Acts 038 – Moses’ Three-Part Life

Acts 038

Moses’ Three-Part Life

Acts 7:17-38

February 7, 2024

Dr. Andy Woods

Let’s open our Bibles to the book of Acts 7:17. Of course, the two major characters in the book of Acts are Peter and Paul. Peter in the first half of the book and Paul in the second half of the book. And as we’ve tried to explain, the bridge between the two is this man named Stephen. Stephen is very instrumental, as we’re going to see, in the conversion of Saul, who will become Paul. So, you can take the material related to Stephen and divide it into four parts. We’ve had Stephen’s arrest, chapter 6. And as he’s arrested, he is brought before the Sanhedrin and he’s given an opportunity to speak. And he does that in chapter 7:2-53. And what a speech this is impromptu, so to speak. It has about six parts to it. It’s a sermon that really declares the guilt of Israel. And the religious leaders, the Sanhedrin, is so happy with his sermon that they take Stephen, and they kill him at the end of it. So be careful about preaching good sermons. The first part of it is Abraham’s partial obedience (Acts 7:2-5). Going back to the roots of the nation of Israel when it started with this man Abraham who obeyed God most of the time.
            Stephen (Acts 6:8 – 8:4)

1. 1. Stephen’s Arrest (6:8 – 7:1)
   2. Stephen’s Defense (7:2-53)
   3. Stephen’s Stoning (7:54-60)
   4. Third Persecution (8:1-4)

So, Stephen, through this whole speech, he’s going to bring up historically, problems with the nation of Israel in terms of their obedience. And he’ll get to the punchline at the end (verses 51-53) where he will explain that the current generation is making the same mistakes in their rejection of Jesus nationally. And the second part of the speech, which we started last time, is a history of Israel’s initial rejections and later acceptances. So, Stephen’s point is Israel gets it right the second time. They don’t get it right the first time. And so, in their rejection of Jesus, the same mistake is being made. So, they’re getting it wrong in the first century. But in the distant future, they’ll get it right. And to get across his point, he uses two examples. The first one is Joseph (verses 6-16), which we covered last time. Basically, with Joseph, and we’re studying it providentially on Sunday morning. He was rejected by his brothers when he was 17. But after Joseph was elevated to second in command in Egypt when Joseph was aged 30, the family– the brothers and the father– submitted to Joseph’s authority when he was in Egypt. And that’s how the Lord rescued God’s nation, Israel, from famine. So, Stephen’s point in rehearsing all that material is: you got it right the second time concerning Joseph, not the first time. And if that weren’t enough of a history lesson, now he moves into part two of that where he makes the same point with the man Moses.

Acts 7 – Stephen’s Speech

1. Abraham’s partial obedience (verses 2-5)
2. Israel’s initial rejections and later acceptances (6-38)
   Example of Joseph (6-16)
3. Example of Moses (17-38)
4. Isael’s early rebellion against Moses (39-41)
5. Israel reinterpreted Moses’ teachings through a polytheistic framework (42-45)
6. Neither the Tabernacle nor Temple were intended as permanent habitations of God (46-50)
7. Current generation imitating these same rebellions (51-53)

And he talks about Moses in verses 17-38. So, Lord willing, I’m going to try to cover verses 17-38 today. Do you think that’s possible? I didn’t hear a rousing “Amen” on that. But let’s pick up the story of Moses now (verse 17). It says, as Stephen is selectively narrating history before the Sanhedrin, “But as the time of the promise was approaching, which God had assured to Abraham, the people increased and multiplied in Egypt…”  So, what does it mean here when it says, “But as the time of promise was approaching…”? Well, it relates to a prophecy that God gave to Abraham all the way back in Genesis 15:16, where he says, “Then in the fourth generation they–“ that’s Israel, going off into Egypt; back to Canaan, in other words– for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete.” A few verses earlier in Genesis 15:13, it says, God said to Abram, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed for four hundred years.” So basically, what God did, is He gave to the nation of Israel a clock.

And God does this frequently with Israel. He gives them clocks. The captivity in Babylon, seventy years. He gave him a clock in the days of Daniel with four hundred ninety years on it. And here’s just another clock that God gave to the nation of Israel. You’re going to be in Egyptian captivity for roughly four hundred years. So, when it says here in verse 17, “But as the time of the promise was approaching, which God had assured to Abraham–“ what he’s saying is now it came time to deliver Israel from Egyptian bondage through the Exodus event. And now God’s hand is on Moses, as the deliverer. So, when God wants to do a work, He uses a person, just like He used Joseph to deliver the nation from famine. Now he’s using Moses to bring the nation out of the Egyptian bondage and captivity. And Stephen is going to make the same point with Moses. You got it right, nationally, the second time. Not the first time. And it says there in verse 17, “the people increased and multiplied in Egypt.” Why is the nation multiplying in Egypt? Because that’s what God said would happen, right? He promised Abraham that he would have children as numerous as the stars of heaven, as the sand of the seashore and as the dust of the earth. Those are the three metaphors that are used in Genesis. In other words, you’re going to have a lot of children, or seed. And so, you know, four hundred years later, roughly, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that God is multiplying His nation even though they’re outside of the land, because that’s what God said would happen.

