Acts 7:37–45

The difficulties and disagreements of the most celebrated Rabbis show what a stumbling stone the true Christ, the Lord Jesus, is to unbelieving Israel… The theory of Aben Ezra and others, that Joshua is meant, is completely untenable. Joshua only supplemented Moses' work, and in little more than one direction. In no adequate way does he stand out as the prophet raised up from his brothers like Moses. So some of the most distinguished Jewish teachers try to read this single prophet as a whole line of prophets! That is as contrary to the usage of the language as it is to the facts of their history… Moses stood as a mediator whose words the people had to hear on pain of death. That was what marked him out. In the highest degree it is true of none but the Messiah.

There is one special prediction of the lawgiver. Both Peter (Acts 3:22-23) and Stephen (Acts 7:37) quote it. It foretells the coming of a Prophet like him, to whom they were to listen. And the likeness he means, which Deuteronomy 34:10 explains, waited for its fulfilment — the coming of Christ. In fifteen centuries no prophet in Israel, however eminent, ever thought of claiming this special distinction for himself: being known by God face to face. The mediator of the old covenant and the Mediator of the new are the only ones of whom that has been true.

A caution may be needed here about what that raising up refers to. It clearly does not point to the Resurrection, but to the Lord's first coming to earth. This fits the words just quoted from Deuteronomy 18:18: "The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet," and so on.

God told the people to hear Him as the promised Prophet (Deuteronomy 18:15). They had been afraid of the voice of divine majesty, which spoke in fire and storm from the smoking mountain where the law was given. So God promised to raise up One "from among their brothers," who would speak in divine grace… All through John's Gospel we find Him speaking as "that Prophet." He could say, "The Father who sent Me has Himself given Me a commandment — what to say and what to speak"; and "What I say, therefore, I say as the Father has told Me."

The privilege granted was immense — not only in works at that time, but in words of God given to man permanently from then on… It was an unspeakable gift. Yet it is even more characteristic of the One greater than Moses. His coming was followed by a fresh, complete, and final revelation of divine grace and truth. Indeed Moses' own prophecy, quoted in verse 37, prepared the way for new communications carrying a still higher sanction. In vain, then, would Jewish unbelief idolise the servant in the sight of his Master.

Moses stands here as mediator, between the angel of Jehovah on one side, and "our fathers" on the other. Reading "church" here suggests thoughts and associations that are altogether misleading. The children of Israel are meant in their collective capacity. It has no bearing at all on what the New Testament calls the church of God, the body of Christ. The church belongs to the great secret that the apostle was sent to reveal — hidden from ages and generations, but now made known to the saints.

The expression in Acts 7:38, "the church in the wilderness," means the whole congregation, the mass of Israel. Most of their bodies fell in the wilderness. Can you call that "the church of God"? There were only a few believers among them. The sound of the word deceives people here. The very same word describes the confused crowd in Acts 19 that would have torn Paul to pieces. If you translated it there like Acts 7, you would get the "church in the theatre," and the blunder is obvious.

The way God gave the law showed how far the people stood from Him. It came through the arrangement of angels. It was an angel that appeared to Moses in the burning bush. It was Jehovah, no doubt, but Jehovah through a representative, and that representative was an angel. It was also an angel at Sinai, Jehovah speaking by angelic means. So Stephen tells the Jews that they had received the law by the arrangement of angels, and had not kept it. An angel was a poor representative of God. It was not God Himself drawing near to them in someone they could trust, but a being they did not know and always feared.

The privilege was immense — not only in the works of that time, but in the words God gave to man from then on, in permanent form. It was not just that the angel spoke to Moses. He "received living oracles to give to us" — a gift beyond words. It marks the One greater than Moses even more, and after Him came a fresh, complete and final revelation of God's grace and truth.

The apostle Paul calls the Old Testament scriptures as a whole "the oracles of God" (Romans 3:2). Stephen says that Moses received "living oracles" — not dead legends — to give to God's people.

This was the same Moses, he says, who was with the assembly in the wilderness. Through him, at Mount Sinai, they received the living oracles, the ten commandments. How had Israel responded to him then? At the very time Moses was receiving the two tablets of stone on the mountain, Israel was refusing him again. They demanded that Aaron make them gods of some sort that they could see.

