Acts 7:2–20

Accused in this way, Stephen answers the high priest's question, "Are these things so?" God had brought out their forefather Abraham, but He never actually gave him possession of this land. Why then boast of it so much? They boasted loudly of Abraham and of God's dealings in a merely natural way. Clearly they were not in communion with God, or even with Abraham.

We know that he and his family were serving other gods in that land beyond the Euphrates (Joshua 24:2). They were caught up in the idolatry that had already swallowed the whole land, and there grace met him. He was not the heir of privilege. For him the glory did not live in any place made with hands. It was apart from the world — the world in which that revelation made him a pilgrim from then on. God called him out of the land of his birth and from his kindred, and the land He called him to was unknown. Faith was a necessity to him in every way — slow as he might be, and was, to cut the ties of nature, which were only a hindrance to him.

"The God of glory" is no mere Hebrew idiom for "glorious God." From the very beginning it directs the heart to One altogether above the world. He is above it in Himself and in His purposes, whatever His ways may be meanwhile on the earth.

Abraham is living in great Ur of the Chaldees. Archaeological discoveries make it plain that this was a splendid city of wealth and learning in those far-off days. Men there were still making themselves "a name" and displaying their glory. In the middle of all this magnificence, the God of glory appears before him. God presented Himself to him marked by the glory that belongs to Him.

"The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia." What unanswerable evidence of sovereign grace! To overlook it springs from a wicked heart of unbelief that turns away from a living God. It hardens the soul in self-sufficiency, so that His voice becomes distasteful, disliked, and dreaded. Yet had they not often heard and read Joshua's testimony? … It was many centuries before the law and far away from Canaan. It was before he lived in Haran, in Mesopotamia — a place infamous as the mother of idolatries.

His story in Genesis begins with God's word to him: "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you" (Gen. 12:1). According to Acts 7, these were the words with which "the God of glory" appeared to him. The revelation and the renunciation were cause and effect. The second was possible in the strength and joy of the first. The glory of Ur of the Chaldees faded before the God of glory. In eagerly stretching out his hands towards the one, Abraham turned his back on the other. This was, as we may call it, Abraham's conversion. Abraham decisively "turned to God from idols," and there is no true conversion without this.

Here then we discover what distinguishes this call from every other call: it comes from God — the God of glory. It is the glory of the One who appears to Abraham that gives such importance to the call, and gives faith its authority and power to answer it.

Even Abraham, blessed as he was, moved slowly in the path of faith at first. He did not leave Mesopotamia to live in Canaan all at once. Before that he lived in Haran. He got out of his land, but not so quickly "out of his kindred." So there was a remarkable delay in coming into the land God was to show him.

"The God of glory" is not simply a Hebrew way of saying "glorious God." From the very start it turns the heart toward One who is entirely above the world. He is above it in Himself and in His purposes, whatever His ways on earth may be in the meantime. "Your fathers lived on the other side of the river long ago, Terah the father of Abraham and the father of Nahor, and they served other gods" (Joshua 24:2). It was in sovereign grace that God appeared like this. Even the line of Shem — Abraham's father and relatives — were idolaters. Grace gives what is good; it does not find it. And the God of glory did not only appear. He appeared to Abraham while he was in Mesopotamia. Abraham was then at the furthest point of distance from "the land," and in idolatrous company.

There are two aspects of the call, both clearly set out in the history of Abraham. We read in Hebrews 11:8 that "he was called to go out," which refers to the world he was to leave behind. Then we read, "he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance." Here the new world he was called into is in view. Stephen also points to these two aspects of Abraham's call.

From there God, in supreme grace, calls him to come into a land where He would guide him, welcome him and provide for him. Note the word "Come" in Acts 7:3, as in Genesis 7 — not "go."

God's ties up to now had been made by natural order, by family blessings and inheritances. Abram is called out of all this — not only out of evil things. This was God's way of breaking the link with idolatry. The word is not, "Correct your ways in the country where you were born," but "Go out … to the land that I will show you."

In Abraham's case God called him literally to leave the country of his birth, his relatives and his father's house. For the Christian the call does not take this literal form, but we are no less called to be morally apart from country, relatives and father's house. And if we are morally apart, the political, social and even family circle may push the Christian out. That happened to the blind man in John 9. In any case, the moment comes in our history when we have to decide. Which comes first: the mighty call of God, or the pressing claims of country, relatives, and father's house?

The land to be shown in due time was as yet unknown, so that he was thrown back on simple-hearted confidence in God. He went out in submission to God's promise, not knowing where he was going. God would show the next step when Abraham took the first. He did not ask, "Where?" He trusted God completely. So his faith was unmixed with calculations of self, resting only but fully on the word of the One who loves and never deceives.

Even Abraham, blessed as he was, moved slowly on the path of faith at first. He did not leave Mesopotamia and settle in Canaan all at once. Before that he lived in Haran. He got out of his land, but not so quickly out of his kindred, so there was a striking delay in coming into the land God was going to show him.

An ancient city in Mesopotamia. Terah and his family moved there from Ur of the Chaldees. Abraham stayed there on his way to the land of Canaan, until his father died... It appears in its Greek form as CHARRAN in Acts 7:2, 4... The name means 'road' in Accadian. It was probably so called because the caravan routes of Syria, Assyria, and Babylonia crossed there.

