God's Purpose in Persecution, Part 2

God's Purpose in Persecution, Part 2

In the last blog entry I reflected on Stephan's calling into the office of deacon, his performing of many miracles and his glorious death at the hands of Jewish leaders. We, as believers in Christ, must remember the great martyrs who came before us. It is important to remember that through many tribulations we will enter the kingdom of God (Acts 14:22). Our heavenly Father's ways are massively above our ways. You can't even for a split second have the remotest idea of how intricate and far reaching his plans and machinations are. He knows all hearts, all thoughts, every will of man. He controls all time and space with one effortless thought. Nothing can frustrate his will for all things are set in motion by him and are by their very nature inferior to him. Understand this: that your mind it self is finite and limited in its ability to perceive and understand and that our God and Saviour is unlimited and boundless in thought and power. Therefore, your very mind even at its fullest in understanding will always, until when glorification begins, be unable to fully grasp God.

Why do I say all of this? Aren't we talking about Stephan? My heart rejoices at the faithfulness of Stephan in front of the council and I lament for him as he endures unimaginable pain and suffering for the Gospel. But, I believe God is sovereign over these series of events and all of history. He allowed for Stephan to go through this great tribulation for his own purpose. God's will is always to bring glory to himself. I know in my own life, this can be very hard to see at times. But, I think Acts 8:1 points us very clearly to how God used Stephan's persecution and death to bring glory to himself.

And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. - Acts 8:1

Keep in mind that the apostles, at this point, had only been operating in Jerusalem where they were preaching the word in the Temple and causing all kinds of problems for the Jewish leaders. Stephan's death was the start of a great persecution against the church and as a result the brethren were scattered throughout Israel. What did they take with them? The Gospel! What is going to happen if you scatter a bunch of devout, spirit-filled disciples of Christ out among the nations? The gospel is preached.

Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ. - Acts 8:4

They went beyond just Israel into what is now Lebanon and also into the Greek world.

Now those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch... – Acts 11:19a

The Jewish leaders tried to squash this steady growing movement and in doing so they only, by the will of the Lord, caused it to spread! How like the Lord to glorify himself in the foolish machinations of prideful men. Even Eliphaz understood that “He frustrates the devices of the crafty, so that their hands achieve no success.” (Job 5:12)

I think what we can learn from this episode in Acts is to trust in the faithfulness and perfect purpose of God. In the midst of our own suffering when the stones are flying and our hearts are bleeding look to Christ our Lord and believe that he works all things for the good of those who love him (Romans 8:28). Remember that he is on the the throne.