The problem is, they multiplied so greatly– the Jewish people, the Hebrews– that they became sort of a threat to one of the pharaohs of Egypt. And it says in verse 18, “until there arose another king over Egypt who knew nothing about Joseph.” So, Joseph had a great relationship with the prior Pharaoh. It was that prior Pharaoh that elevated Joseph to second in command and now a subsequent Egyptian king comes on the scene; doesn’t know about Joseph’s ministry or dreams. All he sees is this Hebrew nation multiplying. And that particular Pharaoh becomes threatened to the point where he decided to subjugate the nation of Israel to slavery. And you go to verse 19 and it says, “It was he who took shrewd advantage of our race and mistreated our fathers so that they would expose their infants and they would not survive.” So that particular Pharaoh, as you know from Exodus 1: 22, said “Every son who is born you are to cast into the Nile, and every daughter you are to keep alive.” He started to engage in a policy of infanticide against the Jewish nation to stunt their growth, numerically.

It’s interesting in verse 9 that the Jewish people are called a race. That should be a no brainer, right? The Jewish people are a race. I was watching a clip of Whoopi Goldberg on The View. Is that the name of the show? I can’t think of three people that are more misnamed than Whoopi, Sunny and Joy. You turn on that show, and there’s these grumpy liberal feminists and they’re not very sunny, they’re not very joyful, and they’re not very “Whoopi”, in my opinion– by the way, the opinions expressed here do not necessarily represent this station or its sponsors. But she was she actually made the point that the Holocaust– Hitler’s Nazi Germany– had nothing to do with race. And I’m thinking to myself, well, why do you think the Holocaust happened? Hitler was trying to eradicate the Jewish people, very similar to what this pharaoh was doing through infanticide on the basis of race. So, this led to the subjugation of the Jewish people, the enslavement of the Jewish people in the post-Joseph era. And you see that there in verse 19. Verse 20 says, “It was at this time that Moses was born–“ See, God is raising up a deliverer. God already knows in advance His plan for getting His people out of bondage, which He said He would do after the four-hundred-year clock had transpired.

He says, “It was at this time that Moses was born; and he was lovely in the sight of God, and he was nurtured three months in his father’s home.” And then verse 21 says, “After he had been set outside, Pharaoh’s daughter took him away and nurtured him as her own son.”  So, in order for Moses to escape infanticide, as you know from the book of Exodus, baby Moses was set adrift by his Jewish mother along the Nile. And it was either that or he was going to be killed because of Pharaoh’s policy of infanticide. And it’s funny how the book of Exodus describes it. It says, it just so happened that this little floating basket that baby Moses was in came across Pharaoh’s daughter. Now we know that just didn’t happen coincidentally. We know that didn’t happen accidentally. This was God’s plan to get Moses outside of his Hebrew people group and get him into an Egyptian upbringing. The reason for which will become very obvious in verse 22. So had Moses not been set adrift on the Nile to avoid infanticide, his little floating basket there wouldn’t have come across the daughter of Pharaoh, who wouldn’t have probably fallen in love with Moses in the sense that he’s such a cute little baby; I’m going to bring him into all of the benefits of Egypt, and he’s going to be raised with all of the benefits of Egypt.

So that didn’t happen accidentally. That didn’t happen coincidentally, although Exodus says it, “it just so happened.” We know that the hand of God is in this whole thing, because God is busy raising up a deliverer. And God must do this because the nation of Israel’s clock in Egypt is almost at its expiration point. And then if you look at verse 22, it explains exactly why this had to happen the way it happened. It says in verse 22, “Moses was educated in all the learning of the Egyptians, and he was a man of power in words and deeds.” Now think about this for a minute. If somehow Moses was not set adrift on the Nile, he could have been killed. If he hadn’t been killed, essentially what would have happened is he would have lived his whole life as a Hebrew slave in Egypt. Slaves were illiterate. They were not given privileges. They weren’t given educational opportunities. But because Moses’ basket was taken in by Pharaoh’s daughter, she was able to, in the Egyptian system, give him the greatest education of the time the world had. And that is very critical to God’s calling on Moses’s life, because Moses is not just going to be the deliverer of the nation of Israel. He is not just going to be the law giver at Mount Sinai to the nation of Israel– he is going to write the Pentateuch, the first five books of Hebrew Bible, sometimes called Torah or Law. It’s Moses who’s going to use his literary gifts to stitch together all of what we call the Toledot.