He sets out, but he takes Terah, his father, with him, and goes and lodges in Haran (he could not carry Terah with him into the land of Canaan). Now God had called Abram, but not Terah. He left everything except Terah, and entered into possession of nothing. But he tried to carry something with him which was not of God, and he could not. It is not until after Terah's death that he removes into Canaan, to where God had called him.

Just so it happens to a heart which has not understood that it must give itself wholly to God. It gives up a great deal for duty, it receives nothing. When the question is of following God, it keeps something for itself. Still, grace acted towards Abraham.

Stephen says that the God of glory appeared to Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran... The effect of this was that he left his country, and possibly many of his relatives. But his father went with him, along with Sarah and Lot, and they settled in Haran... Then it seems God called him to get out from his country, kindred, and father's house, and come into a land that He would show him (Genesis 12:1). The effect of this call was that he departed out of Haran. Stephen confirms this when he says, "after his father died, God removed him from there into this land." This shows beyond question that God acted a second time.

Genesis 11:32 states plainly that Terah died in Haran aged 205 years. Genesis 12:4 states just as plainly that Abram left Haran aged 75, with Terah already dead (see Acts 7:4) — not 135, as we should have expected. So Terah's family began when he was 70, but Abram was not born till Terah was 130. Abram is named first in Genesis 11:26 because Terah's other children mattered little compared with him. These things should teach us that God is concerned with moral and spiritual matters, not with dates.

He was not the heir of privilege. For him the glory did not live in any place built by human hands. It was outside the world, and by that revelation he became a pilgrim in the world from then on. From the land of his birth God called him out, and from his kindred; and the land to which He called him was one unknown. Faith was a necessity for him at every point. He was slow to cut the ties of nature, but those ties were only a hindrance to him. After his father was dead, God removed him to the land which was to be his own.

For though he went out of his land, he did not get out of his kin, but dwelt with his father in Haran till Terah died. Then only God removed him into the land in which the Jews gloried as their dwelling.

God had brought out their forefather Abraham, but He never actually gave him possession of this land. Why, then, boast of it so much? Those who, according to nature, boasted loudly of Abraham and of God's dealings were clearly not in communion with God, or even with Abraham.

Accused in this way, Stephen answers the high priest's question, "Are these things so?" In his wonderful speech (Acts 7) he sets before them the main facts of their history. They bear on God's dispute with the Jews at that moment. God had brought out their forefather Abraham, but He never actually gave him possession of this land. Why then boast so much about it? By natural descent they boasted loudly of Abraham and of God's dealings. Yet they were clearly not in fellowship with God, or even with Abraham.

Abraham was a pilgrim and a stranger in Canaan, and this by divine design. The Jewish boast was far from the mind of God, which Abraham enjoyed by faith. Faith brought him out of the land of the Chaldeans; but what was he in Canaan? "By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land... For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations" (Heb. 11:8-10). The Jews, like unbelievers at all times, stand not on faith but on tradition and outward privilege. Abraham lived on promise and walked by faith, not by sight.

God then brings Abraham into Canaan. What is there for him there? Nothing yet to be possessed. The Canaanites are there, enemies all around in this land of promise. He has only his faith for his pains, not a place to set his foot on that properly belonged to him.

Also, God gave him no actual possession in the land, though He promised it to him. He was a pilgrim — another healthy lesson for those who claim to be sons of Abraham. God's sovereign wisdom is impressed on us too in His promising the land to Abraham's offspring at a time when he had no child. So Abraham should not judge things by the narrow view of his present situation. Israel was failing in this too when Stephen spoke.

But what about the law? Did that make any difference? None whatever, as regards God's gift and promise. Four centuries before the law came, God Almighty settled and established the great transaction with Abraham His friend — settled and established forever. So nothing can touch it. God set no legal conditions for Abraham. All was pure and absolute grace. God gave the land to Abraham by promise, and not by law in any shape or form.

It is completely wrong to say that God did later give him a possession in Canaan — the piece of land he bought from Ephron as a burial place (Gen. 23:17). God's gift is absolute and future. Buying a burial place from the Hittite confirms this; it does not weaken it. For who that owned this land, or any land, would think of buying his own property? There he lays his dead in ground so plainly not his own that he has to buy it for the purpose — the pledge to faith that he will have it another day.

Abram and his offspring will have the promise in the day when glory is to dwell in that land (Ps. 85)... Then the children of Abraham — not by nature only but by grace also — will enter on the promised inheritance. Abraham himself will be there in resurrection glory. This happens when Jesus is revealed from heaven, and there come the times of restoration of all things, which God spoke of through His holy prophets long ago.

The true man of faith cannot find a home on earth because "the Canaanite" is there. By and by it will not be so, for "all that offends" will be gathered out of the kingdom, and the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ (Rev. 11:15).

Stephen's words are a loose quotation of Genesis 15:13-14, with a few words more or less from Exodus 3:12 in place of the closing phrase. The God of glory thought of His people in Egypt and in the wilderness, before the holy place or even the law. He will never give Israel up until He has made good His promise, guaranteed when Abraham had no child... For as with the father, so with his seed. Abraham lived as a stranger in Palestine, and his descendants were first seen as slaves in a foreign land. This lasted no brief moment. In round numbers 400 years (strictly 405) passed from the birth of the child of promise until God judged the nation that held them in slavery.

Genesis 15:13 and Acts 7:6 say nothing about Egypt: "Your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs." God said this to Abraham. It may cover the whole period from the birth of Isaac to the Exodus, which on this reckoning was four hundred and five years. That agrees with the round number of four hundred years. Exodus 12:40 is worded differently: it counts four hundred and thirty years for the time the children of Israel lived in Egypt. It is better to take those four hundred and thirty years as covering the stay of Abraham after the promise, and of Isaac, and of Jacob.

