The Giant of Religion - Part B

When you deal with religious people, at some point you need to address certainty and willingness.

Certainty and willingness. Are you sure you are saved? That's certainty. I think so. I hope so.

Are you sure? And willingness. Are you willing to trust in Jesus Christ to save you? As believers, we can face pressure from the world, but we can also face it from religious circles. And today on Connect with Skip Heitzel, Skip shares how you can engage religious people in truth and love. But before we begin, we want to tell you about a resource that shares hope for our nation by calling on dads everywhere to step up and lead. Your gift to this teaching program has helped us grow and we want to do more in 2023.

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So let's join Skip Heitzig. There's another difference. Religion sets up barriers. The gospel breaks down barriers. With the gospel, there's neither male, female, Scythian, bond, or free. We are all one in Christ.

The gospel is a great bulldozer. The cross brings us all down to the same level ground. Religion sets up barriers. You're speaking against this place. It's about this place. And this place is the temple. And in the temple, there were courtyards, and there were walls. And if you were a Jewish man, you could go to one place. If you were a Jewish woman, you had to go to another place. If you were a non-Jewish person, a gentile, you were in the nosebleed section way far away.

There were barriers. So if it's not outward, or if it is outward but not inward, if it's all about rules instead of relationships, if it's all about barriers rather than Bible verses, you will produce people who trust in themselves because they keep the outward, they keep the rules, they have the barriers, I don't do this, I don't do that. So you'll end up with people who don't trust God for their salvation, they trust in themselves for their salvation. Remember Jesus told a story about a guy like this? In fact, two guys in Luke 18. He said, two men went up to the temple to pray.

A Pharisee, religious dude, and a tax collector, non-religious dude. And the Pharisee, religious dude, prayed thus with himself. Here's his prayer, Lord, I thank you. That's a good way to start your prayer with thanksgiving. But that prayer went into the ditch pretty quickly because he said, Lord, I thank you that I'm not like other men or even like this tax collector, non-religious dude. And then he said this, I fast twice a week, check. I give tithes of all that I possess, check.

Kept the rule, kept the rule, kept the rule. But Jesus said that the tax collector wouldn't even raise his head up, but he pounded his breast. And he said, Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner. Jesus said, that guy, non-religious dude, went away justified. Religious dude did not. And that's the difference. When you're religious, you make it about what you do. When you're saved, you make it about what he's done.

It's a big difference. So I'm going to throw this up on the screen. I don't know who wrote it, but it's good. Religion is manmade. The gospel is God-given. Religion is about what man does for God. The gospel is about what God does for man.

Religion is good views. The gospel is good news. Religion ends in outer reformation. The gospel ends in inner transformation.

Religion can become a farce. The gospel is always a force. And in fact, the force that Paul spoke about is, it is the power of God unto salvation for everyone who believes.

So that is Stephen. Stephen was spiritually equipped. Good reputation, filled with the Holy Spirit, filled with wisdom, man full of faith, man full of power.

Second ingredient that he had is he was scripturally adept. What I mean by that is in his sermon, which is chapter seven, it's a very long chapter, we're not going to go through every verse. There are 60 verses in that one chapter. How many in favor of me not going through every verse?

Yeah, I'm one of them. So I'm just going to show you a couple things. He quotes Old Testament scripture over and over and over and over again. It is the, as I said, longest chapter in the book because it is the longest recorded sermon in the book.

And get this, it's all based on a single, simple, short question. So Stephen is accused of things he never did, blasphemy of all different sorts. And look at chapter seven, verse one. Then the high priest, right, he's like the judge in court, the high priest said, look how short his question is, are these things so? That was enough for Stephen to launch him to get a long sermon. Preachers can be like this, right? Doesn't take much.

Ask them a question, there they go. Are these things so? Like, dude, is this right? This accusation, is that right? Really what he's asking is how do you plead, guilty or not guilty? And so he starts answering it and he does not answer it like you would typically think he ought to answer it.

Are these things so? You would think you would say, no, these things are not so, your honor. That's fake news.

Here's the truth. But he doesn't do that. His response seems like it's not a direct answer at all. We're not going to read it all, as I said, but notice a couple of things. Let's begin in verse two. And he said, men and brethren and fathers, listen, the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was a Mesopotamia before he dwelt in Haran and said to him, get out, now he's quoting scripture, Genesis 12, get out of your country and from your relatives and come to a land that I will show you. And he came out of the land of the Chaldeans and dwelt in Haran and from there, when his father was dead, he moved him to this land in which you now dwell and God. He launches into a history lesson. He gives as his answer a panorama of Old Testament history from the patriarchal period. He talks about Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, to the giving of the law under Moses at Mount Sinai, to the setting up of the tabernacle in the wilderness, which became the temple later on. And he does it with scripture, scripture, scripture, scripture, this whole long chapter.