If the fathers treated Moses like this, is it surprising that their children did not receive the Messiah? Moses had prophesied of Him, and Moses himself was a striking picture of Him. Their fathers of old thrust Moses away from them. What then of that far more honoured Prophet, mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, whom they had just handed over to be condemned and crucified?

Are the saints waiting patiently for Christ, dependent on Him and subject to Him who has gone on high? Or do they act as if they do not know what has become of Him? Do they let His word and Spirit lead them? Or have they set up calves of gold, idols to go before them, rejoicing in the works of their own hands?

He starts at the very beginning of the nation, with Abraham, and goes through its history to the days of Moses. Twice over, he points out, their ancestors made the great mistake of rejecting the instrument God had designed to deliver them. 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. His own people refused Moses in the land of Egypt. In the wilderness they thrust him from them, and turned back in heart to Egypt... In rejecting Moses they were rejecting God.

And how did the children of Israel treat one so plainly honoured in that day? "They would not be subject" to him. The fathers treated Moses like that. Was it surprising that their children did not receive the Messiah he had prophesied about? Moses himself was a striking picture of Him. ... Their fathers of old thrust Moses from them. What then of that Prophet, honoured beyond all comparison? He was mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and they had just handed Him over to be condemned and crucified. Their hearts were gone from God and turned to Egypt. Their appeal to Aaron made that plain, and so did his shameless agreement to it. Was it any less true now, when they chose a robber over "the Anointed of the Lord"?

Yet let us not suppose that either Aaron or Israel intended to abandon Jehovah. It is no stretch to imagine how indignant they would be at such a charge. To Israel's mind the calf stood for Him who is invisible. Aaron applied that image to Jehovah in so many words. People say this of all images: "a help to devotion," "a symbol of the unseen," and in this sense, the God who had brought them out of Egypt! But none the less had they really returned in spirit to paganism. They had "in their hearts turned back again into Egypt."

Still, almost as soon as they reached the wilderness, Egypt took on a new character in their eyes. The wilderness is the place where earth has nothing and heaven supplies everything. Egypt had been the land where they were oppressed and the place where God's judgment fell. Now they saw it as something else... The reason for all this is obvious and instructive. To walk with God in a wilderness needs faith. It needs that spirit of dependence which only faith can give. But being satisfied with the supplies of Egypt is something the senses grasp easily. So whenever their situation called for faith — and faith was not there — they "in their hearts turned back again into Egypt."

It needed a heart weaned from Egypt's influences to enjoy bread from heaven. The people despised it, called it light food, and lusted for flesh. So they proved how little their hearts had left Egypt, or wanted to walk in God's law. "In their hearts they turned back again into Egypt." But they never got back there. In the end they were carried away beyond Babylon. This is a solemn and healthy lesson for Christians. Those redeemed from this present world must walk with God in thankfulness of heart. They must be satisfied with His provision for the redeemed in the wilderness. If not, they are in danger of falling into the snare of Babylon's influence.

Joseph's brothers sold into Egypt the one who turned out to be their saviour and deliverer. His own people refused Moses in the land of Egypt. In the wilderness they pushed him away and turned back in heart to Egypt. But more. They called Aaron to make gods for them. God then gave them up to serve the host of heaven. So in rejecting Moses, they also rejected God.

And how did the children of Israel treat a man so highly honoured in that day? They "refused to obey him." If the fathers treated Moses like that, is it surprising that their children did not receive the Messiah? Moses had prophesied of Him, and was besides a striking picture of Him. Their hearts had left God and turned back to Egypt. That was plain enough then from their appeal to Aaron, and from how shamelessly he gave in. But was it any less true now, when they preferred a robber to "the Anointed of the Lord"? "They cried out again, 'Not this man, but Barabbas!' Now Barabbas was a robber" (John 18:40).

The people do not mean to disown Moses. They fully recognise him as the man who had brought them up out of the land of Egypt. But he was not there for them to see. This was their need — some present, visible prop to lean on, so that they no longer had to depend on what they could not see. They said to Aaron, "Up, make us gods who shall go before us." Their desire was urgent, and they would satisfy it at any cost. Without a murmur they bring their golden ornaments to Aaron... One step away from the fear of God can lead to harm beyond measure.

