Witness

Martyr, by Obsidian Planet

   

Lections: The Fifth Sunday of Easter, AD 2026 A

Homily:

Lord, we pray for the preacher, for you know his sins are great.

Alleluia! Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed! Alleluia!

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

We don’t talk enough about the martyrdom of Stephen. He’s never been a particularly popular saint; you don’t see him in a lot of stained-glass windows. His feast day, December 26th, gets subsumed under the greater Christmas season. And even then he’s only mentioned in a single hymn: “Good King Wenceslas looked out / on the feast of Stephen.” And yet the death of Stephen continues the Crucifixion.

In the wake of Jesus’ Resurrection, and the outpouring of His Spirit at Pentecost, the Apostles acted as men transformed: fearless, joyful, blithe and bold, gladly suffering punishment for proclaiming the Gospel of Christ. And their witness bore great fruit. Thousands welcomed Baptism, according to the Acts of the Apostles.

Yet even in those heady days, we weren’t without our growing pains. The Church in Jerusalem held all things in common, a sort of proto-monastic community. But disputes arose over fairness, in the distribution of goods. The Hellenists—that is, the Greco-Roman Christians, Gentile Christians—claimed that their widows suffered neglect in ways that those of the Hebrew Christians, the Jewish Christians, did not. Right from the start, we were arguing over money.

Thus the Apostles found themselves in a bit of a dilemma. Certainly they must be equitable. They cannot favor only those who look and sound like them; such has never been the Way of Jesus Christ. But the Apostles are also awfully busy. Thousands of new members have joined the community. The Twelve—with Matthias having filled in for Judas—have to coördinate presumably dozens of house-churches, each presided over by an elder, or presbyter, to host the eucharistic meal.

In their job of oversight, the Apostles haven’t the time to get involved with petty squabbles or fine details. They’re much too busy proclaiming the Resurrection. So, like Moses before them, the Apostles learn to delegate. The community selects seven well-qualified, well-respected, deeply spiritual Christians to serve within the Church, distributing food to the hungry, resources to those who need them.

Here we see the beginning of our historic three-fold ministry: bishops overseeing, presbyters presiding, deacons serving.

Foremost among the seven is Stephen, a deacon of considerable gifts, “full of grace and power,” who goes about working wonders and signs amongst the people. His prominence, however, soon leads to his arrest at the hands of “scribes and elders,” the same people who accused Jesus, and for the same reasons: that he supposedly contradicts Moses, and threatens to tear down the Temple.

In response, Stephen follows the example of Jesus. He speaks from the length and breadth of the Scriptures, proving his knowledge of Moses and the Law, interpreting everything in the light of the Resurrection—just as Jesus had recently done upon the road to Emmaus. Jesus prophesied, in all the Synoptic Gospels, that we would see the Son of Man at the right hand of power, coming with the clouds of heaven. Now here in Acts, Stephen cries: “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!”

This proves too much for his accusers, who stop their ears, shouting aloud as they rush upon him, then dragging him outside of the city in order to stone him to death. As Jesus on the Cross prayed, “Father, into your hands I commend My spirit,” so now Stephen prays, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” As Jesus on the Cross prayed, “Father, forgive them; they know not what they do,” so here Stephen prays, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”

And having forgiven his murderers, Stephen dies. He is the first Christian to give up his life for proclaiming the Resurrection. Hence we call him Protomartyr, the First Witness.

The implications of this prove profound. To recap: Stephen, having heard the Good News of Jesus Christ, filled with Jesus’ Spirit, goes out to do the very things that Jesus does. He feeds the hungry, works for justice, humbly serves the people of God, manifests miracles and signs, all the while proclaiming the Resurrection to the world. He is persecuted by the same people who persecuted Christ, and for the same supposed crimes. He prays the same prayers, and dies in the same manner, as Jesus on the Cross, outside of the city. For all intents and purposes, Stephen is Jesus. He is the Body of Christ.

From this moment on, the Church will know official persecution for some 300 years. The most prominent believers, the most outspoken evangelists, will be arrested, beaten, tortured, and often executed in all manner of terrible ways. What did that mean for the Church? How could we make sense of this? Is the reward for our faith the looming threat of death, hanging over our heads like the Sword of Damocles suspended by a hair?

And so we looked to Stephen, the first of us to die. And we learned from his example, from his witness, what it must mean to be Christian. We are now the Body of Christ; we, the Church as a whole. Our job is to be Jesus for the world, sharing His Spirit, proclaiming His Word. Thus it stands to reason that the world will treat us as it treated Jesus. We ought to expect resistance, hardship, persecution, even unto death.

And our response to this cannot be cowardice, nor vengeance, nor violence. Our response can only be love, only forgiveness, even and especially toward our enemies. That’s how Christ has conquered Hell and overcome the grave. And that is how we too shall rise: by sharing Jesus, in word and in deed, for a world in need of Him, embodying Him deep within our bones.

Christ has been preparing us for this mission all along. In our Gospel reading this morning, Jesus promises that “the one who believes in Me will do the works that I do, and even greater works than these … I am going to the Father, and will do whatever you ask in My name.” Now, this doesn’t mean that Jesus is a genie granting wishes. God knows He ain’t gonna gimme a Porsche. It means, rather, that whatever we do according to His nature, according to who Jesus truly is, He will do through us.

We, together, are the Church. We, together, are His Body. “Let not your heart be troubled,” He says, with a plural “you” and a singular “heart.”

The Book of Acts is really about the Church becoming Jesus; about how it’s our job now, to serve as He served us, to love as He loves us, to live like a people who have witnessed that death is defeated. And if that means that we too must be strung on a cross of our own, it also means that we too must be raised once again from the dead. “For if we have been united with Him in a death like His, we shall certainly be united with Him in a resurrection like His.”

Christianity cannot be a tribal marker, delineating Hellenist from Hebrew. Nor can it be simply a series of propositions requiring intellectual assent, checking off the proper boxes. Christianity is the continuation of God’s Incarnation in our fallen flesh. It is the possession, if you will, of our souls by Jesus’ Holy Spirit, overwhelming us with grace. Christianity is seeing Jesus in your neighbor so that they can see Jesus in you. And none of this is our work, but Christ at work in us.

And so we feed each other, in Word and in Sacrament, in service and in love, dying every night to the tyranny of our ego and rising every morning with the life of Christ within us. Our witness, our martyrdom, is a fearless life of love, a life beyond the threat of death. Stephen leads the way. Jesus is the Way. And He shall bring salvation to us all.

Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Pertinent Links

RDG Stout

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St Peter’s Lutheran

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Nidaros Lutheran

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