We’ve been trying to explain these as we’ve gone through Genesis on Sunday mornings. These are pre-written accounts going all the way back to Adam. We believe that all of these ended up somehow in Moses’ hands. Probably when Jacob left Canaan and migrated to Egypt in Genesis 46. He took with him all these written records. All these records are going to end up in Moses’s hands, and he’s the one that has to literally stitch them all together and create what we call the Book of Genesis. Then he’s going to record events in his own life, and he’s going to write the book of Exodus. And then he’s going to be given by God special instruction for the priests. And he’s going to write the book of Leviticus. And then there’s the journey into the Promised Land and how Moses didn’t make it in. And so, he’s going to write all that in the book of Numbers. But now we’ve got a younger generation that needs to have the Old Testament law reapplied to their life. So, he is going to write the book of Deuteronomy. I mean, you can’t do that if you’re not literate, right? An illiterate slave couldn’t do that.

And so, this was the plan of God to get Moses away from his Hebrew family and roots, to get him into Egypt. The highest levels of power in Egypt where he can receive this education. So, God knew exactly what He was doing when Moses and his little basket there was set adrift on the Nile. And then you go down to verses 23 and 24. And now we hit Moses at age 40, it says “But when he was approaching the age of forty, it entered his mind to visit his brethren, the sons of Israel. And when he saw one of them being treated unjustly, he defended him and took vengeance for the oppressed by striking down the Egyptian.”

LIFE PHASE	SCRIPTURE	YEARS	AGE	ACTIVITY
Natural Training	Acts 7:23	1526-1486 B.C.	1-40	Egyptian Education
Spiritual Training	Exodus 7:7	1486-1446 B.C.	40-80	Midian Shepherding
Ministry	Deut. 31:2; 34:7 Acts 7:36	1446-1406 B.C.	80-120	Exodus Law, Wilderness Preservation, Pentateuch Authorship

 

Now you can take Moses’s life and divide it into three parts. And this is easy to remember because Moses lived to about the age of 120. So, you take 120 and you divide it by three, and you’ve got three 40-year increments there on the screen where it says “Scripture”, are the different scriptures that tell you the different sections of Moses’s life, 40 years each, divided into three. The first part of his life was natural training. That’s when he was an infant in the basket up to age 40. He received the best natural training a person could have. Age 1 to age 40– following basic standard chronology– that would be about the year 1526 to 1486, where Moses is receiving that phenomenal education. The problem is he didn’t have his spiritual education yet. And when a person has a natural education and they don’t have a spiritual education, they’re used to handling things through their own power. So, Moses recognized his role. He recognized he was the liberator and the deliverer of the Jewish people. And he ventured out one day around the age 40, and he saw an Egyptian abusing a Hebrew. And he knew that it was his responsibility to be the protector and the redeemer of the nation of Israel. So, he grabbed the Egyptian and he just killed him. Verse 24 say he struck him “…when he saw one of them being treated unjustly, he defended him and took vengeance for the oppressed by striking down the Egyptian.”

So, what is Moses doing here? He’s not waiting on God. He’s not developing patience in God. He is not trusting God. What he’s used to doing is handling things in his own human power. He is on the right path in the sense that he recognizes who he is in God, and he has this tremendous natural training, but he hasn’t had a spiritual education yet. So, waiting on God, trusting in God, being patient in God, waiting for God to help him– all of those are foreign concepts to him. And he tries to fix this problem in his own power, and he ends up oppressing this Egyptian. So, what’s going to happen is God is going to say: Okay, you’ve had a great natural education, but now let’s move you into your spiritual education. The spiritual education is the second one down. “Spiritual training.” It happened from about 1486 to 1446 BC. This would be between the age of Moses from age 40 to age 80, where he is sent out to– as we’re going to see in a minute– Midian. He’s going to be on the backside of a desert. He’s going to be getting his BD degree– backside desert degree– where he is just going to just do this menial shepherding. He’s put into this sort of menial role that’s way beneath him intellectually. And yet he’s been put into that position because God has to give him his spiritual training. He has to learn about humility. He has to learn about waiting upon God. He has to learn about the sovereignty of God. And these are the kinds of things that you cannot learn in a classroom. The way God teaches these things to us is, He puts us in places of menial activity where we’re performing tasks that are way beneath us in terms of talent and education, and then God just leaves us there. Sometimes He’ll leave us there for years. In the case of Moses, he was there for forty years tending these stinky sheep.

