52. Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? And they have slain them which shewed before of the coming of the just One, of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers: 53. Who have received the law by the disposition of angels, and have not kept it.
Stephen was going on in his discourse, (as it should seem by the thread of it,) to shew that, as the temple, so the temple-service must come to an end, and it would be the glory of both to give way to that worship of the Father in spirit and in truth, which was to be established in the kingdom of the Messiah, stripped of the pompous ceremonies of the old law; and so he was going to apply all this which he had said, more closely to his present purpose; but he perceived they could not bear it; they could patiently hear the history of the Old Testament told; (it was a piece of learning which they themselves dealt much in ;) but if Stephen go about to tell them that their power and tyranny must come down, and that the church must be governed by a spirit of holiness and love, and heavenly-mindedness, they will not so much as give him the hearing. It is probable that he perceived this, and that they were going to silence him; and therefore he breaks off abruptly in the midst of his discourse, and by that spirit of wisdom, courage and power where with he was filled, he sharply rebuked his persecutors, and gave them their own; for if they will not admit the testimony of the gospel to them, it shall become a testimony against them.
I. They, like their fathers, were stubborn and wilful, and would not be wrought upon by the various methods God took to reclaim and reform them; they were like their fathers, inflexible both to the word of God and to his providences.
1. They were stiff-necked, (v. 51.) and would not submit their necks to the sweet and easy yoke of God's government, nor draw in it, but were like a bullock, unaccustomed to the yoke; or they would not bow their heads, no not to God himself, would not do obeisance to him, would not humble themselves before him; the stiff neck is the same with the hard heart, obstinate and contumacious, and that will not yield—the general character of the Jewish nation, Exod. 32. 9.—33. 3, 5.—34. 9. Deut 9. 6, 13.—31. 27. Ezek. 2. 4.
2. They were uncircumcised in heart and ears; their hearts and ears were not devoted and given up to God, as the body of the people were in profession by the sign of circumcision; "In name and shew you are circumcised Jews, but in heart and ears you are still uncircumcised heathens, and pay no more deference to the authority of your God than they do, Jer. 9. 26. You are under the power of unmortified lusts and corruptions, which stop your ears to the voice of God, and harden your hearts to that which is both most commanding and most affecting." They had not that circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, Col. 2. 11.
II. They, like their fathers, were not only not influenced by the methods God took to reform them, but they were enraged and incensed against them; Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost.
1. They resisted the Holy Ghost speaking to them by the prophets, whom they opposed and contradicted, hated and ridiculed; this seems especially meant here, by the following explication, Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? In persecuting and silencing them that spake by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, they resisted the Holy Ghost. Their fathers resisted the Holy Ghost in the prophets that God raised up to them, and so did they in Christ's apostles and ministers, who spake by the same Spirit, and had greater measures of his gifts than the prophets of the Old Testament had, and yet were more resisted.
2. They resisted the Holy Ghost striving with them by their own consciences, and would not comply with the convictions and dictates of them. God's Spirit strove with them as with the old world, but in vain; they resisted him, took part with their corruptions against their convictions, and rebelled against the light. There is that in our sinful hearts, that always resists the Holy Ghost, a flesh that lusts against the Spirit, and wars against his motions; but in the hearts of God's elect, when the fulness of time comes, this resistance is overcome and overpowered, and after a struggle the throne of Christ is set up in the soul, and every thought that had exalted itself against it, is brought into captivity to it, 2 Cor. 10. 4, 5. That grace therefore which effects this change, might more fitly be called victorious grace, than irresistible.
III. They, like their fathers, persecuted and slew those whom God sent unto them to call them to duty, and make them offers of mercy.
1. Their fathers had been the cruel and constant persecutors of the Old Testament prophets; (v. 57.) Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? More or less, one time or other, they had a blow at them all. With regard even to those that lived in the best reigns, when the princes did not persecute them, there was a malignant party in the nation that mocked at them and abused them, and most of them were at last, either by colour of law, or popular fury, put to death; and that which aggravated the sin of persecuting the prophets, was, that the business of the prophets they were so spiteful at, was, to shew before of the coming of the Just One; to give notice of God's kind intentions toward that people, to send the Messiah among them in the fulness of time. They that were the messengers of such glad tidings, should have been courted and caressed, and have had the preferments of the best of benefactors; but, instead of that, they had the treatment of the worst of malefactors.
2. They had been the betrayers and murderers of the Just One himself, as Peter had told them, ch. 3. 24.—5. 30. They had hired Judas to betray him, and had in a manner forced Pilate to condemn him; and therefore it is charged upon them, that they were his betrayers and murderers. Thus they were the genuine seed of those who slew them that foretold his coming, which by slaying him, they shewed they would have done if they had lived then; and thus, our Saviour had told them, they brought upon themselves the guilt of the blood of all the prophets. Which of the prophets would they have shewed any respect to, who had no regard to the Son of God himself?
IV. They, like their fathers, put contempt upon divine revelation, and would not be guided and governed by it; and this was the aggravation of their sin, that God had given, as to their fathers his law, so to them his gospel, in vain.
1. Their fathers received the law, and have not kept it, v. 53. God wrote to them the great things of his law, after he had first spoken to them; and yet they were counted by them as a strange or foreign thing, which they were no way concerned in. The law is said to be received by the disposition of angels, because angels were employed in the solemnity of giving the law; in the thunderings and lightnings, and the sound of the trumpet. It is said to be ordained by angels; (Gal. 3. 19.) God is said to come with ten thousand of his saints, to give the law; (Deut. 33. 2.) and it was a word spoken by angels, Heb. 2. 2. This put an honour both upon the law and the Lawgiver, and should increase our ve-
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