Their slavery was in no way accidental. God had foreseen it, and even foretold it to Abram while he still had no child (Genesis 15:13-16). God was training a people destined for a high position. Part of that training was to live in a foreign land and suffer there four hundred years. God rules everything so completely that Satan could not hold the people one day beyond the appointed time.

God promised Abraham this very furnace of affliction in the vision of Genesis 15. This iron furnace represents God, along with the lamp, as it passes between the pieces of the sacrifice. It was the necessary means to bring them out for the inheritance He promised them. It is His way to make them the people He wants them to be. God pledges to them that they shall have this fiery furnace, and Pharaoh was the instrument in God's hand for it.

At no time was there a clearer proof of God's interest in them than during those centuries, and during the deliverance that followed, filled with miracles and still more glowing prophecies. It was a time remarkable in every way, in Egypt and in the wilderness alike. Yet none of it happened while they were settled in the land of promise. Never was there a more awful display of His displeasure, or of the blows His wrath brought on their oppressors. Never was there a more wonderful witness in the past that He had taken Israel as His own people, redeemed from the world's slavery.

God did not promise immediate great blessing. He promised instead that Abraham's offspring would go into slavery and suffer oppression for four hundred years. So there would be long suffering before exaltation... Israel should never have forgotten what this meant, and we today should take its lessons to heart. We must expect suffering before exaltation.

The word itself can carry either sense. Between people it means an arrangement, especially of property by a will. In the things of God it means a covenant, and that is the usual sense in the Greek Old Testament and the New Testament. The context decides it with certainty… Acts 3:25 and Acts 7:8 are just as plain for "covenant," and there all the English versions are correct.

God makes His covenants from Himself, without consulting man… Covenants like this take the form of an unconditional promise. God's covenant with Abraham was such a promise: first about his natural descendants, Genesis 15:4-6; then about his seed, Christ, Genesis 22:15-18. He also gave him the covenant of circumcision, Genesis 17:10-14; Acts 7:8 — a seal of the righteousness of faith. Romans 4:11.

Abraham is near a hundred years old, "his body now dead," with nothing more to expect from it. Right there God steps in as the "Almighty" God. He renews His assurance of what He will do, at the very point where Abraham can do nothing… So where is the law? Where is all the work of man that Israel trusted in, in a covenant given to a man with a "body now dead"?

Its sign was not to be in the clouds for every eye to see, but in the flesh. On the flesh it waged all-out war, declaring it unclean and sentencing it to death. It did not simply demand purity. It set out death, a picture of Christ's death for His own, who by nature were as unclean and ungodly as anyone else. It was not of Moses but of the fathers, as the Lord told the Jews (John 7:22).

God then gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision (v.8), to be applied to his descendants. It was a sign that no promise of God could apply to man as he is in the flesh. The flesh must be cut off, to have no part in God's counsels. Yet in Stephen's time the Jews were boasting in the mere rite of circumcision, and so standing against what it meant.

"So Abraham became the father of Isaac, and circumcised him on the eighth day" — the day of resurrection and its glory, and of that new standing which belongs to the believer by God's counsels of grace. In Genesis 15 Abraham believed God, who counted it to him as righteousness. He had also been called out, and he obeyed the call, set apart to Jehovah — both while still uncircumcised. But it was after his own circumcision, and in the full order of the covenant, that he became the father of Isaac.

Stephen draws marked attention to the covenant of circumcision that God gave to Abraham. He does not belittle an institution that the law itself took up… But the promise came long before the law. And Abraham, the father of the faithful, had enjoyed God's election and call even before circumcision. The truth is a whole. It only suffers when one part is misused to weaken or destroy another.

How does Stephen sum up the history of that early twelve? "And the patriarchs through jealousy sold Joseph into Egypt: and God was with him, and delivered him out of all his afflictions"… Yet which of the twelve was tried by his brothers as Joseph was? Who was plotted against as he was?

Did these twelve men prove to be the most exemplary and upright people? Far from it! As early as this in Israel's history we see signs of the great evils that would later take place. This cruel rejection of their own brother tells us that from the beginning that nation was no better than any other. The fathers of the nation cast out their brother because of envy. In the same way, the nation has cast out their promised Messiah when He came in grace. The same envy and hatred moved them.

The heads of the tribes of Israel show their evil state from the first. Nothing justly provoked them. There was only refusal to obey their father, hatred of their godly brother, and rebellion against the mind of God. They envied Joseph, and even when they gave up their plan to kill him, they sold him away into Egypt. Pride of position hates the faith that rebukes it. It hates the spirit of grace shown in deed and truth. It goes on to hostility beyond measure, more cruel than the world's.

Joseph was a beloved son, a God-fearing slave, a guiltless prisoner, and a wise deputy ruler. In every place and in every circumstance God was with him. Yet who of the twelve was so tried by his brothers? Who was so plotted against as he? Who seemed to suffer more in spite of — yes, because of — his spotless purity? Even so, in prison, "the LORD was with him, and whatever he did, the LORD made it succeed."

The Lord was with him when he gained his father's confidence and love. The Lord was with him when his faithfulness earned the envy and hatred of his brothers. Now Scripture says it with special force about a slave in a strange land… The Lord was with him all the more because the need was greater.