He obviously believed the Old Testament is the inspired word of God. And he quotes it to his audience. Something else I want you to make note of, the message opens and closes with the glory of God.

I want you to see that. Look at verse 2 of chapter 7. He said, men and brethren and fathers, listen, the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham. Then he ends his sermon in chapter 7. Look at verse 48. However, the Most High does not dwell in temples made with hands.

Remember they said this holy place, this holy temple, you're messing with this temple. The Most High doesn't dwell in temples made with hands. As the prophet says, heaven is my throne, earth is my footstool. What house will you build for me, says the Lord? Or what is the place of my rest?

Has not my hand made all these things? Then after the sermon, look at verse 55. He being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. So the sermon begins and closes with the glory of God. Why is that important? Because they're making it all about the greatness of their temple, the greatness of who we are.

And so what he reminds them is this. It's not about a holy land. It's about a holy God calling out a holy people.

It's not about the greatness of this temple. It's about the greatness of God and His plan. It's not about rules. It's about relationship.

It's not about property. It's about people. It's not about my greatness, your greatness, our greatness, the temple's greatness. It's about God's greatness and God's glory. And so he's showing the difference between religion and the gospel. You guys, and the gospel. You guys are geocentric, right?

It's all about a geographical place. The gospel is theocentric. It's about Him. Stephen, what he is doing is exactly what Peter will tell all of us to do when he writes his letter. 1 Peter 3 verse 15 says, Always be ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you. So he was asked to give an account.

Are these things so? He launches into this masterful Bible verse filled sermon. Now again, he was not a theologian. He was not a prophet.

He was not an apostle. But he did know his Bible enough to know that the Old Testament points repeatedly to Jesus. And this young man gave an incredible testimony. I hope that encourages you.

I hope you'll walk away with this knowledge. You don't have to be Theodore theologian. You don't have to be Brittany the Bible nerd. You just have to have a relatively simple, straightforward working knowledge of your Bible and most of you do to be equipped to stand up to the arguments that may come against you. Now back to my 18 year old experience when I stood in front of that group and I was asked to speak.

So I remember, it's been a long time ago, so I might have the facts fuzzy, but this to my best memory, I do remember this. I didn't know much Bible, but I knew some verses and I was quoting Bible verses. So picture 18 year old Skip standing up speaking to this group, including my dad, quoting Bible verses. As I'm quoting several Bible verses, I get interrupted by a nun. And she says, you keep quoting the Bible. She goes. We don't know Bible.

We don't know Bible verses. And I remember pausing. This is the best of my recollection. Go well.

That's on you. OK, so I'm 18 years old and I know a little bit. You should know enough to be able to teach me that you should have been teaching me the Bible, not me telling you what the Bible says. Steven knows his Bible and he works powerfully his way through the scriptures, the Old Testament from all those periods that I just mentioned. Now, when you are defending your faith against like agnostics and atheists, that's where you pull out apologetics. That's where you take philosophical evidentiary apologetics and you show why it's plausible to believe. But when you're dealing with religious people. You pull out your Bible.

Because they're looking for biblical authority, especially Western religions who claim some kind of attachment to the biblical text. That's why Billy Graham, whenever he would speak, he knew that his audience was mostly religious people. He would always say the Bible says the Bible says the Bible says.

So that is Steven. He is spiritually equipped. He is scripturally adept.

But let's move on. There's a couple of other ingredients that he had. He was also skillfully direct.

Now, when I say he was direct, you'll see what I mean. He is bringing his sermon to a close. He's landing the plane, we would say in verse 51. Here's how he ends his sermon.

You stiff necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears. You always resist the Holy Spirit as your father did. So do you. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the just one of whom you now have become the betrayers and murderers who have received the law by the direction of angels and have not kept it.

Okay, so whoa, right? This is not just a Bible study. This is not just a history lesson. He gets very direct. He gets in their grill. And I guess the real question is why? Why so direct?

We would even say mean. Why does he call him stiff necked? Why didn't he just end by saying, and now may the Holy Spirit apply this to our hearts. Why does he say you stiff necked?

Why does he do that? Because that was the exact same name, exact same term God used to describe their forefathers in the Old Testament. Almost 20 times God himself calls his people, the Jewish people, stiff necked. It means obstinate. Heels dug in. It was a word used to describe an ox who would resist the goading of his master, the farmer, trying to pull that plow. You are stiff necked.

But then he tells them something else. You stiff necked and uncircumcised. Now those are fighting words. Those are fighting words. To call a Jewish person who prided himself in the covenant of circumcision, to say you are uncircumcised in heart and ears, is to basically say you are no better than a pagan.

You are no better than a gentile who does not have the covenant of circumcision. I mean he's direct. Charles Haddon Spurgeon said of Stephen's sermon, he takes the sharp knife of the word and rips up the sins of the people laying open the inward parts of their hearts and the secrets of their soul. Why does he do that? Why so direct? Let me give you my best shot at trying to tell you why. I think it's because usually religious people don't think they have a need.

