Insightful Musings on the Scriptures

by

Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67

Good morning, dear ones.

Phooey! It’s raining. At the same time I want to be quick to approve of God making it rain if He wants to. We’ll live with it and be thankful. It’s just that Becki and I have plans to take off on a walk/jog in about 20 minutes.

I won’t attempt to describe everything Becki and I do together. But I’ll risk exposing something I said in private to her this morning while in a warm embrace. Of course, if I tell you what I said, suddenly it’s no longer private. Oh well. I said, “I not only love you, I really really want to love you.” Extended embrace. Then I commented in her ear, “Can you imagine anything more unattractive and laborious than to be in a marriage without being in love?!” (Come on—you see this kind of stuff on TV all the time!) That kind of prompted a bit more dialogue. Without wanting to be condemnatory or arrogant, we both had to agree that that is exactly where marriage relationships will go if they are not tended, cultivated, and nurtured—boring, selfish, a marathon of mere coexistence. And that opened the door to reflect on another relationship dimension as we pondered, “Can you imagine anything more unattractive and laborious than to be a Christian without being in love with Christ?” There you have RELIGION without RELATIONSHIP. Wow! We had better let this suffice. We could run far with that idea.

Have a blessed day…loving Jesus.

Love, Dad/Ray.

It occurs to me that I’m beholding further evidence in this reading to support my discomfort over the mindset demonstrated by “the twelve” back in chapter 6 where they engineered the appointment of seven table waiters because they figured that kind of role and function was beneath them. We now have the spotlight of the narrative shine on two of those table waiters—Stephen and Philip. Stephen preached a message in chapter 7 that would rival anything coming from any of “the twelve”—which implies he was anything but inferior. Now he is stoned to death. And the same Lord and Holy Spirit that authored this revival with miraculous signs and dramatic healings allowed it. At least God surely could have prevented it. If that is true, then it becomes obvious that the Sovereign Lord is orchestrating plans and purposes bigger than what appears. Make no mistake about it—Father God was not blind-sided by the stoning of Stephen any more than He was by the crucifixion of His Son. I love the quote that says, “God doesn’t really have any problems—He only has plans.”

The murder of Stephen gave momentum to further persecution against the church that worked like an explosion, blasting believers all over the known world. It is at this point that we read, “Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went.” Bingo! Now the revival is moving in a more God-intended direction. Philip, the other table waiter, was one who ran for his life, settling for a time in Samaria. He didn’t just hide out there. He let his faith and excitement hang out and was dramatically used by the Holy Spirit there to kindle another sensational revival.

Do you see here what I see? Obviously the scheme of “the twelve” to appoint table waiters didn’t last long. That right there offers evidence that it was not necessarily authored by the Holy Spirit. It could also provide evidence that the apostles may have been too infatuated with their Jerusalem success and size and were content to just hang out and organize a nice big exciting comfort zone, a big Jewish Jerusalem-based super-church, and not worry about much beyond. It sure looks to me like the stoning of Stephen, followed by the intense persecution, served as a kind of a divine kick in the pants toward the believers fulfilling a greater commission than just Jerusalem.

Let’s review Jesus’ mandate before His ascension: “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). I see nothing obsolete about that mandate. Every person on planet earth desperately needs to know that Jesus died to save them from their sins—according to the Scriptures.