Who could forget the envy of Joseph's brothers! Yet it helped to fulfil the very hints of his greatness that had caused their envy. They sold him into Egypt. Did those standing before Stephen not remember their own thirty pieces of silver? Then came the famine, which forced his guilty brothers to turn to the one they had rejected and cast out… Man acted freely and, sadly, away from God. Even so, he carried out God's purposes as if he had aimed at them on purpose.

The patriarchs, moved with envy, hated and persecuted Joseph. But God was with him, and highly exalted him. In his exaltation Joseph sends a message to his brothers. He presents himself as their saviour and deliverer. So Joseph becomes a striking picture of Christ, their own Messiah. Out of envy the leaders of Israel handed Him over to be crucified. But God had exalted Christ to His own right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour. From that place of exaltation, through the Holy Spirit, came the offer of repentance to Israel and the forgiveness of their sins.

Stephen does not say a word about the Lord Jesus. Yet who could miss the parallel between the Just One and the innocent object of the patriarchs' jealousy? Could anyone doubt that this was the plain lesson of their own Scriptures, and no clever trick to serve a purpose?

A beloved son, or a God-fearing slave, a guiltless prisoner or a wise ruler — Joseph had God with him everywhere and in all circumstances. Yet who of the twelve sons of Jacob was so tried by his brothers? Who was so plotted against as he? Who seemed to fare worse despite his unstained purity — yes, because of it? Still, even in prison, "the Lord was with him, and whatever he did, the Lord made it succeed."

God visits the home of a heathen captain. He visits the household of a heathen king — yes, even his bedside. He makes the very dreams in the king's head serve the working out of His plans... How clearly God's providence comes out in this deeply interesting history of Joseph! Look for a moment into the dungeon of the captain of the guard. See a man there in irons, charged with a disgusting crime, the outcast and refuse of society. Then see him raised, almost in a moment, to the very highest position. Who can deny that God is in it all?

Their anger had sold Joseph into Egypt. God used their sin to make Joseph the great organiser of the day, saving countless lives. Nothing could excuse the terrible sin of Joseph's brothers against him. But it must have comforted their accusing hearts to find that God used the anger of man to praise Him.

He rose from the obscurity of the prison to the "favour" of Pharaoh, who set him over the land of Egypt and the king's house (Acts 7:9-10). But after all, this was only the favour of man. It cannot compare with the favour of God. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, the justified believer has gained a permanent right to that favour.

God was with the hated Joseph. Just as surely, He was with Jesus in all fullness. Jesus was the object of divine delight and the storehouse of wisdom for His glory. His troubles went deeper than any that ever came on anyone. When God brought Him out of them all, He highly exalted Him and set Him at His own right hand. But if it was not the kingdom of Israel, with Zion at its centre, this only confirms how fitting the type is... the despised and rejected One is exalted on His Father's throne, not yet on His own. He has all authority over a kingdom as wide as the world. Its form is quite special, and He received it when He was cast out, separated from His brothers. Of this, Joseph's exaltation by the king of Egypt is the striking shadow — made chief over Egypt and all his house.

Joseph was handed over to the Gentiles. Afterwards he became the highest man in the running of the kingdom, and the instrument of God's goodness and wisdom for the very brothers who had persecuted and sold him... such had been the features of their recent sin, and such would be the path of God in His grace. But they had no ear for Him yet.

Moved with envy, they rejected and sold him (v.9). Yet God preserved him and in fact exalted him to a place of great authority in Egypt. Could God not do the same (or something greater) with Jesus, whom Israel rejected?

They sold him into Egypt. (Did the men in front of Stephen not remember their own thirty pieces of silver?) But God was with him, despite those afflictions in the meantime. God so plainly delivered him out of them, and made him governor over all the land. Then came the famine, which forced his guilty brothers to turn for help to the one they had rejected and cast out. And this again led to the fulfilment of the prophecy given to Abraham. Man acted freely and, sadly, far from God. Yet he still worked out God's purposes, as if he had set out to bring them about.

It was a pathway of righteous suffering that led to glory. Once exalted, Joseph handed out, in the wisdom of God, what that same wisdom had raised him up to store in the days of plenty for the days of scarcity. Under the mighty hand of God, the scarcity pressed not only over all Egypt but over Canaan. There the heads of Israel tasted that cruel affliction, for they found no food. In God's providence they went to Egypt for grain.

It is called CHANAAN in Acts 7:11; Acts 13:19.

During the days of plenty the world paid little attention to Joseph. Of his brothers we hear nothing; they were completely indifferent to him. But when the shortage set in, need woke up. "The land of Egypt was famished" (v. 55), and starvation and death faced Jacob and his sons (Gen. 42:1-2). The need calls out a cry for bread. The Gentiles have to learn, and the brothers discover, that no one can meet the need except the one they once scorned and rejected.

Yet His grace can use famine and great distress of every kind for mercy and blessing. But to be blessed, the sinner must feel his evil state... Food for the inner man comes only from Him. The sons of Jacob found none in Canaan. Their father heard of food in Egypt — for the fulfilment of God's purpose — and sent them there. Joseph had provided for a famished world, and his heart longed to supply his father and his brothers, little as they knew who it was they had sold away there.

There is nothing that brings a man down like hunger. Neither a man's pride nor his family name can fill him in the day of hunger and need... Nothing brings a man down like soul-hunger. It is a great thing when that soul-hunger becomes urgent — when a man feels that he is a sinner, that he needs Christ, and that he must have Christ.

