a whitewashing of characters in the Bible, even if they are great and notorious ones.
Stephen had something special. There was something about him. If I were to be re-named, not that I don't like my name, I love the name Andrew, but I think I would want to be called Stephen. Stephen ministers here would understand why. Stephen was unique. He was special. He had wisdom. He had grace. He had power. He had the spirit. It was because of these many dimensions to his character, he was somebody who created the foundation in so many ways for the mission of the church. Let's be honest, you and I cannot try to imitate, duplicate and follow Jesus in his fullness. We are not the Son of God and we are sinful, mortal human beings. We are not the second person in the Trinity.
But Stephen, yes! He emulated Christ! But Stephen was like us, he was a lay person in the church, and he had these tremendous qualities. It seems to me that these very qualities are the qualities which you, lay people, and I, as clergy, need to have in abundance. These are the gifts that make for the biography of a great Christian.
The first of the gifts, as we read over and over again, is that as a man he was full of the spirit. This does not mean that he had some magical powers. It is not as if he had been the recipient of the gift of Dumbledore in Harry Potter and all of a sudden has some magical things to wave around. It is not that he had necessarily any personal gifts or abilities that were greater or stronger than anyone else. We don't know if he was handsome and articulate. We do not know if he was charismatic. We do not know if he was wealthy. We know nothing about his talents and his gifts, but he was full of the spirit. The Lord had blessed him with something. He had what is called in the text, “A touch on the shoulder” that he had been called, that he had been set apart, and that God's spirit rested upon him.
The power of Stephen then was the power of God's gift, of God's love, and it seems to me, as Christians, that the starting place for service and the starting place for ministry is the spirit, and our openness to the power of the spirit to enable us to do things in Christ's name: not magic, not talent, not gifts, not wealth, but the spirit, and from the spirit.
Stephen was able to do all the things that he did and possess all the gifts that he was given, such as the second gift, the gift of wisdom. When he was being persecuted, Stephen said the following, “I see heaven opening and Jesus at the right hand of God.” Stephen was given an insight into God. He was given this vision in the midst of his suffering and his difficulties. He was transported in a sense somewhere else - to a higher vision, to a higher compassion, to a higher sense of the possibilities of God. Wisdom is in fact that very power. It is the power of God. It is the power to perceive and to see and to know with the mind of God. Oh, we can learn intellectually, we can have great knowledge, we can try and figure out the Christian faith, but Stephen had wisdom, and it was that wisdom and that insight that enabled him to do the great things that he was doing.
When you think about it, think back to your school days. Do you remember everything that you were taught? I remember almost nothing! Do you remember every subject and every class and every classroom? Probably not, but I expect that in the recesses of your memories there was a teacher who gave you a love of learning, who wanted you to be passionate about a subject that gave you that certain something that made you want to know more. Teachers are powerful people, they really are. But, it is those who have the wisdom to have a passion in you for the subject that seems to transcend all the knowledge and facts and data that you might accumulate in the little grey cells, because real learning occurs much deeper.
Stephen had that something deeper. When he preached he preached with wisdom and insight into the history of Israel and its people, into the glory of God and of Jesus. Even when others, who supposedly knew this God, said, “This is blasphemous!” And even though they rejected him, Stephen's sense of wisdom kept him going - wisdom that would lead itself to the ultimate sacrifice.
I think he had something else. The writer tells us he had power. On the surface, surely it appears that the last thing that Stephen had was power! He did not have the ability to save himself. He was belittled. He was stoned. He was executed. And, he died. Hardly the biography of a powerful person! Yet, he had power. There was something that he possessed that his accusers did not. And, in his sacrifice lay his power.
Almost 20 years ago I was taken by a friend of mine who was studying with me in Boston at the time, to visit a cell in the southern part of the United States. My friend had been nominated for the Nobel Prize twice for his work with inmates in prisons. He wanted me to meet this one character. He was going down to plead a case on behalf of this man, and he said, “Would you like to go with me?” So, I did. I went and I visited death row in one of the prisons in the United States. Now, I could not spend any time with the inmate, but I was assured by my friend that this man was completely innocent, that he hadn't had proper legal representation, that he had been caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. My friend was convinced that he was innocent. But, he was on death row.
It was obvious that he would be put to death, and he was. Later, DNA evidence came out that vindicated him. But, what was interesting was something that my friend said to me on our way back to Massachusetts. He said, “Andrew, everyone will remember the name of the man who was executed, but will anyone remember the name of the executioner?” I think that is the same with Stephen. Do we know the names of those who held the stones to kill an innocent man? No! Do we know the name of the one who gave himself up for the sake of the Gospel? Yes! So, who had the power?
He also had grace. The text suggests that he had “graciousness” about him, an adjective to describe the way that he acted. You could see this. The power of his words was amazing. The power of his sermon was spellbinding. It upset his enemies so much that they resisted the very power of the Word. But, it was his graciousness that won him the victory. The word had gone forth. But what is wisdom and what are the words? They can become lopsided if not accompanied by grace.
Grace is what Stephen had in spades. It was the grace of a man who, even though he was being stoned, like his Lord and Saviour, said, “Forgive them for what they are doing.” He had a grace that humbled him, and we are told that he knelt and he prayed before the stoning began. Not one to elevate himself, not one to seek the adulation of men and women, only to be faithful to God. This Stephen had grace!
There is a wonderful story told about an event that occurred in 1916 in Vienna. It was the funeral of Franz Josef I. Franz Josef was the last of the Hapsburg monarchs, monarchs who had ruled many countries in Europe for some 600 years. We are told that they were kind of an ugly family. Not very handsome, many of them were petty and had lost their way, and had become obsessed with power and riches. Franz Josef was the last of them.
He was being brought to be buried in a monastery in Vienna. Before he could be buried, his body had to be taken down some stairs into the family Hapsburg crypt. But at the gate between the crypt and those who were delivering it was this very large metal gate. On the other side of the gate was the Archbishop Cardinal of Vienna. When they brought the body of the great Franz Josef down the steps, they knocked on the gate, and they said, “Open up.”
And, the Archbishop said, “Who goes there?”
They replied, “Franz Josef, Defender of the Faith, King of Bohemia, King of Hungary, King of Austria....”, and they went on and listed thirty titles and countries over which this man ruled.
The Cardinal Archbishop said, “I know him not.”
So they reduced the number of countries to be a little less ostentatious the next time around. And the Archbishop said, “I know him not.”
Finally, the person on the other end of the gate came back a third time and said, “This is Franz Josef I, our brother, a sinner like everybody else.“
The Archbishop Cardinal said, “I know him. Let him in.”
It seems to me that what Stephen had was what the Archbishop really wanted - a humble and a contrite heart, a man who believed in what he believed in. Stephen will never be remembered for all the glories that he accumulated, even the things that he achieved, but he will be remembered for his word. He will be remembered for his spirit, for his wisdom, for his power, and for his grace. It seems to me, my friends, that is the biography of a real Christian. I ask you, is that your biography? Amen.