This is my experience when I talk and engage with religion. They don't have a need. I don't need to change anything. I don't need anything. I got religion.

My parents, my grandparents, handed down this religious system. I got all that I need. And so it's Stephen's way of saying, to be clear, you don't have what you need.

You are stiff-necked and uncircumcised. You have the Bible. You have the law.

The problem is you just don't do what it says. So he's being very, very clear. By the way, John the Baptist did the same exact thing. John the Baptist, when he's baptizing at the Jordan River and the religious folks come, he says, you brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath that is to come? And don't start thinking in your mind, we have Abraham as our father. God can raise up sons of Abraham out of these rocks.

It's pretty direct. Jesus did the same thing, Matthew 23, almost the entire chapter. Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites.

You clean the outside of the vessel, but the inside is filled with dead men's bones and all corruption. Woe unto you blind guides. Woe. That's being very direct. So at some point in your dialogue with religious people, you need to be direct.

Maybe not this direct, but certainly direct. When you deal with religious people, at some point you need to address certainty and willingness. Certainty and willingness. Are you sure you are saved? That's certainty. I think so. I hope so. Are you sure? And willingness.

Are you willing to trust in Jesus Christ to save you? That's being direct. Now let me give you a fourth and final ingredient, Stephen. That is, though he was very direct, at the same time he had sacrificial respect. So let's finish the story out. Verse 54 says, when they heard these things, they were cut to the heart.

Yeah, I guess. They were convicted. And they gnashed at him with their teeth. Now we don't typically use that word much, gnashing. You know, gnashing is this. It's grinding your teeth. It's like, ugh. You're just so mad.

So try that. Give me some gnashing. Yeah, come on.

Give me a little more. Okay, yeah. Good gnashing. So there it's like, when you're done, we're going to rip you limb from limb. They're just chomping at the bit, gnashing at him with their teeth. But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God and said, Look, I see the heavens open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God. Then they cried out with a loud voice, stopped their ears, this is religion.

Don't tell me that. And ran at him with one accord, cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul, who will become Paul. And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God.

And that's in the present tense, meaning he called over and over and over, probably with each stone. He said, Lord Jesus received my spirit, Lord Jesus received my spirit. Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, Lord, do not charge them with this sin.

And when he had said this, he fell asleep. What's he doing in verse 60? He's praying for their forgiveness. That's what I mean when I say he had sacrificial respect. Yep, he's direct with them.

You are stiff neck, you are uncircumcised and hard on the ears. But at the end, he goes, Lord, don't lay this sin to their charge. He's praying for their forgiveness. He has hopes in his dying breath that some of them will repent and be converted.

Let me ask you a question. Was his prayer answered? You see, you could look at this and go, well, he lost this battle. They killed him. First of all, a Christian never loses when he dies.

He wins for me to live as Christ, to die as gain. So he just went to heaven. You say, well, that crowd just sort of went on their religious way.

Yeah, they did, except one, one very notable person named Saul of Tarsus. That sermon is the first time probably Paul the apostle Saul of Tarsus heard the gospel from the Old Testament articulated. And it made such an impact on him that within weeks he himself, though resistant at first, will surrender to Christ and be the greatest missionary the church has ever known. So, Stephen had a very short life and a short ministry. It was one sermon long. He preached one sermon, died, went to heaven.

I know some of you could only wish, but you don't need to live long to have an impactful life. Stephen had a very impactful life. Now, I mentioned that the Bible says that the Bible says that Saul of Tarsus was there.

He was obviously very resistant to this. He will leave that place and he will persecute other Christians, we're told in this next chapter. But eventually, he will surrender his life to the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, Saul of Tarsus, who's listening to this sermon in a synagogue, was probably the most religious person in the entire New Testament. By his own admission, he said, I was a Pharisee of the Pharisees, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, because touching righteousness which comes by the law, perfect. I kept the rules.

I checked the boxes. But all those things that were gain unto me, I have counted as rubbish loss that I might gain Christ. He gave up his religion for a relationship with Christ. Reminds me of two caterpillars that were walking down a flowerbed and they looked up and a butterfly flew over them and one caterpillar said to his buddy, you could never get me up on one of those things for a million bucks. That's Paul, that's Saul of Tarsus. You couldn't get me to become a Christian for a million bucks. A couple chapters later, he's a believer preaching the gospel because of the testimony of Stephen.

So, incredible. That wraps up Skip Heitzig's message from his series, Hunting Giants. Now, here's Skip to share how you can keep these messages coming your way to connect you and many others around the world with God's Word. As believers, knowing that our future is in heaven should motivate us how we live on the earth. Our goal is to equip friends like you in your faith as you live for Jesus Christ. That's why we share these Bible-based messages everywhere we can.

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