God's sovereignty again shone out in the great famine that drove Joseph's brothers to Egypt for food. In fact, God would yet bring Israel to such a state of desolation that they too would have to look for help. And they would find that help in none other than the Jesus whom they had crucified. Only at the second visit, after real distress and searching of soul, did Joseph make himself known to his brothers (v.13).

How often God chooses to use hardship for His own purposes and in His own ways, for the good of all — saints and sinners alike! So it is here. The pinch of want fell on Jacob and his sons; "for the famine was in the land of Canaan."

It was a pathway of righteous suffering which led to glory. Once exalted, Joseph gave out, in the wisdom of God, what that same wisdom had raised him up to store in the days of plenty for those in famine. Under the mighty hand of God, the famine pressed not only over all Egypt but over Canaan. There the heads of Israel tasted that cruel affliction, for they found no food, and in God's providence they sought grain in Egypt. This, "at the second time," gave occasion for their great discovery, and it did not come without self-judgment. Joseph made himself known to his brothers, and the line of promise was no longer a secret to Pharaoh.

Then came the famine which forced his guilty brothers to turn to the one whom they had rejected and cast out. And this again led to the fulfilment of the prophecy to Abraham. Man acted freely and, sadly, far from God. Yet he still worked out God's purposes, as if he were deliberately trying to achieve them.

He starts with the very beginning of the nation's existence, dating it from Abraham. He retells its history down to the days of Moses. He points out that twice over their ancestors made the great mistake of rejecting the instrument God had designed for their deliverance. First it was Joseph. Next it was Moses. Joseph's brothers sold into Egypt the one who turned out to be their saviour and deliverer… The mistake they made over Joseph they had repeated over Moses. What were they doing now? They were repeating that mistake.

The patriarchs sold Joseph into Egypt because they were moved with envy. Matthew records Pilate's efforts to release Jesus, "for he knew that it was out of envy that they had delivered Him up." It was the same with Moses. The words that made him flee — "Who made you a ruler and a judge over us?" — came from one of his own brothers, not from an Egyptian. The rejection came from among his own people, not from outside. So it had been with Jesus too.

Stephen does not say a word about the Lord Jesus. Yet who could fail to see the parallel between the Just One and the innocent object of the patriarchs' jealousy? Could anyone doubt that this was no clever device invented to serve a purpose, but the plain lesson of their own Scriptures?

…these events foreshadow what the prophets promise in God's name. A greater than Joseph was rejected by His brothers, and God exalted Him to sit at His own right hand with richer supplies for a famished world. He is about to make Himself known "the second time" to His brothers, with broken hearts and deep repentance.

Under the mighty hand of God, the famine pressed not only over all Egypt but over Canaan. There the heads of Israel tasted that cruel affliction, for they found no food. So in God's providence they sought grain in Egypt. This, "on the second visit," gave occasion for their great discovery. It did not come without self-judgment, when Joseph made himself known to his brothers, and the line of promise was no longer a secret to Pharaoh.

Not a word does Stephen say of the Lord Jesus. Yet who could fail to see the parallel between the Just One and the innocent brother whom Jacob's sons envied? Could anyone doubt that this was no clever device to serve a purpose? It was the undeniable lesson of their own Scriptures.

Scripture foreshadows Israel's wickedness through unbelief as plainly as it foreshadows Messiah's humiliation and rejection by His brothers. This was Stephen's point, and he could not help saying it if he cared for the Lord and for their souls. They might disdain it, but it was exactly the truth they needed then, as they do still.

The discovery did not come from any insight or shrewdness on the part of the brothers. It came entirely from Joseph revealing himself to them… What is more, Joseph revealed himself as the fruit of his love for them. That love was so real that he could not hold back any longer, and it moved him to tears.

But who can describe the scene where Joseph made himself known to his brothers, when they had come the second time? It is a chapter of great tenderness. Some day the Lord Jesus Christ, whom His brothers rejected and disowned, will come the second time. Israel in the end time will pass through deep anguish and searching of soul. When that reaches its climax, He will come, and those who pierced Him will look on Him.

Joseph was not only to be made known to his brothers, as we have seen. His relatives were now to be made known to Pharaoh as well. So he presents them to the king. They were shepherds, it is true, keepers of cattle from their youth, people the Egyptians detested. But what of that? "He is not ashamed to call them brothers." He owns them in front of the king. The king himself is of one mind with Joseph toward them. He owns them too, and honours them.

It was no new feature in their history. Their fathers had done the same as they were doing. Man is always resisting what God sends in blessing. Joseph and Moses had both been rejected — the two clearest pictures of the Lord Jesus. Their fathers despised and hated Joseph; they had done the same to Christ. God exalted Joseph; and Stephen's testimony was to Jesus standing at the right hand of God. And if Joseph sent and called his relatives in grace, did not, and will not, Christ do the same?

Now Stephen places special emphasis on the twelve sons of Jacob, the immediate father of the twelve tribes. Was their history a glorious, beautiful one? Far from it! If Israel wanted to boast, let them think about what their fathers did to their own brother Joseph. Moved with envy, they rejected and sold him (v.9). Yet God preserved him and in fact exalted him to a place of great authority in Egypt. Could God not do the same, or even more, for Jesus whom Israel rejected?

Food for the inner man comes only from Him. The sons of Jacob found none in Canaan. Their father heard of it in Egypt, and to fulfil God's purpose he sent them there. Joseph had provided for a starving world, and his heart longed to supply his father and his brothers, little as they knew who had sold him away there. They thought evil against him; but God meant it for good, to keep descendants for them on the earth and save their lives. How much more was this proved true in the One greater than Joseph!