So, he literally went from the palace in Egypt to this minimal shepherding role. And yet that was a very important time in Moses’ life because he was getting his spiritual education. And by the time he hit age eighty, which is the third and final forty years of Moses’ life, you see there the different Scripture verses at the bottom that talk about this latter forty-year period. Now Moses is ready to be used by God because he’s got natural training, and he’s got the spiritual training. And now he is in a position to lead the Exodus. He wasn’t in that position when he was at age 40, because he didn’t know how to wait upon God. He didn’t know how to trust in God. He was used to handling his problems through his own resources. It’s during that time period that God is going to give the nation of Israel the Law. It’s during that time period that God is going to use Moses to give them the Law and to preserve them in the wilderness wanderings. And it’s during that latter forty years of his life that he’s going to write the Pentateuch or Torah.

Now, the way most of us think is: Boy, you should just graduate from your natural training and move right into productivity. It doesn’t work that way. Your head could be filled with all kinds of data and all kinds of knowledge, but if you don’t have the fruit of the spirit– learning to wait upon the Lord, having your character molded and sculpted in such a way– then you can’t get to that final third part of your life. So, the spiritual training, although most of us would rather bypass that, is essential to getting to part three. And to be completely honest with you, most people will never get to part three because they won’t submit to God in part two. I’ve spent a lot of years of my life in part two, to be honest with you, I know exactly what it feels like. It’s not the funnest place to be, but it’s a place that’s needed for one’s character to be developed in the right way so that they can be used. The most productive time in Moses’s life was that third part, age 80 to age 120. Most people at age 80 are ready to retire. But God says to Moses: We’re just getting started here because I’ve given your BD degree in part two.  So, I just send that out as a word of encouragement, because a lot of people feel that they’re stuck in a dead-end job, or they’re stuck in some kind of role that’s beneath them. And it’s easy to despise that. But I would just encourage you to submit to it because what God is doing through all of that is preparing you for what He wants to do in your life in part three. And Moses was extremely productive in part three because he submitted to the spiritual training in part two. And he obviously needed that spiritual training, because how he’s reacting to this Egyptian through his own power in part one.

There’s nothing in this world as scary as a 19-year-old that knows Greek and Hebrew.  I’ve taught seven years in the Bible college. I ran into young people that were really smart and really well educated, and their head was so big, they felt that they had arrived. And I would look at the way that they were acting, and I would just laugh to myself and say, you know, it’s going to take years and years and years for God to deflate your ego to the point where he can even use you. Howard Hendrix, Dallas Seminary, when the students would graduate with their degrees; 120 units, Greek, Hebrew, church history, homiletics, hermeneutics, and all kinds of other names I can’t even pronounce anymore– this is what Howard Hendrix would say to the graduating students. You ready for this? They would come in for their chapel, graduation chapel. And this is what Howard Hendrix would say when he got up to the pulpit, he would say, “Gentlemen, you’re pathetic. And the reason you’re pathetic is it’s going to take years and years and years for your life experiences to catch up with all the information that’s been crammed into your head.”

But if you run into someone very young who’s had the natural training and hasn’t had the spiritual training, they are absolutely frightening in terms of their pride and their arrogance. And God is going to have to spend a lot of time with them as they’re flipping burgers or scrubbing toilets or doing some kind of role that God will put them in to humble them so he can deflate their ego so that they’re even at a at a place where they can be used of God. And so, you see this pattern in Moses’s life. It’s the same pattern He uses in all our lives. I’m not sure each of our lives has these nice, neat forty-year increments. Maybe they do, maybe they don’t. But if you’re honest with yourself, you’ll see God producing this pattern in our lives.

So, verses 23 and 24 say, “he defended him and took vengeance for the oppressed by striking down the Egyptian.” And then you go to verse 25 and notice what it says here: “And he supposed that his brethren understood that God was granting them deliverance through him, but they did not understand.” So, here’s Moses with all this natural education and natural training, promoting himself as the redeemer of the nation of Israel, and the nation of Israel didn’t want anything to do with him. They didn’t understand him at all. The nation of Israel is following the same pattern of Joseph. They are right out of the gate rejecting Moses. Now, forty years later, when he’s at age 80, as we’ll see in a minute, they will accept him. So just like Joseph’s initial rejection and later acceptance– the same pattern is in the life of Moses: initial rejection, later acceptance. And Stephen’s point at the end is: the nation of Israel is making the same error or mistake concerning Jesus or Yeshua. In fact, verse 25 goes really well with verse 9. Verse 25 is Israel’s initial rejection of Moses. Verse 9 is Israel’s initial rejection of Joseph. Verse 9 says: “The patriarchs became jealous of Joseph and sold him into Egypt. Yet God was with him,” and then you go down to verses 26 through 28 and you see the evidence of this initial rejection. “On the following day (this is still age 40 in Moses life) he appeared to them as they were fighting together, and he tried to reconcile them in peace, saying, ‘Men, you are brethren, why do you injure one another?” So, he understands his role as a sort of lawgiver, a ruler within Israel. And the next day he sees two Hebrews fighting amongst themselves, and Moses tries to step in through his natural resources, just like he did the prior day concerning the Egyptian. He tries to step in with his natural resources and he tries to resolve the problem.