Make us gods! A god made by man is not as great as the man who made it. An idol, an image, is contemptible in the light of divine glory. Make us gods! Aaron himself had defeated the gods of mighty Egypt with the rod of Jehovah. He had stood by Moses on the memorable day when Moses called their calf-gods "the abomination of the Egyptians."

But unbelief craves a present and visible guide. "Make for us gods who will go before us. As for this Moses who led us out from the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him." Israel was rebellious when Moses was on high; and so is the Jew now that Christ is gone to heaven. But is it only the Jew? Does the Gentile stand in the truth? Only by faith can he stand, as the apostle declares.

Those who took the Christian name grew weary of depending on an exalted but absent Lord. They stopped waiting for His return from heaven... Refusing to submit to Him soon bred distance from Him, and the heart turned back toward the world — the very world that grace calls people out of, to God. By nature men are even more idolatrous than sceptical. Unbelief is the mother of both these enemies of God and His truth. Men love to have gods to go before them. The true Deliverer becomes tiresome, and so He soon drops out of mind: "we do not know what has become of him."

Israel took the worship of the calf from their old masters, the Egyptians. That remarkable people were generally clean, even in their idolatry. Israel adopted Apis, the bull, who represented Osiris. To tell the truth, at first glance there seems little harm in it. People more respectable than Israel had worshipped at his shrine for centuries, with no visible harm. Where was the sin? Aaron might think. It was a clean and useful animal, and it represented the valuable principle of Prosperity. Yet God looks down out of the heavens full of anger. He deals with His own people differently from the rest of the world: "You only have I known of all the families of the earth; therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities."

reason: "blessing" loses original's "sanctification"; 46-word sentence split Call the sin holy, and the abomination will be held in religious awe. They dedicated the image to God — the God who had commanded them to make no image and to bow down to no image. Calling the festival by Jehovah's name did not change what it really was.

The spirit of false worship is to rejoice in the work of one's own hands — "they made a calf... and rejoiced in the work of their own hands." But in true worship, God Himself is the glory of the worshipper. It is in Him that the soul makes her boast.

It is governed by sight instead of faith, for Israel said, "Make for us gods who will go before us" (40). And it rejoices in its own works instead of the work of God, for after making an idol they "rejoiced in the works of their own hands" (41).

The people are clearly taught that in making any image and bowing down to it, they lowered and corrupted themselves. So when they made the golden calf, the Lord said to Moses, "Go down, for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves." It could not be otherwise. The worshipper must be lower than the object of his worship. So in worshipping a calf, they put themselves below the level of the beasts that perish.

This has been called Israel's original sin... First of all, it is the first action of the people recorded after they solemnly agreed to the covenant in Exodus 24. It was their first move on the new footing, in their new standing as a people "under the law." Then, that blow was aimed at the very throne of God itself. It went straight against the first item of the law they had pledged themselves to obey: "You shall have no other gods before me." Again, original sin is besetting sin — the first swing of the pendulum, deciding all the swings to come.

It is said of the people when they made the golden calf, "they rejoiced in the work of their own hands." The Galatian error — adding the law to Christ — is the same in principle. It is what the human heart naturally feels, as though people could serve God with their hands, as if He needed something. The apostle knew of no middle way between the grace of God in Christ and idolatry.

The 'calf', the abomination of Egypt, did not satisfy Israel. They craved objects higher than the works of their own hands, whatever charm that has for man's vain heart. Once they yielded to the snare, Israel had to outdo Egypt. So "God turned away and gave them over to worship the host of heaven." Idolatry that grovels in the dust still reaches for higher things, and puffs itself up with its heavenly imaginations. Stephen is not the authority for so withering a charge, but Amos (Amos 5:25-27). These words stand in the prophets' Book. Would an Israelite contradict them too, or charge Scripture itself with saying blasphemous things about Israel?

They fell away from God until God gave them up. The words come three times: God gave them up to impurity (v. 24); God gave them up to shameful passions (v. 26); and, because they did not want to keep God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind (v. 28)… To be given up is the act of God in judicial judgment. He gave up the Gentiles in this way, and we see what man became. We also know that when the Jews had fully rejected the testimony of the Holy Spirit, God gave them up, for the present, as a people.

When the Spirit of prophecy announced their coming captivity, He does not go back to the wicked kings of Israel, nor to the shameless sons of David who ruled Judah. He goes back to the idolatry in the wilderness — at the very time when Israel openly honoured the tabernacle of Jehovah and the priesthood of Aaron. But all that time God saw how hollow the animals and sacrifices they brought in His name were. In their hearts, in secret, they carried the tent of Moloch and the star of the god Raiphan.

