Acts 8:1-3
1And Saul was there, giving approval to his death.
This is one of my pet peeves in the Bible. This verse obviously belongs at the end of chapter 7, not here. The original writings in both the Old and New Testaments were not divided into chapters and verses like our Bible is today. Those divisions were added much later, in the 13th, 15th, and 16th centuries A.D. I quote here from gotquestions.org:
The chapter divisions commonly used today were developed by Stephen Langton, an Archbishop of Canterbury. Langton put the modern chapter divisions into place in around A.D. 1227. The Wycliffe English Bible of 1382 was the first Bible to use this chapter pattern. Since the Wycliffe Bible, nearly all Bible translations have followed Langton’s chapter divisions.
The Hebrew Old Testament was divided into verses by a Jewish rabbi by the name of Nathan in A.D. 1448. Robert Estienne, who was also known as Stephanus, was the first to divide the New Testament into standard numbered verses, in 1555. Stephanus essentially used Nathan’s verse divisions for the Old Testament. Since that time, beginning with the Geneva Bible, the chapter and verse divisions employed by Stephanus have been accepted into nearly all the Bible versions.
So I guess we have Langton to blame for this. But that’s not why we’re here. Luke puts Stephen’s martyrdom together with his introduction of Saul of Tarsus on purpose. Luke was Paul’s companion, and heard from Paul (many times, I’m sure) what an impression Stephen made on him when he was still called Saul, and was a member of the Sanhedrin. The word that’s translated approval in the NIV is the Greek word suneudokeo, which implies enthusiastic approval, or “to be pleased with”. In the Amplified Bible, verse one reads:
1AND SAUL was [not only] consenting to [Stephen's] death [he was [a]pleased and [b]entirely approving].
Saul didn’t just assent to the persecution of Christians, he was enthusiastic about it. He believed he was doing God’s work, fulfilling Jesus’ prophecy in John 16:2, when Jesus said that the time was coming “when anyone who kills you will think he is offering a service to God.” We sometimes hear today that it doesn’t really matter what you believe, as long as you’re sincere. Saul was sincere, enthusiastic, committed, and completely wrong. It does matter what we believe.
The Church Persecuted and Scattered
On that day a great persecution broke out against the church at Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. 2Godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him. 3But Saul began to destroy the church. Going from house to house, he dragged off men and women and put them in prison.
Stephen’s execution was a key turning point in the life of the early church and the life of Saul. It triggered the persecution of Christians in earnest. What had started as harassment became an all-out campaign of extermination. This persecution drove the church, with the exception of the apostles, out of Jerusalem and into Judea and Samaria. The next part of Jesus’ command in 1:8 was coming to fruition. They had been his witnesses in Jerusalem, and now they would be his witnesses in Judea and Samaria. The ends of the earth would soon follow. It’s admirable that the apostles stayed, in spite of the danger. Eventually, they would leave Jerusalem as well, but perhaps at this time they felt that it would show weakness and fear to leave, so they stayed.
Another example of bravery in the face of persecution is in verse 2; Godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him. Under Jewish law, victims of execution were to receive no funeral honors. No lamentation or other sign of mourning was allowed. But the believers in Jerusalem who loved Stephen braved persecution in order to give Stephen a proper burial and mourn for him.
I read a quote by Augustine today that shed a light on the death of Stephen that I had not thought of before. Stephen was the first Christian to die a righteous death. The first apostle to die was Judas, a traitor. The first members of the early church to die were Ananias and Sapphira, and they were hypocrites. In Stephen, we get our first glimpse of how a genuine believer dies.
The picture of Saul’s persecution of the church in verse 3 reveals a level of malice that I attribute to guilt. Nothing inspires anger and spite like guilt. Have you ever noticed how spiteful a non-believer can be when God is working on them? I believe that witnessing how Stephen conducted himself in his trial and death had a profound effect upon Saul. I don’t think that Saul was 100% evil when he persecuted the church they way he did, and that he suddenly turned on a dime after his Damascus Road experience. I think that the Holy Spirit was working on him from the trial of Stephen on, and that he fought the conviction of the Holy Spirit on his heart until Jesus appeared to him on the road to Damascus. That was when God, in effect, hit him with over the head a 2X4. I can’t prove this scripturally, but Luke put the trial and stoning of Stephen together with Saul’s persecution of the church for a reason. I think he made that connection because of his time with Paul.
I say all of that to say this. If you are angry at Christianity, at the church, or at God, consider the reasons why. Maybe someone in the church hurt you. God help us, but many times, when someone is hostile to the faith, that is the reason why. But the source of your anger may also be guilt. God may be working on you, and he wants to show himself to you. He probably won’t do it in as dramatic a way as he did with Saul, but he is calling your name. To those believers who have loved ones who are hostile to Christianity, I say this. Hostility is actually preferable to indifference. Those who are indifferent are the most difficult to reach. They feel no need in themselves. Those who are hostile at least feel something, and can still be reached. They are the ones who, when God gets a hold of them, can be radically saved the way Saul was.