The message that Joseph sends to Jacob is "Come down to me." Joseph is lord of all, with the riches of glory at his disposal for all. Yet only those who "come" receive the blessing. If all power is in his hands to bless, all grace is in his heart to attract to himself — the blesser. Joseph says in effect to his father, "I want you," for it is not only "Come," but "Come down to me."

It is God's register of Jacob and his house, "seventy" souls including Jacob, and Joseph with his two sons, "sixty-six" without these. The Septuagint, which Stephen quotes, speaks of seventy-five. It adds Manasseh's son Machir and his grandson Gilead. It also adds Ephraim's two sons, Shuthelah and Tahan, with Shuthelah's son Eran, or Edom. … Scripture reveals the interest God took in recording things little in man's eyes.

The real question is not about truth, but about the purpose and the manner of speaking. The original account speaks of 66 in one verse and of 70 in the next. In the first of those verses the Hebrew strictly means "belong to," rather than "with Jacob." The 70 are his house, including more. The Greek version that Stephen quotes includes five more, even though they were born in Egypt. This follows the well understood practice of treating parent and children as one.

Notice, though, that this count may not include Joseph and his sons. If it does not, that leaves room for nine more of the patriarch's "kindred." And kindred is not the same thought as those who "came out of his loins." We do not offer any firm solution to the difficulty. Nor is it needful to prove exactly how the list of seventy-five was made up. … Stephen was also full of the Holy Spirit. He was speaking before an assembly of Israel's teachers, who knew every detail of the history of Jacob. These and other considerations leave no room to question the truth of the martyr's statement.

And the fathers, with Israel their father, went down into Egypt. There, in long, repaying sorrow, they were to pay the penalty for their heartless wrong to their brother. God exalted him in the very place where Jew and Gentile had both put him to shame. He repaid that with nothing but grace to all, but especially to Israel.

It was plain how little they knew anything as they should. They had never yet thought of seeing the Christ in Joseph. They had never seen in the guilty fathers themselves the still guiltier murderers of the Lord of glory. Their ignorant boast was their shame.

God had brought out their forefather Abraham, but He never gave him this land to own. Why, then, boast of it so much? By natural descent they made loud boasts of Abraham and of God's dealings. Yet they were not in communion with God, or even with Abraham.

They valued their dead bodies and the burial places which held them. While they lived, they were content to live in Canaan without so much as a place to set their foot. But "they died in faith." God's promise had made over that land, that very land, to them, though they themselves were to be gathered to their fathers. That was the warrant for their dying in faith, in the sure and certain hope of a resurrection to the enjoyment of it. They would link their dead bodies with that land, though not their living ones.

The move of Jacob and his family to Egypt begins a new period in Israel's history. The nation grew there under intense pressure and slavery. Jacob himself died outside the land, but his body went back there for burial. This showed that God still considered it Israel's land.

The true solution is not Calvin's idea that "Abraham" is a wrong reading for "Jacob." It lies in the compressed way Stephen, like other Jews, referred to well-known facts. Abraham's grave was at Hebron, bought from Ephron the Hittite. Jacob bought ground at Shechem from the sons of Hamor. Everyone knew who lay in the first: Sarah, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Ancient scripture tells us that Joseph was laid in the second, and Stephen shows here that his brothers were too. The difficulty comes from bringing both together, as Stephen did.

This is thought to clash with Genesis 33:19, which speaks of Jacob buying it. But nothing is said in that passage about a burial place: Jacob bought a piece of ground to spread his tent in. Bengel says of this alleged discrepancy in Stephen's address, that "the brevity which best suited the ardour of the Spirit gave Stephen good occasion, in the case of a fact so well known, to compress these details in the way he has done."

Is it not a safer conclusion that we may be ignorant of facts which, better known, would clear away this mist? Or that there is some peculiarity in the way of referring to things which Westerners are not used to, but which Jews understand without objection? … And one may question whether it would not be better, these things being so, to amend our manners instead of presuming to amend the text.

Prince of the Hivites and father of Shechem, from whose family Jacob bought a piece of ground in which Joseph was buried. Gen. 33:19; Joshua 24:32; Judges 9:28. He is called EMMOR in Acts 7:16.

The true solution is not Calvin's idea that "Abraham" is a wrong reading for "Jacob." It lies in the compressed way Stephen, like other Jews, referred to well-known facts. Abraham's grave was at Hebron, bought from Ephron the Hittite. Jacob bought ground at Shechem from the sons of Hamor. Sarah, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were buried in the first. Since ancient scripture tells us that Joseph was laid in the second, Stephen shows here that his brothers were laid there too… The difficulty comes from bringing both together, as Stephen did.

A writer on inspiration points out the same system of combining incidents. Compare verse 43 of this speech with Amos 5:27. There "beyond Damascus" clearly refers to the Assyrians carrying off the ten tribes, while Stephen combines with it, in his own way, the carrying off of the two tribes to Babylon.

Leave the word "Abraham" out and all difficulty disappears: "Jacob died, as did our fathers, and they were carried back to Shechem and laid in the tomb that he had bought," and so on. Joseph was buried there, and Jerome states that Paula saw the graves of the rest.

Given the circumstances, the least worthy suggestion is that this blessed and mighty witness of Christ confused Hebron with Shechem, and Abraham with Jacob. That would be a mistake below the level of an ordinary Sunday-school child… One may ask whether it would be better to correct our own manners than to set out to correct the text.