As to their idolatry, I doubt whether Israel offered God a single sacrifice through all the wilderness years, apart from the official ones… They likely kept the official sacrifices up, or could have; and on the whole, what they did offer they claimed was for the Lord. When they made the golden calf, Aaron announced, "Tomorrow is a feast to Jehovah."

God's judgment is sure, even if it seems to sleep. Long afterwards the prophet Amos passes sentence for the sin committed in the desert. Whatever made the sin worse later on, it is the first sin that decides. Evil never gets better and never works itself out. It easily can grow worse, and it always does… Patience may go on for ages, in ways that faith admires; but judgment, however long delayed, is certain.

By nature people are even more idolatrous than doubting. Unbelief is the mother of both these enemies of God and His truth. People love to have gods that go before them. They find the true Deliverer tiresome, and He soon slips out of mind: "we do not know what has become of him." Is not the wilderness history prophetic?

The name of a god in Acts 7:43, which Israel had worshipped (but some Greek manuscripts read Rephan). Stephen was quoting Amos 5:25-26 from the Septuagint, which has Raephan. In the Hebrew the name of the god is Chiun, but why the translators changed the name is not known.

When the Spirit of prophecy announced their coming captivity, He does not go back to the wicked kings of Israel. Nor does He go back to the shameless sons of David who ruled Judah. He goes back to the idolatry in the wilderness. On the outside, at that very time, they honoured the tabernacle of Jehovah and the priesthood of Aaron. But God saw all along how hollow their offerings and sacrifices in His name were. In their hearts, out of sight, they took up the tent of Moloch and the star of the god Raiphan. They had made these forms to worship them.

Worshipping God by the ritual of the law was no security against idolatry. Stephen proved it from the words of Amos the prophet. Amos goes back to the days of Moses in the wilderness. There he finds the sin that carried them off, after long patience, to the lands of captivity. "The holy place and the law" did nothing for God's glory then, and they do nothing now. This was his answer to their boast, and his defence against their accusation.

Man, unbelieving man, is so quick to abandon the living God. He does it despite the daily standing witness of His power and grace. He does it despite the solemn judgments God sends before all eyes from time to time. He is just as quick to take up the idolatry that he had known, only a short time before, to rule the high and mighty, the refined and learned — the world, in short, where he himself had been a slave… The calf, the abomination of Egypt, did not satisfy Israel either. They craved objects higher than the works of their own hands, whatever the charm of those works to man's vain heart. Once they yielded to the snare, Israel had to outdo Egypt. So "God turned away and gave them over to worship the host of heaven."

The prophet reminds them when and where their idolatry began: in the wilderness… Stephen says beyond Babylon, and so it turned out, perhaps to mark it off from the Babylonian captivity. Such was the result of the old sin in the wilderness. No doubt that sin was worse at the end. The dark stream kept gathering more water as it flowed… Still, God always goes back to the source. At last He declares that the final blow came because of the first departure.

The failure in the wilderness is connected here with the Babylonian captivity, though a great number of years came in between. The whole thing failed there. Babylon was the necessary result of that failure in the wilderness.

The Israelites had not worshipped Jehovah for forty years in the wilderness; but they had carried symbols of Molech and Chiun (or Remphan) and worshipped them. The root of their idolatrous course was that they had never in heart made a clean break from Egypt.

Stephen has well answered their accusations against him concerning Moses. Now in verse 44 he addresses their charge concerning the holy place. This began with the tabernacle that God ordered Moses to make precisely according to His plain directions. The tabernacle remained as God's dwelling place among His people when Joshua led them into the land, and until the days of Solomon.

How much more guilty were those who knew far better! They stood in a national relationship with God as His own special and favoured people. They even had the tent of the testimony itself — a witness for Him and against their ways. They carried it through the wilderness from father to son, and then into the good land, where God used Joshua to drive out the old pagan peoples so that Israel could have it. In this way they added open hypocrisy to their greedy idolatry. No corruption is worse than the corruption of God's own people, and so His discipline matches it: "You only have I known of all the families of the earth; therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities" (Amos 3:2).