Verse 27, “But the one who was injuring his neighbor pushed him (Moses) away, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and judge over us?'” Verse 28, “‘You do not mean to kill me as you kill the Egyptian yesterday, do you?'” So, Moses, the day earlier actually killed the Egyptian. Through his own naturalistic understanding of things. And now he wants to step in as sort of a ruler over the Jewish people. And he sees two Jewish slaves, two Hebrew slaves fighting with each other. Moses steps in with his natural talents and wants to resolve the situation, and they reject him. They say, Who are you? We saw what you did to that Egyptian yesterday. You’re not going to kill one of us, are you? So, this now pushes Moses into the second part of his life. And he flees out of fear. He goes to Midian for forty years, age 40 to age 80, and does the menial task of shepherding. And yet that’s the design of God, because God is now giving him his spiritual training. And then you look at verse 29: “At this remark, Moses fled–“ Why is he fleeing? Because he’s afraid. Why is he afraid? Because natural education doesn’t tell you how to deal with fear. Spiritual education does. In your spiritual education you learn to trust the Lord. Natural education doesn’t teach you any spiritual principles like this. And so, you react to a lot of things out of fear. The fact that he is afraid demonstrates that he is not ready to lead Israel through the Red Sea. Because the day is going to come where the Egyptians are coming in like a storm. His back is up against the Red Sea. The people of Israel are panicking. They’re totally hitting the panic button. And you see Moses in the book of Numbers saying, Don’t be afraid. God is going to provide a way. I don’t know how He’s going to do it, but He’s going to provide a way. So how did he get to that point where he was fearless like that? It wasn’t his natural education that gave him that ability. It wasn’t age 1 to 40 that gave him that ability. It was age 40 to age 80 that gave him that ability. Because on the backside of the desert, receiving this spiritual training in Midian, he learned to trust the Lord. So, this guy, he’s got kind of raw talent, he’s got abilities, he’s got gifts. But he’s prone to fear. Meaning he doesn’t know how to trust God. He’s prone to handling situations impulsively because he doesn’t know how to rely upon the resources of God. And he’s in desperate need of a second phase in his education.

And this is where the Lord gives it to him. Verse 29, it says, “At this remark, Moses fled and became an alien in the land of Midian, where he became the father of two sons.” And you’ll see a reference to that in Exodus 2:15 and verse 19. So, there he goes, out of Egypt into Midian, which is basically modern-day Saudi Arabia. And he is so humiliated in that second phase of his education that when the Lord finally speaks to him and says, “Arise, you’re the redeemer,” Moses doesn’t want anything to do with it. I mean, “Who am I that Pharaoh should listen to me?” He wasn’t saying that when he was 40. He thought he had arrived. But he goes through such a leveling of his pride that by the time God shows up with the burning bush at age 80, Moses sees himself as totally inadequate for the task. My point is, Moses is a different guy when you compare him at age 40 to age 80. And what made him a different guy is that middle tier of his education, the B.D. degree, backside of the desert degree. You go to verse 30, it says, “After forty years had passed, an angel appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai, in the flame of a burning thorn bush.” Now we’re at age 80 in Moses’ life, the background of this would be Exodus 3:1.

And then verses 31-32 says “When Moses saw it, he marveled at the sight; and as the approach to look more closely, there came the voice of the Lord: ‘I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.’ Moses shook with fear and would not venture to look.” In fact, when you study the book of Exodus, he tries to talk God out of picking him to the point where God got angry at Moses. When he was at age 40, he probably had his hand up and said, I’m the guy that God’s going to use. Now he’s so humbled because of the middle part of his education that he sees himself as totally unworthy to the task. Verse 33, “But the Lord said to him, ‘Take off the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.'” Verse 34, “‘I have certainly seen the oppression of my people in Egypt and have heard their groans, and I have come down to rescue them; come now, and I will send you to Egypt.'”