The point seems to be that Abraham had it while Israel did not yet hold the land. Shechem is mentioned to show God's title over the whole land, for it was now the centre of the Samaritan religion. That point carried weight in Stephen's speech. So did his showing that the best and most blessed of their ancestors had nothing there at all except what they bought. They were still pilgrims and strangers, as the saints now were becoming through the Jews' rejection of Messiah.

While they lived, they were content to live in Canaan without owning so much as a foot of it. But "they died in faith." God's promise had handed that land, that very land, over to them, though they themselves would be gathered to their fathers (Gen. 15). That was the ground of their dying in faith, in the sure and certain hope of rising again to enjoy it… It did not matter whether their bodies lay in Machpelah or Shechem. Their bones were linked to the promised land either way.

The God of glory thought of His people in Egypt and in the wilderness, before the holy place or even the law. He will never give Israel up until He has made good His promise — the promise He guaranteed when Abraham had no child. God called Abraham alone, and blessed and increased him. How wrong they all were, then, to make so much of themselves and of their privileges, and so to slight His grace and Himself. … As Abraham went about as a stranger in Palestine, so his descendants first appear as slaves in a land not their own. This was no brief moment: in round numbers 400 years passed from the birth of the child of promise until God judged the nation that held them in slavery.

We find these two words, "growing and multiplying", used of the children of Israel. They occur in Stephen's address to the Jewish council. The sons of Jacob went down into Egypt, seventy-five people, and in a short space of time they grew and multiplied to a miraculous degree. This increase was so striking that it attracted the attention of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. He was alarmed, and he took drastic measures to stop the marvellous increase. That increase was God's gift to His chosen ones as the descendants of Abraham. God had promised that they would be as many as the stars in heaven and the sand on the seashore.

God, however, took them in hand and allowed them to feel the scorching heat of Egypt's furnace. "But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and the more they spread abroad" (Ex. 1:12). In that furnace of affliction they were welded together as a nation. They entered Egypt a feeble and divided family: they left it a compact and powerful nation.

It is always so. There is always war between God and the enemy. It rages most fiercely where His people are involved, and when a clear display of divine mercy is close at hand. God's approaching favour to Israel drew out the hostility of Satan. He stirred up a fitting tool for his malice in the ruler of the world of that day, "another king who did not know Joseph." … The order to destroy the boys failed. It failed not only through human pity, but through the fear of God. He honoured those who honoured Him, and He brought His enemies to nothing.

As the time drew near for this promise to be fulfilled, you might have expected the children of Israel to grow in might and power and prominence. But instead of rising, they stand at what is perhaps the lowest point of their national history. God had allowed them to become slaves under the tyranny of this king who did not know Joseph.

Here the people are in Egypt, waiting for God to carry out the promise He had made to Abraham. … Their position then is very much like ours today. A promise has been left us of entering into our heavenly part at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Some have hoped that as this event draws near, a wonderful revival will take place among those who look for Him… But do we not rather see something different in places like the messages to the seven assemblies? The nearer we are to that moment, the more we need to hold fast His word and not deny His name… Like Israel here, we may find our liberties more and more restricted before we are taken out of this world.

The word expresses "a different kind." … In Egypt there arose a different king who did not know Joseph, Acts 7:18; this doubtless refers to one of a different dynasty.

As the years passed, a great change came over the whole situation. A new king rose up, who "did not know Joseph." This may not mean he was unaware that Joseph had existed. It may mean that he saw him as an intruder and an oppressor, and ignored him altogether.

The statement that he "did not know Joseph" is deeply significant. Joseph in Egypt was a type — a picture — of Christ in His earthly glory, and so not to know him is the mark of a moral state. Pharaoh in fact is the god of this world, and as such must of necessity be in opposition to the Lord's people.

That land was thus the ungrateful, the rebellious. She had departed from Joseph, and so from God Himself, from Him who had filled her storehouses with plenty, and her throne with honour and strength. Egypt was the world in miniature — the great deserter from its rightful Lord and gracious Benefactor. … Joseph's memory had been despised, and all that remained to Joseph was put to work at the brick kilns.

It is always so. There is always war between God and the enemy. Nowhere is it fiercer than where His people are concerned, and when a clear display of divine mercy is close at hand. God's approaching favour to Israel drew out the enmity of Satan. He stirred up a fitting instrument for his malice in the prince of the world of that day, "another king who did not know Joseph."

These verses are a compact summary of Exodus 1:7-20. That chapter gives the details of Pharaoh's cunning, aggressive and ruthlessly cruel efforts to crush them. God defeated those efforts just as strikingly, for, say or do what he might, "the people multiplied and grew very strong." The order to destroy the boys failed. It failed not only through human pity, but through the fear of God, who honoured those who honoured Him, and brought His adversaries to nothing.

Here we see grace in its first workings: a nation's small beginning in the seventy souls who came into Egypt with Jacob, set against their astonishing and unstoppable increase. Even the bondage they come into had already been announced to them. What seemed most against them was really the working out of the promise for them. The hand of power works in disguise, yet faith can see right through it. It is essentially the same story, whether told of the nation of Israel or of any of the Lord's redeemed.

He recites to the Jews a history they could not deny, a history they boasted in, yet it condemned them completely. They were doing as their fathers had done. Two people stand out in Stephen's account, in connection with the goodness of God towards Israel at this period — Joseph and Moses. Israel had rejected them both, handed Joseph over to the Gentiles, refused Moses as judge and leader. In cases the Jews could not deny or argue with, it was the history of Christ as well.