The expression "the tabernacle of your Molech," Amos 5:26, is quoted in Acts 7:43-44. The Israelites had not worshipped Jehovah for forty years in the wilderness; but they had carried symbols of Molech and Chiun (or Remphan) and worshipped them. The root of their idolatrous course was that they had never in heart made a clean break from Egypt.

It goes by several names: the "tabernacle of testimony, or of witness," the "tabernacle of the congregation," or "tent of meeting." It was the place Jehovah recognised. There He lived among His people and met them. There, away from the world outside, He made His will known. Moses had to make it after the pattern God showed him on the mountain. When it was finished, Moses testified that it had been built just as the Lord commanded. Notice this: God left none of its details to Moses' own cleverness. Moses only had to carry out his instructions.

God kept the pattern of the tabernacle on high, in heavenly glory. Moses went up the mountain and spent forty days with God. The people thought he was going to get the law. Not that alone. He had gone to get God's mind and to see lovely pictures of Christ. He received the tablets of stone. But far better than that, he saw many shadows of Christ… Do we want to learn anything about God's dwelling place? We are asking here about the Church, and men are great church-makers. Then we must be sure our eyes are on the heavenly pattern.

The writer has now affirmed that the true tabernacle exists in heaven. How did he know that? He tells his readers, quoting from Exodus 25:40: "See that you make everything according to the pattern that was shown you on the mountain" (Hebrews 8:5). This statement had very likely been overlooked… and Stephen, in his speech (Acts 7:44), points to the same scripture.

Stephen does not deny this at all. He insists that the tent of the testimony was made just as God appointed, by His word through Moses, and according to the model Moses had seen above… But he insists just as strongly on what the Jews were blind to, as the prophet Isaiah said. The Most High does not live in places made by human hands, except in a figurative sense… So when they misused and twisted the outward form, He handed it over to the Chaldeans, as He would later hand it to the Romans.

Two parts of the New Testament follow the Septuagint exactly, even where it differs sharply from the Hebrew. These parts are Stephen's speech in Acts 7 and the Epistle to the Hebrews... In each of them the name Jesus turns up in an awkward way. Stephen's speech mentions the "tabernacle of witness, which our fathers brought in with Jesus into the possession of the Gentiles." And in Hebrews 4 we read, "If Jesus had given them rest." In both of these places Joshua is the one meant. Jesus is only the Greek form of that name, and it is the form always used in the Septuagint.

How much more guilty were those who knew far better! They stood in a national relationship with God as His own special and favoured people. They even had the tent of the testimony, a witness for Him and against their ways. They carried it from father to son in the wilderness, and then into the good land. There God, through Joshua, drove out the old heathen inhabitants so that Israel could have the land. In this way they added gross hypocrisy to their greedy idolatry. No corruption is so serious as the corruption of God's people, and so God's discipline falls on them in proportion.

The tabernacle was only a movable tent. There the Lord lived as between curtains and walked as in a tent. In infinite grace He refused to enter His rest while His Israel travelled from one nation to another people. But the temple was fixed. Once Israel had come into the land of their covenant, and all their enemies were subdued, the Lord would enter into rest among them.

Stephen speaks of the tabernacle continuing until the days of David. David wanted to build a temple, but God did not allow him. He had reserved that honour for Solomon. This was a reminder to the Jews that they did not always have a temple. Was it of greater importance than the God who had brought Israel out of Egypt? Indeed, Israel seemed to think that God was confined to their temple!

Joshua is a type of Christ risen, but still the actual leader of his people in the conflict of taking possession of what is theirs. So it is with Christ as He dwells in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. It is Christ in us, by the Holy Spirit, leading us with divine energy to take hold of all that is given to us. It is ours, and yet we have to take hold of it and plant our foot on it... Our inheritance is in Christ, but our enjoyment of that inheritance is by the power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in us.

Stephen, far from denying it, insists that God appointed the tent of the testimony by His word through Moses, according to the model seen above. Their fathers received it from those before them and brought it with them when they entered into the possession of the nations driven out before them. It stayed so until the days of David, whose son built the house for the God of Jacob. But he insists just as strongly on what the Jews were blind to, as the prophet Isaiah said: the Most High does not live in places made with hands, except in a symbolic sense... So when they abused and perverted the outward form, He gave it up to the Chaldeans, as He would again to the Romans.