Now notice this: that the revelation of God is happening in Midian. Just like for Abraham, the revelation of God happened to him, as we saw earlier in this sermon, in Mesopotamia. Later, we’re going to see the revelation of God taking place at Mount Sinai. Why is that a big deal? Why is Stephen interweaving all of this in his sermon? That God reveals himself outside the borders of Israel? He did it in Mesopotamia with Joseph. He did it in Egypt with Joseph. He did it in Midian with Moses, and he did it at Mount Sinai with Moses. Why does Stephen give in the sermon four examples where God revealed Himself outside the borders of Israel? The answer is verse 48, where Stephen late in the sermon will make this point, “However, the Most High does not dwell in houses made by human hands; as the prophet says–“ So the Jews looked at the temple as a good luck charm. They felt that as long as the temple was standing, nothing bad could happen to them, because after all, the temple and its precursor, the tabernacle, is the only place where God reveals Himself. So, they looked at the tabernacle or the temple as the sole revelatory activity of God. And Stephen is making the point in this speech that things are now different in the church age. The glory of God has left that temple, and He is now the Holy Spirit inhabiting the body of the Christian. And God has a right to do that because God never said, “I only engage in My revelatory activity in the temple.” So, the temple and the tabernacle which preceded it were wonderful things, but they were never final, comprehensive sources of God’s revelation. The Jewish people thought the temple is the only place where God reveals Himself.

Stephen in this sermon is weaving all this material together to get to his final point there in verse 48, that God lives wherever He wants. If God wants to leave that temple and indwell the body of Christ, He can do that. And look at how God has acted in the past. He was never confined to the temple. Look at what He did in Midian. Look at what He did in Sinai. Look at what He did in Mesopotamia. Look at what He did with Joseph in Egypt. So that’s why Stephen keeps weaving into his material here. You know, all this information about God revealing Himself outside the borders of Israel. I mean, the Jews thought God works only through our nation. It’s basically what they thought. It was arrogance and pride. It’s like listening to some Christians talk about their church or their denomination. You know, God only works through our church. God only works through our group. God only works through our people. God only works through our country. And Stephen is saying, Nonsense. God works when He wants, where He wants, any time He wants, under any circumstances He wants. And if God has made a decision to leave the temple and have His Spirit indwell the body of Christ, He is completely and totally free to do that. Check the historical record. Check your own Jewish record, is Stephen’s point here.

So what Stephen is doing here is really a masterpiece when you look at all these parts. Stephen continues with the story of Moses, verse 35, “This Moses whom they disowned, saying ‘Who made you a ruler and a judge?’ is the one whom God sent to be both a ruler and a deliverer with the help of the angel who appeared to him in the thorn bush.” So back in verse 25, they rejected Moses. Forty years pass, Moses receives the second layer of his education. Now he’s age 80. Now they embrace him. They did this exact same thing with Joseph. They initially rejected him at age 17. But at age 30, they submitted to him. And Stephen’s point is: the nation of Israel is doing the same thing. You’re going through the exact same cycle. You’re repeating the same patterns of the past. currently, you’re rejecting Jesus nationally, but the day in history will come where you will accept Him and embrace Him. And this is not stuff they want to hear concerning their own guilt– particularly when someone uses their own history to prove their case. And this is why they killed Stephen on the spot, as we’re going to see.

You go down to verse 36, now Moses is at age 80. And he’s ready to start part three of his life. Now God is saying, you’ve got the natural education. You can write, you’re literate, you’ve got the spiritual education, you’re humble. You know how to trust Me. Okay, now let’s get busy. So, the first part of Moses’s life, up to age 40, he thought he was a somebody. The second part of Moses’s life, up to age 80, he learned he was a nobody. And then in part three of his life, age 80 to age 120, he learned what God can do with a somebody that now believes he’s a nobody. And the problem with us is we have a difficult time realizing that we’re nobodies because so much of our world system is through education; our natural talents is built on puffing us up. And there’s nothing wrong with having natural gifts and talents. But you have to understand that those natural gifts and talents are not going to accomplish what God wants to accomplish through your life. You have to take those gifts and talents and give them to God for Him to use. It’s like the little boy who gave to Jesus the loaves and the fish. I mean, what if the little boy had held on to the loaves and fish? We would not have had multiplication with the miracle that happened there in the Gospels. But because he relinquished what little he had and put those things into the hands of Jesus, you have the feeding of the 5000. We have to learn to take what God has given us and see them as just little loaves and fish and put them into the Master’s hands.

What is my education at the end of the day? Systematic theology. Church history. Bible exposition. Hermeneutics. Right interpretation. Homiletics. Preaching. What is my spiritual gifting at the end of the day? What it is, is loaves and fish that are very small. And things are going to stay small until we learn to take the loaves and fish that we have and turn them over to Jesus. Then it becomes big. Moses didn’t become big until he learned to do that. And it took forty years of spiritual training on the backside of a desert to learn that. And that’s not something that comes easy. It’s not something that comes naturally. It’s counterintuitive to our human pride, and yet it’s essential if we want to be used by God.