You might have thought that as the time drew near for God to keep this promise, the children of Israel would be growing in might and power and prominence. Instead, their national standing did not rise. They are seen at what is perhaps the lowest point in their national history. God had allowed them to become slaves under the tyranny of this king who did not know Joseph. They seemed so much at his mercy that he decided to wipe them out. He ordered every baby boy to be thrown into the river.

There is a clear double tyranny over the people. It guards against two dangers. Israel might rise to first place in the land, or they might escape altogether, and then the Egyptians would lose their labour. So the order went out to kill all their males. In this way the nation would stay in slavery, unable to escape, and would still supply slaves to do the work of the Egyptians. Their oppression and misery made them cry out loud in their distress. Meanwhile the faith of individuals who took hold of God and refused to obey the king's command shows how God works through His people when they count on Him.

It is always like this. There is always war between God and the enemy. It rages most fiercely where His people are concerned, and when a clear display of divine mercy is about to come. God's approaching favour to Israel drew out the hatred of Satan. He stirred up a fitting tool for his malice in the prince of the world of that day, "another king who did not know Joseph". These verses are a compact summary of Exodus 1:7-20. That passage gives the details of Pharaoh's cunning, aggressive and utterly cruel efforts to hold them down. God defeated those efforts just as plainly, for whatever Pharaoh said or did, "the people multiplied and grew very strong". The order to destroy the boys failed, not only through human pity, but through the fear of God. He honoured those who honoured Him, and brought His opponents to nothing.

The attempt to destroy all the male children comes next. Satan, who is a murderer from the beginning, showed his cunning and power in this way. He wanted to destroy the seed of Abraham so that the coming of the Promised One would be impossible. The murder of Abel was his first attempt. Here is an attempt on a larger scale, followed by many others. See Exodus 14; 2 Chronicles 21:4, 17; 22:10; Esther 3:6, 12, 13; Matthew 2, and others.

Then he starts at the very beginning of the nation's existence, dating it from Abraham. He goes over its history down to the days of Moses. He points out that twice over their ancestors made the great mistake of rejecting the one God had appointed for their deliverance. First it was Joseph. Next it was Moses… With these facts in front of them they might well pause. They might well consider carefully what they were doing, and where they might be drifting. The mistake they made over Joseph they had repeated over Moses. What were they doing now?

Their position at that time is much like ours today. A promise remains for us — we will enter our heavenly portion at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ… Like Israel here, we may find our liberties shrinking more and more before He takes us out of this world. The conflict between light and darkness goes on without a pause. The enemy will do his best to end all testimony to Christ in this world.

The enemy had raised up a suitable instrument, another king over Egypt who did not know Joseph. Suffering became Israel's portion. The king aimed a deadly blow at the promise by striking at their babies... At that critical moment Moses was born, fair to God. A glorious career lay ahead of him, however dark its beginnings. He too came under the sentence of death, and after three months of care in his father's house, he was cast out like the rest.

This world offers different types of beauty. Saul was "handsome and tall; there was not a man among the people of Israel more handsome than he." Eliab also had a fine appearance that caught Samuel's eye. But such beauty by itself is worth nothing except in men's eyes. There is another beauty. In men of faith it may go together with outward beauty, and God values it as the reflection of character. It is the beauty of a pure soul or of simple faith. It is the shining out of a heart that shuts out evil and sin, a heart without deceit. This is the beauty of the little child Moses, of whom the Word says he "was exceedingly lovely," literally, "fair to God" (Acts 7:20).

It means that when he was born there was an expression in his face that faith read. "Beautiful to God" is the word. There was a certain beauty in him that awakened the faith of Amram and Jochebed, and they obeyed it. Was there not a beauty in the face of the dying Stephen? Should not his murderers have obeyed it? They stand in moral contrast to Moses' parents. Under the finger of God they saw the purpose of God and hid the child.

Here we have a remarkable simplicity of faith in Moses' parents, which acts on grounds that to most would seem slight enough — the beauty of the child. God still answers it, for it was faith in Him; and how largely He answers, for this is Moses the deliverer! Is there not here one of the natural signs of the mind of God, which we are so unskilled at finding? The poor and unlearned perhaps read such signs best, and people easily confuse them with mere superstition... but God makes no mistake, and wherever faith is, He will honour it.

Such is God's valuation of the actions of the father and mother whose natural affection for this son given to them rose up against the king's decree. They recognised that they owed loyalty to an earthly ruler. But by faith they acknowledged a higher loyalty to their God, and this proud tyrant was accountable to Him too. Trusting in God, they were able to rise above the fear of man that brings a snare... and they hide their child from the tyrant and a hostile world.

The providence of God raised up a fitting instrument for His merciful purpose. But even Moses had to learn dependence on Him, and that neither the advantages of his person, nor his training in Egypt's wisdom, nor the court influence of Pharaoh's daughter, could achieve that purpose to His glory... But no: that would have been man's method and the world's wisdom, to the credit of Moses' genius and prudence, and in no way a foreshadowing of Christ.

Moses, as we have seen, was by birth exposed to the death sentence that lay on the sons of Israel in Egypt. Faith saw him "fair to God," but that did not exempt him. And what do we learn of the One whom Moses pictured? Every moral beauty shone out from that blessed One's wonderful Person, to the full delight of the Father's heart. Yet neither His own people nor the world at large saw any beauty in Him. There was no room for Him in the homes or the hearts of men.