So, Moses has submitted to the process. Now he’s at a point in his life where most people are ready to retire. And God says, okay, I’m going to start using you now. It’s kind of interesting. Some of these guys in the Bible, their most productive years are years in their old age. Study Daniel’s prophecies. The greatest prophecies that Daniel received and wrote down took place in his life from about age 80 to age 90. Study John’s writings. John wrote the Gospel of John, he wrote First John, Second John, Third John, then he wrote the Book of Revelation, and he wrote all those books, we think somewhere between age 85 and 95. Because I think John, like Daniel, like Moses had to go through this middle tier of education. Where they learned to submit what they have to God so that it can really multiply.

But verse 35, they accepted him the second time. And this takes us into the third part of Moses’ life. And this is the part of Moses’ life that we know the most about. I mean, isn’t it interesting that the time of Moses life that we’re most familiar with is the last third? Nobody ever talks about the middle third, do they? We know something about the first third, we know something about the last third. But what about the middle third? Nobody ever talks about it. Those are the silent years. That are necessary for character development, but once it takes place– Katy bar the door. Look at what God can do. Verse 36, “This man led them out, performing wonders and signs in the land of Egypt and in the Red Sea and in the wilderness for forty years.” In fact, look how successful he was. Verse 37, “This is the Moses who said to the sons of Israel, ‘God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brethren.'” That’s a quote from Deuteronomy 18:15, which is a messianic prophecy of the Messiah, indicating that when the Messiah comes, he will be a prophet like Moses. So, Moses became the standard even for a coming Messiah in the final third of his life.

Verse 38, “This is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness–“ now we have a little problem here. Some of your versions say, “church in the wilderness.” You said, well, pastor, I thought you’ve been teaching us that the church started in Acts 2. And the church didn’t exist in the Old Testament. After all, Jesus said in Matthew 16:18, “I will build My church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it]” How in the world are you getting the church in the wilderness in the time of Moses, when the church didn’t start until Acts 2? People that are non-dispensational– in fact, we had a conference once with Mal Couch and it was sort of invaded by amillennialists and people that didn’t hold to our dispensational theology when I was living in the Dallas area. And these amillennialists showed up to the conference pointing to Acts 7:38. Hey, you dispensationalists teach the church started in Acts 2. But I’m seeing here the church in the wilderness in the time of Moses. And they kind of acted like, you know, game, set, match. And we were all supposed to, you know, go home and say: Boo hoo, dispensational theology is over, I guess is the reaction that they were looking for. When it says “church in the wilderness” it’s just talking about a common gathering. That’s all it’s talking about. It’s not infused with the meaning that Paul gives to the church in Ephesians 2:14. Where he has taken Jew and Gentile in one new man, the body of Christ, and broken down the dividing wall. “For he himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the dividing wall.”

The church in the wilderness here is not infused with Paul’s meaning. Paul’s understanding of the church did not start until Acts 2, the body of Christ. The only thing this is talking about is just a common gathering in the wilderness. It’s not talking about Jew and Gentile being united together in one new man called the Body of Christ. Paul calls the church a mystery. Ephesians 3:3-6, “…to be specific, that the Gentiles are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus…” That is not an Old Testament concept. That’s an Acts 2 concept that Jesus in Matthew 16:18 prophesied was coming. Ephesians 3:9, it says “…to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for a for ages has been hidden in God who created all things.” So, this Ephesians understanding of the church is foreign to the pages of the Old Testament. It’s hardly referenced in the Gospels. It doesn’t come into existence until Acts 2, and then Paul doesn’t even explain it in totality until the book of Ephesians. So just because you see the word church there, “church in the wilderness”, you have to define the word church by how it’s used in context.

Sometimes the word church just refers to a common gathering. For example, the rioters in Ephesus in Acts 19:32-39 and verse 41. These are rioters. They’re called a church. Acts 19:32 says, So then, some were shouting one thing and some another, for the [church] (ekklēsia) was in confusion and the majority did not know for what reason they had come together. This is not a church the way Paul describes it, this is just a mob scene, crowd. Acts 19:39, But if you want anything beyond this, it shall be settled in the lawful assembly (ekklēsia). Acts 19:41, After saying this he dismissed the assembly (ekklēsian). Some of your Bible translations say church. So just because you see the word church doesn’t mean the word always means the same thing every time it’s used. When Paul uses the word church, he’s talking about something very special that doesn’t exist in the pages of the Old Testament. He’s talking about people regardless of gender, regardless of whether they’re Jew or Gentile being brought together by the Lord in one new man called the Body of Christ, where there’s neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for we are all one in Christ Jesus. You will not find that Pauline concept in the Old Testament. And simply identifying the word church in Acts 7:38 doesn’t solve anything because the word church is broad enough to include Paul’s definition, and also just a common gathering– in some cases a mob scene. So how do you know which definition to apply to the word church? What’s our three rules of Bible study? Context, context, context. And this becomes a big deal because reformed theology teaches the “one people of God.” They don’t believe there’s a program for Israel and a separate program for the church. They believe we’re all one people. We’re all part of the church. In fact, the church, they believe, started with Abraham. Some believe the church started when Adam got outside the Garden of Eden and had his clothes put on. That’s when the church started. No, the church never started back then. All that leads up to God’s plan and program for Israel. The program for the church doesn’t start until Acts 2. Jesus said it was coming, Matthew 16:18. It began with the baptizing ministry of the Holy Spirit in Acts 2. Paul, in the book of Ephesians looks back to what happened in Acts 2 and explains it. That’s basic dispensational theology. You are in a dispensational church, Sugar Land Bible Church, that teaches this. So, we believe there are separate programs for Israel and the church. Reformed theology says, No, the church has already always been in existence. So, they’ll show up at your conferences and point to Acts 7:38, which talks about the church in Old Testament times, not understanding that the word church doesn’t mean the same thing everywhere it’s used. Sometimes it can refer just to a common gathering. That’s how it’s being used here in Acts 7:38.

And wrapping up here with verse 38, and then we’ll stop. “…together with the angel who was speaking to him on Mount Sinai, and who was with our fathers; and he received living oracles to pass on to you.” So, this is talking about what Moses received there at Mount Sinai when he was age 80. At age 80, God’s ready to use him, and he receives the law of God at Mount Sinai. And he mediates that law to the Jewish people. And notice again that God can reveal Himself outside the borders of Israel. Because there, you have an angelic revelation at Sinai, where Moses was given living oracles. Notice it says, “…together with the angel…” Angels mediated God’s law. Galatians 3:19 says, Why the Law then? It was added because of transgressions, having been ordained through angels by the agency of a mediator, until the seed would come to whom the promise has been made. The law was given via angels. Hebrews 2:2, For if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every transgression and disobedience received a just penalty. And here’s your third reference to an angel. The angel mediated the Mosaic law through Moses to the people of Israel. Probably one of the greatest revelations that God ever gave as the Mosaic Law. It taught the nation, the redeemed people, how to live. It didn’t redeem them. They already were redeemed. They were redeemed through the Red Sea crossing.

It’s very important to understand this. The Law was not given to redeem a people. It was given to a redeemed people. Okay, we’re redeemed, Lord. How do we interact with you? God says, I’m glad you asked. That’s commandments one through four. Okay, Lord, well, how do we interact with each other? God says, I’m glad you asked. That’s commandment six through ten. Well, Lord, how do we worship you? Well, I’m glad you asked. Here’s the revelation concerning the tabernacle. Well, Lord, what do we do when we sin as Your redeemed people? God says, I’m glad you asked. Here’s what the animal sacrificial system is about. Well, Lord, how do we interact with the nations around us? And God says, I’m glad you asked. That’s why I called you a kingdom of priests when I gave you the Mosaic Law. So, nothing in the Mosaic Law taught them how to be justified before God. What it taught them, is how a redeemed people is supposed to live. I mean, it is a fantastic revelation that God gave them. And He did the whole thing outside the borders of Israel. God doesn’t need the temple. He chooses to use it. He revealed himself at Sinai, Arabia, Egypt, with Joseph, and at the very beginning with Abraham in Mesopotamia. So, you guys didn’t think I’d finish this, did you?

Stephen’s point is: Israel, concerning Moses, got it right the second time. Israel, concerning Joseph, got it right the second time. You’re making the same mistake with Jesus.

And so next time, we’ll see how fast Israel rebelled against Moses. Because he was only gone for forty days on the mountain. And it didn’t take him long to build a golden calf. If you build a golden calf, you’re only violating the first two commandments, right? No gods before me, no graven images. And who’s leading the charge into the golden calf? The high priest who should have known better. And then Moses confronts the high priest, Aaron, and he says, I just don’t really know what happened here. We just took this metal, and we threw it into a fire and this calf just popped out. You know, it kind of reminds me of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, where they blamed everything but themselves when they were confronted. It’s the woman you gave me, Adam said. Adam, what have you done? It’s the woman you gave me. Okay, Eve, what have you done? It’s the serpent. So, Adam blamed Eve. Eve blamed the serpent. And the serpent didn’t have a leg to stand on, as we say. So, with that, we’re going to stop.